Poof! So much for civil rights

By REKHA BASU

A female supervisor at Goodyear Tire was earning 40 percent less than all 15 of her male colleagues at the same management level. She didn't know that until someone anonymously sent her a list of the other managers' salaries. By then, it had been nearly 20 years. She'd started out about equal but gotten consistently lower raises.


You might think that with nearly 20 years of provable differential treatment, the woman would walk away with a fat settlement to coast through her old age.


But the new U.S. Supreme Court has scrapped the old rules on how to calculate inequality.

The woman sued for discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. At first it was a slam dunk. A court awarded her more than $3 million; another dropped it down to $360,000.


Then a U.S. Court of Appeals tossed out the verdict, and last week, the newly constituted U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire that Lilly M. Ledbetter wasn't entitled to one dime.With that decision, the court rewrote rules on civil-rights claims that have long been understood by the federal government agency created to enforce them.


The issue isn't whether she was discriminated against, but when the discrimination occurred. The law requires charges be filed within 180 days of the occurrence. The Supreme Court said the occurrence was whenever her employers originally decided to pay her less, and that had happened more than 180 days before she sued.


What matters to the plaintiff, of course, is the amount she was cheated out of over her career, and the fact that even in retirement, her benefits will be lower because they're based on what she earned.


By declaring that the only "unlawful employment practice" was when the first disparate salary decision was made, the court ignored the cumulative effects of ongoing discrimination.


With every single paycheck, the woman's employers had the option of continuing to discriminate against her or adjusting her pay to what the men were making. They chose to continue the inequality.


That's how the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sees it, anyway. It's called the "paycheck accrual rule," and it says each differential paycheck reflects an act of discrimination.


Isn't that obvious? How can an employee be expected to file a claim for discrimination she never knew about? There's no law requiring employers to disclose that information. Why reward employers who have discriminated the longest, and kept their employees from finding out?


Only Congress can undo the damage this ruling will do, by clarifying the 180-day rule. But the case is a reminder of why we need to pay close attention to what can happen when the Supreme Court is stacked with justices who put big business interests over those of working Americans.


Every time there's been a vacancy, the candidates' views on abortion have dominated the discussion. But civil rights and gender equality also became casualties when a moderate justice like Reagan-appointee Sandra Day O'Connor was replaced with ultra-conservative Samuel Alito, who wrote this decision.

As we gear up for a presidential election, now is the time for Iowans in particular, because we have access to candidates, to grill them on what they would look for in court nominees. Ask them about Ledbetter vs. Goodyear Tire. Do it for your mother, your sister, your daughter, your wife, yourself.