Reese v. Atlantic Steel Company

• Decision Date: 21 July 1967
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 10309.
• Citation: 282 F. Supp. 905
• Parties: Curtis Otis REESE, for himself and all other persons similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. ATLANTIC STEEL COMPANY, a corporation, Atlantic Steel Company, Inc., a corporation, United Steel Workers of America, Local No. 2401, an unincorporated association, United Steel Workers of America, an unincorporated association, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Georgia

282 F. Supp. 905

Curtis Otis REESE, for himself and all other persons similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. ATLANTIC STEEL COMPANY, a corporation, Atlantic Steel Company, Inc., a corporation, United Steel Workers of America, Local No. 2401, an unincorporated association, United Steel Workers of America, an unincorporated association, Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 10309.

United States District Court N. D. Georgia, Atlanta Division.

July 21, 1967.

Charles Morgan, Jr., Morris Brown, Atlanta, Ga., Melvin L. Wulf, New York City, for plaintiff.

Cooper, Mitch, Johnston & Crawford, Birmingham, Ala., Jones, Bird & Howell, J. R. Goldthwaite, Jr., Atlanta, Ga., for defendants.

Donald Hollowell, Atlanta, Ga., Kenneth F. Holbert, Washington, D. C., for Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

LEWIS R. MORGAN, Chief Judge.

The plaintiff in the above-styled action brought suit, pursuant to Title 42, § 2000e-5 of the Civil Rights Act, for alleged employment discrimination. The defendants filed a motion to dismiss on the grounds that this Court lacks jurisdiction to entertain the suit.

The pertinent portion of Title 42, Section 2000e-5 provides:

If within thirty¹ days after a charge is filed with the Commission * * * the Commission has been unable to obtain voluntary compliance with this subchapter, the Commission shall so notify the person aggrieved and a civil action may, within thirty days thereafter, be brought against the respondent named in the charge (1) by the person claiming to be aggrieved * *.

In the instant case, the plaintiff lodged a complaint with the Commission. After sixty days the Commission notified the plaintiff that no voluntary compliance had been secured and, therefore, he had thirty days within which to file suit. It is the defendants' contention that the Commission failed to make any effort toward a conciliatory settlement, and that the plaintiff is therefore precluded from bringing suit under the Act.

The issue before the Court is whether the plaintiff has done all that is required of him by the Act as a condition precedent to the filing of a complaint with the Court.

It is clear that the plaintiff has filed a complaint with the Commission, and that he has filed a complaint with the Court after receiving notification from the Commission that it has been unable to secure voluntary compliance. Thus, the plaintiff has availed himself of the available administrative remedial procedures, and should not be precluded from his day in court on the basis of a charge by the defendants which contend that the Commission has failed to properly execute its duties.

Access to the Court should not be closed to the plaintiff, regardless of whether the Commission was neglecting to perform its duty of seeking conciliation or if it made a reasonable determination that efforts at conciliation would be futile.

In Hall v. Werthan Bag Corporation, D.C., 251 F.Supp. 184 (1966), the Court ruled on the question of administrative exhaustion regarding this section of the Act, holding that the filing of a complaint with the Commission was sufficient. In essence, the Court held that a person who has made resort to the Commission has exhausted administrative remedies and may sue even though application to the Commission was unsuccessful in that the Commission took no action.

This conclusion has been reached by two...