Opinion ID: 524973
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Legislative History of the ADEA

Text: 15 The Court has instructed us to turn to the legislative history as well as the textual provisions of the statute at issue to discern whether there is evidence of Congress' intent to establish an enforcement scheme that would not be preempted by arbitration. As in the case of the statutory language, we find no direct reference to arbitration and we must therefore draw inferences from Congress' actions. 16 A precursor proposal to the ADEA would have added discrimination on the basis of age to the forms of discrimination prohibited by Title VII. After the defeat of this proposal, see 110 Cong.Rec. 2599, 13,492 (1964), reprinted in EEOC, Legislative History of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act 8, 14 (1981) [hereinafter ADEA History ], the final version of Title VII enacted into law merely directed the Secretary of Labor to investigate the extent of age discrimination in employment and to make recommendations about appropriate legislative responses. See The Civil Rights Act of 1964, Pub.L. No. 88-352, Title VII, Sec. 715, 78 Stat. 265-66 (1964). Following the issuance of the Secretary of Labor's report, which documented a pervasive problem of age discrimination throughout the economy, see Report of the Secretary of Labor, The Older American Worker: Age Discrimination in Employment (1965), reprinted in ADEA History at 16-41 [hereinafter Secretary's Report], Congress again took up consideration of legislation to bar discrimination on the basis of age in employment. At this time, the debate about enforcement narrowed to the choice between patterning an enforcement scheme on that of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) or on the FLSA. 17 Despite an unsuccessful attempt in 1966 to have the proposed statute prohibiting age discrimination enforceable under the FLSA through the Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor, Senator Javits again introduced this proposal in 1967. See 113 Cong.Rec. 2199 (1967), reprinted in ADEA History at 64. Senator Yarborough introduced a competing proposal, supported by the Administration, which contained an enforcement scheme modelled after that of the NLRA, and thus would have provided for resolution of claims of age discrimination through administrative proceedings, with hearings conducted by the Department of Labor and review of the Secretary's determinations through petition to the courts of appeals. See 113 Cong.Rec. 2795 (1967), reprinted in ADEA History at 69. 18 The applicable House and Senate committees considered these alternative proposals and opted for the FLSA enforcement scheme proposed by Senator Javits. See H.R.Rep. No. 805, 90th Cong., 1st Sess. 5-6 (1967), reprinted in ADEA History at 78-79, U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1967, p. 2213; Sen.Rep. No. 723, 90th Cong., 1st Sess. 5, 13-14 (1967), reprinted in ADEA History at 109, 117-18. The bills adopting the FLSA scheme which were reported out of these committees became the basis for the ADEA, passed by both houses and signed into law later that year. Thus, Congress made a deliberate policy choice in favor of enforcement of ADEA claims in court proceedings. 19 Significantly, Congress did not borrow the enforcement scheme of Title VII, which at that time granted aggrieved individuals, but not the EEOC, authority to bring suit against private employers. See The Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title VII, Sec. 706, Pub.L. No. 88-352, 78 Stat. 259-62 (1964). 4 Instead, Congress placed primary responsibility for eliminating age discrimination in employment in the hands of the Secretary of Labor (later the EEOC) and gave the Secretary the power to ensure compliance with the ADEA by filing suit, if necessary, on behalf of the aggrieved individual. 20 In 1978, Congress amended the ADEA to reinforce further the statute's focus on public agency enforcement through the courts, adding a provision to toll the statute of limitations for filing suit for up to one year pending completion of agency efforts to effect voluntary compliance. See 29 U.S.C. Sec. 626(e)(2). The purpose of this amendment, according to the Senate committee recommending it, was to ensure that [t]he claim of discrimination ... be decided on the merits through litigation in the event the conciliation process fails and to prevent those who have violated the Act from delaying and postponing conciliation and thereby possibly avoiding liability. Sen.Rep. No. 493, 95th Cong., 1st Sess. 13 (1977), reprinted in ADEA History at 446 (emphasis added). This suggests that Congress intended that extrajudicial methods of seeking resolution of age discrimination claims should not impede ultimate resolution of those claims in a judicial forum when extrajudicial methods proved inadequate. 5