National Org'n For Women v. Sperry Rand Corp.

• Decision Date: 11 October 1978
• Docket Number: Civ. No. H-77-524.
• Citation: 457 F. Supp. 1338
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut
• Parties: NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR WOMEN, Suffield-Enfield Chapter, and Susan C. Madison, on behalf of herself and all others similarly situated, v. SPERRY RAND CORPORATION, Sperry Univac Division.

457 F. Supp. 1338

NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR WOMEN, Suffield-Enfield Chapter, and Susan C. Madison, on behalf of herself and all others similarly situated, v. SPERRY RAND CORPORATION, Sperry Univac Division.

Civ. No. H-77-524.

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

October 11, 1978.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Phyllis Gelman, Susan R. Meredith, Connecticut Womens Educational & Legal Fund, Inc., New Haven, Conn., for plaintiffs.

Jay S. Siegel, Thomas Royall Smith, Siegel, O'Connor & Kainen, Hartford, Conn., for defendant.

RULING ON MOTIONS TO DISMISS AND TO STRIKE

CLARIE, Chief Judge.

The plaintiffs, Susan C. Madison and the National Organization for Women, Suffield-Enfield Chapter ("NOW"), brought this action against Sperry Rand Corporation, Sperry Univac Division, Madison's former employer, alleging various acts of employment discrimination. The plaintiffs allege that the defendant has violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq.; the Civil Rights Act of 1866, 42 U.S.C. § 1981; the Equal Pay Act of 1963, 29 U.S.C. § 206(d); and that the defendant has committed certain state common law torts against the plaintiff Madison. The plaintiffs seek both monetary and injunctive relief and have brought said action on behalf of a class of employees and prospective employees, who claim to have been injured by the employment practices of the defendant.

The defendant has moved to dismiss several of the plaintiffs' causes of action and to strike that portion of the complaint, which demands compensatory and punitive damages. In addition to those parts of the complaint which the plaintiffs have withdrawn,¹ the Court grants the defendant's motions to dismiss the Equal Pay Act claim, except insofar as it applies to the plaintiff Madison at the defendant's Windsor facility; and to strike the demand for compensatory and punitive damages with respect to the Title VII cause of action. In all other respects, the defendant's motions are denied.

Statement of Facts

Susan C. Madison, a white female, was hired by the Sperry Univac Division of Sperry Rand Corporation on January 1, 1973 as an Administrative Branch Manager A at the marketing and customer service office located in Windsor, Connecticut. Her starting salary was $11,000 per year. She remained in that position until April of 1974, when she was promoted to Administrative Branch Manager B. She continued to serve in that capacity until her voluntary termination on October 7, 1977, at which time her annual salary was $17,316.

On October 9, 1976 Madison and NOW attempted to jointly file a charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") alleging sex and race discrimination in various aspects of the defendant's operations. The District Director of the EEOC advised NOW that the organization had no standing to institute a complaint in its own behalf, and requested that the complaint be amended to list Madison as the sole complainant; however, no such amendment was made. At the request of counsel for Madison the EEOC issued a right to sue letter to her on October 3, 1977. On March 31, 1977, the plaintiffs filed a charge with the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities and the present court action was instituted on October 7, 1977.

Procedural Prerequisites For A Title VII Action

The defendant challenges NOW's standing to sue for the following reasons: (1) Title VII provides that a civil action may be brought only by "the person claiming to be aggrieved," 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(f)(1), and NOW has not been aggrieved by any conduct alleged in the complaint; and (2) NOW has not satisfied the jurisdictional prerequisites to maintaining a Title VII suit, because no right to sue letter was issued to NOW. Additionally, the defendant argues that the EEOC's failure to give the defendant notice of the charge filed with the EEOC is a jurisdictional bar to suit by either plaintiff.

With respect to the first argument, it must be noted that NOW does not claim to have sustained any injury to itself; rather, it is suing on behalf of its members who were allegedly harmed by the defendant's discriminatory acts. On more than one occasion the Supreme Court has held that an association has standing to represent its aggrieved members. Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727, 739, 92 S.Ct. 1361, 31 L.Ed.2d 636 (1972); United States v. SCRAP, 412 U.S. 669, 685, 93 S.Ct. 2405, 37 L.Ed.2d 254 (1973); Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 40, 96 S.Ct. 1917, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976). In fact, in this District it has been held that an organization does have standing to assert the rights of its members in a Title VII suit. Bridgeport Guardians, Inc. v. Members of Bridgeport Civil Service Commission, 354 F.Supp. 778, 783 (D.Conn.1973), reversed on other grounds 482 F.2d 1333 (2d Cir. 1973), cert. den. 421 U.S. 991, 95 S.Ct. 1997, 44 L.Ed.2d 481 (1975); League of United Latin American Citizens v. City of Santa Ana, 410 F.Supp. 873, 886-887 (C.D.Cal.1976). Since NOW has alleged in its complaint that the defendant's employment practices have injured one or more of its members, the fact that the organization itself may not have sustained any injury is not a bar to suit.

The Court finds that the failure to receive a right to sue letter from the EEOC does not disqualify NOW from bringing this action. The filing of timely charges of employment discrimination with the EEOC and the receipt of a right to sue letter from the EEOC are normally jurisdictional prerequisites to commencing a Title VII civil action. McDonnell Douglas v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 798, 93 S.Ct. 1817, 36 L.Ed.2d 668 (1973); Alexander v. Gardner-Denver Co., 415 U.S. 36, 47, 94 S.Ct. 1011, 39 L.Ed.2d 147 (1974). However, since NOW instituted a complaint with the EEOC and requested a right to sue letter from the agency, it has fulfilled these prerequisites. It is not the fault of NOW that no right to sue letter was issued to the plaintiff organization. The Court has ruled herein that NOW has standing to sue under Title VII on behalf of its members. Therefore, the EEOC erred in refusing to issue the right to sue letter. Having done everything within its power to comply with the procedural requirements of Title VII, NOW is not barred from maintaining the present action. Bormann v. Long Island Press Publishing Co., 379 F.Supp. 951, 953 (E.D.N.Y.1974), Cox v. Allied Chemical Corp., Local 216, International Union of Operating Engineers, AFL-CIO, 382 F.Supp. 309, 313 (M.D.La.1974), reversed in part on other grounds 538 F.2d 1094 (5th Cir. 1976). The rationale of these decisions is that "The plaintiff is not responsible for the acts or omissions of the Commission. He . . . should not be denied judicial relief because of circumstances over which he has no control." Quarles v. Philip Morris Co., 271 F.Supp. 842, 846-47 (E.D.Va.1967) (holding that the EEOC's failure to attempt conciliation of the dispute is not a jurisdictional bar to suit).

The same reasoning compels the Court to reject the defendant's claim that the EEOC's failure to serve notice of the charge on the defendant is a bar to suit by either Madison or NOW. Title VII specifies that "the Commission shall serve a notice of the charge (including the date, place and circumstances of the alleged unlawful employment practice) on such employer . . within ten 10 days and shall make an investigation thereof." 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-5(b). The original charge was filed with the EEOC on October 9, 1976. The defendant alleges that it never received a copy of this charge, but that on December 29, 1976 it did receive notice from the EEOC that a charge had been filed against it. However, the defendant contends that this notice did not give the date, place and circumstances of the alleged unlawful employment practice, as required in the statute. The defendant's contention that this deficiency should bar suit by the plaintiffs has been answered elsewhere:

"Courts have uniformly held that . . an individual is not jurisdictionally barred from suit in federal court merely because the EEOC failed to notify the employer of the charges against it within the time schedule proscribed in § 2000e-5(b)." McAdams v. Thermal Industries, Inc., 428 F.Supp. 156, 159 (W.D.Pa.1977).

The present defendant did receive at least some notice of the charge which had been filed against it. In a similar case where the EEOC completely neglected to inform the defendant of the charge, the court held that a civil suit was not barred: "A Title VII complainant is not charged with the commission's failure to perform its statutory duties." Russell v. American Tobacco Co., 528 F.2d 357, 365 (4th Cir. 1975), cert. den. 425 U.S. 935, 96 S.Ct. 1667, 48 L.Ed.2d 176 (1976). See also Thornton v. East Texas Motor Freight, 497 F.2d 416, 424 (6th Cir. 1974); Foye v. United A. G. Stores Cooperative, Inc., 336 F.Supp. 82, 83 (D.C.Neb.1972); Townsend v. Exxon Co., 420 F.Supp. 189, 192 (D.Mass.1976). The Court finds that the plaintiff NOW is a proper party to this Title VII action and that both the individual plaintiff and NOW have satisfied the jurisdictional prerequisites to commencing the present civil action.

The Adequacy of the EEOC Charge

In an attempt to limit the scope of the lawsuit, the defendant seeks to dismiss the counts of the complaint which relate to the hiring, recruitment, and discharge practices of the employer, as well as the count relating to its actions taken against the plaintiff Madison in retaliation for her filing a charge with the EEOC.

The defendant urges that the issues of discharge and retaliation should be excised from the lawsuit, because those issues were not presented in the EEOC charge. There are two competing values in determining whether a variance between the EEOC charge and the civil complaint is a material one. On the one hand, the plaintiff should be required to give the EEOC such notice of his complaint as will enable the...