Baker v. Runyon, s. 96-3307

• Decision Date: 12 June 1997
• Docket Number: 96-3514,Nos. 96-3307,s. 96-3307
• Parties: 74 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 160, 70 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 44,760 Mitzi BAKER, Plaintiff-Appellee/Cross-Appellant, v. Marvin T. RUNYON, Postmaster General of the United States, Defendant-Appellant/Cross-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 668

114 F.3d 668

74 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 160,

70 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 44,760

Mitzi BAKER, Plaintiff-Appellee/Cross-Appellant, v. Marvin T. RUNYON, Postmaster General of the United States Defendant-Appellant/Cross-Appellee.

Nos. 96-3307, 96-3514.

United States Court of Appeals Seventh Circuit.

Argued April 11, 1997.

Decided June 12, 1997.

Stanley L. Hill, Robert D. Whitfield (argued), Hill & Associates, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Joseph M. Ferguson, Office of the United States Attorney, Civil Division, Appellate Section, Matthew M. Collette (argued), Marleigh D. Dover, Department of Justice, Civil Division, Appellate Section, Washington, DC, Thomas P. Walsh, Office of the United States Attorney, Civil Division, Chicago, IL, for Defendant-Appellant.

Before CUDAHY, FLAUM, and ROVNER, Circuit Judges.

FLAUM, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff-appellee Mitzi Baker brought suit under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended in 1991 ("the Act"), seeking both compensatory and punitive damages for sexual harassment she allegedly suffered while employed by the United States Postal Service. Defendant-appellant Marvin T. Runyon, the Postmaster General of the United States, moved to strike Baker's claim for punitive damages on the ground that the United States Postal Service is a government agency and is therefore exempt from punitive damages under Title VII. As codified at 42 U.S.C. § 1981a(b)(1), Title VII provides that parties may recover punitive damages "against a respondent (other than a government, government agency or political subdivision) ...." (emphasis added). The issue presented by this case, then, is whether the Postal Service is a "government agency" for purposes of section 1981a. The district court concluded that the Postal Service was not. Challenging this determination, the Postmaster General brings this appeal. Because we conclude that the Postal Service is a government agency for purposes of section 1981a, we reverse the judgment of the district court awarding Baker punitive damages. ¹

I.

Congress, in enacting section 1981a, exempted all government agencies from the Act's punitive damage provision, with no articulated exceptions. Because Baker has conceded that the Postal Service is a "government agency," there would therefore appear to be little for this court to decide. Not surprisingly, Baker does not view this case as quite that simple. It is her contention, a view shared by the district court, that it can be inferred from Congress' historical treatment of the Postal Service as a quasi-commercial entity, from Congress' waiver of the Service's sovereign immunity, and from the legislative history of the Civil Rights Act of 1991, that Congress did not intend to exempt the Postal Service from punitive damages. We cannot agree that this is an appropriate inference to draw.

Baker faces an uphill battle in arguing that Congress intended to subject the Postal Service to punitive damages. She is asking this court to read into the Act an exception to Congress' blanket exemption, despite the absence of any textual support for such an exclusion, because, according to Baker, this is what Congress intended. It is, however, axiomatic that "the plain language of a statute is the most reliable indicator of congressional intent." Time Warner Cable v. Doyle, 66 F.3d 867, 876 (7th Cir.1995), cert. denied, Doyle v. Time Warner Cable, --- U.S. ----, 116 S.Ct. 974, 133 L.Ed.2d 894 (1996); see also Director, OWCP v. Forsyth Energy, Inc., 666 F.2d 1104, 1107 (7th Cir.1981). "[C]ourts must presume that a legislature says in a statute what it means and means in a statute what it says there." Connecticut Nat'l Bank v. Germain, 503 U.S. 249, 253-54, 112 S.Ct. 1146, 1149, 117 L.Ed.2d 391 (1992). We therefore presume that Congress would have said that all government agencies, except the Postal Service, are exempt from punitive damages, if this is what it intended.

This presumption that a statute means what it says is a difficult one to overcome. When the words of a statute are unambiguous, ordinarily the "judicial inquiry is complete." Id. at 254, 112 S.Ct. at 1149-50; see also In the Matter of Lifschultz Fast Freight Corp., 63 F.3d 621, 628 (7th Cir.1995) (plain language of statute ordinarily conclusive). "The statutory language should be conclusive except in the rare cases in which the literal application of a statute will produce a result demonstrably at odds with the intentions of its drafters ... [or] lead to absurd results...." Time Warner Cable, 66 F.3d at 876 (citation omitted); see also Grzan v. Charter Hosp. of Northwest Ind., 104 F.3d 116, 122 (7th Cir.1997) (legislative history of statute examined "only for the limited purpose of determining whether it reflects a clearly expressed legislative intent to the contrary"). This is not such a case. In mounting her attack on the plain meaning of section 1981a, Baker has produced no evidence of a clear intent by Congress to saddle the Postal Service, despite its governmental nature, with judgments for punitive damages. Nor has she demonstrated that exempting the Service from punitive damage awards is "demonstrably at odds" with the goals of Title VII. As discussed below, the inferences Baker would draw from the various statutes and excerpts of legislative history cannot counter section 1981a's clear language.

II.

We first address Baker's contention that Congress, because it intended the Postal Service to operate in a manner similar to a commercial entity, must have intended to subject the Service to punitive damages. We do not believe that it is possible to make the leap in logic Baker suggests. The Postal Service may be run in a manner similar to a private commercial entity, but it is not a private commercial entity. See Silver v. United States Postal Service, 951 F.2d 1033, 1035 (9th Cir.1991) ("Congress could not have made its intention more clear that the Postal Service was to remain a part of the U.S. Government and to perform executive branch functions within the government."); Friedlander v. United States Postal Service, 658 F.Supp. 95, 101 (D.D.C.1987) ("Congress did not intend to create a private business, rather, it desired a more efficient government agency."). While this court, as well as the Supreme Court, has recognized the quasi-commercial nature of the Postal Service on several prior occasions, see, e.g., Loeffler v. Frank, 486 U.S. 549, 556, 108 S.Ct. 1965, 1969-70, 100 L.Ed.2d 549 (1988); Standard Oil Div., Am. Oil Co. v. Starks, 528 F.2d 201, 203 (7th Cir.1975), neither court has ever held that the Postal Service is anything other than a federal agency, see, e.g., United States v. Bardsley, 884 F.2d 1024, 1027-28 (7th Cir.1989) (false statements made to Postal Service are false statements to government agency); McGuinness v. United States Postal Service, 744 F.2d 1318, 1322-23 (7th Cir.1984) (only proper defendant in Title VII suit is head of agency). Congress may have vested the Postal Service with significant powers in order to increase its independence and autonomy, see Standard Oil, 528 F.2d at 202-03 (listing powers granted to Postal Service), but it also provided that the Postal Service is part of the executive branch of government, that its employees are part of the federal civil service, and that it possesses certain powers unique to governmental entities, such as the authority to exercise the power of eminent domain in the name of the United States. See 39 U.S.C. §§ 201, 1001(b) & 401(9).

Contrary to the suggestion of appellee, it would be illogical to assume that Congress, because it granted the Postal Service considerable autonomy, intended to grant the agency the status of a private actor. Congress knows how to create entities and confer upon them non-governmental status when it is Congress' intention to do so. In establishing Amtrak and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, for example, Congress explicitly provided that they were not agencies or establishments of the United States Government. See 47 U.S.C. § 396(b) (providing that Corporation for Public Broadcasting "will not be an agency or establishment of the United States Government"); 45 U.S.C. § 541 (providing that Amtrak "will not be an agency or establishment of the United States Government") (repealed). Because Congress lodged the Postal Service within the federal government, the more logical inference is that it did not intend to subject the agency to punitive damages.

Baker next points to Congress' waiver of the Postal Service's sovereign immunity to support her assertion that Congress intended to subject the Postal Service to punitive damages. As is true of many other federal agencies, the Postal Service's charter contains a "sue-and-be-sued" clause that permits the Postal Service to be sued. The presence of this clause, however, does little to advance Baker's argument. If anything, it supports the position of the Postmaster General. This waiver of sovereign immunity is necessary solely because the Postal Service is a government agency. See Western Securities Co. v. Derwinski, 937 F.2d 1276, 1280 (7th Cir.1991) ("The 'sue or be sued' clause ... operates as the necessary waiver of sovereign immunity, permitting the suit to go forward notwithstanding that it is a suit against a federal agency.") (emphasis added).

That Congress has waived the Postal Service's sovereign immunity does not answer...