Opinion ID: 2570445
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: ada claim

Text: Courts have set forth three ways that state immunity may be relinquished: (1) where the state has consented to suit; (2) where the application of Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 52 L. Ed. 714, 28 S. Ct. 441 (1908), and its progeny is appropriate; or (3) where Congress has abrogated the state's immunity. Nelson v. Miller, 170 F.3d 641, 646 (6th Cir. 1999). Kansas has not consented to be sued on either the ADA or FMLA claims in this matter and Ex parte Young is not applicable. The United States Supreme Court in Seminole Tribe of Fla. v. Florida, 517 U.S. 44, 134 L. Ed.2d 252, 116 S. Ct. 1114 (1996), set forth a two-part test to determine whether Congress has abrogated a state's immunity when enacting legislation. First, Congress must unequivocally express its intent to abrogate the immunity, and second, Congress must act pursuant to a valid exercise of its power in abrogating the immunity. 517 U.S. at 55. Congress has unequivocally expressed its intent to abrogate the State's immunity under the ADA. 42 U.S.C. § 12202 (1994) of the ADA states: A State shall not be immune under the eleventh amendment. The first prong of the Seminole Tribe test is, therefore, satisfied. Congress acts pursuant to a valid exercise of power in abrogating the states' immunity if Congress enacts legislation pursuant to the enforcement clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Seminole Tribe, 517 U.S. at 55. Congress' power to pass legislation pursuant to the Fourteenth Amendment is very broad. Katzenbach v. Morgan, 384 U.S. 641, 651, 16 L. Ed.2d 828, 86 S. Ct. 1717 (1966). Congressional power under the Fourteenth Amendment is not unlimited, however. The Supreme Court retains the power to decree the substance of the Fourteenth Amendment's restrictions on the states, and Congress may not enlarge those rights. City of Boerne v. Flores, 521 U.S. 507, 524-25, 138 L. Ed.2d 624, 117 S. Ct. 2157 (1997). The question, therefore, becomes whether the ADA is a valid exercise of Congress' power under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, thereby abrogating Kansas' sovereign immunity even in suits brought in its own courts. The United States Supreme Court has developed a test for determining whether legislation was properly enacted pursuant to Congress' power under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment: (1) whether the statute may be regarded as an enactment to enforce the Equal Protection Clause; (2) whether it is plainly adapted to that end; and (3) whether it is not prohibited by, but is consistent with, the letter and spirit of the Constitution. Katzenbach, 384 U.S. at 651. The ADA was enacted to enforce the Equal Protection Clause. 42 U.S.C. 12101(b)(4) (1994) sets forth that the purpose of the ADA was to invoke the sweep of congressional authority, including the power to enforce the fourteenth amendment ... in order to address the major areas of discrimination faced day-to-day by people with disabilities. The first prong of the Katzenbach test is satisfied by the ADA. The ADA was also plainly adapted to enforce the Equal Protection Clause. Enforcement legislation must evidence a congruence and proportionality between the injury to be prevented or remedied and the means adapted to that end. City of Boerne, 521 U.S. at 520. The Fourteenth Amendment provides Congress authority to enact legislation if the court can perceive a basis upon which Congress might predicate a judgment that the state action constituted an invidious discrimination in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. Katzenbach, 384 U.S. at 656. The disabled are protected against discrimination by the Equal Protection Clause. Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center, Inc., 473 U.S. 432, 450, 87 L. Ed.2d 313, 105 S. Ct. 3249 (1985). Congress has found that persons with disabilities suffer at the hands of discrimination. 42 U.S.C. § 12101(a). Congress set forth that (1) some 43,000,000 Americans have one or more physical or mental disabilities, and this number is increasing as the population as a whole is growing older; (2) historically, society has tended to isolate and segregate individuals with disabilities, and, despite some improvements, such forms of discrimination against individuals with disabilities continue to be a serious and pervasive social problem; (3) discrimination against individuals with disabilities persists in such critical areas as employment, housing, public accommodations, education, transportation, communication, recreation, institutionalization, health services, voting, and access to public services; (4) unlike individuals who have experienced discrimination on the basis of race, color, sex, national origin, religion, or age, individuals who have experienced discrimination on the basis of disability have often had no legal recourse to redress such discrimination; (5) individuals with disabilities continually encounter various forms of discrimination, including outright intentional exclusion, the discriminatory effects of architectural, transportation, and communication barriers, overprotective rules and policies, failure to make modifications to existing facilities and practices, exclusionary qualification standards and criteria, segregation, and relegation to lesser services, programs, activities, benefits, jobs, or other opportunities; (6) census data, national polls, and other studies have documented that people with disabilities, as a group, occupy an inferior status in our society, and are severely disadvantaged socially, vocationally, economically, and educationally; (7) individuals with disabilities are a discrete and insular minority who have been faced with restrictions and limitations, subjected to a history of purposeful unequal treatment, and relegated to a position of political powerlessness in our society, based on the characteristics that are beyond the control of such individuals and resulting from stereotypic assumptions not truly indicative of the individual ability of such individuals to participate in, and contribute to, society. 42 U.S.C. § 12101(a). The provisions of the ADA are proportional to their remedial or preventative goal. City of Boerne, 521 U.S. at 532. In Martin v. Kansas, 190 F.3d 1120, 1128 (10th Cir. 1999), the court stated: [T]he remedial purposes of the ADA are tailored to remedying and preventing the discriminatory conduct, and are thus congruent and proportional to the injury to be prevented or remedied. The Act only prohibits discrimination against `qualified individuals,' and it requires only `reasonable accommodations' that do not impose an `undue burden' on the employer. The court in Autio v. AFSCME, Local 3139, 140 F.3d 802, 805 (8th Cir. 1998), discussed the second Katzenbach prong and stated: In passing the ADA, Congress was not attempting to make a substantive constitutional change. Rather, it was attempting to enforce a recognized Fourteenth Amendment right; equal protection. In [City of Boerne v.] Flores, the Court restated its long-held view that `[l]egislation which deters or remedies constitutional violations can fall within the sweep of Congress' enforcement power even if in the process it prohibits conduct which is not itself unconstitutional and intrudes into legislative spheres of autonomy previously reserved to the states.' Flores, 521 U.S. at 518, 117 S. Ct. at 2163 (quoting Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, 427 U.S. 445, 455, 96 S. Ct. 2666, 2671, 49 L. Ed.2d 614 (1976)).... Unlike the RFRA [Religious Freedom Restoration Act] struck down in Flores, the ADA is `plainly adapted' as a remedial measure even though each individual violation of the ADA may not in and of itself be unconstitutional. The remedies provided in the ADA are not so sweeping that they exceed the harms they are sought to redress. Because of the clear `evil' present in disability discrimination and the well-documented need for equal protection in this respect, the ADA is plainly adapted to the end of providing those with disabilities equal protection under the law. The second Katzenbach prong is satisfied by the ADA. We also hold that the ADA is consistent with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, thereby satisfying the third Katzenbach prong. Although the United States Supreme Court has not addressed this issue yet, the majority of courts that have addressed this issue have held that Congress effectively abrogated the states' Eleventh Amendment rights when it enacted the ADA. See Garrett v. University of Alabama, 193 F.3d 1214, 1218 (11th Cir. 1999) (holding that both the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act are within the scope of Congressional power and that the states' Eleventh Amendment immunity was effectively abrogated by Congress); Dare v. California, 191 F.3d 1167, 1175 (9th Cir. 1999) (holding that the ADA is a congruent and proportional exercise of Congress' enforcement powers under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment and that Congress abrogated the states' Eleventh Amendment immunity); Martin, 190 F.3d at 1129 (affirming the district court and joining the majority of courts on this issue and holding that Congress effectively abrogated the state's immunity when it enacted the ADA); Muller v. Costello, 187 F.3d 298, 311 (2nd Cir. 1999) (distinguishing the ADA from the RFRA and holding that the ADA is narrowly tailored and is a reasonable response to the problem of discrimination against people with disabilities); Amos v. Maryland Dept. of Public Safety, 178 F.3d 212, 222-23 (4th Cir. 1999) (holding that Congress properly enacted the ADA within its Constitutional powers pursuant to § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment); Nelson v. Miller, 170 F.3d at 648 (holding that [i]t is clear from the language of the ADA that Congress abrogated the states' rights under the Eleventh Amendment and that states cannot claim immunity in defending ADA claims from private citizens in federal court); Autio, 140 F.3d at 806 (finding that enforcement of the ADA is well within the spirit and letter of the Constitution and that the ADA is a proper exercise of Congress' enforcement power under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, thereby abrogating states' immunity rights under the Eleventh Amendment); Kimel v. State of Fla. Bd. of Regents, 139 F.3d 1426, 1433 (11th Cir. 1998) (siding with the majority of courts which have addressed this issue and holding that the ADA is a valid abrogation of the states' Eleventh Amendment immunity); Coolbaugh v. State of La., 136 F.3d 430, 438 (5th Cir. 1998) (holding that the ADA is a proper exercise of Congress' § 5 enforcement power under the Fourteenth Amendment, thereby depriving Louisiana of an immunity defense pursuant to the Eleventh Amendment); Clark v. State of California, 123 F.3d 1267, 1270 (9th Cir. 1997) (affirming the district court and holding that both the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act were validly enacted under the Fourteenth Amendment); Crawford v. Indiana Dept. of Corrections, 115 F.3d 481, 487 (7th Cir. 1997) (the ADA is similar to the Age Discrimination and Employment Act, Congress was well within its powers under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment in addressing the issue of disability discrimination, and states cannot use the Eleventh Amendment to claim immunity from suits brought pursuant to the ADA); Jones v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, (2000 WL 15073) (E.D. Pa. 2000) (holding that the Eleventh Amendment offers no protection to states from the ADA and noting that a strong majority has held likewise); Johnson v. State Technology Center at Memphis, 24 F. Supp.2d 833, 842 (W.D. Tenn. 1998) (noting that the great weight of authority has rejected states' claims of immunity under the Eleventh Amendment when facing an ADA claim brought by a private citizen in federal court); Thrope v. State of Ohio, 19 F. Supp.2d 816, 821-22 (S.D. Ohio 1998) (noting that the clear majority of courts have held that the ADA is a proper exercise of congressional power and holding that Ohio could not claim immunity pursuant to the Eleventh Amendment from a claim brought in a class action lawsuit); Lamb v. John Umstead Hosp., 19 F. Supp.2d 498, 510 (E.D. N.C. 1998) (holding that the ADA falls within Congress' power to adopt legislation pursuant to § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment and that the ADA is an effective abrogation of the states' immunity to suit under the Eleventh Amendment); Meekison v. Voinovich, 17 F. Supp.2d 725, 730 (S.D. Ohio 1998) (holding that Congress effectively abrogated the states' immunity under the Eleventh Amendment); Anderson v. Department of Public Welfare, 1 F. Supp.2d 456, 468 (E.D. Pa. 1998) (holding that the ADA is a congruent and proportional response to unconstitutional discrimination against disabled individuals, thereby preventing Pennsylvania from using the Eleventh Amendment immunity as a defense to ADA claims made by private citizens in federal court); Williams v. Ohio Dept. of Mental Health, 960 F. Supp. 1276, 1282-83 (S.D. Ohio 1997) (noting that a number of other courts have found that Congress abrogated the states' Eleventh Amendment immunity when it enacted the ADA and holding likewise); Mayer v. University of Minnesota, 940 F. Supp. 1474, 1480 (D. Minn. 1996) (holding that both the Rehabilitation Act and the ADA were valid exercises of congressional power and that the University could not assert Eleventh Amendment immunity); and Martin v. Voinovich, 840 F. Supp. 1175, 1187 (S.D. Ohio 1993) (noting with very little analysis that Congress unequivocally expressed its desire to abrogate states' Eleventh Amendment immunity, and holding that the plaintiff could proceed with his ADA claim against the state). The United States Supreme Court has granted certiorari in Garrett v. University of Alabama, 193 F.3d 1214, solely on the issue of whether Congress effectively abrogated the states' immunity when it enacted the ADA. A minority of courts have held that Congress failed to abrogate the states' immunity when it enacted the ADA. See Erickson, 207 F.3d at 951 (holding that the ADA is not prophylactic legislation and that the Eleventh Amendment provides Illinois protection from suits brought in federal courts); DeBose v. Nebraska, 186 F.3d 1087, 1088 (8th Cir. 1999) (holding that Congress did not abrogate the states' immunity when enacting the ADA); Alsbrook v. City of Maumelle, 184 F.3d 999, 1009-10 (8th Cir. 1999) (finding that the congressional record of the ADA fails to support the proposition that most state programs and services discriminate arbitrarily against the disabled and, therefore, holding that Congress did not validly abrogate Arkansas' Eleventh Amendment immunity from private suit in federal court; Brown v. North Carolina Division of Motor Vehicles, 166 F.3d 698, 708 (4th Cir. 1999) (finding that Congress went beyond a mere remedy of violations of constitutional rights and attempted to define the substance of those rights and holding that Congress did not abrogate the states' Eleventh Amendment immunity); Hedgepeth v. Tennessee, 33 F. Supp.2d 668, 675 (W.D. Tenn. 1998) (agreeing with the minority of courts and holding that the ADA gives the disabled a preferential right to treatment where no such right exists under the Equal Protection Clause and holding that Congress did not effectively abrogate the states' immunity when it enacted the ADA); and Nihiser v. Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, 979 F. Supp. 1168, 1175 (S.D. Ohio 1997) (holding that the ADA did not meet the second prong of the Katzenbach test as there is no congruence and proportionality between the injury to be prevented and the remedies contained within the ADA, thereby allowing the Ohio EPA to claim immunity under the Eleventh Amendment). Having noted earlier that the United States Supreme Court has this issue before it at the present time and in all likelihood will file a decision which will control this issue in the next 12 to 14 months, we are in somewhat of a quandary. Recent trends would lead us to believe the Supreme Court will hold the ADA is a congruent and proportional exercise of Congress' enforcement powers under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, thereby abrogating Kansas' sovereign immunity. We need not try to predict what the Supreme Court will hold, however, because the trial court held and substantial competitive evidence supports the finding that Schall is not a qualified individual as that term is used in the ADA (42 U.S.C. 12101 [1994] et seq.) because Schall could not perform the tasks assigned to the clinical supervisor. To establish a prima facie case under the ADA, a plaintiff must demonstrate: (1) that he or she is a disabled person within the meaning of the ADA, (2) that he or she is qualified, that is, able to perform the essential functions of the job, with or without reasonable accommodations; and (3) that the employer terminated the plaintiff under circumstances which give rise to an inference that the termination was based on his or her disability. Morgan v. Hilti, Inc., 108 F.3d 1319, 1323 (10th Cir. 1997); Lowe v. Angelo's Italian Foods, Inc., 87 F.3d 1170, 1173 (10th Cir. 1996); White v. York Intern. Corp., 45 F.3d 357, 360-61 (10th Cir. 1995). Only the first two elements are at issue in this case. The worker has the burden to prove that he or she has a disability and that he or she is a qualified individual under the Act. Monette v. Electronic Data Systems Corp., 90 F.3d 1173, 1184 (6th Cir. 1996); Tenbrink v. Federal Home Loan Bank, 920 F. Supp. 1156, 1161 (D. Kan. 1996); Dutton v. Johnson County Bd. of County Comm'rs, 859 F. Supp. 498, 504 (D. Kan. 1994). This issue concerns both questions of law and questions of fact. We will review a district court's finding of fact with great deference. A thorough review of the record indicates that Schall was unable to travel in his car for any lengthy period of time and that he often could not come to work because of his pain and because of the medication that he was taking to combat the pain. 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(g)(1) (1999) defines disability as a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more of the major life activities of such individual. Substantially limited means either the inability to perform a major life activity, or a severe restriction on the ability to perform a major life activity as compared to the general population. Dutton, 859 F. Supp. at 505 (citing 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2[j][i]). Schall argues that he is limited in the major life activity of work. Work is considered a major life activity under the ADA. 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(i). See also Colwell v. Suffolk County Police Dept., 158 F.3d 635, 642 (2d Cir. 1998) (major life activity under the Rehabilitation Act [the model for the ADA] includes work). Schall has been substantially limited in the major life activity of work. Schall is disabled as is defined under the ADA. The district court dismissed the ADA claim because Schall is a not a qualified individual as is defined under the ADA. 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(m) states that a qualified individual with a disability means an individual with a disability who satisfies the requisite skills, experience, education and other job-related requirements of the employment position such individual holds or desires, and who, with or without reasonable accommodation, can perform the essential functions of such position. The federal courts have adopted a two-step inquiry to analyze whether a plaintiff is qualified under the ADA: `First, we must determine whether the individual could perform the essential functions of the job, i.e., functions that bear more than a marginal relationship to the job at issue. Second, if (but only if) we conclude that the individual is not able to perform the essential functions of the job, we must determine whether any reasonable accommodation by the employer would enable him to perform those functions.' (Emphasis added.) Milton v. Scrivner, Inc., 53 F.3d 1118, 1123 (10th Cir. 1995) (quoting White, 45 F.3d at 360-61). The term essential functions is defined as the fundamental job duties of the employment position the individual with a disability holds or desires. 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(n)(1). Whether a particular function is essential is a factual inquiry. 29 C.F.R. Pt. 1630, App. § 1630.2(n). The ADA provides that in making this inquiry, consideration shall be given to the employer's judgment as to what functions of a job are essential. 42 U.S.C. § 12111(8) (1994). Equal Employment Opportunity Commission regulations promulgated under the ADA provide: (2) A job function may be considered essential for any of several reasons, including but not limited to the following: (i) The function may be essential because the reason the position exists is to perform that function; (ii) The function may be essential because of the limited number of employees available among whom the performance of that job function can be distributed; and/or (iii) The function may be highly specialized so that the incumbent in the position is hired for his or her expertise or ability to perform the particular function. 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(n). In the present case, Schall did not work more than a handful of days from the date of his surgery on October 16, 1996, until February 11, 1997. Several doctors were of the opinion that Schall could not work at all. On January 16, 1997, Drs. DuMont Schmidt and David Sollo concluded that Schall was unable to perform the work required of him by his job and that Schall could not drive as required by his job. Schall suffered from chronic pain and was taking strong medication to combat the pain. Schall could not make site visits to supervise the physicians assistant students and their preceptors. Schall has admitted that he cannot drive for more than 30 minutes at a time. An essential part of Schall's job was to visit the students on site and counsel them on their clinical rotations. WSU has students all over the state of Kansas, many in rural areas. Prior to his surgery, Schall would spend days on the road visiting sites and many times spend the night in motels. He was unable to do this after his surgery. Travel was a fundamental part of Schall's job. Because he was unable to travel to the sites to visit with the students, the trial court did not err in holding that Schall could not perform the essential function of his clinical supervisor job. The first part of the qualified individual test, as described in Milton, has not been satisfied by Schall. Pursuant to Milton, we must determine whether Schall could have performed the essential parts of his job with reasonable accommodation. On February 10, 1997, Schall proposed that he be allowed to work part time. Schall argues that he should have been given part-time work and that part-time work is an example of reasonable accommodation citing 42 U.S.C. § 12111(9) and 29 C.F.R. § 1630.2(o)(2)(ii). A worker bears the burden to prove that he could perform the essential functions of the job with reasonable accommodation. Tyndall v. National Educ. Centers, 31 F.3d 209, 213 (4th Cir. 1994); Lucero v. Hart, 915 F.2d 1367, 1371 (9th Cir. 1990). Employers, however, do not have to give an employee a reasonable accommodation that would cause an undue hardship. 42 U.S.C. § 12112(b)(5)(A) (1994); Den Hartog v. Wasatch Academy, 129 F.3d 1076, 1087 (10th Cir. 1997). The employer... bears the burden of persuasion on whether a proposed accommodation would impose an undue hardship. Smith v. Ameritech, 129 F.3d 857, 866 (6th Cir. 1997). The factors to be considered in determining whether an accommodation would cause an employer undue hardship are, among others: the nature and cost of the accommodation; the number of persons employed by the company; the financial resources of the company; and the impact of the accommodation upon the operation of the company. 42 U.S.C. § 12111(10)(B). The ADA does not require an employer to create a new position or even modify an essential function of an existing position in order to accommodate a disabled worker. Smith v. Midland Brake, Inc., 180 F.3d 1154, 1169-70 (10th Cir. 1999). An employer is not required to reallocate job duties to change the essential functions of a job. 29 C.F.R. Pt. 1630, App. § 1630.2(o). An accommodation which results in other employees having to work longer hours or to work harder in the same time is not required. Barnard v. ADM Milling Co., Inc., 987 F. Supp. 1337, 1343 (D. Kan. 1997). Schall's co-workers wrote a letter to Lary, stating: If the Clinical Supervisor is allowed to return to work on a part-time basis, we cannot see that anything will change. There are several urgent and ongoing matters that need constant attention including site visits, student evaluation and counseling, rotation scheduling, preceptor visits, senior handbook publication, preceptor manual publication, affiliation agreements, and other student matters that may arise. Obviously, these tasks cannot be managed by someone who is here infrequently. Other WSU faculty members attempted to cover the on campus clinical supervisor tasks, but they were unable to make the site visits that were an essential part of Schall's job. The faculty informed Lary that they were not able to cover for Schall. The faculty also stated that their own jobs would suffer unless the clinical supervisor position was filled with a person who could perform the job. The faculty believed that the student's education was at risk because the students were not being properly trained. The record establishes that the other faculty members were not able to perform their own jobs and the traveling portion of Schall's job as well. There is no reasonable accommodation that would have allowed Schall to perform the essential functions of his job. Schall is not able to satisfy the second element of the qualified individual test as described in Milton and is not a qualified individual within the meaning of the ADA. Schall also argues that whether a plaintiff is able to perform the essential functions of a job is a factual inquiry and, therefore, summary judgment is inappropriate. There may be cases where the facts are at issue, therefore precluding summary judgment, but this case is not one of them. It is not disputed that Schall could not travel as a result of his chronic pain. It is not disputed that it would not have been reasonable to have other faculty members fill in for Schall's travel schedule without placing an undue hardship on the faculty and WSU. This argument is without merit.