Court Opinion

ID: 9439916
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 06:54:11.673818+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:26:42.870807
License: Public Domain

BOWNES, Senior Circuit Judge,
concurring.
Although I am compelled by the deference due a district court’s findings of fact to concur in the final result, I write separately because I am troubled by the analysis used in deciding the Title VII claim. The majority applauds the district court’s failure to fully analyze Smith’s claims as “prudential.” I, however, am convinced that Smith produced direct evidence of intentional discrimination and that the district court was obligated to fully analyze plaintiffs case under the framework of Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 490 U.S. 228, 109 S.Ct. 1775, 104 L.Ed.2d 268 (1989). Additionally, I think that the majority mischaraeterizes the law relevant to the causation requirement under Title VII and Morse’s position-elimination defense. Its *430opinion could erroneously be viewed as an invitation to use that defense as a cover for discrimination against women who take or plan to take maternity leave.
I. The District Court’s Analytical Process
The basic facts are undisputed. My first concern arises from the district court’s abbreviated analysis of plaintiffs claim. The Supreme Court has established two analytical frameworks that courts reviewing Title VII claims must follow. Where the evidence produced at trial is “direct,” the Price Waterhouse framework applies.13 See Fields v. Clark Univ., 966 F.2d 49, 51-52 (1st Cir.1992), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 1052, 113 S.Ct. 976, 122 L.Ed.2d 130 (1993); Cumpiano v. Banco Santander P.R., 902 F.2d 148, 152 (1st Cir.1990); Jackson v. Harvard Univ., 900 F.2d 464, 467 (1st Cir.), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 848, 111 S.Ct. 137, 112 L.Ed.2d 104 (1990).
If the evidence of discrimination is indirect or circumstantial, the burden-shifting framework of McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973), governs. See McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973); Texas Dep’t of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248, 101 S.Ct. 1089, 67 L.Ed.2d 207 (1981); St. Mary’s Honor Ctr. v. Hicks, 509 U.S. 502, 113 S.Ct. 2742, 125 L.Ed.2d 407 (1993). These basic rules have been followed, as they must, by this Circuit. See, e.g., Cumpiano, 902 F.2d at 152; Jackson, 900 F.2d at 467; Chamberlin v. 101 Realty, 915 F.2d 777, 782 n. 7. (1st Cir.1990).
Yet, the district court found that gender discrimination played no part in the decision to terminate the plaintiffs employment without determining whether there was direct evidence under Price Waterhouse or even mentioning McDonnell Douglas. See Jackson, 900 F.2d at 467 (holding that a finding of direct evidence renders the McDonnell Douglas framework inapplicable). The majority compounds this analytical omission by praising the district court for its “directness” and for having “largely bypassed any differential direct evidence/circumstantial evidence tamisage.” A district court’s decision to circumvent the analytical processes Supreme Court and circuit precedent require should be criticized, not praised.
This is particularly true where Title VII cases are concerned. The discrimination that plaintiffs like Kathy Smith face in the workplace is frequently as subtle as it is invidious. It is in recognition of this hard truth that the Supreme Court established an analytical process which district courts, in my opinion, are required to follow. See, e.g., McDonnell Douglas, 411 U.S. at 801, 93 S.Ct. at 1823-24 (“[I]n the implementation of [employment] decisions, it is abundantly clear that Title VII tolerates no ... discrimination, subtle or otherwise.”); see also Price Waterhouse, 490 U.S. at 271, 109 S.Ct. at 1802. The Court’s jurisprudence stands for the principle that the unlawfulness of the employment actions typically challenged in Title' VII eases is best exposed through a process of inquiry. See, e.g., Burdine, 450 U.S. at 255 n. 8, 101 S.Ct. at 1094 n. 8 (“In a Title VII case, the allocation of burdens and the ... prima facie case [requirement] [are] intended progressively to sharpen the inquiry into the elusive factual question of intentional discrimination.”). Because I stand by that principle, I would ordinarily suggest a remand in a case such as this.
I have come to the conclusion, however, that remand would not be meaningful in this case. This does not mean that I agree with the district court’s finding that the evidence produced by Smith was not compelling. I concur in the result because I am bound by Supreme Court and circuit precedent. And in this area, that precedent, unfairly in my opinion, imposes too heavy a burden on plaintiffs trying to prove the ultimate issue in discrimination eases: that the employer intentionally discriminated against her on the basis of a Title VII-protected trait. I believe that Smith has produced enough evidence to *431meet her initial burden under Price Waterhouse or McDonnell Douglas, but agree that it would have been plausible for a factfinder to conclude that Morse proved its position-elimination defense by a preponderance of the evidence or, alternatively, that the facts established were insufficient to show pretext. Although it did so without adhering to the process Title VII requires, the district court decided the ultimate issue in the case and, although I disagree with it, I cannot say that decision was clearly erroneous.
II. Direct Evidence Under Price Water-house
In light of my concurrence in the majority’s ultimate holding on Smith’s Title VII claim, issues pertaining to the nature of the evidence Smith produced at trial are, admittedly, moot. Nevertheless, I want to explain my belief that Smith produced direct evidence and that Price Waterhouse controls this ease. This is important for two reasons. First, the availability of direct evidence determines whether a case should be analyzed under Price Waterhouse or McDonnell Douglas. Direct evidence renders the McDonnell Douglas framework inapposite and imposes a heavier burden of proof on the employer. Fuller v. Phipps, 67 F.3d 1137, 1141 (4th Cir.1995).
Second, the determination of whether the evidence produced at trial is direct, though cast in procedural terms, affects the substantive outcome in Title VII cases. See Deborah C. Malamud, The Last Minuet: Disparate Treatment After Hicks, 93 Mich.L.Rev. 2229, 2229 (1995) (“Title VII jurisprudence cloaks substance in the ‘curious garb’ of procedure.”). This observation is of less import in Smith’s case because, at the time the events giving rise to Smith’s suit occurred, the law provided that an employer shown to have unlawfully discriminated could avoid Title VII liability by demonstrating by a preponderance of evidence that the adverse employment decision would have been the same even if discrimination had played no role. Lam v. Univ. of Hawai’i, 40 F.3d 1551, 1564-65 (9th Cir.1994). In other words, direct evidence of discrimination, without more, was not enough to impose liability on Morse. Id.
Under today’s applicable law, however, a plaintiff producing direct evidence of discrimination under Price Waterhouse may have a Title VII remedy. Id. at 1565 n. 24. The Civil Rights Act of 1991 “modified the Price Waterhouse scheme” and made “mixed-motives treatment more favorable to plaintiffs.” Fuller, 67 F.3d at 1142; see Civil Rights Act of 1991, Pub.L. 102-166, § 107, 105 Stat. 1071, 1073 (1991) (codified at 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2). Section 107 of the Act provides that Title VII is violated whenever an employer takes sex or pregnancy into account, regardless of whether other considerations independently explain the adverse employment decision. Id.; see 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(m) (“[A]n unlawful employment practice is established when the complaining party demonstrates that race, color, religion, sex, or national origin was a motivating factor for any employment practice, even though other factors also motivated the practice.”). Prevailing mixed-motives plaintiffs, at the very least, are now entitled to declaratory and injunctive relief and attorney’s fees. See Kerr-Selgas v. Am. Airlines, 69 F.3d 1205, 1210 (1st Cir.1995) (citing 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(g)(2)(B)) (where an employer in a mixed-motives case proves that it would have made the same decision, the prevailing plaintiff is entitled to attorney’s fees, and declaratory and injunctive relief, but not damages or reinstatement). Thus, what constitutes direct evidence is a critical issue for Title VII plaintiffs.
The majority makes repeated references to “smoking gun” evidence. Using this term only obscures the fact that this Circuit has yet to clearly define what constitutes direct evidence of gender discrimination. On prior occasions we have held that “[djireet evidence is evidence which, in and of itself, shows a discriminatory animus.” See, e.g., Jackson, 900 F.2d at 467. But, this reasoning is circular and does not further understanding of the term. Justice O’Connor, in her concurring opinion in Price Waterhouse, defined the term in the negative, explaining that direct evidence “exclude[s] ‘stray remarks in the workplace,’ ‘statements by non-decisionmakers’, or ‘statements by decision-makers unrelated to the decisional process *432itself.’ ” Price Waterhouse, 490 U.S. at 277, 109 S.Ct. at 1804-05 (O’Connor concurring).
I contend that the evidence Smith produced at trial was direct and, therefore, warranted full application of the Price Water-house framework. The evidence shows that Smith was pregnant, and requested and received unpaid maternity leave. After being on leave several weeks, Smith notified Morse’s general manager, Guimond, that she wanted to return to work on May 15, 1989, a week earlier than planned. Guimond approved the earlier start time and assured Smith that her job was secure. She also asked Smith whether she intended to have additional children; Smith indicated that she did.
On May 2, 1989, the day after this conversation occurred, Guimond also questioned Vendasi, Smith’s sister, about Smith’s future childbearing plans. Smith confronted Gui-mond about this behavior and the rumor that she would not be returning to work because she had decided to stay home with her child. Guimond denied any knowledge about the rumor and reiterated that Smith’s job was secure; she repeated this guarantee two days later. Despite these assurances, Gui-mond terminated Smith on May 11,1989, one week after their last conversation and four days before Smith was slated to return to work. Guimond requested permission to tell people that Smith failed to return to work because she decided to stay home to care for her child, but Smith refused to give it.
There is precedent holding that statements like those Guimond made to Smith and Ven-dasi constitute direct evidence. For example, in the Eighth Circuit, statements made by an employer can be direct evidence of discrimination, if made during a key decisional process. In Beshears v. Asbill, 930 F.2d 1348, 1354 (8th Cir.1991), the court held that an employer’s oral statement, “older employees have problems adapting to changed and new policies,” was direct evidence of age discrimination. 930 F.2d at 1354. Two years later, the court expanded its Beshears holding to include written statements. Radabaugh v. Zip Feed Mills, Inc., 997 F.2d 444, 449-50 (8th Cir.1993), held that written statements included in corporate planning documents were also direct evidence of discrimination.
Other circuits have included statements made outside of the decisional process in the definition of direct evidence. In 1994, the Seventh Circuit held that post-discharge statements made by a supervisor were direct evidence of age bias, even though they were not reflective of an express intent to discriminate. See Robinson v. PPG Indus., Inc., 23 F.3d 1159, 1165 (7th Cir.1994). Similarly, the Eleventh Circuit has held that statements made by an employer to third parties are direct evidence of discriminatory animus. In EEOC v. Beverage Canners, Inc., 897 F.2d 1067, 1070 (11th Cir.1990), the court found that racially biased statements made by a supervisor to workers in his plant were direct evidence of racial animus and a hostile environment under Title VIL
Guimond’s statements to both Smith and Vendasi fall well within the definition of direct evidence established by cases such as Beshears and Beverage Canners. Guimond was solely responsible for Morse’s personnel decisions. Her questions about Smith’s childbearing plans were neither stray nor random and evinced a concern about future pregnancy. Additionally, Guimond began asking questions about Smith’s childbearing plans during what she admits was a key decisional period. Finally, the facts show that the timing of the decision to terminate Smith was suspicious. Cf. Troupe v. May Dep’t Stores, 20 F.3d 734, 736 (7th Cir.1994); Josey v. Hollingsworth Corp., 996 F.2d 632, 639 (3d Cir.1993). Within two weeks of learning about Smith’s plans to have more children, Guimond decided to terminate Smith, even though she had repeatedly assured Smith that her job was secure.
This evidence of discrimination is direct and clear even if it does not reach the status of a smoking gun. That some inferences must be drawn from what was said and done to reach this conclusion does not make Smith’s evidence indirect. As the Seventh Circuit recognized in its 1991 decision, Visser v. Packer Eng’g Assoc., Inc., 924 F.2d 655, 659 (7th Cir.1991), “all knowledge is inferential.” Because judges are not mind-readers and cannot reach into the mind of a Title VII *433defendant, a certain amount of inference-drawing is necessary in any case, whether the evidence is direct or indirect. The ultimate issue in disparate treatment cases— whether the employer intended to discriminate — cannot be established by purely direct evidence. See Charles A. Sullivan, Accounting For Price Waterhouse: Proving Disparate Treatment Under Title VII, 56 Brook. L.Rev. 1107, 1138 (1991) (“ ‘[D]irect evidence’ of intent cannot exist, at least in the sense of evidence which, if believed, would establish the ultimate issue of intent to discriminate.”); Tyler v. Bethlehem Steel Corp., 958 F.2d 1176, 1183-84 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 826, 113 S.Ct. 82, 121 L.Ed.2d 46 (1992).
Rather than adhering to the colorful but meaningless requirement of a smoking gun, I think we should adopt a definition of direct evidence in Title VII cases which satisfies the minimum negative requirements Justice O’Connor set out in Price Waterhouse: “ex-elude[s] ‘stray remarks in the workplace,’ ‘statements by nondecisionmakers’, or ‘statements by decisionmakers unrelated to the decisional process itself.’ ” Price Waterhouse, 490 U.S. at 277, 109 S.Ct. at 1804-05 (O’Connor concurring). In accord with the Civil Rights Act of 1991, this definition preserves the mixed-motives ease as a viable option in Title VII suits. Cf. Michael A. Zubrensky, Despite The Smoke, There Is No Gun: Direct Evidence Requirements In Mixed-Motives Employment Law After Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 46 Stan.L.Rev. 959, 969 (1994). It lowers the high hurdle of “smoking gun” evidence to reasonable limits so that plaintiffs in employment discrimination cases can receive all the protections Title VII was intended to give.
Even if my definition of Price Waterhouse direct evidence is rejected, however, it is irrefutable that Smith made out a prima facie case of discrimination under McDonnell Douglas: that after being directly so asked, she expressed an intention to become pregnant in the future; that her performance at work was more than satisfactory; that she was terminated after repeated assurances that her job was “secure;” and that her duties continued to be performed by comparably qualified individuals. See Cumpiano, 902 F.2d at 153; Lipsett v. Univ. of P.R., 864 F.2d 881, 899 (1st Cir.1988).
Smith’s reiteration of these facts on appeal complied with Supreme Court and circuit precedent. Smith proved that she-was fired even though she was an excellent manager and that her duties continued to be performed by other employees. In my view, this is all McDonnell Douglas’ prima facie ease burden requires. See, e.g., Byrd v. Ronayne, 61 F.3d 1026, 1031 (1st Cir.1995) (“[T]he required prima facie showing is not especially burdensome.”) (citing Woodman v. Haemonetics Corp., 51 F.3d 1087, 1091 (1st Cir.1995)). The district court should have shifted to the McDonnell Douglas framework before finding Smith’s evidence deficient.
III. Causation Under Title VII
In addressing the question of causation in disparate treatment cases, the majority stresses that a “coincidence” between pregnancy leave and an employment decision does not prove intentional discrimination. It may not in all cases, but it arguably did in this case. The majority’s discussion of causation completely disregards this possibility. Its blanket contention that pregnancy does not give plaintiffs “total immunity” from adverse employment actions ignores the extent to which maternity leave gives employers an opportunity to discharge women who take maternity leave or who express an intention to have one or more children.
The evidence arguably shows that the position Smith held would have been eliminated even if Morse had not considered her pregnancy or intention to become pregnant in the future. It does not necessarily follow from this, however, that Smith would have been fired had Morse not considered her maternity leave or desire to have more children. In their conversations before Smith took maternity leave, Bond, Morse’s president, and Gui-mond discussed eliminating the materials manager position, but not Smith. The record shows both that Bond initially intended to retain Smith because of her excellent skills and that he admitted that Smith would still be employed at Morse had she not taken maternity leave.
*434Had Smith refused to disclose or even lied about her intention to have more children, she would probably still have a job at Morse. The facts show that Guimond was very concerned about the disruption Smith’s absence would cause and suggest that she would have taken steps to avoid such disruption in the future. The majority completely ignores the probability that Smith’s expressed desire to have more children was the motivating factor in her discharge and that her temporary absence on maternity leave gave her employer an opportunity to find a reason to discharge her. I contend that the evidence Smith produced was sufficient to establish intent and causation.
The two examples the majority gives to illustrate the need for a causal connection between pregnancy and the adverse employment action challenged in disparate treatment cases are both inapposite and unfair. Footnote 9 of the court’s opinion analogizes Smith’s dismissal during maternity leave to an employee who is discharged while on religious leave because heroin is discovered in her desk. It is true that in both cases the employee’s absence enabled the employer to make the discovery resulting in discharge. But here the analogy breaks down.
The possession of heroin is illegal; its presence in the employee’s desk was a fact that could not be refuted (although an explanation might be made). The employer did not have to make any determination as to the quality of the employee’s work or her capabilities. She had to be fired. In the case of maternity leave, however, an employer would have to make a judgment as to whether eliminating the position made good business sense. Considerations such as the employee’s prior performance and future childbearing plans would be part of the employer’s position-elimination decision. At least in part, that decision would be “because of’ pregnancy, present and future. It could not be made in the vacuum the majority’s hypothetical presupposes.
Similarly, the cases the majority cites to support its view obscure the causation issue and unfairly compare Smith to employees who are placed on probation because of poor attitudes or who are discharged because of unexcused absences. Cases such as Troupe v. May Dep’t Stores Co., 20 F.3d 734 (7th Cir.1994), Crnokrak v. Evangelical Health Systems Corp., 819 F.Supp. 737 (N.D.Ill. 1993), and Johnson v. Allyn & Bacon, Inc., 731 F.2d 64 (1st Cir.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1018, 106 S.Ct. 433, 83 L.Ed.2d 369 (1984), involved discharge, not position elimination. In Troupe, the employee’s pre-maternity leave dismissal was motivated by her tardiness and frequent absences. Cmokrak involved a plaintiff who was terminated after returning from maternity leave later than originally expected, whereas Johnson dealt with an employee who lacked supervisory skills and who was fired after being placed on probation because of a poor work attitude. The one position-elimination case the majority cites, Pearlstein v. Staten Island Univ. Hosp., 886 F.Supp. 260 (E.D.N.Y.1996), is similarly inapposite; it involved adoption, not pregnancy, and an employee who gave short notice of her need for maternity leave. And in that case, the evidence showed that the plaintiff was accidentally overpaid, that her employer was experiencing financial difficulties, and that she had received no assurances about the security of her job.
These cases do not directly address the causation issues presented here. In contrast to Pearlstein, the evidence in this case shows that Smith received repeated assurances about her job, that the raise she received before taking maternity leave was intentional, and that Smith’s termination was not due to economic hardship. Additionally, the evidence does not show that Smith was fired for a poor attitude, that she had ever been on probation, or that she lacked supervisory skills. The fact that Smith received regular promotions and that few people at the Morse plant exceeded her level of education or experience belies any suggestion that Smith’s performance and skills were below par.
Finally, Smith received permission for her maternity leave, shortened the duration of that leave, and was fired before she could return to work, not before she left. Smith’s maternity leave, thus, did not pose a problem for Morse in the same way that the Troupe employee’s unexpected illness or the Cmok-rak plaintiff’s extended leave did for their *435employers. The crux of Morse’s defense, after all, is that Smith was fired because her absence had no effect whatsoever on Morse’s operations.
My point is simple: just as pregnancy does not fully shield plaintiffs from adverse employment actions, business judgment or necessity does not totally immunize employers from Title VII’s sanctions. The majority’s discussion of causation understates this important point. I believe that, more often than not, a correlation between pregnancy and position elimination during maternity leave will exist. It is naive to think that an employer would not take an employee’s pregnancy or intention to become pregnant in the future into consideration during the process of determining whether the employee’s position should be eliminated.14
IY. The Position-Elimination Defense
The majority upholds the district court’s finding that Morse made out a position-elimination defense on two grounds: that Morse reduced its management-level staff and that Smith’s duties were shifted to employees who were already on the Morse payroll. Though I concur in the holding that Morse arguably proved the facts necessary to rebut Smith’s gender discrimination claim, I think the scope of the position-elimination defense is considerably more narrow than the majority’s interpretation of the facts suggests. That a company is able to manage in the absence of one of its key employees will not always be proof of a nondiscriminatory purpose, contrary to what the court’s opinion implies. Were that so, every woman who took maternity leave would do so at risk of losing her job.
Moreover, the conclusion that Morse reduced its management staff is not supported by the evidence. Morse did not, as the court’s exposition of the facts suggests, reduce its management team from seven to three. The majority reached this conclusion by eliminating Bond and Guimond from its final count, even though they each donned one of the two hats formerly worn by Darryl Robinson, Damar’s founder and chief officer. It also erroneously included Smith in Da-mar’s original management team, even though she did not have a management title at that time. And it failed to include the two assistant manager positions in its final count, even though the individuals holding those slots did have management titles. If the individuals excluded from the majority’s calculations are added, the size of Morse’s management team was the same at the end as it was in the beginning — seven.15
The facts demonstrate that Morse mainly reorganized its management team. It consolidated positions and eliminated titles, but did not decrease the size of its management. Because it would have been plausible for the district court to interpret this reorganization as position elimination, I concur in the court’s holding. I do not agree, however, that reorganizations of the sort Morse carried out will be enough to rebut claims of intentional discrimination in every case. For me, whether the district court was clearly erroneous in its findings on this issue was a very close call.
The court’s holding that Smith was not replaced, that her duties were merely transferred to other Morse employees, is based on our holding in LeBlanc v. Great Am. Ins. Co., 6 F.3d 836 (1st Cir.1993), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 114 S.Ct. 1398, 128 L.Ed.2d 72 (1994). LeBlanc holds that a *436position-elimination defense is not defeated by the claim that an employee was only “replaced” because “another employee [was] assigned to perform the plaintiffs duties in addition to other duties, or [because] the work [was] redistributed among other existing employees already performing related work.” 6 F.3d at 846; see also Barnes v. GenCorp., Inc., 896 F.2d 1457, 1465 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 878, 111 S.Ct. 211, 112 L.Ed.2d 171 (1990).
To the extent that Morse’s defense comports with LeBlane at all, it does so on the basis of the first prong, not the second. In analogizing Morse’s first reorganization to the reorganization which occurred after Smith’s firing, the majority opinion gives the impression that LeBlane’s second prong, the “related work” requirement, can be satisfied by demonstrating that a plaintiffs duties were simply transferred to someone working in the same company. I disagree. I contend that LeBlane’s related-work requirement cannot be met unless the employer proves that it shifted the plaintiffs duties to employees who were already performing some of the plaintiffs duties or, at least, duties that were very similar. This did not occur in this ease.
In the first reorganization, Smith was promoted to materials manager and asked to officially assume some of the duties she had already been performing because of the inadequacies of other managers. Smith at that time assumed duties which, in my opinion, constituted related work under LeBlane. In contrast, the second reorganization did not shift Smith’s responsibilities to managers who had already been performing her job. After Smith was fired, those managers took on what were essentially new duties; the majority’s own contention that Paradis and Shevenell were far more experienced than Smith and responsible for the technical aspects of Morse’s business bears this out. That they performed those duties for some period before Smith was fired was only because Smith was on maternity leave. The nonpregnancy-based explanation for their additional responsibilities did not kick in until after Smith’s firing.
If Title VH’s protections against pregnancy-based discrimination are to have any force, the relevant period of inquiry for determining whether the duties formerly performed by a plaintiff were assumed by someone already performing related work under LeBlane should not be during a maternity leave. The relevant period of inquiry must be before that leave began. Using the time period when the woman is on maternity leave creates a perverse incentive to discriminate against pregnant women by firing them when they are not at their jobs and when it will almost always be true that someone else is performing their duties. In this case, if Smith had not become pregnant and taken maternity leave, she would still be a valued Morse employee.
V. Conclusion
William James once said that an idea’s “validity is the process of its valid-ation.” Accordingly, I concur in the outcome reached in this case, but not the process employed, because I disagree with the view of pregnancy discrimination cases taken by the majority. I think it only plausible that gender was not the motivation for the adverse employment action taken against Smith, not “true.” And I agree only that position elimination can be a defense in Title VII cases, not that it will be a defense in every case. For me, the process employed in reaching a result, which includes the hypotheticals drawn and examples given, matters.

. The plurality opinion in Price Waterhouse does not itself require direct evidence of discrimination. The reference to direct evidence appears in Justice O’Connor’s concurrence in that case. See, e.g., 490 U.S. at 270-74, 109 S.Ct. at 1801-03. This court first adopted Justice O'Connor’s conclusion that direct evidence is required in mixed-motives cases in Jackson v. Harvard Univ., 900 F.2d 464 (1st Cir.1990), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 848, 111 S.Ct. 137, 112 L.Ed.2d 104 (1990).

. I am, of course, aware that the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, P.L. 103-3, 107 Stat. 6 (1993) (codified at 29 U.S.C. §§ 2601-2654) addresses a number of the concerns I raise. That Act, however, does not apply in pre-1993 cases and does not, moreover, correct the problems I perceive in the majority opinion’s analysis and posture towards Smith's discrimination claim.

. Post-acquisition of Damar, Morse's upper-level management team included the following seven people: Bond (president); Guimond (general manager); Paradis (machining); Shevenell (sheet metal); Bickford (engineering); Seeger (sales); and Smith (materials). I do not include Lane and Hickman in this number because they were fired almost immediately after Damar's acquisition, partially due to their poor performance. After Smith was fired, Morse's upper-level management team still included seven individuals: Bond (president); Guimond (general manager); Paradis (operations); Shevenell (manufacturing); Seeger (sales); Lapanne (assistant manager); and Hoffman (assistant manager).