Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/524bv.pdf
Page Number: 804

524US2

Unit: $U99

[09-15-00 14:41:05] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 524 U. S. 742 (1998)

759

Opinion of the Court

gence.
§ 219(2)(b). Thus, although a supervisor’s sexual
harassment is outside the scope of employment because the
conduct was for personal motives, an employer can be liable,
nonetheless, where its own negligence is a cause of the har-
assment. An employer is negligent with respect to sexual
harassment if it knew or should have known about the con-
duct and failed to stop it. Negligence sets a minimum
standard for employer liability under Title VII; but Ellerth
seeks to invoke the more stringent standard of vicarious
liability.

Section 219(2)(d) concerns vicarious liability for intentional
torts committed by an employee when the employee uses
apparent authority (the apparent authority standard), or
when the employee “was aided in accomplishing the tort
by the existence of the agency relation” (the aided in the
agency relation standard).
Ibid. As other federal deci-
sions have done in discussing vicarious liability for supervi-
sor harassment, e. g., Henson v. Dundee, 682 F. 2d 897, 909
(CA11 1982), we begin with § 219(2)(d).

C

As a general rule, apparent authority is relevant where
the agent purports to exercise a power which he or she does
not have, as distinct from where the agent threatens to
misuse actual power. Compare Restatement § 6 (deﬁning
“power”) with § 8 (deﬁning “apparent authority”).
In the
usual case, a supervisor’s harassment involves misuse of ac-
tual power, not the false impression of its existence. Appar-
ent authority analysis therefore is inappropriate in this con-
text.
If, in the unusual case, it is alleged there is a false
impression that the actor was a supervisor, when he in fact
was not, the victim’s mistaken conclusion must be a reason-
able one. Restatement § 8, Comment c (“Apparent author-
ity exists only to the extent it is reasonable for the third
person dealing with the agent to believe that the agent is
authorized”). When a party seeks to impose vicarious liabil-