ASSOCIATED PRESS
A former tire plant worker’s complaint that she was paid thousands of dollars less than men in the same job made it to the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday in a case that could affect pay discrimination claims nationwide.
The justices engaged in a lively but inconclusive debate over how to apply a 180-day deadline for complaining about discriminatory pay decisions under Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Lilly Ledbetter sued Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., saying that after 19 years at the company’s Gadsden, Ala., plant, she was making $6,000 a year less than the lowest-paid man in the same job.
She said the disparity existed for years and was primarily a result of her sex. A jury agreed, but an appeals court overturned the verdict.
Enforce the statute of limitations strictly and an employee is “condemned to perpetually unequal pay for equal work unless she recognizes and complains about the discrimination within a few short months after it first begins,” Kevin Russell, Miss Ledbetter’s lawyer, argued to the court.
Each smaller paycheck should be treated as a new act of discrimination, Mr. Russell said.
Allow employees to reach back years to claim discrimination and the deadlines mean nothing, lawyers for Goodyear and the Bush administration said.
“No one at Goodyear took Miss Ledbetter’s sex into account during the charge-filing period in deciding what to pay her,” said Glen Nager, Goodyear’s attorney.
Applying the 180-day deadline to decisions made years ago makes no sense in a situation in which the disparity grew over time, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said.
Early on, “there is no reason to think there is going to be this inequality,” she said.
But Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. was skeptical that employees should be allowed to challenge decisions made years ago. “It could be 40 years, right, that there was a discriminatory act, in one of the semiannual pay reviews I was denied … a raise that I should have gotten,” he said.
Only Justice Clarence Thomas, who rarely speaks up during court sessions, did not participate in the questioning. But he could play a pivotal role in deciding the case.
In the 1980s, Justice Thomas was chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which is responsible for investigating workplace discrimination claims.
One of the court’s most conservative justices, Justice Thomas was joined by his four liberal colleagues in a 5-4 decision in 2002 that made it easier for victims to complain about long-term job discrimination or harassment when shabby treatment is extended over a period of months or years.
In Miss Ledbetter’s case, the EEOC said her claims could go forward. She was awarded more than $3.8 million. A judge reduced the award to $360,000.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the verdict. The appeals court said she mainly was complaining about decisions made by her supervisors long ago, well after the deadline for raising charges of discrimination.
Goodyear denied discriminating against Miss Ledbetter. She received periodic raises despite being ranked near the bottom of her group of workers, the company said.
“Title VII requires allegedly aggrieved employees like Ledbetter to assert their intentional discrimination claims within the 180-day charge-filing period or lose them,” the company told the court.
A ruling is expected before July.
The Supreme Court also heard opening arguments of a case that some experts say is the most important antitrust case to reach the court in 20 years.
The case, Bell Atlantic v. Twombly, stems from the deregulation of the telecommunications industry in the 1980s and 1990.
The case is being watched by numerous companies, including airlines, credit-card issuers and trade associations representing the wireless communications and pharmaceutical industries, all of whom have submitted or signed onto friend-of-the-court briefs.
The plaintiff is represented by Milberg Weiss, known for its class-action lawsuits charging securities fraud against major corporations.
The firm filed a lawsuit in 2003 on behalf of William Twombly and all individuals in the continental United States who bought local telephone and Internet service between February 1996 and the present.
The suit says the incumbent local telephone companies, or “Baby Bells,” illegally conspired to prevent competition by excluding new local phone companies from their territories and agreeing not to compete against each other in each other’s markets.
As part of the original court-ordered breakup of AT&T in 1982, seven regional telephone companies were created to provide local service.
The 1996 Telecommunications Act allowed those “Baby Bells” to offer long-distance calling, in addition to local service, in exchange for allowing competitors access to their networks.
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