Green v. Brennan (14-613)

argument 14-613

Green v. Brennan

Supreme Court of the United States 57 min 7 speakers 8 chapters transcribed 5 days ago official recording ↗

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What is a constructive discharge and how does it differ from an actual termination?

John G. Roberts 0:01

We'll hear argument next in Case 14613, Greene v. Brennan. Mr. Wolfman. MR. Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court, the basic principles of this Court's timeliness cases, Title VII and otherwise, is that the clock starts when the cause of action is complete. Because a constructive discharge claim is complete only after the employee resigns, this Court should reverse. The Court has indicated that limitations principles should be as simple as possible. The Tenth Circuit's rule, however, injects unnecessary complexity. Identifying the last discriminatory act in an alleged hostile work environment can be difficult. And as this Court said in early — What does the statute say? Can we look at the statute?

John G. Roberts 0:45

What does the statute say? The statute says matter — the Grieve Party has to bring within 45 days the matter alleged to be discriminatory. The matter

Stephen G. Breyer 0:53

alleged to be discriminatory. And is the resignation of the employee a matter alleged to be discriminatory? Absolutely, Your Honor.

John G. Roberts 1:07

The employee discriminated against himself? No, the matter alleged is the whole of the claim. As the dictionaries say, and as most of the lower courts say, the matter is just a shorthanded way of referring to the cause of action that the person is bringing. Here, the matter, and this is undisputed, is a constructive discharge, which, as this Court said in suitors, has two elements, both the precipitating conduct and the resignation. Without both, there is no constructive discharge claim.

Antonin Scalia 1:36

But for a constructive discharge claim to succeed, you have to point to a discriminatory or an unlawful act. It is

John G. Roberts 1:45

true. And

Antonin Scalia 1:46

so we have to find this anyway.

John G. Roberts 1:49

It is true that that is one component. There is no question that there are going to be — again — Souter said there would be both precipitating conduct and the resignation. Both elements must be present for the constructive discharge. But let's assume for a second that the matter alleged to be discriminatory is ambiguous in some sense. Then the Court should just go to its time-honored default rule. Default rule is that the cause of action must be fully formed before the limitations period is triggered.

Stephen G. Breyer 2:22

Of course, that's — That rule is adopted for statutes that do not have a conciliation provision. What use is the conciliation provision once the employee has

John G. Roberts 2:33

quit? I think not, Your Honor. The conciliation process always anticipates that the claim will have occurred, that the acts giving rise to the claim, including all the elements associated have occurred before conciliation. That's fine, but the

Stephen G. Breyer 2:49

employer

John G. Roberts 2:49

can

Stephen G. Breyer 2:49

make it up, you know. It's — they try to bring the employer and the employee together. That is true, but only — But he's quit. He's gone. He's no longer

John G. Roberts 2:59

an employee. What conciliation — Your Honor, that is true for any of the acts that could be brought prior to the 45-day trigger. For instance, a termination would fit exactly the scenario you're suggesting, a termination which, after all, is the analog to the constructive discharge of That claim cannot be brought into the conciliation process until it exists. So it's just that the first component of the process, what you're referring to, Your Honor, as conciliation, moves quickly into a more adversarial stages. And all of those stages presuppose that there is a cause of action that exists or a claim that exists. And again, that's quite consistent with this Court's default rule that that The limitations period is not triggered until the claim is fully formed, and that's perfectly consistent with all of this Court's Title VII timeliness cases.

John G. Roberts 3:55

If you look at, for instance, Evans, if you look at Ricks, at Ricks there was a fully formed cause of action, and that's why the limitations period was triggered, because the limitations period was triggered by the denial of tenure.

Elena Kagan 4:10

I somehow feel you've given up too much. you can charge a discriminatory termination, correct? And that's the employer making a decision that he's going to fire you for reasons that are not legitimate. They're discriminatory. Isn't a constructive discharge that the moment that the environment has gotten so hostile that you feel overwhelmed and have to leave,