Moar BIBILCAL references today. Interesting…
Gatekeeper won't post em though, cause muh yahoo.
Co-workers could bear costs of accommodating religious employees in the workplace if Supreme Court tosses out 46-year-old precedent
The Supreme Court may soon transform the role of faith in the workplace, which could have the effect of elevating the rights of religious workers at the expense of co-workers.
On April 18, 2023, the court heard oral arguments in Groff v. DeJoy, a case addressing an employer’s obligation to accommodate religious employees’ requests under federal law. The dispute involves a Christian postal worker who quit his job and sued the U.S. Postal Service after he was unable to find coverage for his Sunday shifts. Current law requires employers to make accommodations for workers’ religious requests only if doing so doesn’t impose more than a minimal cost on their business, known as the “de minimis” standard.
After listening to the oral arguments in the case, I believe it’s very likely the court will overturn the de minimis standard and require employers to accommodate more religious requests. As Justice Gorsuch stated, “I think there’s common ground that de minimis can’t be the test, in isolation at least, because Congress doesn’t pass civil rights legislation to have de minimis effect, right?”
In my view, as a scholar of employment discrimination, the only questions are how far the justices will go – and who will ultimately pay the price.
Religious rights in the workplace
Employers are required to accommodate the religious needs of employees under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, so long as they can do so without imposing an “undue hardship.”
Congress didn’t define what that term meant, and it took another dozen years for the U.S. Supreme Court to do so in Trans World Airlines v. Haridson. The court determined that Title VII does not require employers to bear more than a “de minimis” or minimal cost in accommodating religious employees.
Relying on this narrow decision, employees requesting religious accommodation in the workplace have generally fared poorly in the courts. Supporters of more religious accommodation in the workplace have tried many times to amend Title VII to redefine undue hardship as a “significant difficulty or expense.”
From 1994 to 2013, over a dozen bills attempting to codify this definition were introduced in Congress, with none coming close to passage. After failing to persuade Congress to amend Title VII, religious advocates turned to the Supreme Court. However, the court’s decision to hear this case is highly unusual, since it suggests it is considering overturning its own long-standing precedent.
The other key issue in the case is whether or not a religious accommodation that imposes on co-workers can count as an undue hardship on the employer.
Since Trans World Airlines v. Haridson, most federal appellate courts have determined that accommodations affecting religious employees’ co-workers – such as those requiring them to take over undesirable weekend shifts – can be an undue hardship, even if the business is not directly harmed. In practice, that has made it easier for an employer to avoid accommodating a religious request.
moar
https://www.yahoo.com/news/co-workers-could-bear-costs-123301577.html