Bowlds v. General Motors Mfg.

• Decision Date: 09 June 2005
• Docket Number: No. 04-1907.,04-1907.
• Parties: Lawrence BOWLDS, Jr., Plaintiff-Appellant, v. GENERAL MOTORS MANUFACTURING DIVISION OF THE GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

411 F.3d 808

Lawrence BOWLDS, Jr., Plaintiff-Appellant, v. GENERAL MOTORS MANUFACTURING DIVISION OF THE GENERAL MOTORS CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 04-1907.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued October 25, 2004.

Decided June 9, 2005.

Paul Rauch (argued), Harrison & Moberly, Indianapolis, IN, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Kay Rivest Butler (argued), Hardy, Lewis, Pollard & Page, Birmingham, MI, for Defendant-Appellee.

Before POSNER, KANNE, and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges.

WILLIAMS, Circuit Judge.

Lawrence Bowlds, Jr., a Vietnam veteran and a victim of the Agent Orange skin disease, contracted as a result of his military service on behalf of our country in Vietnam, sued his former employer, General Motors. Mr. Bowlds claimed that he had been improperly denied reemployment with the company in violation of both the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act ("USERRA") and the Veterans' Reemployment Rights Act of 1974 ("VRRA").¹ The district court granted summary judgment for General Motors, finding that Mr. Bowlds's claims under the USERRA accrued before the statute's enactment date and that General Motors met its reemployment obligation under the VRRA by rehiring Mr. Bowlds after his return from the Vietnam War. Regrettably, because the USERRA is not retroactive to the time period concerning Mr. Bowlds's claims and the VRRA does not cover an injury incurred after an employer's initial rehiring of an employee, we agree with the findings of the district court and affirm.

I. Background

Mr. Bowlds began his employment with General Motors on September 27, 1965, at General Motors' Metal Fabricating Plant in Marion, Indiana. As a result of the Vietnam War, Mr. Bowlds was inducted into the United States Army in January of 1967 and was discharged from active military service in January of 1969. In February of 1969, General Motors reemployed Mr. Bowlds in an hourly position. Shortly after Mr. Bowlds's return from Vietnam, his physician, Dr. Gary Dillon, diagnosed him as suffering from a skin disorder caused by wartime exposure to the chemical commonly known as "Agent Orange," and on August 1, 1977, as a result of Dr. Dillon's recommendation, General Motors placed Mr. Bowlds on total and permanent disability.

Mr. Bowlds's medical condition improved in later years, and on October 6, 1983, Dr. Dillon prepared and signed a note stating that Mr. Bowlds could return to work as long as he "perform[ed] clean and dry work whenever available." Mr. Bowlds presented this note to General Motors, who did not respond. On March 19, 1984, Dr. Dillon again wrote to General Motors stating that he had cleared Mr. Bowlds to work. Once again, General Motors did not respond. Finally, on August 24, 1989, Dr. Dillon wrote a third letter to General Motors on Mr. Bowlds's behalf. On September 5, 1989, General Motors rehired Mr. Bowlds as a tow motor operator. On May 1, 2002, Mr. Bowlds retired from General Motors.

Two of General Motors' actions taken during Mr. Bowlds's employment with the company, initial disability retirement, rehiring, and subsequent retirement are at issue: first, whether General Motors violated the USERRA and the VRRA by failing to rehire Mr. Bowlds in 1983, when Dr. Dillon initially declared that he could return to work; and second, whether General Motors violated these same statutes by its calculation of Mr. Bowlds's retirement pension in 2002. General Motors based Mr. Bowlds's pension on service to the company of 24.8 years, which includes the period from Mr. Bowlds's initial hiring in 1965 through his initial disability retirement in 1977, as well as Mr. Bowlds's service to General Motors from his rehiring in 1989 through his final retirement in 2002. Mr. Bowlds argues that his pension should be based on 36.7 years, which in addition to the 24.8 years that General Motors has acknowledged would also include the period from 1977 through 1989 when Mr. Bowlds was on disability retirement.

On General Motors' Motion for Summary Judgment, the district court held that the USERRA did not apply to Mr. Bowlds's claims for reemployment between 1983 and 1989, further determining that even if the USERRA did apply to Mr. Bowlds's claim, no reasonable reading of that statute mandated that an employer reemploy a veteran for a medical leave of absence related to prior military service. The district court concluded that although Mr. Bowlds's claims did arise under the VRRA, that statute was also inapplicable to Mr. Bowlds's claims for the same reasoning as the USERRA. Finding that General Motors had violated neither the USERRA nor the VRRA by its decision not to reemploy Mr. Bowlds during his disability period, the district court held that General Motors' calculation of Mr. Bowlds's pension also did not violate the USERRA or the VRRA.

II. Analysis

A. Standard of Review

We review de novo a district court's grant of summary judgment. Lamers Dairy Inc. v. USDA, 379 F.3d 466, 472 (7th Cir.2004); Ind. Family & Soc. Servs. Admin. v. Thompson, 286 F.3d 476, 479 (7th Cir.2002). Summary judgment is properly granted when "the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c); Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986). When determining whether a genuine issue of material fact exists, we consider evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. See Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 587, 106 S.Ct. 1348, 89 L.Ed.2d 538 (1986). Material facts are facts that "might affect the outcome of the suit" under the applicable substantive law. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). A dispute over material facts is genuine if "the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party." Id.

B. Bowlds's USERRA Claim

One of the purposes of the USERRA and its predecessor, the VRRA, is "to prohibit discrimination against persons because of their service in the uniformed services." 38 U.S.C. § 4301(a)(3) (2005) (USERRA); Yates v. MSPB, 145 F.3d 1480, 1483 (Fed.Cir.1998); see also 38 U.S.C. § 2000(1) (1991)² (VRRA) ("alleviating unemployment and underemployment among such veterans is a national responsibility"). The statutes provide that persons inducted into the military shall be reemployed to their former positions within a certain period of time. 38 U.S.C. §§ 4312-4313 (2005); 38 U.S.C. § 2021 (1991).

In the case before us, Mr. Bowlds argues that General Motors violated the USERRA by not reemploying him from 1983 to 1989, when he was on disability retirement. However, as the district court noted, the President signed the USERRA into law on October 13, 1994, and the statute provides that it applies only to reemployment initiated on or after the first day after the sixty-day period beginning on October 13, 1994. Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act of 1994, Pub.L. No. 103-353 § 8(a). Congress has not directed the courts to apply this statute retroactively, and the Supreme Court has held that courts should be extremely hesitant to apply a statute retroactively, where Congress has not expressly mandated such an extension. Landgraf v. USI Film Prods., 511 U.S. 244, 265-75, 114 S.Ct. 1483 (1994) (explaining the logic behind this rule and illustrating its proper application). In addition, several of our sister circuits have held that courts should not retroactively apply the USERRA. E.g., Fernandez v. Dep't of the Army, 234 F.3d 553, 557 (Fed.Cir.2000) (holding that retroactive application of the USERRA would "impair rights a party possessed when he acted, increase a party's liability for past conduct, or impose new duties with respect to transactions already completed" (quoting Landgraf, 511 U.S. at 280)); Newport v. Ford Motor Co., 91 F.3d 1164, 1167 (8th Cir.1996). Mr. Bowlds's USERRA claim clearly accrued well before the application date mandated by Congress. Therefore, his USERRA claim fails.

C. Bowlds's VRRA Claim

Next, Mr. Bowlds argues that the district court erred by holding that General Motors did not violate the VRRA, the USERRA's predecessor, by either its calculation of Mr. Bowlds's pension or its failure to rehire him between 1983 and 1989. In interpreting a statute, we must first begin with the text. Community for Creative Non-Violence v. Reid, 490 U.S. 730, 739, 109 S.Ct. 2166, 104 L.Ed.2d 811 (1989); United States v. Miscellaneous Firearms, Explosives, Destructive Devices & Ammunition, 376 F.3d 709, 712 (7th Cir.2004). The plain meaning of legislation 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." United States v. Ron Pair Enters., 489 U.S. 235, 242, 109 S.Ct. 1026, 103 L.Ed.2d 290 (1989) (quoting Griffin v. Oceanic Contractors, Inc., 458 U.S. 564, 571, 102 S.Ct. 3245, 73 L.Ed.2d 973 (1982)) (alteration in original); see also Pittway Corp. v. United States, 102 F.3d 932, 934 (7th Cir.1996) (limiting the courts' function to the enforcement of a statute's terms only where "the statute's language is plain" (quoting Ron Pair Enters., 489 U.S. at 241, 109 S.Ct. 1026)).

The VRRA states:

(a) in the case of any person who is inducted into the Armed Forces of the United States ... for training and service and who leaves a position ... in the employ of any employer in order to perform such training and service, and ... (2) makes application for reemployment within ninety days after such person is relieved from such training and service or from hospitalization continuing after discharge for a period of not more than one year ... (B) if such position was in the employ of ... a private employer,...