July 29, 2020:- Today the Appeals Court reaffirmed that the employment relationship between a religious organization and its ministers is beyond the reach of the anti-discrimination laws. The court held that the “ministerial exemption” covered the job in question, namely director of music ministries, and that the trial judge was right to dismiss the plaintiff’s age- and gender-discrimination case against her former employer.
As the ruling points out, the purpose of the exemption is to prevent courts depriving a religious organization of control over “the selection of those who will personify its beliefs.”
You can read the decision in Menard v. Archdiocese of Boston, which proponents of freedom of conscience and religion will welcome, by clicking here.
March 4, 2020:- The Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) has published three new decisions (link).
One of the cases (Chase, et al v. Crescent Yacht Club, et al) involves an award of attorney’s fees and cots in the amount of approximately $83,000.00 on top of a damages award of almost $30,000.00.
February 28, 2020:- New rules of procedure have taken effect at the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD). One welcome addition: Rule 1.13(9)(b)(3), which allows for a stay of the investigation pending the adjudication of a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction (my personal hobbyhorse). I’ll drink to that.
November 19, 2019:- When the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) stopped producing documents in response to Attorney J. Whitfield Larrabee’s public records requests, Attorney Larrabee sued. The MCAD said that it had changed its policy, and that from now on it would only produce information about closed cases, not open ones. Today the Appeals Court held that it is duly promulgated regulations that govern, not a unilateral policy adopted without notice and comment.
Justice Sullivan’s opinion states that the agency’s new policy conflicts with its regulations and that it must, in accordance with the regulations, produce the documents. My favorite excerpt is the following:”A regulation controls over policy statements or guidelines that conflict with the regulation… If the MCAD wishes to consider recalibrating its policy regarding public disclosure, it must follow the amendment process.”
In case any of my students are reading this, I point out that this case provides an example of why you should read the footnotes, which are there for reading not decoration. In footnote 7 the court deals with the MCAD’s argument that public disclosure of open cases will lead to respondents retaliating against complainants: The argument does not hold water because Respondents know about the complaint from the outset when the MCAD serves them with it.
Today’s decision makes this a good day for open government and the rule of law.
P.S. November 19, 2019: I just filed my own public records request with the MCAD for pending charges filed so far this year in the commission’s Springfield office. I will keep you posted.
September 19, 2019:- At 12 noon on October 9 in its Springfield office, the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) will hold a public hearing on proposed changes to its procedural regulations. For a link to the notice click here.
One proposal in particular caught my eye, as I mentioned in a previous post, and here is the text of the comment I submitted to the MCAD in support of it:
804 CMR 1.13(9)(b)(3)
The proposed rule provides that “where the Commission’s jurisdiction or authority to proceed is challenged by a motion filed with the Commission, the Investigating Commissioner may stay investigation of the merits of the charge pending a ruling on the motion.”
As an attorney who has previously complained about the Commission investigating charges without having adjudicated a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, I welcome this proposal. A clear and unambiguous grant of discretion to issue a stay would be a significant improvement on the current situation.
However, where a respondent’s motion raises the limitation period I believe that a stay should be mandatory not discretionary. The purpose of a statute of limitation is to provide a degree of certainty and predictability, which purpose is undermined when investigations commence after the statutory deadline has passed. Accordingly, where a motion seeks dismissal based on the expiry of the limitation period, the Commission should only continue to investigate after determining that the period has not expired and the Commission does, in fact, have jurisdiction.
In order to maintain the principle of separation of powers (one of the bulwarks of liberty), agencies should operate within, not beyond, their statutory remit. Conducting an investigation without jurisdiction violates that principle. It should not happen. This proposed regulation goes some way toward preventing the MCAD exceeding its authority, so I hope that it makes the final cut.
I intend to be at the public hearing in Springfield and to post a brief report of what, if anything, occurs. Probably it will not be necessary to arrive hours ahead of time and queue for a seat. After all, on October 9 many Bay Staters will be busy observing the anniversary of the banishment of Roger Williams in 1635 or celebrating Leif Erikson Day. Quite possibly, therefore, there may not be much of a crowd at the mid-week, noontime meeting to discuss amendments to the MCAD’s procedural regulations. But you never know. In the meantime, if readers would like to know more about the issue, please post a comment or email me.
January 15, 2019:- The Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) has published its draft procedural regulations, and I am happy to report that the draft includes a proposal of mine, or at least a version of it.
Readers may recall that back in 2017 I wrote a bill to cover situations where there is doubt that the MCAD has jurisdiction to investigate a complaint. (New MCAD Bill Filed). If a person accused of discrimination files a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, the MCAD should rule on that motion first, before launching an investigation. In the meantime, the Investigating Commissioner should stay (i.e. suspend) the investigation.
The new proposed rules give the Investigating Commissioner clear authority to issue a stay.
Generally, investigation of a complaint shall not be not stayed pending the ruling on a motion. However, where the Commission’s jurisdiction or authority to proceed is challenged by a motion filed with the Commission, the Investigating Commissioner may stay investigation of the merits of the charge pending a ruling on the motion.
July 17, 2017:- Today the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) held that where an employer fired an employee for her off-site use of marijuana, the employee may sue for handicap discrimination. The name of the case is Barbuto v. Advantage Sales and Marketing, LLC, and you can read it by clicking here. The decision does not sit easily with the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution of the United States, to put it mildly.
The case involves the Massachusetts anti-discrimination law, chapter 151B. Under 151B an employee who is a “qualified handicapped person” may seek “reasonable accommodations.” In this case, the employee asked for one particular accommodation, namely marijuana use. Faced with this request the employer demurred, arguing that marijuana use is a crime and, therefore, inherently unreasonable.
Certainly, in 2012 Massachusetts enacted the medical marijuana act. But the use of marijuana is illegal under the federal Controlled Substances Act, which Congress enacted and has not repealed. The SJC referred to this contradiction between state and federal law as an “unusual backdrop.” That is one way of putting it, I suppose.
Now, admittedly I am no judge and nobody asked me, but my starting point in resolving the contradiction would have been clause 2 of article VI of the Constitution of the United States, which provides:
This Constitution and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof… shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.
The clause means that a law passed by Congress becomes part of “the supreme law of the land.” That is why we call it the Supremacy Clause. Lest there be any doubt, the clause includes the proviso “any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.” If a State does not like a Federal law, the judges of that State may not repeal it. Nullification is not an option. I believe we fought a war about this.
However, the SJC held that respect for the supreme law of the land must take second seat to something else, something not referred to in the Constitution of the United States:
“To declare an accommodation for medical marijuana to be per se unreasonable out of respect for the Federal law would not be respectful of the recognition of Massachusetts voters, shared by the legislatures or voters in the vast majority of States, that marijuana has an accepted medical use for some patients suffering from debilitating medical conditions.”
That is a very difficult sentence for me to understand. Don’t get me wrong: I can read English, so I understand the words. I just do not understand how (with all due respect to the SJC) one can square that sentence with the plain language of the Supremacy Clause or with the body of precedent on the subject of field preemption.
After all, the Supremacy Clause is a straightforward answer to this simple question: Where there is a clear conflict between a federal law and a subsequent state law, which prevails? Federal law, says he Supremacy Clause. State law, says the SJC. Why? Because it is better to ignore the federal law than fail to be “respectful” of the voters.
Perhaps this is one of those instances where the framers and ratifiers tacked on an exception using invisible ink, so that to the cognoscenti the Supremacy Clause actually concludes with the words “and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding, except when they decide not to be.” Hold your copy of the Constitution up close, then at arms’ length. If that doesn’t work, try holding it up to the light.
February 23, 2017:- If you are charged with discrimination and you file a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, must the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) rule on your motion before launching an investigation? No, not at present. But that will change if H. 775 becomes law.
Titled “An Act Streamlining the Investigation Process of Discrimination Complaints,” the bill would require the MCAD to adjudicate a respondent’s motion first and start its investigation only if it determines that jurisdiction is proper.
Why does this matter? The main reason is the constitutional principle of the separation of powers: an executive agency should not hale people in if the Legislature has said it should not. For example, when it enacted Chapter 151B the Legislature said that the MCAD would have no jurisdiction to investigate businesses with fewer than six employees (the small-business exemption). So when the MCAD does investigate businesses with fewer than six employees it is, in effect, exercising the legislative function by re-writing the statute.
But there are pocket-book reasons too. Defending against a charge of discrimination can prove costly, which rather stacks the deck in favor of the complainant who is represented either by a lawyer working on a contingent-fee basis or by the MCAD itself. Add to that the MCAD’s institutional bias toward early resolution (which is not necessarily a bad thing) and you have an incentive for respondents to fold faster than Superman on laundry day, as Jerry Seinfeld put it.
As things stand a respondent will be tempted to settle at a commission-mandated conciliation conference early on, even if the case should never have been on the agency’s docket in the first place. Real money is at stake here, and business owners should not have to fork over for claims that should be thrown out on jurisdictional grounds. That is not an efficient use of resources. Screening out cases like these would allow businesses to devote those resources to other purposes, e.g. improving products and services to benefit their customers and creating new jobs.
The bill has been assigned to the Joint Committee on the Judiciary. Stay tuned for updates, and click here for a previous post on this subject.
February 9, 2017:- Earlier this month the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) announced a significant cut in its backlog of cases.
In 2016, the agency substantially reduced the number of cases that were more than 2 years old. Of the 3,811 investigations currently open at the MCAD, just 318 remain over 2 years old, down from 1,134 in 2015, a reduction of 72%.
Approximately 3,000 new complaints are filed with the MCAD every year, so the dramatic reduction in the old cases is quite an achievement. Complainants and respondents alike should hope that the agency manages to maintain this level of efficiency.
Must a charity that offers free reconstructive surgery to female victims of domestic violence also provide those services to a gay man? No, said the MCAD in a decision last September. Only two months earlier the Legislature and Governor had prohibited places of public accommodations from excluding men from women’s restrooms and locker rooms, so you might think the case would have grabbed the odd headline, but apart from this Mass Lawyers Weekly article it received surprisingly little media attention.
The respondent was the R.O.S.E (Regaining One’s Self Esteem) Fund, a non-profit that seeks to help women who are the survivors of domestic violence. In 2008 it declined to extend its services to Kevin Doran, whose male partner had assaulted him, leaving him with broken teeth and facial bones. With the support of Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (GLAD), Mr. Doran argued that the ROSE Fund is a place of public accommodation and that by turning him away it had violated the Massachusetts anti-discrimination laws.
In 2014 an MCAD hearing officer ruled in favor of the ROSE Fund, finding that the organization was not a place of public accommodation. In its appeal brief GLAD said the decision meant that “ROSE can now discriminate not only against men, but also on the basis of race, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, and disability as well.”
Nevertheless the full three-member Commission upheld the 2014 decision on First Amendment grounds:
“The U.S. Supreme Court has recognized the venerable history of the public accommodation laws in Massachusetts, but when applied to expressive activity, the laws may not act to compel certain speech in violation of the First Amendment.”
For that reason, the Commission held that “a private charity set up with the express purpose of serving a narrow community may be allowed to make choices about whom to serve, based on the purpose of the organization and consistent selection criteria.”
This is a very narrow ruling. The MCAD limits its First Amendment expressive-activity exception to a thin sliver of entities: tax-exempt corporations set up to serve a “narrow community,” as opposed to regular businesses and individuals who do not have tax-exempt status and cater to the general public. The decision sits awkwardly alongside expressive-conduct cases from other jurisdictions such as Elane Photography (photographers fined for refusing to photograph same-sex commitment ceremony) and Barronnelle Stutzman (flower arranger fined for refusing to design arrangement for her friend’s same-sex wedding). In those cases, the fact that the defendants’ businesses consisted of expressive activity did not exempt them from the legal obligation to provide their services at same-sex weddings. If those are not examples of the state “compelling certain speech” I don’t know what is.
And as for why tax-exempt corporations should have greater free-speech rights than the rest of us, that is not something the MCAD’s Doran decision addresses.
October 26, 2016:- With less than a fortnight to go until the general election, now is the time to start thinking about the day after.
In addition to choosing the state’s presidential electors, in 13 days’ time Massachusetts voters will elect the state legislature, officially known as the Great and General Court of Massachusetts. Perhaps “elect” is too strong a word given that almost 80% of the seats are uncontested, earning Massachusetts a competitiveness ranking of 44 out of 50. Nevertheless, even without the ordeal of an actual race many freshly re-elected politicians tend to experience feelings of relief and generosity of spirit, which makes Election Day + 1 an ideal time to ask them for a favor.
If you are willing to make one post-election request of your state representative and senator, please consider asking them to co-sponsor a bill to restore some balance to the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD). The goal is quite modest. If enacted, this piece of legislation would require the MCAD to make sure that it only handles cases that fall within its jurisdiction. In fact it does not even go that far. It puts the onus on the respondent (the person being accused of discrimination) to file a motion to dismiss, which would automatically stay, i.e. pause, the investigation until the MCAD determines that it does, in fact, have jurisdiction.
Why is this necessary? Because, as a report by the State Auditor showed, the MCAD routinely investigates cases that are outside its statutory remit, which not only contributes to the agency’s four-year backlog but is unfair to the individuals who are haled in and investigated without justification. Click here for my article on the subject in the Massachusetts Bar Association’s Lawyers Journal.
Invidious discrimination is real, and there are enough cases that do fall within the MCAD’s jurisdiction without the agency having to spend its budget investigating cases that do not. The new legislation would restore some balance. If you would like a copy of the bill and a bill summary for legislators and their aides, email peter@petervickery.com with the words “MCAD Bill” in the subject line.
Invidious discrimination does occur, and we are fortunate to have an agency tailor-made to address it, namely the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD). But the current four-year backlog of cases at the MCAD is hurting litigants on both sides, employers and employees alike. Justice delayed is justice denied, as the saying goes. And most reasonable people would agree that the MCAD should not handle cases outside its jurisdiction.
So what should we do about the problem? Check out my article in the current edition of the Massachusetts Bar Association’s Lawyers Journal by clicking here.
September 1, 2016:- Employers take note: In compliance with the Act Relative to Transgender Discrimination that Governor Baker signed into law in July, earlier today the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) filed with the Clerk of the House of Representatives its Gender Identity Guidance. Much of the document is old, a restatement of the MCAD’s 2015 Advisory, including the “best practices” e.g. “update personnel records, email systems, and other documents to reflect [an] employee’s stated name and gender identity, and ensure confidentiality of any prior documentation of an employee’s pre-transition name or gender marker.”
But the section of the Guidance regarding proof of gender identity and restrooms (Part III. D) is new. Readers will recall that the statute requires that employers allow employees and members of the public to use the restroom “consistent with their gender identity.” The Guidance states that “[r]equiring an employee to provide identification or proof of any particular medical procedure (including gender affirming surgery) in order to access gender designated facilities, may be evidence of discriminatory bias” (emphasis added).
This is important to note because an earlier part of the Guidance (III. A: Definition of Gender Identity) states that when it investigates claims of discrimination the MCAD may look at “medical records from medical or other professionals involved in the treatment or transition of the individual seeking, in the process of, or who has completed gender transition.”
In a nutshell: When an employee files a discrimination claim against the employer the MCAD can consider evidence of a medical procedure, but ahead of time — unless it wishes to invite an MCAD investigation — an employer must not ask an employee for proof of any particular medical procedure.
July 22, 2016:- When Governor Baker signs into law Senate Bill 2199, titled “An Act to Establish Pay Equity,” Massachusetts employment law will un-define (not merely re-define) an important word. Here is the text of the very first section of the bill:
Section 1 of chapter 149 of the General Laws, as appearing in the 2014 Official Edition, is hereby amended by striking out the definition of “Woman”.
So, farewell “woman,” a word that the statute used to define as “a female eighteen or over” but now does not define at all.
And farewell “sex,” too. Out with the hackneyed old phrase “no employer shall discriminate in any way in the payment of wages as between the sexes,” and in with the new: “No employer shall discriminate in any way on the basis of gender in the payment of wages.”
Pondering the replacement of sex with gender, and mulling over one of the other laws enacted this session, An Act Relative to Transgender Discrimination, which prohibits discrimination in public accommodations on the basis of gender identity, I see the potential for some mischief.
Could an employer charged with discriminating on the basis of gender raise the defense that the gender of her employees is information to which she is not privy? After all, gender is a matter of identity not physiology. I know this because I just read it in the relevant statute (clause 59, if you’re curious), which tells me in pertinent part:
“Gender identity” shall mean a person’s gender-related identity, appearance or behavior, whether or not that gender-related identity, appearance or behavior is different from that traditionally associated with the person’s physiology or assigned sex at birth.
Got that? Gender identity means “gender-related identity, appearance or behavior.” If you are not satisfied with that definition and worry about the challenges of establishing gender identity in the courtroom, fear not; the Legislature recognized the need for greater clarity as to “when and how gender identity may be evidenced” and saw the need for guidance. In addition to having a stab at it themselves (the statute says that litigants may offer any of the following: “medical history, care or treatment of the gender-related identity, consistent and uniform assertion of the gender-related identity, or any other evidence that the gender-related identity is sincerely held as part of a person’s core identity”) lawmakers delegated the task of crafting said guidance to the Attorney General and the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination. They are due to report to the Legislature by September 1, 2016.
In the meantime, what do we know? Well, we have replaced wage discrimination on the basis of sex (a matter of physiology) with wage discrimination on the basis of gender (a matter of identity). Of course, how a person “identifies” is not always obvious, and some think it shows rather poor manners to ask. So in the inevitable litigation, I can imagine a cross-examination of an employer along these lines:
Q. Does your employee Valery earn more than your employee Valerie for comparable work?
July 1, 2016:- The term “mission creep” refers to a military operation that gradually expands beyond its stated objectives. A new report provides evidence of a government commission repeatedly extending its reach beyond the parameters laid out in its statutory remit, a phenomenon I hereby dub “commission creep.”
The State Auditor has published an official report on the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) and in addition to revealing the usual, garden-variety problems that bedevil state agencies (e.g. mismanagement, inefficiency, and poor book-keeping) it confirms a long-harbored suspicion: The MCAD asserts jurisdiction where it has none. This matters not only to the small business owners who find themselves the target of costly investigations that drag on for years, but to all citizens who expect public servants to abide by one of the bedrock principles of constitutional government, namely the separation of powers (see Article 30 of the Massachusetts Constitution).
Despite clear statutory language confining its jurisdiction to cases filed within 300 days of the last allegedly discriminatory act, the Commission investigates cases filed after the deadline. And it does so on a scale that suggests something more than ineptitude, no mere unfortunate series of oopsy daisy events.
So that readers may judge for themselves, here is the text of the statute (section 5 of chapter 151B of the General Laws) in words as clear and unambiguous as the English language permits:
Any complaint filed pursuant to this section must be so filed within 300 days after the alleged act of discrimination.
The word must falls into the category of words legislative drafters call mandatory, as opposed to precatory or hortatory. In the vernacular, it is hard not mushy.
Nevertheless, the State Auditor’s report (p. 11) reveals that in the three-year period of the audit (2012-2015) the MCAD processed at least 123 separate cases where it lacked subject matter jurisdiction because the applicable statute of limitations had run its course:
[D]uring our audit period, MCAD accepted 123 complaints beyond the 300-day timeframe for complainants to file their complaints. MCAD regulations allow for this 300-day timeframe to be extended under certain conditions, but there was no documentation in the case files to substantiate that any of these complaints met those conditions.
I cannot tell whether the auditors independently identified the 123 cases or simply made note of the instances where the MCAD itself had determined that it lacked jurisdiction on the basis of the limitation period. If the latter, then the determination would have come at the end of the MCAD’s investigative phase, the point at which the Commission issues a Lack of Probable Cause (LOPC) finding. On average that point now arrives four years — yes, four years — after the filing of the complaint. In the meantime MCAD investigators will have required the employer to devote hours responding to questions and demands for internal documents and to attending “investigative conferences” at the agency’s offices.
Either way, this is an extraordinary finding on the part of the State Auditor. The 300-day deadline is not some off-the-cuff recommendation or flexible guideline but a statutory limitation. The Legislature decided that the deadline for filing a discrimination complaint with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) is 300 days, and only the Legislature can amend a statute. By flouting the limitation period so often, the MCAD has arrogated to itself the power to legislate, a power the Massachusetts Constitution expressly reserves to the legislative branch.
The report bears out something I have suspected for some years, i.e. that the MCAD investigates cases where it clearly lacks jurisdiction. Because of my experience with the MCAD, after the 2014 gubernatorial election I sent the incoming Baker-Polito administration a proposal that would remedy the problem, and the associated problem of the MCAD improperly asserting jurisdiction over employers with fewer than six employees (another statutory limit on the MCAD’s jurisdiction called the “small-business exemption”). My proposal is this:
If a respondent files a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, the MCAD shall suspend its investigation until it has adjudicated the motion.
The proposal does not require action on the part of the Legislature. With a nudge from the Governor the Commissioners could make it happen via a simple amendment to the MCAD’s regulations, with proper notice and comment. Under my proposal, the MCAD would have to deal with the threshold matter of jurisdiction before putting the employer to the expense of a full-blown, years-long investigation.
I submitted this suggestion back in January 2015. In view of the State Auditor’s findings, I shall re-send it.
April 13, 2016:- From now on, developers can be sued for housing discrimination in Massachusetts even if they did not intend to discriminate and complied with all applicable laws.
In a major decision, the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) held that “a disparate impact claim is cognizable even if a defendant who is a private owner adheres to statutory, regulatory, and contractual obligations.” The case is Burbank Apartments Tenants Association v. Kargmanand it is consistent with Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion in Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. The Inclusive Communities Project, Inc. Like SCOTUS, the SJC rationalized its decision by analogizing to employment law: “[W]e conclude from our employment discrimination precedent that… [the disparate impact] theory of liability is cognizable under G.L. c. 151B, §§ 4(6), (7), and (11).”
Springfield, Mass. :- It doesn’t happen every day, or very often at all for that matter, so this case merits a mention. An employer terminated a 64-year old, White, male employee in favor of hiring a “younger more aggressive sales person who spoke Spanish and understood Latino culture.” The older White man sued for age and ethnicity discrimination and won.
A hearing officer at the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) ordered the company to pay $11,100.00 in lost wages and $5,000.00 for emotional distress. You can read the full decision (issued January 20, 2016) here.
Resist the temptation to fire first and ask questions later. That is the headline and key message of my latest article in Business West magazine, which you can read by clicking here.
Peter Vickery, Esq., 