Opinion ID: 25032
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Constitutionality of the EPA

Text: 29 The University asserts that Congress exceeded its authority when it abrogated the states' Eleventh Amendment immunity in the EPA, in light of the Supreme Court's recent opinion in Kimel v. Florida Bd. of Regents, 528 U.S. 62 (2000). Kimel held that the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA), 29 U.S.C. § 621, although containing a clear statement of Congress's intent to abrogate state immunity, was not a valid exercise of Congress's power under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment to abrogate state immunity and extend liability to the states. Kimel, 528 U.S. at 78-80. In addition, UTHSCSA argues that Congress not only unconstitutionally invoked its authority under Article I to abrogate state immunity, but it also lacked authority to abrogate state immunity under § 5 because Congress failed to find widespread constitutional violations by the states when it amended the EPA to extend liability to the states in 1974. 4 The University consequently argues that the Act fails the congruence and proportionality test outlined in City of Boerne v. Flores, 521 U.S. 507, 519-20, 117 S. Ct. 2157, 138 L. Ed. 2d 624 (1997). 30 This Court reviews de novo the question of whether a state is entitled to immunity under the Eleventh Amendment. Ussery, 150 F.3d at 434. This Court in Ussery explicitly upheld the constitutionality of the EPA under the Eleventh Amendment in a similar challenge when it stated, [b]y amending the EPA to include the States as employers, Congress sought to eliminate such discrimination by the States themselves . . . [and] it goes without saying that the substantive provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibit the States from discriminating on the basis of gender. Id. at 437. Moreover, this Court in Ussery expressly rejected the argument that the University makes regarding Congressional reliance on Article I to amend the EPA to include the states. It stated that the 1974 Amendments were a separate statute, and we must examine that statute and its legislative history to determine if Congress stated its intent to legislate under any particular constitutional provision. Id. at 436 n.2. 5 31 We find that in the wake of Kimel, the EPA nevertheless does not violate the Eleventh Amendment of the Constitution because it is congruent and proportional between the injury to be prevented or remedied and the means adopted to that end and is therefore an appropriate use of Congress's § 5 power of the Fourteenth Amendment. City of Boerne, 521 U.S. at 520. Kimel held that the ADEA was not an appropriate use of Congress's § 5 power because it was not congruent and proportional to the means employed by the Equal Protection Clause to prohibit discrimination by the states on the basis of age. Kimel, 528 U.S. at 82-86. The Court essentially found that the discriminatory conduct that is prohibited by the ADEA, as applied to the states, is disproportionate to similar conduct prohibited by the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause. Id. 32 The Kimel Court distinguished between state discrimination on the basis of age, which requires rational review under Equal Protection, and state discrimination on the basis of race or gender, which requires higher standards of review and a tighter fit between the discriminatory means and the legitimate ends they serve. Id. at 84. Importantly, other courts to consider this issue post-Kimel have been similarly swayed. 6 See Varner, 226 F.3d at 934-35; Hundertmark v. Florida Dept. of Transp., 205 F.3d 1272, 1276-77 (11th Cir. 2000); Kovacevich, 224 F.3d at 819-21; Anderson v. State Univ. of New York, 107 F. Supp. 2d 158, 165 (N.D.N.Y. 2000). 33 Moreover, although the Kimel Court discussed the lack of legislative findings regarding unconstitutional age discrimination by the states, it nonetheless stated that lack of support is not determinative of the § 5 inquiry. Kimel, 528 U.S. at 91. Other courts examining the lack of legislative findings regarding the discriminatory practices by the states on the basis of gender have found this argument unpersuasive, as the historical record clearly demonstrates that gender discrimination is a problem that is national in scope, whether or not committed in the public sector. Varner, 226 F.3d at 935-36; see also Kovacevich, 224 F.3d at 821 n.6 (stating that we are satisfied by Congress's more general finding in enacting the original EPA that wage differentials are due to outmoded beliefs about the relative value of men's and women's work . . . combined with the fact that women have been subjected to a history of purposeful unequal treatment more generally (internal citations omitted)). Thus, we hold that the EPA is constitutional under the Eleventh Amendment.