Wednesday, April 23, 2008

U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson (R-GA)
Floor Statement on the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act
Remarks as Delivered on the Senate Floor

Mr. President, the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts makes an eloquent and passionate statement, but everyone within the sound of my voice needs to understand something. This debate today is not about allowing, favoring, or supporting discrimination. It is about preserving the Civil Rights Act to which the distinguished Senator just referred, because the Civil Rights Act stated clearly that if a complaint was filed, it needed to be filed within 180 days of the act of discrimination, or as, as current EEOC practice allows, 180 days from the date which a reasonable person should have known.

Let's make sure everyone understands all this. Since 1964, 44 years ago, that has been the provision in the statute. No one is trying to keep that from happening.

Secondly, everybody needs to understand this: It is very important to people, regardless of whether they are a woman, a man, a Methodist, African American, Latino, whatever, if they are discriminated against, we need to make sure there is timely evidence so the handling of these claims can be completed thoroughly and completely.

The Ledbetter Fair Pay Act changes the civil rights law provisions from 180 days from the time a discriminatory act was made or a reasonable person should have known they had been discriminated against to 180 days from any "economic effect." This means that someone can work for a company for 30 years, go on retirement and pension, get a pension check, declare the 180 days just started, and file a complaint from 30 years ago.

We are about having integrity in the system so we have timely complaints, we have timely evidence, and the parties who are there can quickly be remedied.

I would like my staff to put up a chart because I would like to review the history of the Ledbetter case.

In 1982, Mrs. Ledbetter filed a complaint for sexual harassment against her supervisor. That complaint was settled between her and the company, Goodyear, in a timely fashion, and she was satisfied.

In 1992, Mrs. Ledbetter, under testimony, testified that she became aware she was being paid less than her peers, but she filed no complaint.

In 1993, she did not file a complaint.

In 1994, she did not file a complaint.

In 1995, Mrs. Ledbetter said:

I told him at that time that I knew definitely that they were all making a thousand at least more per month than I was and that I would like to get in line.

But she did not file a complaint.

In 1996, she did not file a complaint.

In 1997, she did not file a complaint.

And then on July 21, 1998, a complaint was filed, shortly after her supervisor died. That is the reason for the statute of limitations on the complaint to begin with--to ensure you have contemporary and timely information and the parties who might have committed the act of discrimination are alive and can be held accountable.

No less than Justice John Paul Stevens, the first time this particular provision of statute of limitations was taken to the Court, in a 7-to-2 decision in 1977 said the following:

A discrimination act which has not made the basis for a time charge is merely an unfortunate event in history which has no present legal consequence.

Some will argue--and I am sure Senator Kennedy will--about hidden, or concealed, discrimination, whereby a person might not become aware they are being victimized. Essentially, you can rope-a-dope someone and fool them. Current EEOC practice clearly states that it is 180 days from the time a reasonable person should have known or would have known they were discriminated against.

It is very important for us to understand that we have a case, the Ledbetter case, where the individual testified under oath in deposition that she was aware she was being underpaid and did not file. We also have a person in 1982, a decade before the alleged act, who did file a case for sex discrimination. So it was not ignorance of the system, ignorance of the law, or ignorance of the court; it was violation of the time provided.

Just to make sure the record is clear, in a deposition of Mrs. Ledbetter on July 18, 2000:

Question: So you had this conversation with Mike Tucker about the 1995 evaluation. You told him then that you wanted to try to get your pay more in line with your peers?

Mrs. Ledbetter: That is correct.

Question: How did you know that your peers were earning more?

Mrs. Ledbetter: Different people I worked for along the way had always told me my pay was extremely low.

Again in a deposition later on:

Question: And so you knew in 1992 that you were paid less than your peers.

Mrs. Ledbetter: Yes, sir.

Mr. President, I abhor discrimination. I share the reverence of the quote of Martin Luther King, a citizen of my home State, quoted by Senator Kennedy, that we all yearn for the day that a man will be judged by the content of his character and not the color of his skin. We respect that today. That is why the Civil Rights Act we discuss today was passed. That is why, when they passed the Civil Rights Act, Congress put in a standard of 180 days from the date of discrimination to ensure the evidence was there, the supervisors were there. That way an aggrieved person could take action to remedy quickly this situation could. The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act changes that to a distant time in the future when people could have passed away, records could have been destroyed, and the ability to prove the allegation would be impossible.

I submit, in an environment in 2008 in the United States of America where equity, nondiscrimination, and freedom are available to all Americans, that it is this timeliness is important so that anybody who is injured and anybody who is aggrieved gets a swift and just action in the courts of the United States of America.

I reserve the remainder of my time.

***

Mr. President, I yield myself 30 seconds.

The distinguished Senator from Massachusetts referred to restoring the law to pre-2002. The Supreme Court, in 1977, through John Paul Stevens' majority opinion, 7 to 2; 1980 and 1986, in all three of those rulings they upheld the 180-day provision of the Civil Rights Act of the United States of America. That was the law prior to Ledbetter, and that is what the court reaffirmed in Ledbetter.

Mr. President, I owe the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts an answer to the rhetorical questions he has asked. Everybody within the sound of my voice should understand we are not debating whether anybody in here believes in discrimination. We have voted over and over in this body for 44 years. We have the Equal Pay Act, as the Senator had on his chart there. That passed the Senate on voice vote. That is not the issue. The issue in this case is the tolling provisions of the 1967 Civil Rights Act, Title VII, which dealt with discrimination in wages based on race, religion, sex, or national origin. I will debate what tolling period is appropriate, but I am not going to stand here and allow this to be described as a debate over one side being for discrimination and another being against it. We are for the timely reporting of claimants and the ability of people to be remedied expeditiously if they have been discriminated against.

***

I yield myself the remainder of the time.

Madam President, with all due respect to the Senator from Illinois, as was said earlier, in this case, in each and every year from 1992 to 1997, Ms. Ledbetter testified that she knew she was being discriminated against but didn't file a claim.

Secondly, this is not about restoring the Civil Rights Act to its state before Ledbetter was decided last year. This is about amending title VII of the Civil Rights Act passed in 1964 in terms of its statute of limitations.

The fact is that every one of us in this body is for precisely the same thing: Discrimination against no one for race, sex, color, creed, national origin; equal pay for everyone. As the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts showed in his chart, we have over and over again reaffirmed this. This is not about the issue of discrimination. This is about the rule of law, the Civil Rights Act as it was passed in 1964 and amended in 1967, and its statute of limitations that has been upheld by the Supreme Court--not once, not twice, not three times, but four separate opinions in 1977, 1980, 1989, and 2002. Ledbetter simply reaffirmed these cases.

If we have a problem, let's address it in committee. Let's fix it after open debate. Let's not eviscerate the committee process and bring a flawed bill to the floor of the Senate.

I urge my colleagues to vote against the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed and yield back the remainder of my time.