Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-alnd-1_05-cv-00457/USCOURTS-alnd-1_05-cv-00457-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
AFGE, Local 1945, American Federation of Government Employees
Defendant
Angie Rogers
Plaintiff

Document Text:

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA

EASTERN DIVISION

ANGIE ROGERS, ]

]

Plaintiff, ]

]

v. ] CASE NO.: CV-05-HS-457-E

]

AFGE, LOCAL 1945, AMERICAN ]

FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT ]

EMPLOYEES, ]

]

Defendant. ]

Memorandum of Opinion

I. INTRODUCTION

This is a civil action filed on March 2, 2005, by the Plaintiff, Angie Rogers,

against the Defendant AFGE, Local 1945, American Federation of Government

Employees. Complaint, at 1. The Complaint characterizes the action as “an

employment discrimination suit authorized and instituted pursuant to Title VII of the

Act of Congress known as the ‘Civil Rights Act of 1964,’ as amended, 42 U.S.C. §

2000e et seq.” Id. The Complaint alleges three Counts against the Defendant

including sex discrimination (Count One), retaliation (Count Two), and hostile work

environment (Count Three). Id. at 3-4. All Counts are brought pursuant to Title VII.

Id. Plaintiff sues the Defendant as an “employer”, as that term is defined in Title VII.

 This case is presently before the Court on the Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss

FILED

 2005 May-17 PM 04:37

U.S. DISTRICT COURT

N.D. OF ALABAMA

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pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1) and (6). (Doc. 8). For the reasons stated herein,

the motion will be GRANTED. 

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW FOR MOTION TO DISMISS

We accept the facts of the complaint as true and view them in the light

most favorable to the nonmoving party. Id. Dismissal pursuant to Rule

12(b)(6) is not appropriate "unless it appears beyond doubt that the

plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would

entitle him to relief." Magluta v. Samples, 256 F.3d at 1283-84 (quoting

Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80

(1957)).

Magluta v. Samples, 375 F.3d 1269, 1273 (11 Cir. 2004). th

A district court may only exercise jurisdiction over a Defendant in a Title VII

case, if the defendant is an employer as defined by 42 U.S.C. 2000e. See EEOC v.

Arabian Oil Co., 499 U.S. 244, 248 (1991) (describing the term “employer” as used

in Title VII as “jurisdictional”). 

Whether the [Defendant is] an "employer" within the definition of Title

VII is a threshold jurisdictional issue. Virgo v. Riviera Beach Associates,

Ltd., 30 F.3d 1350, 1359 (11th Cir.1994). Unless the [Defendant is] an

employer "who has 15 or more employees for each working day in each

of 20 or more calendar weeks in the current or preceding calendar year,"

Title VII is inapplicable, and the district court lacks subject matter

jurisdiction over [the] claims. 

Scarfo v. Ginsberg, 175 F.3d 957, 961 (11 Cir. 1999). th

Because at issue in a factual 12(b)(1) motion is the trial court's

jurisdiction--it's very power to hear the case--there is substantial

authority that the trial court is free to weigh the evidence and satisfy

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itself as to the existence of its power to hear the case. In short, no

presumptive truthfulness attaches to plaintiff's allegations, and the

existence of disputed material facts will not preclude the trial court from

evaluating for itself the merits of jurisdictional claims. Lawrence, 919

F.2d at 1529 (quoting Williamson v. Tucker, 645 F.2d 404, 412-13 (5th

Cir.1981)).

Scarfo, 175 F.3d at 960 -961.

III. ANALYSIS

Title VII provides:

(b) The term "employer" means a person engaged in an industry

affecting commerce who has fifteen or more employees for each

working day in each of twenty or more calendar weeks in the current or

preceding calendar year, and any agent of such a person.

42 U.S.C.A. § 2000e. The undisputed Declaration of Everett Kelley provides that the

Defendant has had only one employee, a secretary, for the last 15 years. Declaration

of Kelley, at 1. The Plaintiff does not contest this assertion, but instead alleges that

“the defendant ignores the multitude of cases holding that jurisdiction does in fact

exist under 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(c)(1) and (3) in this very circumstance if the Union

has fifteen or more members.” Plaintiff’s Response to Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss

(hereinafter “Plaintiff’s Brief”), at 1 (emphasis added). 

42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(c)(1) and (3) provide:

(c) Labor organization practices

It shall be an unlawful employment practice for a labor organization--

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(1) to exclude or to expel from its membership, or otherwise to

discriminate against, any individual because of his race, color, religion,

sex, or national origin;

[or]

(3) to cause or attempt to cause an employer to discriminate against an

individual in violation of this section.

42 U.S.C.A. § 2000e-2(c)(1), (3).

The Plaintiff has confused the sections under which a union is sued as an

“employer”, and those under which it is sued as a “labor union”. The above cited

sections of Title VII were not meant to create an exception so that labor unions, in the

context of employing individuals, could be sued even thought they have less than 15

employees. 

The Second Circuit has addressed this very issue in Yerdon v. Henry, 91 F.3d

370, 377 (2d Cir. 1996). There, the Court wrote:

The EEOC, as amicus curiae, takes the view that a labor union is

covered by Title VII when acting in its capacity as an employer even if

it does not meet the definition of "employer" under Title VII. The

EEOC grounds this view in the broad language of § 703(c)(1)'s

prohibition against sex discrimination: "[I]t shall be an unlawful

employment practice for a labor organization ... to exclude or to expel

from its membership, or otherwise discriminate against, any individual

because of ... [her] sex." 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(c)(1). Such an

interpretation, the EEOC argues, is not inconsistent with the

congressional policy that animated the statutory exclusion of small

employers from the definition of "employer," i.e., allowing small familyrun businesses to be operated by friends and relatives of the owners

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without the administrative burdens of complying with Title VII. See S.

2515, 92d Cong., 2d Sess., 118 Cong. Rec. 2386-90, 2409-10 (1972).

The EEOC maintains that because labor organizations are already

subject to a wide array of regulatory and reporting requirements,

subjecting them to liability under §703(c)(1) would not be inconsistent

with the intention of Congress.

* * *

We conclude that, in the present case, the EEOC's interpretation of §

703(c)(1) should be given little weight. At the outset, we find the

language of the statute to be unambiguous in the context of the statute

in its entirety. Accordingly, deference is not warranted. Cf. EEOC v.

Commercial Office Prods. Co., 486 U.S. 107, 115, 108 S.Ct. 1666, 1671,

100 L.Ed.2d 96 (1988) ("EEOC's interpretation of ambiguous language

need only be reasonable to be entitled to deference."). Moreover, to hold

otherwise would contravene the plain language of the statute. See EEOC

v. Arabian Am. Oil, Co., 499 U.S. 244, 257-258, 111 S.Ct. 1227, 1235-

36, 113 L.Ed.2d 274 (1991) (applying Gilbert standard, the Court held

that particular EEOC interpretation should not be given deference in part

because it contradicted statute's plain language). Because "the meaning

of statutory language, plain or not, depends on context," King v. St.

Vincent's Hosp., 502 U.S. 215, 221, 112 S.Ct. 570, 116 L.Ed.2d 578

(1991), the interpretation of a statute requires consideration of the

language of the relevant provision in conjunction with the entire statute,

see Stafford v. Briggs, 444 U.S. 527, 535, 100 S.Ct. 774, 780, 63

L.Ed.2d 1 (1980) (citing Brown v. Duchesne, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 183,

194, 15 L.Ed. 595 (1856)). Where an examination of the statute as a

whole demonstrates that a party's interpretation would lead to "absurd

or futile results ... plainly at variance with the policy of the legislation

as a whole," that interpretation should be rejected. Commercial Office

Prods., 486 U.S. at 120, 108 S.Ct. at 1674 (internal quotations omitted).

We believe Yerdon's interpretation to be inconsistent with the statute as

a whole. As the primary liability provision of Title VII, §703

distinguishes among three primary participants in the employment

process-- "employers," "employment agencies," and "labor

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organizations," in subsections (a), (b), and (c), respectively. That the

assignment of liability is a function of the role of the particular

participant at issue undermines the strength of Yerdon's interpretation.

Furthermore, nothing in the statute's text or legislative history gives any

indication that the definition of employer contained in § 701(b) does not

apply to a labor organization when it is sued as a result of its conduct as

an employer. Indeed, that the definition of "employer" specifically

includes labor organizations, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e(b), suggests that labor

unions are to be treated no differently than other employers. If §

703(c)(1) were read to extend to a labor organization's activities as an

employer, the result would be incongruous with congressional intent: an

employer with fewer than fifteen employees that, fortuitously, is also a

labor union, would be liable notwithstanding that it is excluded from the

statutory definition of "employer." This result cannot be squared with

the structure of § 703 as a whole, and we find that § 703(c)'s mandate

that a labor organization may not "otherwise discriminate" applies only

to a labor union in its role as a labor union and not as an employer.

We join the company of our sister circuits who have addressed this issue

in comparable contexts. In an analogous case in the Ninth Circuit, an

employee brought suit against her former union employer for age

discrimination under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act

("ADEA"). Herman v. United Bhd. of Carpenters, 60 F.3d 1375 (9th

Cir.1995). The employee and the EEOC argued that the union was liable

under § 4(c)(1) of the ADEA, which makes it unlawful for a union "to

exclude or to expel from its membership, or otherwise to discriminate

against, any individual because of his age." 29 U.S.C. § 623(c)(1). The

Ninth Circuit held that, despite theEEOC's view, "when a union is being

sued, in its capacity as an employer, it must meet the statutory definition

of 'employer' rather than some other statutory provision." Herman, 60

F.3d at 1384-85;see also Childs v. Local 18, Int'l Bhd. of Elec. Workers,

719 F.2d 1379, 1382-83 (9th Cir.1983) (assuming that labor

organization must meet statutory definition of employer to be held liable

for discrimination against employee under Title VII).

Similarly, in Greenlees v. Eidenmuller Enters., Inc., 32 F.3d 197 (5th

Cir.1994), a former employee of an employment agency brought a suit

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against the agency under § 703(b), 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(b), claiming that

it was an "employment agency." The Fifth Circuit rejected the EEOC's

position on the grounds that the language of the statute was

unambiguous, obviating the necessity for deference to the EEOC's

interpretation, and that, in any event, the EEOC is due less deference

than other agencies. Id. at 200; see also Chavero v. Local 241, 787 F.2d

1154, 1155 n. 1 (7th Cir.1986) (per curiam) (where "plaintiff attempts

to hold the union liable in its employer capacity, it must fall under that

definition ... just as any other employer").

Because we agree that a labor organization with fewer than fifteen

employees cannot be sued as an employer for discrimination under Title

VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, we affirm the grant of summary

judgment in favor of the defendants on Yerdon's claim under §

703(c)(1).

Yerdon v. Henry, 91 F.3d 370, 375-377 (2d Cir. 1996). 

In the absence of Eleventh Circuit precedent on point, the Court finds the

reasoning of the Yerdon opinion persuasive, and follows its holding. The Defendant

in this case does not fall within the definition of an “employer” under Title VII.

IV. CONCLUSION

For the above stated reasons the Motion to Dismiss will be GRANTED.

DONE this 17 day of May, 2005. th

 

 VIRGINIA EMERSON HOPKINS

United States District Judge

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