Nevada Human Resources Department v. Hibbs, 538 US 721 (2003), is the case of the United States Supreme Court stating that the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 is "narrowly targeted" in "sex-based overgeneralization" and thus represents "a valid exercise of the power [congress] under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment."
Video Nevada Department of Human Resources v. Hibbs
Undang-undang
FMLA
The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) allows qualified employees to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave each year for several reasons, including the birth of a child or "serious health condition" of a spouse, child or employee's parents. FMLA also authorizes employees whose rights under FMLA have been violated to sue their employers for a fair remedy and compensation for money.
In enforcing FMLA, Congress requested two powers under the Constitution. In organizing private entrepreneurs under the FMLA, he appealed to his forces under the Trade Clause. In organizing public entrepreneurs, he relies on his power under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. Section 5 provides Congressional forces "to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of [Fourteenth Amendment]." One of these provisions is the Equal Protection Clause, which prohibits countries denying to persons in their jurisdictions "equal legal protection." It is his power to apply the same Clause of Protection that Congress exercises in enacting FMLA.
Country sovereignty immunity
In Hans v. Louisiana (1890), the United States Supreme Court declared that the Eleventh Amendment forbids states prosecuted in federal courts without their consent by their own citizens, despite the Eleventh Eleventh language of the Eleventh. Congress, however, when acting under the powers of Section 5, can undermine the sovereign state's immunity and allow the state to be prosecuted for damages of money. The Supreme Court has stated that Congress may do this only if personal remedies enforced under Section 5 have "conformity and proportionality" to constitutional errors that want to be corrected. Without the necessary conformity and proportionality, Congress can not constitutionally authorize private litigants to recover state compensation, although such plaintiffs may demand equal assistance.
Maps Nevada Department of Human Resources v. Hibbs
Facts and procedural history of this case
William Hibbs works for Nevada's Human Resources Department in the Welfare Division. He requested leave from the Department under FMLA to care for his wife, who had a car accident and had a neck surgery. The Department granted the request and informed Hibbs that he could use 12 full weeks of FMLA to go away intermittently as needed between May and December 1997. He used the leave intermittently until August 5 of that year, after which he did not return to work. In October, the Department informed Hibbs that he had spent his FMLA leave and was required to report to work on 12 November. When he failed to report, he was fired.
Hibbs then sued the Department in the United States District Court for Nevada District for alleged FMLA violations. He's looking for money compensation and other help. The district court provided a Department summary decision, finding that Hibbs claims under the FMLA are prohibited by the Eleventh Amendment. Hibbs appealed the verdict to the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, stating that FMLA was a valid exercise of Congressional powers under the Fourteenth Amendment, and reversed the decision of the district court judgment. After that the Supreme Court endorsed certiorari.
The majority opinion
The majority, in an opinion written by Chief Justice William Rehnquist, begin by reaffirming the City of Boerne v. Flores (1997), which is the first case to establish the requirement of "conformity and proportionality" for the law enacted under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Court declared that while the "powers of Congress to uphold" [the Fourteen] Amendments include the authority to correct and to prevent violations of the rights guaranteed there by prohibiting broader measures, including those not banned by the Amendment of the text, "an agreed solution Congress to enforce the Amendment shall not constitute an "attempt to substantively redefine the legal obligations of the State. "To prevent Congress from doing this, the Court said its case law requires the Section 5 legislation to" show 'the appropriateness and proportionality between injuries to be prevented or corrected and the means adopted for that purpose.' "
The Court recognizes that Congress, by enacting FMLA, has sought "to protect the right to be free from gender-based discrimination at work." The FMLA is intended to protect that right by guaranteeing for working women, which Congress is found to normally assume primary responsibility for family maintenance, the right to take unpaid leave to handle these responsibilities while still retaining employment. Whether FMLA is constitutional depends on whether Congress has evidence that states systematically violate women's workplace rights. To quote Bradwell v. Illinois and Goesaert v. Cleary , the majority recognize that there is a long history of legally-agreed discrimination against women in employment.
Congress, the majority said, first responded to this inequality by passing Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. the abolition of the title VII of the sovereign state's immunity upheld at Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, "the Court said," the country's gender discrimination does not stop. "The court noted that" the persistence of such unconstitutional discrimination by the Americans only justifies the [d] "part of the FMLA, designed to prevent discrimination Furthermore.
In addition, the majority continues, Congress has evidence that parental leave offered to fathers is rare, and states that "[t] his and other resignation policies are not caused by the physical needs of different men and women, but rather stereotypes of sex roles which permeates that caring for family members is a woman's work. "Even in countries where laws should offer parental leave to parents, such laws are" applied discriminatively. " Taking into account this condition, the majority concludes, Congress is justified in passing the FMLA.
The court added that previous cases that had violated the law passed under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment - cases such as Kimel v. Florida Bupati Board and Alabama University Board of Trustees v. Garrett - can be distinguished. These cases concern the law that Congress has agreed to combat what is considered discrimination based on age and disability. The court stated that because such discrimination is not subject to strict supervision under the Constitution, and because of unauthorized laws in Kimel and Garrett prohibits almost any such discrimination, the previous case hitting down laws that contain little "conformity and proportionality" to the mistakes they are looking for to fix. Gender-based discrimination, by contrast, is subject to intermediate supervision under the Constitution, and thus in enacting the FMLA "it is easier for Congress to show a pattern of constitutional violations of the state." In addition, the majority noted that FMLA places certain restrictions on the employee's right to take leave and limits the amount of damage that the plaintiff may sue for infringement. For that reason, the Court said, "we conclude that [FMLA's personal drug] is congruent and proportional to the remedial object, and can be 'understood as responsive, or designed to prevent, unconstitutional behavior.'
Concurrences
Judge Souter and Judge Stevens both wrote brief approvals. Judge Souter, in which Ginsburg and Breyer defense judges joined, approved the Court's opinion. He believes that "[e] ven to the Court's view of the scope of congressional powers under Ã, § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment," FMLA is lawful enforcement. He stressed, however, that he still disagrees with the Court's interpretation of the powers of Congress under the Fourteenth Amendment, citing dissent in Kimel, Garrett and Prepay Florida. Pascaminary Education Fee Board v. College Savings Bank .
Judge Stevens agreed on the judgment only. He doubts that FMLA is independently applicable under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, but believes that it is the constitutional use of congressional powers under the Trade Clause. Repeating the position he and other judges took in previous decisions, Judge Stevens stated that the Eleventh Amendment does not preclude Congress from enacting laws under the Trade Clause to allow citizens to sue their own countries for money damages. Thus, he concludes, the Hibbs suit is not banned by sovereign immunity and can proceed.
Dissents
Both Justice Scalia and Justice Kennedy put forward a different opinion. Judge Scalia joined the dissent of Judge Kennedy but wanted to "add one more observation." A legal action filed against Nevada under legislation enacted to protect against future violations of the Equal Protection Clause, Judge Scalia says, can not be justified by showing "a violation by another State, or by most other States, or even by 49 other States. "Instead, the plaintiff must point out that Congress prevented the Fourteenth Amendment offense" by the State against which enforcement action was taken, "which in this case is Nevada. Because Congress can not rely on what it calls "guilt by association", and because it believes the majority does not indicate that each of the 50 states has been involved in a gender-based offense of the Equal Protection Clause, Scalia Justice concluded that FMLA is unconstitutional.
The differences of opinion Judge Kennedy, united by Judge Scalia and Justice Thomas, stated that Congress simply did not stipulate that countries "engage [d] in wide-ranging discrimination on the basis of gender in the provision of family leave allowances." Justice Kennedy believes that the evidence summarized by the Court is too isolated and anecdotal to form such a pattern of discrimination. He also argues that the states actually "have advanced from Congress in providing the benefits of gender-neutral family leave." The fact that gender classification is the subject of increasing scrutiny, he said, "did not change its conclusions," because Hibbs still bears "the burden to show that Congress identifies unconstitutional history and patterns of employment discrimination by Americans." This is a burden, says Justice Kennedy Hibbs has not met. Thus the FMLA amounts to substantive changes within the range of the Fourteenth Amendment, not the enforcement of its provisions, and under Boerne , this is unconstitutional.
See also
- List of US Supreme Court cases, volume 538
- List of US Supreme Court cases
References
Further reading
- Siegel, Reva B. (2006). "You Come in a Far Way, Baby: A Rehnquist New Approach to Pregnancy Discrimination within Hibbs ". Stanford Law Reviews . 58 (6): 1871-1898. Archived from the original on 2011-01-09.
External links
- Text Nevada Human Resources Department v. Hibbs , 538 US 721 (2003) is available from: Cornell Ã, CourtListener Findlaw Google Scholar Ã, Justia Oyez
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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