Opinion ID: 489890
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Remedial Purpose

Text: 46 Although application of the second prong of the test (involving consideration of any legitimate interests of nonminority candidates) does not appear to vary in the statutory and constitutional contexts (indeed, the Supreme Court's analysis of the second prong in Johnson borrowed heavily from its constitutional jurisprudence, see id. at 1455; cf. Wygant, 106 S.Ct. at 1846, 1849-52 (plurality opinion)), the Court explicitly stated in Johnson that the Constitution imposes greater constraints on voluntary affirmative action plans than does Title VII. See 107 S.Ct. at 1449-50 n. 6, 1452. It necessarily follows, then, that the Constitution is more demanding in the application of the first prong of the test, under which a court must determine whether the employer had a sufficient factual predicate for adopting a voluntary plan. And, indeed, a comparison of Johnson and Wygant reveals that the critical distinction between the statutory and constitutional standards lies in the quantum of evidence needed to demonstrate that the plan was adopted for a remedial purpose. 47 Under Johnson, the relevant inquiry is whether there existed a  'manifest imbalance'  in  'traditionally segregated job categories.'  Id. at 1452 (quoting Weber, 443 U.S. at 197, 99 S.Ct. at 2724). Under Wygant, by contrast, the test is whether the employer had a strong basis in evidence for concluding that affirmative action was necessary to remedy the present effects of prior discrimination in the work place. 106 S.Ct. at 1848 (plurality opinion). 16 Whether the employer had the requisite strong basis is a factual determination to be made by the trial court. Id. The factual findings undergirding this determination must be respected unless clearly erroneous. See, e.g., Pullman-Standard v. Swint, 456 U.S. 273, 287, 102 S.Ct. 1781, 1789, 72 L.Ed.2d 66 (1982). 48 Unfortunately, the plurality in Wygant did not enumerate the factors that a court should consider in determining whether an employer had a strong basis for believing that remedial action was required. This is in contrast to Johnson, which explicitly instructs trial courts to focus on the existence of statistical imbalances. See 107 S.Ct. at 1452. The two decisions read together, however, do provide some useful insights into the application of the strong basis requirement. 49 The only Justice who has expressed a view on the nature of the evidence required to establish a strong basis is Justice O'Connor. Writing separately in both Johnson and Wygant, Justice O'Connor opined that the strong (or firm) basis test would be satisfied by evidence of a statistical disparity sufficient to support a prima facie claim of discrimination under Title VII. 17 See Johnson, 107 S.Ct. at 1461 (O'Connor, J., concurring in the judgment); Wygant, 106 S.Ct. at 1856 (O'Connor, J., concurring in part and concurring in the judgment). Importantly, however, the five Justices who formed the majority in Johnson --Justices Brennan, Marshall, Blackmun, Powell and Stevens--have never required as much as a prima facie case to justify efforts at voluntary affirmative action, either under Title VII or the Constitution. Indeed, not even the plurality opinion in Wygant suggests that there must be a prima facie case in order to justify voluntary affirmative action. Thus, it must be assumed that strong basis is something less than a prima facie case. 50 Even if the Court were to require a prima facie case, however, it is clear that a gross statistical disparity alone could satisfy the constitutional requirement of a remedial purpose, as articulated in Wygant. See Hazelwood School Dist. v. United States, 433 U.S. 299, 307-08, 97 S.Ct. 2736, 2741, 53 L.Ed.2d 768 (1977) (gross statistical disparities ... alone may in a proper case constitute prima facie proof of a pattern or practice of discrimination). Indeed, in her separate concurring opinion in Johnson, Justice O'Connor concluded that the glaring statistical imbalance in the agency's work force, standing alone, was sufficient to make out a prima facie case of employment discrimination against women. Accordingly, she found that the agency had adopted its plan based on sufficient evidence that remedial action was warranted. Of course, in any case, evidence of actual discriminatory practices engaged in by the public employer in the past also will be highly relevant to the determination of whether the employer had a strong basis for believing that remedial action was justified. 51 C. Application of the Law of Voluntary Affirmative Action to the Facts of the Instant Case 52 In this section, we apply the law governing voluntary affirmative action plans, as explicated by the Supreme Court in Weber, Wygant and Johnson, to the facts as found by the District Court. We conclude that the Department's Plan is clearly valid under Title VII, but that further factual findings are necessary with regard to the constitutional claims alleged in the appellants' complaints. 1. Title VII 53 Under the guidelines established by the Supreme Court in Weber, and refined by the Court in Johnson, we find that the appellants have failed in their burden to establish the invalidity of the Department's Plan. Accordingly, we affirm that portion of the District Court's judgment dismissing the appellants' Title VII claims. 54 Under the first prong of the Court's two-part test, we must inquire into whether the plan was justified by the existence of a manifest imbalance in traditionally segregated job categories. On the facts as found by the District Court, this part of the test is satisfied. As outlined earlier, the trial court, in upholding the validity of the Department's Plan, explicitly relied on unchallenged evidence in the record that, at the time of the Plan's adoption, there existed a manifest racial and sexual imbalance in the higher-level positions within the Department. Specifically, women held only 6 of 807 positions at or above the rank of Sergeant, and blacks held only 174 of these positions. When measured against the percentage of women and blacks in the area labor market, these figures plainly demonstrate a manifest imbalance in the Department's higher-level positions, justifying some effort at voluntary affirmative action. 18 Cf. Johnson, 107 S.Ct. at 1446, 1453 (while women comprised 36.4% of the area labor market, they made up only 7.1% of the agency officials and administrators, 8.6% of the professionals, 9.7% of the technicians and 22% of the service and maintenance workers; by contrast, they constituted 76% of the office and clerical workers). The figures likewise demonstrate a manifest racial and sexual imbalance in the Sergeant position, see note 12 supra, which is of comparable rank to the position of Detective Grade I. 55 The appellants vaguely suggest in their brief that there appears to be no manifest racial imbalance if the number of blacks in the Department's higher-level positions are compared with those blacks in the labor force who possess the qualifications for those positions. However, even assuming that this were the appropriate statistical data against which the Department's Plan should be judged, see note 22 infra, the appellants failed at trial to introduce any data that purports to identify those in the District of Columbia labor force who possess the requisite qualifications. Because the ultimate burden of proof in a Title VII case is on the plaintiff, see, e.g., Johnson, 107 S.Ct. at 1449; McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973), the appellants' unsupported contention must fail. 19 56 Once it has determined that the voluntary plan was adopted for a valid remedial purpose, a court must next consider whether the plan unnecessarily trammels any legitimate interests of nonminority or male employees. Here again, the Department's Plan passes muster. The Plan does not transgress any of the prohibitions on voluntary plans outlined earlier; specifically, it does not call for the displacement or layoff of nonminority or male employees; it does not totally exclude such employees from promotional opportunities; it does not authorize the promotion of unqualified blacks and women; and it does not seek to establish in perpetuity a work force whose racial or sexual composition mirrors that of the area labor force. In fact, the Plan is virtually identical to the one approved by the Court in Johnson; it simply authorizes the consideration of race or sex as one factor in choosing among qualified employees, with the long-term goal set as the achievement (rather than the maintenance) of racial and sexual balance in the work force. See Exhibit 9 to Motion of Defendants to Dismiss the Complaints or, in the Alternative, for Summary Judgment (The objective of this Plan is to direct this Department toward total equality in employment in its work force.) (emphasis added). Pursuant to the Plan, the Department afforded racial and sexual preferences to qualified applicants for promotion to the Detective Grade I position. This was well within the limits of Title VII, as articulated by the Supreme Court in Weber and Johnson. 2. The Constitution 57 Because the District Court had the benefit of Weber at the time of its decision, it made factual findings necessary to the application of Title VII. As we held in the previous section, these findings are adequate, under both Weber and Johnson, to uphold the validity of the Department's Plan under Title VII. However, the trial court did not have the benefit of Wygant when it undertook to examine the validity of the Plan. As a consequence, it did not make factual findings geared to the legal question whether the Plan is permissible under the Constitution. We must therefore remand for further findings because the Supreme Court has made it absolutely clear that the requisite findings in an employment discrimination suit are to be made by the trial court, not the court of appeals. See Lehman v. Trout, 465 U.S. 1056, 104 S.Ct. 1404, 79 L.Ed.2d 732 (1984) (mem.); Pullman-Standard, 456 U.S. at 292, 102 S.Ct. at 1792. 58 On remand, the trial court should make the critical factual determination demanded by Wygant; namely, whether the Department had a strong basis in evidence for believing that affirmative action was necessary to remedy the present effects of past discrimination within the Department. The trial court may base this factual determination on evidence already in the record, or, if necessary, it may reopen the record for the introduction of additional evidence. The court need not revisit the issue whether the Plan unnecessarily trammels any legitimate interests of nonminority and male employees, since this second prong of the constitutional test is coextensive with the second prong of the statutory test, and we have already held that the Department's Plan did not transgress any of the statutory limitations on the scope of voluntary plans. 59 Because the Supreme Court has not yet had occasion to review an application of the strong basis test, 20 we are somewhat hampered in our ability to provide legal guidance to the trial court concerning what specific factors it should consider on remand. However, this much is clear from Johnson and Wygant. Because the constitutional standard is somewhat stricter than the statutory standard, a strong basis in evidence must be something more than a manifest imbalance in traditionally segregated job categories. It would appear that this something more may be a greater quantum of statistical evidence, evidence of prior discriminatory practices, or some combination of the two. Beyond this, we leave the necessary factual determination to the trial court in the first instance. 21