GOP's Ugly Side Shows in Job Discrimination Debate

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by: Colorado Pols

The Grand Junction Sentinel's Charles Ashby reports, another great story outside the paywall:

Small businesses, just like larger ones, could face employment discrimination lawsuits under a bill that won preliminary approval in the Colorado House on Wednesday.

The measure, HB1136, extends to employees who work in business with 14 or fewer workers the same right to file anti-discrimination lawsuits against their employers that workers in larger companies can do in federal court.

The bill also extends to all employees regardless of the size of the business they work for the ability to file such lawsuits in state court.

Republicans mounted an hours-long unsuccessful opposition effort to this bill yesterday, with some 20 amendments of (to put it charitably) wildly varying seriousness, and a full-on ragefest about this bill as an "attack on small business" and "job creation for trial lawyers." FOX 31's Eli Stokols covered the scene:

Republicans brought more than a dozen amendments, including one to rename House Bill 1136 the “Trial Lawyers Employment Act”, simply to make political points and drive their Democratic colleagues nuts.

They accomplished that goal before the bill’s passage on a second reading voice vote, which was never in doubt.

“As former minority whip, I certainly appreciate the minority’s right to vigorously debate and stand up for one’s ideals. But there is a difference between having a thorough debate than purposely filibustering and obstructing the work of the House,” said Majority Leader Dickey Lee Hullinghorst, D-Boulder.

This isn't the first time we've been struck by the choices by legislative Republicans on where to make their ideological grandstands. Obviously, a minority is going to use the legislative process to lodge their objections to bills they cannot stop as memorably as possible. As contentious as this legislative session has been, hours-long bombastic debates would seem to be the norm.

But as the Sentinel's Ashby continues…why this bill?

“This is a complete outrage to small businesses,” said Rep. Jared Wright, R-Fruita. “We’re punishing economic growth in the state. We’re allowing frivolous lawsuits by employees to punish these small business. Do you think that’s going to help economic growth?”

Wright, who employed a trial lawyer for his own employment case against the city of Fruita after he resigned as a police officer there, [Pols emphasis] said the bill would only lead to jobs for lawyers.

There's a really big problem with this argument. This bill simply gives employees at small businesses the same relief from proven discrimination that businesses with more than 15 employees already have under federal law. Nobody's "allowing frivolous lawsuits." The lawsuit must still prevail in a court of law. The only way Rep. Jared Wright's argument makes sense, in fact, is if you believe that all such discrimination lawsuits are "frivolous."

Folks, if that's what they really believe, we think it should be broadly publicized.

8 thoughts on “GOP’s Ugly Side Shows in Job Discrimination Debate”

JeffcoBlue says:

April 18, 2013 at 9:20 am

NEWS FLASH: it's what they believe.

Yeah, it ought to be fucking publicized. I hope somebody mentions that to Chuck Plunkett over lunch at the Brown Palace sometime.

(mutters cuss words)

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Albert J. Nock says:

April 18, 2013 at 10:03 am

What would a trial lawyer’s trade association or lobbyist do? What actions would they take on behalf of the organization that hired them?

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1. JeffcoBlue says:
  
  April 18, 2013 at 12:36 pm
  
  I guess it depends on whether you think "trial lawyers" are the devil, Nockless.
  
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ArapaGOP says:

April 18, 2013 at 3:33 pm

WRONG. This bill doesn't give any new rights. Small business discrimination victims can still sue. This bill hikes punitive damages. Why?

Because bloodsucking trial lawyers won't help them without a big payoff.

This is a trial lawyer employment bill, plain and simple. Ambulance chasing lawyers care only about themselves.

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1. ClubTwitty says:
  
  April 18, 2013 at 3:36 pm
  
  Like this blood sucking ambulance chaser?
  
  http://rickwagnerslaw.blogspot.com/
  
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  1. Urban Snowshoer says:
    
    April 18, 2013 at 8:31 pm
    
    Speaking of ambulance chasers, whatever happened to Frank Azar the "Strong Arm." He had the most ridiculous and over-the top TV ads,
    
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ohwilleke says:

April 18, 2013 at 4:18 pm

ArapaGOP is wrong about employees of small businesses currently being able to sue, but there is some sense at some point to having a small business exclusion.

The notion is that in a very small business, the interactions between employer and employee are at such a personal level and so much of the hiring is simply a matter of hiring friends, family and neighbors which frequently has an obviously discriminatory effect. Thus, the assumptions of anti-discrimination law that employers have a basically meritocratic and bureaucratic hiring process don't map well to the real world hiring context for these employers, while leaving small business employers exposed to suits claiming that permissible non-racial reasons like friend and family ties with a discriminatory effect are really pretexts for a racial or other prohibited reason. This is similar to the exemption for homeowners renting rooms in their own residence for discriminatory reasons and the lack of law prohibiting people from discriminating in dating and marriage.

The counterargument is that in fact virtually nobody except governmental agency plaintiffs ever wins or brings a discrimination in hiring suit, because convincing a jury that you have damages because you out of all of the applicants are the one who would have been hired but for racial discrimination (and then showing your damages) is virtually impossible in a private employer cases involving an individual job applicant, class actions are virtually impossible to bring against a small employer because identifying other applicants (on the theory that someone in the class would have been hired) is a practical impossibility for a private trial lawyer. Thus, this won't give rise to many lawsuits. The real practical effect of the law is to make it impossible for small business employers to publicly solicit employees on a purely prohibited basis since they are allowed in principle to be openly discriminatory in hiring. Prohibiting discriminatory solicitation and making it theoretically illegal for even small business employers to discriminate in hiring (even if the prohibition is unenforceable in fact) sends a moral message to small business employers and is likely to prevent openly discriminatory attitudes toward hiring from becoming normative in the small business hiring market. Thus, the law is likely to change behavior a lot with very little private litigation.

Still, politically, this issue is a tarbaby that would look very ugly for the Republican to bring up in a campaign ad against a Democrat even in many very safe GOP districts. Knowing that they're going to lose anyway, they were fools to choose this battle rather than more "photogenic" ones.

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1. Aristotle says:
  
  April 19, 2013 at 6:59 am
  
  ArapaGOrP is wrong about everything. He's a liar. I really wonder why he believes he's "saved," as he's stated on Pols before.
  
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