Opinion ID: 606356
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: history of the adea provisions relating to mandatory retirement policies

Text: 6 As first enacted in 1967, the ADEA contained no provision specifically forbidding age-based mandatory retirement rules. Although such requirements could be challenged as violating the statute's general ban on age discrimination against persons under age 65, ADEA, Pub.L. No. 90-202, §§ 4(a)(1), 12, 81 Stat. 602, 603, 608, 29 U.S.C. §§ 623(a)(1), 631 (1968), most mandatory retirement programs were found to fall within a statutory exception to the ADEA that permitted age-discriminatory policies instituted under bona fide seniority system[s] or [ ] bona fide employee benefit plan[s] so long as such systems or plans were not subterfuge[s] to evade the purposes of the [ADEA]. ADEA § 4(f)(2), 29 U.S.C. § 623(f)(2) (1968). See United Air Lines v. McMann, 434 U.S. 192, 98 S.Ct. 444, 54 L.Ed.2d 402 (1977); Brennan v. Taft Broadcasting Co., 500 F.2d 212 (5th Cir.1974). 2 See also 29 C.F.R. § 1625.9(a)(1) (1992) (summarizing history of ADEA mandatory retirement provisions). The original 1967 statute excluded from coverage employees of state and local governments, ADEA § 11(b), 29 U.S.C. § 630(b) (1968), but that exception was removed by a 1974 amendment. Fair Labor Standards Amendments of 1974, Pub.L. No. 93-259, § 28(a)(2), 88 Stat. 55, 78, amending ADEA § 11(b), 29 U.S.C. § 630(b) (1976). 7 In 1978 the statute was amended so as specifically to forbid mandatory retirement before the age of 70. This new blanket prohibition covered even retirement requirements instituted pursuant to bona fide seniority systems or employee benefit plans. 1978 ADEA Amendments, Pub.L. No. 95-256, §§ 2(a), 3(a), 92 Stat. 189, 189, amending ADEA §§ 4(f)(2), 12(a), 29 U.S.C. §§ 623(f)(2), 631(a) (1982). 8 In 1983 the Supreme Court in EEOC v. Wyoming, 460 U.S. 226, 103 S.Ct. 1054, 75 L.Ed.2d 18 (1983), rejected a constitutional challenge to Congress's 1974 extension of ADEA protections to state and local public employees. The Court held that even under the then-prevailing Tenth Amendment jurisprudence of National League of Cities v. Usery, 426 U.S. 833, 96 S.Ct. 2465, 49 L.Ed.2d 245 (1976), the ADEA could still permissibly be applied to state law enforcement officers. In the wake of the Wyoming decision, the EEOC initiated an enforcement effort targeting public employee mandatory retirement laws--rules which in spite of the 1978 ADEA amendments were still common, particularly for firefighters and law enforcement officers. Reacting to this wave of legal challenges, state and local governments in 1986 prevailed on Congress to grant them a grace period during which to study the question of whether physical and mental fitness tests might safely be substituted for across-the-board mandatory retirement rules. This grace period was established under the 1986 ADEA Amendments which contain a provision specially exempting firefighters and law enforcement officers for a period of seven years from the ADEA's ban on forced retirement. This temporary exemption, which will expire pursuant to a sunset clause on December 31, 1993, 1986 ADEA Amendments, Pub.L. No. 99-592, § 3(b), 100 Stat. 3342, 3342, codified at 29 U.S.C. § 623 note (1988), provides that: 9 It shall not be unlawful for an employer which is a State, a political subdivision of a State, an agency or instrumentality of a State or a political subdivision of a State, or an interstate agency to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual because of such individual's age if such action is taken-- 10 (1) with respect to the employment of an individual as a firefighter or as a law enforcement officer and the individual has attained the age of hiring or retirement in effect under applicable State or local law on March 3, 1983, and 11 (2) pursuant to a bona fide hiring or retirement plan that is not a subterfuge to evade the purposes of this Act. 12 1986 ADEA Amendments, § 3(a), 100 Stat. at 3342, codified as ADEA § 4(i), 29 U.S.C. § 623(i) (1988), recodified as ADEA § 4(j), 29 U.S.C.A. § 623(j) (West Supp.1992). 3 13 C. LEGALITY OF THE GEORGIA STATE TROOPER RETIREMENT LAW UNDER THE 1986 ADEA FIREFIGHTER/LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICER EXEMPTION 14 In order to qualify for the § 4(j) exemption, a firefighter or law enforcement officer mandatory retirement law must satisfy two requirements. First, it must be no more restrictive than the retirement rule that the employer had in place on March 3, 1983. ADEA § 4(j)(1), 29 U.S.C. § 623(j)(1); Roche v. City of Chicago, No. 89-C-6956, 1991 WL 104134, at  2 (N.D.Ill. June 12, 1991). There is no dispute that the Georgia state trooper retirement law meets this requirement as it has not been altered since 1978. Second, the mandatory retirement law must be part of a bona fide hiring or retirement plan that is not a subterfuge to evade the purposes of [the ADEA]. ADEA § 4(j)(2), 29 U.S.C. § 623(j)(2). The district court, at the urging of appellee, found that the Georgia law is, in fact, a subterfuge to evade the purposes of the ADEA and therefore is not shielded by the § 4(j) firefighter/law enforcement officer exceptio n to the ADEA ban on mandatory retirement rules. For the reasons set forth below, we disagree with this conclusion. 15
16 To date there is only a single reported case in which a federal court has ruled on whether a challenged mandatory retirement rule should be deemed a subterfuge under § 4(j)(2). See McCann v. City of Chicago, No. 89-C-2879, 1990 WL 70415 (N.D.Ill. May 3, 1990); McCann v. City of Chicago, Nos. 89-C-2879, 90-C-0464, 1991 WL 2537 (N.D.Ill. Jan. 8, 1991). However, there exists a substantial body of case law interpreting similar language that, until 1990, appeared in another provision of the ADEA, § 4(f)(2), 29 U.S.C. § 623(f)(2) (1988). As noted in appellee's supplemental brief, the subterfuge language of § 4(j) was borrowed nearly verbatim from the former § 4(f). Where such a relationship exists between statutory provisions, courts construe the language found in the derivative provision in the same fashion as the original language. Trans World Airlines v. Thurston, 469 U.S. 111, 121, 105 S.Ct. 613, 621, 83 L.Ed.2d 523 (1985). We therefore find it appropriate to draw upon the pre-1990 § 4(f) case law in interpreting § 4(j). 17 Like the § 4(j) firefighter/law enforcement officer exception, § 4(f) exempts certain practices from the ADEA's general ban on age discrimination. Until it was modified in 1990, § 4(f) provided, in pertinent part, that: 18 It shall not be unlawful for an employer, employment agency, or labor organization 19