Labor & Employment Law

The EEOC's Hard Times Continue

You may have read some of our posts (here for example) about the EEOC’s recent losses and/or dressing downs by the courts. Well, the hits keep on coming, and now it is the U.S. Supreme Court chastising the EEOC for the way it conducts business. 

Ross Runkel at the Employment Law Blog notes that while the issue in front of the Supreme Court in Federal Express v. Holowecki was a simple one, the oral arguments “turned into a judicial pile-on, seeing which Justice could be the most critical of the way the EEOC does business.”

Ross further commented:

I'll give the award to Justice Scalia. When the government's lawyer stood up to talk, the lawyer didn't get past his formal introduction before Justice Scalia jumped on him.

"JUSTICE SCALIA: Mr. Heytens, let me tell you going in that my -- my main concern in this case, however the decision comes out, is to do something that will require the EEOC to get its act in order, because this is nonsense: These regulations that are contradicted by forms; this failure to give notice, but it's okay because it's a charge anyway.

"This whole situation can be traceable back to the agency, and I -- whoever ends up bearing the burden of it, it's the agency's fault, and this scheme has to be revised."

Hopefully the U.S. Supreme Court’s comments knock some sense back into the agency – but we are not holding our breaths.

Full post as published by California Labor & Employment Defense Blog on November 07, 2007 (boomark / email).