Supreme Court Hears Environmental, Employment Discrimination Cases

Thursday October 9, 3:02 am ET
Tony Mauro, Legal Times

The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard arguments in what may be its top environmental and employment discrimination cases of the term, and from the tenor of the debates, the verdict seems to be: whales, dolphins and employers will lose....

[I]n the employment case, Crawford v. Nashville and Davidson County, lawyers for a Nashville, Tenn., school employee and for the Bush administration appeared to persuade the Court that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act protects employees from retaliation even when they complain about sexual harassment during an internal investigation -- before any formal charges are made....

In the employment case, the Court has in recent years been favorable to claims by those who suffer retaliation for complaining about Title VII workplace discrimination in the context of Equal Employment Opportunity Commission investigations. But the case before the Court involves the firing of someone who complained about sexual harassment during an internal investigation before any EEOC charges were filed -- a not uncommon scenario.

Vicky Crawford, the Nashville school employee in the case, complained about a supervisor's lewd behavior in an interview with a human resources department official, but made no formal charges and was later fired. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that she was not protected from retaliation because her complaints did not amount to the kind of "active opposition" to school policies that Title VII requires.

University of Washington School of Law professor Eric Schnapper, a veteran advocate for employees in civil rights cases, argued strenuously that the law covers Crawford's situation because in making her complaints, she was actively objecting to her employers' conduct....

Noting that Crawford had told her harasser to "get the hell out of my office," [Justice] Stevens said, "That's an active opposition, it seems."

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