Statute and Case Law Relationship Paper

Statute and Case Law Relationship

Gender has always been a mainstream modus of discrimination within the employment matrix of the United States. PRICE WATERHOUSE v. HOPKINS was one of those cases that had been brought forth in front of the Supreme Court. The respondent claimed that she was placed into a neutral category in her occupation. She, in other words, was not given the opportunity to climb the corporate ladder because of her gender. Because of her situation she decided to bring litigation against the company under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, charging that it had discriminated against her on the basis of sex in its partnership decisions. The District Court ruled in favor of the respondent in regards to the question of liability. The court ruled that the petitioner had, in fact shown discrimination against the respondent on the grounds of gender. The court of appeals later affirmed the judgment which was set by the district court, sighting stereotype as being the facilitator of discrimination in the case. Both courts held that "an employer who has allowed a discriminatory motive to play a part in an employment decision must prove by clear and convincing evidence that it would have made the same decision in the absence of discrimination, and that petitioner had not carried this burden" (U.S. Supreme Court, n.d).

This court case has had large scale ramifications in the business world. The Supreme Court ruling in this case placed an example on future judgments. The Supreme Court concluded from this case that when a plaintiff in a Title VII case proves that her gender played a part in an employment decision, the defendant may avoid a finding of liability by proving by a preponderance of the evidence that it would have made the same decision even if it had not taken the plaintiff's gender into consideration. This gave employers a considerable amount of leverage when it comes to gender litigations. As long as the company can prove that its actions where not in fact based upon the gender of the individual, it will not be liable for litigation that may be brought before them. This decision in a way changes the whole social demographic of the workplace. It is important to note that the conventional rules of Title VII still apply in all cases subsequent to this one (U.S. Supreme Court, n.d).

The wording of the ruling also has a deeper context than what is traditionally written. For instance, the phrase "because of" can point to prohibited factors in regards to the legislative statute's history and other illegitimate allegations. The Statute however prevents the adoption of an "evidentiary rule which places the burden of persuasion on the defendant to demonstrate that legitimate concerns would have justified an adverse employment action where the plaintiff has convinced the fact finder that a forbidden factor played a substantial role in the employment decision. Such a rule has been adopted in tort and other analogous types of cases, where leaving the burden of proof on the plaintiff to prove "but-for" causation would be unfair or contrary to the deterrent purposes embodied in the concept of duty of care." These interpretations of the case have