Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/12pdf/11-556_11o2.pdf
Page Number: 40.0

6 

VANCE v. BALL STATE UNIV. 

GINSBURG, J., dissenting 

Under  that  guidance,  the  appropriate  question  is:  Has 
the employer given the alleged harasser authority to take 
tangible  employment  actions  or  to  control  the  conditions 
under  which  subordinates  do  their  daily  work?    If  the 
answer  to  either  inquiry  is  yes,  vicarious  liability  is  in 
order,  for  the  superior-subordinate  working  arrangement
facilitating the harassment is of the employer’s making. 

A 
Until today, our decisions have assumed that employees 
who  direct  subordinates’  daily  work  are  supervisors.    In 
Faragher,  the  city  of  Boca  Raton,  Florida,  employed  Bill 
Terry  and  David  Silverman  to  oversee  the  city’s  corps  of
ocean lifeguards.  524 U. S., at 780.  Terry and Silverman
“repeatedly  subject[ed]  Faragher  and  other  female  life-
guards  to  uninvited  and  offensive  touching,”  and  they
regularly “ma[de] lewd remarks, and [spoke] of women in
offensive terms.”  Ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted).
Terry told a job applicant that “female lifeguards had sex 
with  their  male  counterparts,”  and  then  “asked  whether 
she  would  do  the  same.”  Id.,  at  782.  Silverman  threat-
ened to assign Faragher to toilet-cleaning duties for a year 
if  she  refused  to  date  him.  Id.,  at  780.    In  words  and 
conduct,  Silverman  and  Terry  made  the  beach  a  hostile 
place for women to work.

As  Chief  of  Boca  Raton’s  Marine Safety  Division,  Terry
had  authority  to  “hire  new  lifeguards  (subject  to  the  ap-
proval  of  higher  management),  to  supervise  all  aspects  of
the lifeguards’ work assignments, to engage in counseling, 
to  deliver  oral  reprimands,  and  to  make  a  record  of  any
such  discipline.” 
Id.,  at  781.  Silverman’s  duties  as  a 
Marine Safety lieutenant included “making the lifeguards’ 
daily  assignments,  and  .  .  .  supervising  their  work  and 
fitness training.”  Ibid.  Both men “were granted virtually 
unchecked  authority  over  their  subordinates,  directly
controlling  and  supervising  all  aspects  of  Faragher’s  day-