Kremer v. Chemical Construction Corp. (456 U.S. 461)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided May 17, 1982 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 456 U.S. 461 · 102 S. Ct. 1883
- Decided
- May 17, 1982
- Term
- October Term 1981
- Vote
- 5–4
- Majority author
- Justice White
- Issue area
- Civil Rights
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. As one of its first acts, Congress directed that all United States courts afford the same full faith and credit to state court judgments that would apply in the State’s own courts. Act of May 26, 1790, ch. 11, 1 Stat. 122, 28 U. S. C. § 1738. More recently, Congress implemented the national policy against employment discrimination by creating an array of substantive protections and remedies which generally allows federal courts to determine the merits of a discrimination claim. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 78 Stat. 253, as amended, 42 U. S. C. § 2000e et seq. (1976 ed. and Supp. IV). The principal question presented by this case is whether Congress intended Title VII to supersede the principles of comity and repose embodied in § 1738. Specifically, we decide whether a federal court in a Title VII case should give preclusive effect to a decision of a state court upholding a state administrative agency’s rejection of an employment discrimination claim as meritless when the state court’s decision would be res judicata in the State’s own courts. HH Petitioner Rubin Kremer emigrated from Poland in 1970 and was hired in 1973 by respondent Chemical Construction Corp. (Chemico) as an engineer. Two years later he was laid off, along with a number of other employees. Some of these employees were later rehired, but Kremer…
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