Meacham v. Knolls Atomic Power Lab. (554 U.S. 84)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 19, 2008 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 554 U.S. 84 · 128 S. Ct. 2395
- Decided
- June 19, 2008
- Term
- October Term 2007
- Vote
- 7–1
- Majority author
- Justice Souter
- Issue area
- Civil Rights
- Disposition
- Vacated and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
Opinion excerpt
Justice Souter delivered the opinion of the Court. A provision of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA), 81 Stat. 602, as amended, 29 U. S. C. § 621 et seq., creates an exemption for employer actions “otherwise prohibited” by the ADEA but “based on reasonable factors other than age” (RFOA). § 623(f)(1). The question is whether an employer facing a disparate-impact claim and planning to defend on the basis of RFOA must not only produce evidence raising the defense, but also persuade the factfinder of its merit. We hold that the employer must do both. I The National Government pays private companies to do some of the work maintaining the Nation’s fleet of nuclear-powered warships. One such contractor is respondent KAPL, Inc. (Knolls), the operator of the Government’s Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory, which has a history dating back to the first nuclear-powered submarines in the 1950s. The United States Navy and the Department of Energy jointly fund Knolls’s operations, decide what projects it should pursue, and set its annual staffing limits. In recent years, Knolls has been charged with designing prototype naval nuclear reactors and with training Navy personnel to run them. The demands for naval nuclear reactors changed with the end of the Cold War, and for fiscal year 1996 Knolls was ordered to reduce its work force. Even after 100 or so employees chose to…
Excerpt of a 33,631-character opinion. The full text and citation network load in the interactive viewer above.