Atonio v. Wards Cove Packing Co., Inc.

• Decision Date: 23 February 1987
• Docket Number: Nos. 83-4263,84-3527,s. 83-4263
• Citation: 810 F.2d 1477
• Parties: 43 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 130, 42 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 36,809, 55 USLW 2486 Frank ATONIO, Eugene Baclig, Randy del Fierro, Clarke Kido, Lester Kuramoto, Alan Lew, Curtis Lew, Robert Morris, Joaquin Arruiza, Barbara Viernes, as administratrix of the estate of Gene Allen Viernes, and all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. WARDS COVE PACKING COMPANY, INC., Castle & Cooke, Inc., and Columbia Wards Fisheries, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 1477

810 F.2d 1477

43 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 130,

42 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 36,809, 55 USLW 2486

Frank ATONIO, Eugene Baclig, Randy del Fierro, Clarke Kido Lester Kuramoto, Alan Lew, Curtis Lew, Robert Morris Joaquin Arruiza, Barbara Viernes, as administratrix of the estate of Gene Allen Viernes, and all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. WARDS COVE PACKING COMPANY, INC., Castle & Cooke, Inc., and Columbia Wards Fisheries, Defendants-Appellees.

Nos. 83-4263, 84-3527.

United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted En Banc

Feb. 18, 1986.

Decided Feb. 23, 1987.

Abraham A. Arditi, Seattle, Wash., for plaintiffs-appellants.

Douglas M. Fryer, Seattle, Wash., for defendants-appellees.

Bill Lann Lee, Los Angeles, Cal., Robert E. Williams, Washington, D.C., for amicis curiae.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington.

Before BROWNING, GOODWIN, WALLACE, SNEED, ANDERSON, HUG, TANG, SCHROEDER, FLETCHER, PREGERSON, and REINHARDT, Circuit Judges.

TANG, Circuit Judge:

We grant en banc review in this Title VII race discrimination case to decide two questions. First, we decide the procedure a panel should follow when faced with an irreconcilable conflict between the holdings of controlling prior decisions of this court. Second, we resolve that irreconcilable conflict, by deciding that disparate impact analysis may be applied to subjective employment practices. The district court declined to apply disparate impact analysis on the authority of Heagney v. University of Washington, 642 F.2d 1157 (9th Cir.1981) (practice of hiring without well-defined criteria cannot be subjected to disparate impact analysis) and chose to disregard the later decision in Wang v. Hoffman, 694 F.2d 1146 (9th Cir.1982) (lack of objective criteria for promotion can be analyzed for disparate impact). The Ninth Circuit panel that heard the appeal from the judgment for the employers in the instant case noted our conflicting decisions but held it was bound by Heagney because it expressed the "correct view" or, alternatively, because it was the decision "first in line." Atonio v. Wards Cove Packing Co., Inc., 768 F.2d 1120, 1132 and n. 6 (9th Cir.1985), withdrawn, 787 F.2d 462 (9th Cir.1985).

The panel's approach did not resolve the broader question of how future panels should decide a case controlled by contradictory precedents. We now hold that the appropriate mechanism for resolving an irreconcilable conflict is an en banc decision. A panel faced with such a conflict must call for en banc review, which the court will normally grant unless the prior decisions can be distinguished. Despite the "extraordinary" nature of en banc review, United States v. American-Foreign Steamship Corp., 363 U.S. 685, 689, 80 S.Ct. 1336, 1339, 4 L.Ed.2d 1491 (1960), and the general rule that en banc hearings are "not favored," Fed.R.App.P. 35(a), en banc review is proper "when consideration by the full court is necessary to secure or maintain the uniformity of its decisions." Fed.R.App.P. 35(a)(1); see also American-Foreign Steamship, 363 U.S. at 689-90, 80 S.Ct. at 1339-40.

Turning to the substantive question which produced our conflicting prior decisions, we note that this case arises out of the cannery workers' allegations of both disparate treatment and disparate impact. Thus it affords us the opportunity to refine the analytic tools for the identification and eradication of unlawful discrimination. Specifically, we now determine that disparate impact analysis may be applied to subjective employment practices.

I. BACKGROUND

Former salmon cannery workers brought a class action suit charging three companies with employment discrimination on the basis of race in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e et seq. (1982) and the Civil Rights Act of 1866, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1981 (1982). The class alleged both disparate treatment and disparate impact claims on behalf of minority persons. It alleged that the pronounced concentration of Asian and Alaska Native employees in the lowest paying cannery worker and laborer positions and the relative scarcity of such minority employees in the higher paying positions proved disparate treatment of minority people. It also alleged that certain specific employment practices of the companies proved both disparate treatment of and disparate impact on minority people. The cannery workers challenged the companies' use of separate hiring channels for cannery workers from those used for the higher paying, at-issue jobs, as well as word-of-mouth recruitment, nepotism, rehire policies, and the lack of objective job qualifications.

The majority of cannery workers are hired from native villages in Alaska and through a local union of primarily Filipino members of the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union (ILWU) in Seattle. Consequently, cannery workers are almost all members of these ethnic groups. All other positions are filled through applications received during the off-season at the mainland home offices, through rehiring previous employees and through word-of-mouth recruitment. These positions are held predominantly by white people. Another challenged practice, of particular relevance in our en banc review of this case, is the apparent lack of objective qualifications for many job classifications, and the resultant use of subjective criteria in hiring and promoting. When filling most job positions, the respective hiring officers generally seek to hire the individuals who are, in the hiring officer's opinion, the best for the job.

In addition to the racial stratification of jobs, the cannery workers complain that even those nonwhites who obtain positions with the companies are treated differently from whites. They allege that nonwhites are segregated from whites in housing and messing, and that the bunkhouses and food provided for nonwhites are far inferior to those provided for whites.

In holding for the defendant companies, the district court evaluated the evidence introduced by both sides, including conflicting statistical data. The court analyzed all the cannery workers' claims for intentional discrimination, and concluded that the companies had successfully shown nondiscriminatory motivations for their practices. Despite the cannery workers' contrary arguments, the court, relying on Ninth Circuit authority, refused to evaluate all of the claims under the disparate impact model of Title VII. The court subjected a few claims to disparate impact analysis and again found for the defendants.

II. ANALYSIS

A. Title VII Liability

Section 703(a)(2) of Title VII, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e-2(a)(2) (1982), provides that:

It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer--

....

(2) to limit, segregate, or classify his employees or applicants for employment in any way which would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment opportunities or otherwise adversely affect his status as an employee, because of such individual's race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.

An employee may prove an employer's Title VII liability through a theory of disparate treatment or a theory of disparate impact. Proof of disparate treatment requires a showing that the employer intentionally "treats some people less favorably than others because of their race, color, religion, sex, or national origin." International Brotherhood of Teamsters v. United States, 431 U.S. 324, 335 n. 15, 97 S.Ct. 1843, 1854-55 n. 15, 52 L.Ed.2d 396 (1977). An illicit motive may be inferred in an individual discrimination claim when the plaintiff shows he is a member of a protected class who applied for, and failed to get, a job for which he was qualified and which remained open after his rejection. McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 802, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 1824, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973). An illicit motive may be inferred in a class-wide discrimination claim from a sufficient showing of disparity between the class members and comparably qualified members of the majority group. Segar v. Smith, 738 F.2d 1249, 1265-66 (D.C.Cir.1984), cert. denied, 471 U.S. 1115, 105 S.Ct. 2357, 86 L.Ed.2d 258 (1985) (citing Teamsters, 431 U.S. at 335 n. 15, 97 S.Ct. at 1854-55 n. 15).

A disparate impact claim challenges "employment practices that are facially neutral in their treatment of different groups but that in fact fall more harshly on one group than another and cannot be justified by business necessity." Teamsters, 431 U.S. at 336 n. 15, 97 S.Ct. at 1854-55 n. 15. Illicit motive is irrelevant because impact analysis is designed to implement Congressional concern with "the consequences of employment practices, not simply the motivation." Griggs v. Duke Power Co., 401 U.S. 424, 432, 91 S.Ct. 849, 854, 28 L.Ed.2d 158 (1971) (emphasis in original). In a class action suit, commonly known as a "pattern or practice" case, plaintiffs typically assert claims both of disparate treatment occasioned by an employer's practices and of disparate impact produced by those practices. Segar, 738 F.2d at 1266. As the Supreme Court noted in Teamsters, a pattern and practice class action case, "[e]ither theory may, of course, be applied to a particular set of facts." 431 U.S. at 336 n. 15, 97 S.Ct. at 1854-55 n. 15.

B. Impact Analysis in the Ninth Circuit

1. Conflict

Disparate treatment and disparate impact are but two analytic tools which may be used in the appropriate Title VII case to resolve the ultimate question, whether there has been impermissible discrimination by an employer. See, e.g., Goodman v. Lukens Steel Co., 777 F.2d 113, 130 (3d Cir.1985). Despite the Teamsters language stating that either theory may be applied to a set of facts, courts have not uniformly interpreted the scope of impact analysis. ¹ Differences have arisen from the conflicting views of whether impact analysis can be applied to evaluate employment procedures or criteria...