The Supreme Courtroom’s stunning overturn of a 47-year-old precedent on non secular lodging

Final week the Supreme Courtroom handed down landmark decisions on affirmative action, pupil mortgage forgiveness and LGBTQ+ rights. Whereas these circumstances rightfully acquired vital public consideration, an equally necessary case, Groff v. DeJoy, which addresses non secular lodging within the office, ended up flying beneath the radar. The dispute on this case, concerned a Sabbatarian postal employee in rural Pennsylvania who stop his job and sued his employer after being subjected to “progressive self-discipline” for refusing to work his Sunday shifts.

On this stunning unanimous resolution written by Justice Samuel Alito, the Supreme Courtroom completely ignored an nearly 50-year-old precedent, and considerably reinterpreted a significant federal statute, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, whereas pretending that it was counting on its earlier choices. It’s not stunning that the conservative justices dominated as they did as a result of some had explicitly acknowledged that they wished to overturn their prior slim resolution on non secular lodging. Nonetheless, it comes as an actual shock that each liberal Justice joined within the pretense that the courtroom was not overturning longstanding precedent.

To grasp why the courtroom’s motion is so disturbing, some background is required. Title VII requires employers to accommodate the non secular wants of staff if they’ll achieve this with out “undue hardship on the conduct of the employer’s enterprise.” In a landmark 1977 case, TWA v. Hardison, the Supreme Courtroom interpreted “undue hardship” to imply greater than a “de minimis” or minimal price. Spiritual rights activists have lengthy criticized this resolution, arguing that the courtroom interpreted undue hardship incorrectly. No matter whether or not the criticism of the “de minimis” normal is legitimate, the very fact remained that till final week this normal was the regulation. 

For nearly 50 years, decrease courts and the Equal Employment Alternative Fee relied on the de minimis normal when addressing points involving non secular lodging within the office. Even members of Congress who vehemently opposed the de minimis normal acknowledged that it was the regulation.  

Final week, nevertheless, the Supreme Courtroom inexplicably decided that the decrease courts, Congress and the EEOC have been all mistaken and that the Hardison Courtroom didn’t really imply what it stated when it decided that undue hardship means requiring an employer “to bear greater than a de minimis price.” Quite, the Groff resolution decided that as a result of the Hardison Courtroom had in different components of its opinion acknowledged employers weren’t required to offer lodging that resulted in a “substantial” price, this substantial price language was the right interpretation of undue hardship. In keeping with Justice Alito, for the final half century everybody had learn the Hardison resolution incorrectly. 

The issue with Justice Alito’s reasoning, is that, after Hardisonwas determined, the Supreme Courtroom itself handled the “de minimis” normal because the authoritative interpretation of undue hardship beneath Title VII. In Ansonia v. Philbrook, a non secular lodging case that was determined in 1986, the Supreme Courtroom majority’s opinion acknowledged that in Hardison “we decided that an lodging causes ‘undue hardship’ every time that lodging ends in “greater than a de minimis price” to the employer.” Extra just lately, in a concurrence in a 2020 case Justices Alito, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch acknowledged that Hardison “endorsed” the de minimis normal. The identical three justices, together with Justice Brett Kavanaugh had a 12 months earlier acknowledged the Hardison Courtroom had outlined undue hardship as “any lodging that imposes greater than a de minimis burden.”  

So why didn’t the courtroom simply actually acknowledge that it was overturning longstanding precedent in changing the “de minimis” normal with the brand new “substantial” burden normal? The reason being that this isn’t how American democracy is meant to work. As soon as the Supreme Courtroom interprets a statute, there’s a sturdy presumption towards reinterpreting that statute, since if Congress disagrees with the courtroom’s interpretation, it might probably — and lots of occasions has — amended the statute by a easy majority vote. In different phrases, the courtroom has the ability to interpret a statute, and Congress then has the ability to let the courtroom know if it interpreted the statute incorrectly. 

The truth is, Congress amended Title VII in response to earlier Supreme Courtroom choices it disagreed with. For instance, in an earlier case decoding Title VII, the Supreme Courtroom held that intercourse discrimination didn’t embody being pregnant discrimination. Congress disagreed with this resolution, and in response, amended the definition of “intercourse” in Title VII by passing the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 to explicitly embody being pregnant discrimination.  

The issue non secular advocates confronted was that Congress tried and was unable to go laws overturning the de minimis normal of Title VII. During the last 27 years, laws trying to overturn this normal was launched over a dozen occasions and has by no means come near passing. 

What’s surprising is that the liberal justices performed together with this charade. Maybe they joined the bulk opinion as a part of a compromise aimed toward limiting how far the conservatives would go in increasing an employer’s lodging requirement. Certainly, throughout oral arguments it was clear that the justices have been on the lookout for a compromise place. But no matter why the liberal justices joined the conservatives, the result’s a choice, the unanimity of which implicitly sends the message that it’s affordable. Consequently, little consideration has centered on the very fact the courtroom overturned a 47-year-old precedent which might dramatically impression the rights of many staff within the office.  

Debbie Kaminer regulation professor at Baruch Faculty on the Metropolis College of New York (CUNY).