Blalock v. Metals Trades, Inc.

• Citation: 775 F.2d 703
• Decision Date: 24 October 1985
• Docket Number: No. 84-3714,84-3714
• Parties: 39 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 140, 38 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 35,645, 54 USLW 2260 Larry BLALOCK, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. METALS TRADES, INC., Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (6th Circuit)

Page 703

775 F.2d 703

39 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 140,

38 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 35,645, 54 USLW 2260

Larry BLALOCK, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. METALS TRADES, INC., Defendant-Appellee.

No. 84-3714.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued July 18, 1985.

Decided Oct. 24, 1985.

Alexander M. Spater (argued), Lead Counsel, Michael S. Kolman, Spater, Gittes, & Terzian, Columbus, Ohio, for plaintiff-appellant.

Lloyd C. Nicol (argued), Circleville, Ohio, for defendant-appellee.

Before CONTIE, WELLFORD and MILBURN, Circuit Judges.

CONTIE, Circuit Judge.

Larry Blalock appeals the district court's judgment in favor of the defendant, Metals Trades, Inc. on Blalock's complaint alleging that Metals Trades discharged him on account of religious discrimination in violation of Title VII, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000 et seq. For the reasons that follow, we reverse the judgment and remand the case to the district court for proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I.

Metals Trades is a closely held corporation principally owned by Wendall Woodward and Arnold Brewer. Woodward and Brewer each own 50 of the 101 shares of stock. The remaining share is owned by Woodward's brother, Evan. Wendall Woodward and Arnold Brewer jointly manage the business. Major decisions are made only after the two have reached an agreement. One area of sufficient importance to be subject to joint control is the hiring and firing of office personnel.

Woodward met Blalock through John Rothacker, a self-described "apostle." Rothacker testified that his mission as an apostle is to "establish the church" and to "establish Christians in the foundations of the faith as it is properly presented from the scriptures and the prophets and the apostles that wrote in the New Testament as well as the prophets of the Old." Woodward described Rothacker as his spiritual shepherd, but consistently maintained that although Rothacker "can give me advice ... it's up to me to make up my mind how I have to handle it myself." Similarly, Rothacker testified that although "in spiritual matters" Woodward was "in submission" to Rothacker, he only offers advice in other areas and "the decisions ultimately reside with him [Woodward]." At the time of the events in question, Rothacker and Woodward regularly met in a prayer group. Members of the group introduced their personal problems to the group's discussion and prayers.

Blalock met Rothacker in 1972 or 1973 and became interested in his work. ¹ Rothacker knew that Blalock had an engineering background and that he was interested in sales. In early 1974, Rothacker learned that Woodward was looking for a salesman with some engineering experience. Following a prayer meeting, Rothacker introduced Blalock and Woodward and suggested to Woodward that Blalock might fulfill his needs. In March 1974, Woodward hired Blalock.

It is undisputed that when Blalock began working for Metals Trades, he was told it was a "christian company." ² Blalock assumed this meant that the company conducted its business with ethical standards consistent with biblical commands. Blalock did not believe that there were any specific religious requirements attendant to the job and Woodward testified that there were, in fact, no religious requirements. At the time, Blalock was eager to work for a christian company and requested and received permission to "witness" his faith to clients who expressed an interest in religious matters. Woodward was happy to have "a Christian, a good, moral, ethical man" working for Metals Trades.

Soon after Blalock started working at Metals Trades, he and Rothacker had a parting of the ways. The basis of their disagreement is undisputed. Blalock felt that Rothacker wanted him to submit to his authority, which he was unwilling to do. Rothacker, being an apostle, felt Blalock owed him a certain amount of obedience, which was not forthcoming. Blalock testified that during work hours Woodward relayed acrimonious messages and accusations from Rothacker to him. According to Blalock, Woodward also quoted bible verses to him, arguing that he was in doctrinal error in parting with Rothacker. Woodward acknowledged that he may have passed on some information from Rothacker to Blalock, but he could not remember the content.

Arnold Brewer testified that he became disenchanted with Blalock soon after he started working at Metals Trades and Woodward confirmed Brewer's testimony. Woodward testified that he asked Brewer to give Blalock some more time. Brewer's specific complaints against Blalock were a perceived patronizing attitude, a habit of spending too much time agonizing over insignificant mechanical tolerances, leaving a mess on Brewer's desk and failing to call in to tell Metals Trades when he would be working. ³ Blalock testified, on the other hand, that Brewer asked him only two weeks before his discharge if he would consider working full time.

Blalock was fired in September 1974. Brewer had been unhappy with Blalock for some time and when Woodward reached a decision to fire Blalock, Brewer readily assented. Blalock and Woodward's versions of the actual firing are generally consistent. Woodward told Blalock he wanted to talk to him. Blalock asked if it concerned Rothacker and Woodward responded that it did. Blalock said he did not want to discuss it if it concerned Rothacker. According to Woodward, Blalock immediately left the room. Woodward admitted that he told Blalock "until he got things straightened with John [Rothacker], he was discharged." According to Blalock, he did not leave immediately, but instead stated that while he would discuss work matters, he would not talk about Rothacker. Blalock testified that although Woodward agreed to talk about work only, he never mentioned any work-related problems, but instead kept referring back to the biblical reference to "feigned obedience." After this went on for some time, according to Blalock, he told Woodward he was leaving. Blalock testified that at that point Woodward said, "consider yourself laid off ... until the situation with you and John Rothacker is settled." Woodward testified, however, that his statement about Rothacker was "simply my reaction to his reaction" and that he never meant to condition employment on Blalock's relationship with Rothacker. Blalock subsequently telephoned Woodward in an attempt to recover his job. Blalock testified that he asked Woodward to talk only about their business relationship and leave religion out of it, but that Woodward refused to do so. Woodward's testimony was entirely consistent with this account.

Two letters from Woodward to the Ohio Civil Rights Commission were introduced into evidence. In the first, Woodward stated that "we were generally satisfied" with Blalock's performance of his sales duties. The letter expressed some displeasure, however, with Blalock's attitude and his engineering practices. A second letter states that Blalock was laid off because of the failure to notify Woodward which days he would be working and because Woodward asked him "a question and he refused to answer." Woodward testified that this referred to Blalock's refusal to discuss Rothacker when he was discharged. The letter then states:

Larry was hired with the full knowledge and understanding that Metals Trades is a Christian Company and our rule book is the word of God, or the Bible. He was in full accord and very excited. He said he wanted to work for a Christian Company and, being a salesman contacting new accounts, he wanted to witness to them; in which I encouraged him. Larry is a fine young man and he has my respect in many areas. I hated to lay him off as there are all too few men willing to commit themselves to Jesus--especially salesmen. Larry's problem is that he refuses to submit himself to those in authority over him and the Bible makes it clear that we are to be in submission. Larry was let go for strictly secular reasons but the root of his problem is spiritual, as the scriptures will show....

The letter closed by quoting several biblical passages.

The district court accepted Blalock's contention that the precise analysis of Texas Department of Community Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248, 101 S.Ct. 1089, 67 L.Ed.2d 207 (1981) and McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973) does not apply in this case. "[T]his is a case in which the plaintiff has offered direct evidence that defendant intentionally discriminated against him." The court did "not agree, however, with plaintiff's assertion that he has proved his case by direct evidence that the defendant discharged him because of religious differences." The court found that

[t]he personal relationship between plaintiff and Mr. Woodward that motivated Mr. Woodward to tolerate plaintiff's poor performance as an employee was rooted in their shared religious experience. When this personal relationship broke down, Mr. Woodward no longer felt motivated to close his eyes to plaintiff's attitudes and behavior as an employee.

The court held that "plaintiff has not proved that defendant fired him because of his religion or because of any particular religious beliefs he may have held" and that "there was no discriminatory intent in violation of Title VII." Further, "plaintiff has failed to prove that in terminating him, defendant intentionally discriminated against plaintiff because of his religion or religious beliefs." On appeal, Blalock contends first that the district court clearly erred in finding that Blalock had not established by direct evidence that Metals Trades acted with discriminatory intent, and, second, that, in light of its clearly erroneous findings, the district court erred in apportioning the burden of proof with respect to establishing the "cause" of Blalock's termination.

II.

Preliminarily, we note that we review the district court's findings of fact for clear error. Jackson v. RKO Bottlers of Toledo, Inc., 743 F.2d 370, 374 (6th Cir.1984); ...