William BARKER, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. TAFT BROADCASTING COMPANY, Defendant-Appellee

549 F.2d 400, 1977 U.S. App. LEXIS 10066, 13 Empl. Prac. Dec. (CCH) 11,548, 14 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 697

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
• Decided: February 11, 1977
• Docket: 75-2397
• Status: Published

Opinions

ENGEL, Circuit Judge.

The issue on appeal is whether an employer’s grooming code which mandates a shorter hair length for men than for women constitutes a prima facie violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2. Plaintiff contends that his discharge from employment by defendant because of his hair length is sex discrimination because female employees were permitted to wear long hair. Plaintiff had been employed as an “artist-craftsman” since November 1972 by defendant’s Kings Island Division, which operates a recreation and amusement park. The district court dismissed plaintiff’s complaint under Rule 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted.

Considered in the light most favorable to the plaintiff the complaint in this case charges that the employer maintained a grooming code for men and women employees which limited the manner in which the hair of the men could be cut and limited the manner in which the hair of women could be styled; and that the plaintiff was discharged for failing to comply with the code provision relating to hair length. There is no allegation that women employees who failed to comply with the code provisions relating to hair style were not discharged. Nor is there any allegation that the employer refused to hire men who did not comply with the code, but did hire women who were not in compliance. We conclude that the complaint does not state a cause of action under Title VII for discrimination on the basis of sex within the traditional meaning of that term.

In so holding we are in agreement with the other courts of appeals that have considered this question. Dodge v. Giant Food, Inc., 160 U.S.App.D.C. 9, 488 F.2d 1333 (1973); Baker v. California Land Title Co., 507 F.2d 895 (9th Cir. 1974); Willingham v. Macon Telegraph Publishing Co., 507 F.2d 1084 (5th Cir. 1975) (en banc), rev’g 482 F.2d 535 (5th Cir. 1973); Knott v, Missouri Pacific Railway Co., 527 F.2d 1249 (8th Cir. 1975); Longo v. Carlisle DeCoppet & Co., 537 F.2d 685 (2nd Cir. 1976); Earwood v. Continental Southeastern Lines, Inc., 539 F.2d 1349 (4th Cir. 1976). We agree with the Second Circuit in Longo v. Carlisle De-Coppet, supra, that “without necessarily adopting all of the reasoning of those opinions, we are content to abide by this unanimous result.”

The prohibition of sex discrimination must be interpreted in light of the purpose and intent of Congress in enacting the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Employer grooming codes requiring different hair lengths for men and women bear such a negligible relation to the purposes of Title VII that we cannot conclude they were a target of the Act.

When Congress makes it unlawful for an employer to “discriminate ... on the basis of sex . . without further explanation of its meaning, we should not readily infer that it meant something different than what the concept of discrimination has traditionally meant. General Electric v. Gilbert, 429 U.S. 125, 145, 97 S.Ct. 401, 413, 50 L.Ed.2d 343 (1976)

Affirmed.