Is The Anti Discrimination Law Being Misused?

The recent immigration laws seemed to have brought our either an error in or misuse of anti discrimination laws. It seems that four years ago Swift & Co. meat packing plants was fined for discrimination when they demanded proof of legal status. This involved two different parts of the federal government which are at cross purposes.

The lawsuit should have been thrown out of court if the plaintiffs were unable to show that Latino’s were singled our for special treatment. If all employees no matter their race or ethnicity were treated the same then there was no basis for the lawsuit. Racial profile is not a smart thing to do in this case since illegal immigrants though seemingly predominately Hispanic do come in other races and ethnicities.

Looking at my deduction above and comparing it to the following statement shows one place where the anti discrimination laws are being misused..

In June, the Department of Homeland Security issued a proposed rule that companies give workers 60 days to resolve discrepancies in their Social Security records. But the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission warned that the proposal could lead businesses to violate nondiscrimination laws, and the rule has not been adopted.

As you can see there is no evidence that a company following the above rule would be showing any bias toward a person based on their ethnicity of race. This tends to make me believe the attorneys and courts involved are misusing the law and are not throwing our cases which are obviously non discriminatory.

Here is another misapplication of the law since an employee is not barred from asking for additional proof of identity by the anti discrimination law as long and that asking is done equally across racial or ethnic lines.

Federal law requires businesses to have job applicants fill out an I-9 form and to verify that the person can legally work in the United States by checking documents — usually a Social Security card and photo identification. But employers are prohibited from asking for additional documentation to prove legal residency.

I believe this is blatant lawsuit abuse and the plaintiffs are harassing these companies for their own purposes. Such abuse needs to be addressed by the legislation. They could demand a sizable fine be paid by those plaintiffs whose case is thrown out of court.

There is also some question about the constitutionality of federal anti-discrimination laws that allow lawsuits against organizations or businesses , In reading the Fourteenth Amendment it can clearly be seen that the federal governments authority in regulating these activities is only extended to the states themselves and not to the citizens of the state or any organization they see fit to form themselves in. I do not believe the elastic clause(last part of Article 1 Section 8) should be used to expand the Federal government’s power in this case. The Federal government could require that the state in question pass and enforce anti Discrimination legislation that does effect individuals and organizations. This would be much like what New Jersey courts mandated in respect to homosexual unions in their states except it would not violate the division of powers as the New Jersey action did.

Do not get me wrong as I believe legal action should be taken against Swift & Co. with the hopes that there defense may have an effect on getting the Anti Discrimination laws correctly applied to take into account the need to enforce immigration laws. I know it may be a burden for Swift but it seems to be the likeliest way to correct the wrong that is done in the court systems.

Source 1 is about Swift & Co and how they are caught in a legal crossfire.