Political Discussions
Sotomayer's Firefighter Descision Reversed
Posted by satijournal • 6/29/09 • Subscribe to this Discussion [RSS] • Report This Topic
Topics: politics
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court ruled Monday that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were unfairly denied promotions because of their race, reversing a decision that high court nominee Sonia Sotomayor endorsed as an appeals court judge.
New Haven was wrong to scrap a promotion exam because no African-Americans and only two Hispanic firefighters were likely to be made lieutenants or captains based on the results, the court said Monday in a 5-4 decision. The city said that it had acted to avoid a lawsuit from minorities.
"Fear of litigation alone cannot justify an employer's reliance on race to the detriment of individuals who passed the examinations and qualified for promotions," Justice Anthony Kennedy said in his opinion for the court. He was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.
[...]
In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the white firefighters "understandably attract this court's sympathy. But they had no vested right to promotion. Nor have other persons received promotions in preference to them."
Justices Stephen Breyer, David Souter and John Paul Stevens signed onto Ginsburg's dissent, which she read aloud in court Monday.
www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/06/29/business/AP-US-SupremeCourt-Fire.html
Thoughts?
User Comments
-
I overheard some of the guys talking about this yesterday. I can't repeat what they said on this forum
Let's just say there were a lot of racial slurs. I don't know that this reversal was the best thing to do at this time, given the current climate, even if it wasn't the best law. The conversation I heard yesterday kinda confirmed that for me.-
Funny that they scrapped the test to "avoid a lawsuit from minorities" and then they got a lawsuit from the firefighters. The city of New Haven screwed up. They could have promoted just one firefighter and probably would have been off the hook. Now they're going to be forced to promote people who might not even be well qualified.
-
-
Sad, but to be expected from this court. Of course, those who would use this decision as a reason not to confirm Sotomayer don't get it. Same with those who would take this as a license to voice racist views.
-
Confirm Sotomeyer?
If a white male had made the statement that he would be a better judge because he was a White male as opposed to a Latina Woman, We wouldn't even be hearing his name mentioned in the same sentence as "confirmation" anymore.
The fact that this obviously racist woman is even a consideration is the single biggest proof that institutional racism is alive, well, and thriving under Obama. -
*nods*
-
-
markstoneman says: "Sad, but to be expected from this court. Of course, those who would use this decision as a reason not to confirm Sotomayer don't get it. Same with those who would take this as a license to voice racist views."
Let me get this straight. Believing that people should be promoted on merit is racist? The test was thrown out because no blacks and only two minorities passed it. Firefighters who EARNED the promotion were denied because the rules were changed after the fact. Why not give the people who EARNED promotions their advancement and tell the others to study harder for the next try?
The only legitimate objection to the court's decision would be one based on federalism. I think even Leftists realize how hypocritical it would be for them to take that tact. Maybe its time we actually start evaluating people on merit. That, sir, is NOT racism.-
You obviously don't understand the dynamics of how this is and has been playing out.
Promotions here - and even the attainment of jobs - are NOT merit based. There is a high level of racism among the firefighters and that bias has been loud and clear throughout the years by the glaring absence of minorities in the ranks.
-
-
Sotomayor's ruling was a correct one because it was based on precedent. It is not a federal judge's place to set precedent; that is the role of SCOTUS, which is what the Robert's court did with its ruling.
-
Cop out,
Show me the precedense that exactly matches the circumstance.
You can either accept precedent cases because they are "close enough" or you can make precedense. As far as i've seen there has been NO discussion about what part of this test that was "racist" in its formation.
The stupidity of the lawsuit, and of Sotomayor was to simply accept that if minorities failed, it HAS to be racist. Using a group of less than 80 as a basis for statistical certainty.
Maybe the ones that passed, studied harder, wanted it more. based on nothing else than their personalities. How ridiculous do we have to get to assume that in such a small sample, there can't be any deviation from the curve.
Thank god the SC made some sense of this debacle. And congrats to the ones that got promoted and now have 6 years of back pay coming in one fat check. I would LOVE to be around for the victory party. -
The test was only to determine who QUALIFIED for promotion -- not who gets promoted. So calm down. This isn't over yet.
-
Erik - if you lived here you would understand just how racist it is. Some commentary that I heard yesterday included (censored though, because it goes even beyond my foul mouthed line of decency) Those stupid *bleep*ggers deserved it because they're lazy no good *bleep*ggers. Stupid *bleep*ggers don't deserve these jobs OUR jobs etc and so forth.
The whole running commentary revolved around the fact that they didn't want *bleep* in their firehouses.
And you know what? There isn't one single non white man in our fire departments here. Not one. No minorities, no women.
I have a special place in my heart for firefighters, but the racism has got to stop. -
there is a certain hereditary nature to many fire departments, though i don't know if that was the case there. I'm not sure i care to comment on the case itself because, though I have heard a plethora of rhetoric on it, I have heard precious little solid unbiased fact. I haven't even heard the actual case name (as in ___ v. ___) why is that? -
I don't know enough about the specific case, either. I had just been addressing the natural order of things here. I knew that there was some racism in the departments....but after what I heard yesterday I was..appalled. I had no idea it ran so *shudder* deeply.
I am willing to bet that there is a lot more to this than meets the eye, and that perhaps, just maybe, the original ruling was more right than we thought. Wrong time perhaps, wrong case even...but right reason. -
woah! that was from members of the DEPARTMENT?
-
@Agit8r - here is what I found. And the case is Ricci v DeStefano.
"In Monday's ruling, Justice Anthony Kennedy said, "Fear of litigation alone cannot justify an employer's reliance on race to the detriment of individuals who passed the examinations and qualified for promotions."
"In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the white firefighters "understandably attract this court's sympathy. But they had no vested right to promotion. Nor have other persons received promotions in preference to them."
news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090629/ap_on_go_su_co/us_supreme_court_firefighters_l...
"Justice Kennedy's opinion for the court attempts to strike a delicate balance," said Jon Bauer, who specializes in employment discrimination law at the University of Connecticut School of Law. "The court was trying to find a way to reconcile two aspects of antidiscrimination law that are somewhat in tension: Employers are generally prohibited from making decisions on the basis of race. On the other hand, they sometimes are required to take race into account."
www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-new_haven-firefighters-0630.artjun30,0,...
Face it, no matter which way they decided, only 50% of the people would be happy. -
Agit8r - yep. Members of the department.
Antics - while only 50% of the people would be happy, these things aren't (or shouldn't) be about making people happy, but rather to make sure that they are being treated equally. While I have stated several times that the law/action that was just reversed may have been the right ruling, wrong case - I do firmly believe (now) that there is some serious racial foul play going on here.
If the racists and bubba's aren't happy because they can no longer prevent minorities from getting jobs, you won't see me crying in my soup about it. -
Anok, I know it isn't about making people happy. I was just providing Agit8r some background and I probably stated that wrong.
However, I don't think this is about people preventing minorities from advancing. It might be, I don't know. But I do know that the guy (Ricci) who worked hard to pass that test shouldn't have been kept back from advancing because the city was afraid of a lawsuit.
The most qualified people should advance, no matter the color of their skin. -
Anok,
I don't think you get it.
It doesn't matter how many people are screaming racist slurs in the streets or even in the firehouses. This is about the TEST.
Now, I'd love to see a single question on that test that would have been harder for a black person to answer than a white. If such questions DO exist, and the reason for the discrepancy is cultural, then we have a problem.
But i've seen the materials that You have to study here to become a fire Lt. And quite frankly, i don't know how the burning temperature of certain materials or the water pressure calculations for altitude variations is any different for a black or white person.
If the blacks failed in answering questions that are relevant to the job, it isn't racist. Even if 100% of them always fail.. it isn't racist.
I just saw a group of welders testing for a job on a shipyard here. They all had to weld the same material. And achieve the same result to pass. Only 2 passed the final test. And they were both Hispanic. Should the 6 white guys that failed the test scream that the metal properties are racist?
Until there is PROOF that there were race oriented questions on the test. We only have a case of a group of predominantly white test-takers who were better prepared this time. -
What I have personally witnessed here is that even though a person completes the test - they are told that they failed, or will not or still do not qualify.
A friend of mine's son just went through this. He passed the test. Twice. They are still refusing to hire him. He scored higher than several other applicants who got the jobs instead of him.
What was the difference? He's black, they are white.
(And this is from a rather prominent member of the city, city council, and political circles - her son is the one being denied the job - so it's not like this is biased info. Even my stepfather - retired and racist - called what happened BS).
-
-
Isn't it great that the white guys on the bench had so much empathy for the white firemen? Okay, I more or less stole that from Justice Ginsberg, but it was funny. And I'm seeing that empathy here too.
And for the totally oblivious, yes, this is a dig at those conservatives who made such a big deal of Obama's "empathy" comments.
Add Your Comment
Login to leave a message.
