Montrose - Daily Press

In a perfect world, promotion is on merit. In the real world, things get in the way — everything from the whim of those making the decision, to corruption. But when fairness and promotion upon merit can be legally enforced, they should be.

This is why the U.S. Supreme Court's Monday ruling on firefighters' promotions, though controversial and an embarrassment for nominee Sonia Sotomayor (who sat on the appeals court that rejected the firefighters' claims), was correct.

The high court found New Haven, Conn. was wrong to throw out a promotion exam given to firefighters because not enough minorities could have been promoted, based on the results.

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The AP reports nearly 60 firefighters — including 22 African Americans and 18 Hispanics — passed the promotion test. Of them, two Hispanics and 17 whites could actually expect a promotion to captain or lieutenant.

New Haven, saying that it feared lawsuits, threw out the tests so that it could not be accused of disparate discrimination under the Civil Rights Act. The white firefighters sued, saying the city committed intentional discrimination, itself a violation of the Act.

Fear of a suit wasn't enough, Justice Anthony Kennedy said. New Haven needed strong evidence of disparate discrimination, and also proof the exams weren't job-related, which they clearly were.

"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," Kennedy's opinion stated.

Dissenting justices say none of the firefighters had a vested right to promotion.

We feel for New Haven, which looks to have been caught between a rock and a hard place: namely, as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg noted, the disparate and intentional discrimination directives under the Civil Rights Act.

More than that, though, we feel for the firefighters — whatever the color of their skin — whose proven skills were rejected out of fear of what might be, which is hardly a viable strategy, no matter who the employer is.

New Haven could have better directed its energies toward fighting demonstrated discrimination instead of, however inadvertently, practicing it.

Comments

REALLY wrote on Jul 3, 2009 9:22 PM:

" I DONT KNOW WHERE YOU LEARNED POLITICS, BUT THERES NO MONEY OR PROMOTIONS BASED ON MERIT. "




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concerned citizen wrote on Jul 1, 2009 8:19 AM:

" How do you figure it's an embarrassment for Judge Sotomayor? Four members of the S.Ct. voted to affirm the lower court decision, not to mention the majority of judges that voted with her on the Circuit Ct. of App. An appellate judge can only follow precedent, which is what she did. The S.Ct. has more leeway. Who knows how she would have decided had she been on the S.Ct.? If you understood the case, you'd know that it's not as simple as deciding what's "fair" in this case. "




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