Dobbs v. City of Atlanta, Ga.
| Decision Date | 14 November 1979 |
| Docket Number | No. 77-2668,77-2668 |
| Citation | 606 F.2d 557 |
| Parties | 21 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 827, 21 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 30,386 Henry DOBBS et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. CITY OF ATLANTA, GEORGIA, et al., Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
Richard L. Stumm, B. Lee Crawford, Jr., Atlanta, Ga., Roy E. Barnes, Marietta, Ga., for plaintiffs-appellants.
Ferrin Mathews, City Atty., Mary Carole Cooney, Atlanta, Ga., for City of Atlanta, defendants-appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.
Before GEWIN, AINSWORTH and REAVLEY, Circuit Judges.
This Title VII 1 class action attacks the disparity between three pension plans maintained by the City of Atlanta for its employees. Appellants represent those black employees and recipients of retirement benefits to whom the general employee pension plan applies. The plans for police and for firefighters are more attractive. 2 Appellants complain of the different treatment on the ground that the City historically funneled black employees exclusively or predominantly into the general employees cohort, thereby denying to them the subsequent enjoyment of police or firefighters' pensions. The district court granted the City's Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. We affirm. 3
The touchstone of the amended complaint lies in paragraph 12. 4 While it is not clear whether the past discriminatory hiring practices are alleged to have occurred prior to or subsequent to the date cities came within the purview of Title VII (March 1972), the complaint clearly fails to claim that the City currently engages in discriminatory hiring practices. It is appellants' complaint that the present effect of maintaining the separate pension plans perpetuates the effects of past hiring discrimination.
The controlling Supreme Court pronouncements on the perpetuation of prior discrimination are in United Air Lines v. Evans, 431 U.S. 553, 97 S.Ct. 1885, 52 L.Ed.2d 571 (1977) and International Brotherhood of Teamsters v. United States, 431 U.S. 324, 97 S.Ct. 1843, 52 L.Ed.2d 396 (1977). Evans emphasized that the mere continuity of impact from prior discrimination is insufficient to justify relief under Title VII. Instead, "the critical question is whether any present Violation exists." 431 U.S. at 558, 97 S.Ct. at 1889 (emphasis in the original). No adjustment of seniority rights was required in Evans because that system presented no barrier based upon sex at the time of the suit and the continuing impact on respondent's pay and Fringe benefits fell short of an actionable wrong.
The distinction between Evans and Teamsters is that in Teamsters the current employment choices were impacted by seniority and the prior discriminatory hiring. There was a present violation in Teamsters because racial minorities were prevented from improving their Employment prospects at the time suit was brought. The Court described the dilemma as follows:
For purposes of calculating benefits, such as vacations, pensions, and other fringe benefits, an employee's seniority under this system runs from the date he joins the company, and takes into account his total service in all jobs and bargaining units. For competitive purposes, however, such as determining the order in which employees may bid for particular jobs, are laid off, or are recalled from layoff, it is bargaining-unit seniority that controls. Thus, a line driver's seniority, for purposes of bidding for particular runs and protection against layoff, takes into account only the length of time he has been a line driver at a particular terminal. The practical effect is that a city driver or serviceman who transfers to a line-driver job must forfeit all the competitive seniority he has accumulated in his previous bargaining unit and start at the bottom of the line drivers' "board."
The vice of this arrangement, as found by the District Court and the Court of Appeals, was that it "locked" minority workers into inferior jobs and perpetuated prior discrimination by discouraging transfers to jobs as line drivers. While the disincentive applied to all workers, including whites, it was Negroes and Spanish-surnamed persons who, those courts found, suffered the most because many of them had been denied the equal opportunity to become line drivers when they were initially hired, whereas whites either had not sought or were refused line-driver positions for reasons unrelated to their race or national origin. (footnotes omitted)
431 U.S. 343-44, 97 S.Ct. 1858. Thus, even though this seniority system was racially neutral on its face, the combined effect of earlier discriminatory job placement and the seniority system produced a present violation of continuing nature under Title VII.
Two cases involving allegations of continuing violations have been decided in this circuit since Teamsters and Evans. James v. Stockham Valves & Fittings Co., 559 F.2d 310 (5th Cir. 1977), Cert. denied, 434 U.S. 1034, 98 S.Ct. 767, 54 L.Ed.2d 781 (1978), involved an employer which allocated jobs on the basis of race at the time suit was filed. The company had a policy of excluding blacks from the more desirable craft jobs and the apprenticeship program which led to those jobs. The court found that while the testing, educational, and age requirements for the apprenticeship program were facially neutral, they had a disproportionate negative impact on blacks. Further, the requirements were not shown to be related to job performance or business necessity. This presented clear examples of current discriminatory employment practices based upon race. Similarly, the facially neutral seniority system which inhibited current job transfers, and consequently reinforced prior job stratification, evidenced a prima facie case of Present discrimination based upon race.
Pettway v. American Cast Iron Pipe Co., 576 F.2d 1157 (5th Cir. 1978), Cert. denied, 439 U.S. 1115, 99 S.Ct. 1020, 59 L.Ed.2d 74 (1979), ("Pettway IV "), involved an employer which had segregated employees by race until 1961. The segregated profile was carried forward through 1964 when the employer began utilizing testing and educational requirements to discriminate against blacks. These practices were held to be illegal in Pettway III, 494 F.2d 211 (5th Cir. 1974). The company...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Johnson v. K Mart Corporation, 99-14563
...the term "fringe benefits" to include retirement and other post-employment medical benefits. See, e.g., Dobbs v. City of Atlanta Georgia, 606 F.2d 557 (5th Cir 1979) (Title VII suit alleging that an employer's racially discriminatory personnel practices prevented Black employees from access......
-
Fisher v. Procter & Gamble Mfg. Co.
...court viewed the prior discriminatory acts as constituting the actionable wrongs upon which relief was based. Dobbs v. City of Atlanta, Ga., 606 F.2d 557 (5th Cir. 1979); United Air Lines v. Evans. If, on the other hand, prior practices were considered relevant to show independently actiona......
-
Carpenter v. Stephen F. Austin State University
...on the basis of their "quality of production" and without intention to discriminate on basis of race or gender. See Dobbs v. City of Atlanta, 606 F.2d 557, 559 (5th Cir.1979).11 The delinquent contribution lump-sum requirement thus also seems to fulfill the standards for an employment pract......
-
Allen v. U.S. Steel Corp.
...A recent decision of this court supports our reading of Evans to bar the claims of the filing plaintiffs. In Dobbs v. City of Atlanta, 606 F.2d 557 (5th Cir. 1979), a class of black employees claimed that a city's discriminatory hiring practices resulted in disparate pension treatment for b......