Supreme Court Decision Protects Employees Who Are Victims Of Retaliation

A recent United States Supreme Court case has made it easier for an employee to prevail in a retaliation claim. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits an employer from discrimination or retaliating against an individual because he or she has opposed an unlawful employment practice or because he or she has made a charge, testified, assisted or participated in an investigation, proceeding or hearing under the statute. To establish a claim of retaliation under Title VII, an employee must demonstrate that he or she engaged in protected activity, that an adverse employment action occurred and that a causal link exists between the protected activity and the adverse employment action.

On June 22, 2006, the United States Supreme Court issued a decision in Burlington Northern & Santa Fe Railway Co. v. Sheila White interpreting what constitutes an “adverse employment action” and significantly broadened the protections afforded to employees who claim retaliation. The plaintiff, Sheila White, was the only woman working in the Maintenance of Way department of a rail yard operated by Burlington Northern & Santa Fe Railway Company. After White complained about sex discrimination her supervisor transferred her from her job as a forklift operator to a different job with no change in status or pay. After she was accused of insubordination, she was suspended without pay for 37 days, but Burlington Northern later reinstated the pay.

White complained of retaliation. Burlington Northern’s defense was that she could not show an “adverse employment action” since there was no adverse effect on a term or condition of her employment (because her new job assignment was in the same classification and she was re-paid for the 37 day suspension). The USSC disagreed. Unlike a discrimination suit, the plaintiff in a retaliation suit need only show that a reasonable employee would have found the challenged action materially adverse, “which in this context means it might have dissuaded a reasonable worker from making or supporting a charge of discrimination.”

In short, in order to establish retaliation, it is not necessary to show an employer’s action resulted in economic harm. It is only necessary to show that the employer’s action would discourage a reasonable person from claiming retaliation.

THE FOREGOING IS MERELY A PARTIAL SUMMARY OF THE CASE
AND IS NOT INTENDED TO BE RELIED UPON AS A LEGAL OPINION.