McLaughlin v. Callaway

382 F. Supp. 885, 10 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 135
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. Alabama
DecidedSeptember 30, 1974
DocketCiv. A. 74-123-P
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 382 F. Supp. 885 (McLaughlin v. Callaway) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
McLaughlin v. Callaway, 382 F. Supp. 885, 10 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 135 (S.D. Ala. 1974).

Opinion

ORDER

PITTMAN, Chief Judge.

This case presents important questions concerning the effect of the 1972 Amendment to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. Plaintiff is an employee of the General Services Administration, doing custodial work in the offices of the Corps of Engineers in Mobile, Alabama. He alleges he was denied employment by the Corps of Engineers because of his race, Negro. He brings suit pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-16, 42 U.S.C. § 1981, 28 U.S.C. § 1361, 28 U.S.C. § 1346(a) (2), and the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. Plaintiff contends that the Mobile District of the Corps has practiced, and continues to practice, a discriminatory employment and promotional policy to the detriment of blacks and Latin Americans. (A detailed exposition of the alleged practices is found in paragraph V of the complaint.) This discriminatory policy is alleged to be violative of 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981, 2000e-16; Executive Order 11478; and the United states Constitution.

Plaintiff, a Negro of Latin American descent, seeks to maintain this suit as a class action. He asks the court to certify the class as all past, present and future minority (Negro and Latin American descent) employees of the Corps, and all minority persons who have applied, or may apply, for employment with the Corps. Relief sought includes preliminary and permanent injunctions restraining discriminatory practices; a declaratory judgment that the past policies of the Mobile District are violative of the rights of the class; back pay and reinstatement, as appropriate; attorneys’ fees; employment of McLaughlin in the highest position to which he is entitled; and retention of jurisdiction to ensure continued compliance with the court’s order.

Subsequent to the filing of this action, Milton Jones, Jr., filed for leave of court to intervene as a party plaintiff. Jones avers that he is a member of the class which plaintiff seeks to represent, in that he is a Negro employee of the Mobile District of the Corps of Engineers. His main contention, aside from his adoption of the plaintiff’s complaint, is that he was denied ■ a promotion because of his race.

The defendants are the Secretaries of the Army and Defense, and the District and Division Engineers in charge of the Mobile District. They are sued individually and in their representative capacities. In response to the complaint and the motion to intervene, the defendants have filed a motion to dismiss, or alternatively, for summary judgment, and an objection to the proposed intervention. The main thrust of these motions is that plaintiff is required to exhaust administrative remedies before filing suit, and, if the plaintiff has exhausted, he is entitled to a review of the administrative record as opposed to a trial de novo. Defendants have filed the complete administrative record which was compiled during agency action on McLaughlin’s complaint.

As will be developed more fully, the court finds that administrative remedies have been exhausted. This leaves as the critical initial determination whether plaintiff is entitled to full trial in this court, possibly maintained as a class action, or whether some procedure short of a de novo hearing is sufficient. Much has been written on the question of the effect of the 1972 Amendment to Title VII as it relates to federal employees, specifically 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-16. Until the Act was amended by Congress, Title VII applied only to employees in the private sector of the economy. Although the amendment clearly extends coverage to employees of the federal government and grants these persons the right to “file a civil action” in the District Courts, there has been disagreement be *888 tween various courts concerning the scope of this civil action. The precise question has yet to be decided by any of the Courts of Appeals, however numerous District Courts have considered this issue. The parties have presented several of these decisions in their briefs and the court has discovered a few other recent cases. After a consideration of these cases and the legislative history of the 1972 Amendment, this court has concluded that a trial de novo is not automatically require^ by the statute.

I.

The court has observed that much has been written on the scope and meaning of § 2000e-16, and we do not intend to discuss in great detail points which have received adequate discussion elsewhere. Instead, the court will attempt to emphasize those points which it deems to be most persuasive. In Hackley v. Johnson, 360 F.Supp. 1247 (D.D.C.1973), Judge Gessell analyzed in detail the legislative history of the 1972 Amendment. The Hackley decision points out, as virtually all the reported cases do, that the legislative history is sketchy and inconclusive. Although the statute grants the District Courts jurisdiction over these cases, it does not explain how it is to be exercised. 1 The Hackley court briefly summarizes the evolution of court review of federal employment standards, emphasizing that resolution of controversy has traditionally been based on the administrative record. Id. at 1250. This historical method of dealing with disputes involving employment of federal personnel, coupled with the lack of a clear directive in the statute, leads the Hackley court to look to the legislative history to determine the proper exercise of this new grant of federal jurisdiction.

It appears two major problems were ■ uppermost in the consideration of the Congress when enacting the amendment to Title VII: (1) the ineffectiveness of the Civil Service Commission (CSC) in dealing with employee grievances, and (2) the almost insuperable barriers to court review of agency action in this area. Hackley, supra at 1251, n. 4. Before a final bill was passed, several proposals were offered to remedy these shortcomings in the existing system. See Pointer v. Sampson, 62 F.R.D. 689 (D.D.C.1974) (Gasch, J.). There were proposals suggesting the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) be given authority over federal employees, however, the final draft of the law opted for strengthening of the CSC. The CSC was given extensive powers to enforce the commands of Title VII, including the power to grant back pay and reinstatement. Congress also gave the CSC the duty of establishing and monitoring affirmative action plans designed to eradicate discrimination. The CSC was also ordered to establish a procedure whereby an employee could obtain fair and speedy resolution of his grievances. 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-16(b).

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Bluebook (online)
382 F. Supp. 885, 10 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 135, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mclaughlin-v-callaway-alsd-1974.