$240,000 jury award to Muslim truck drivers who were fired for refusing to transport alcohol

WAPO ^ | Oct. 23, 2015 | Eugene Volokh

[PROCON]

One more data point on the “When does your religion legally excuse you from doing part of your job?” question — like it or not, under American law, employers sometimes do have to excuse employees from tasks that the employees find religiously objectionable. Tuesday, two Muslim truck drivers who were fired for refusing to deliver shipments containing alcohol were awarded $40,000 in compensatory damages and $200,000 in punitive damages by the jury in their discrimination claim.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission brought suit on their behalf (EEOC v. Star Transport Co., Inc. (N.D. Ill.)), arguing that the employer had failed to provide “reasonable accommodations” to the employees — i.e., accommodations (including an exemption from job duties) that could be provided without “undue hardship” to the employer or others. The court noted that Star Transport had indeed often “swap[ped]’ loads between drivers,” and Star Transport conceded that it could have easily accommodated this request, too, but argued (unsuccessfully) that it shouldn’t be liable for punitive damages.

[CyberAnt]

I agree .. no Christian is ever afforded such an exemption from certain portions of their jobs.

[Tzimisce]

So Christians are required to bake cakes and make flower arrangements or they go to jail, but Muslims can do anything they want and call “religious freedom”.

If I was in ISIS, I’d be planning to blow Americans up too. :)

[G Larry]

I’ll bet Kim Davis is happy to hear that she can now expect $240K!!!

[5th MEB]

Then people wonder why employers are reluctant to hire women, blacks, queers, and now mudslimes.
These people do it to themselves.

[PGR88]

I guess the key is never hire them in the first place

[dfwgator]

Don’t hire Muslims, problem solved.

[bgill]

They hired on knowing full well they'd have to haul x,y,z. This is another set up. Probably coached by Jarrett -

[Amendment10]

"The EEOC said that Star Transport Inc., a trucking company based in Morton, Ill., violated their religious rights ..."

There are major constitutional problems indicated by the excerpt above imo. First, regardless what FDR’s activist justices wanted everybody to believe about the scope of Congress’s Commerce Clause powers (1.8.3), a previous generaton of state-sovereignty respecting justices had clarified the following. The states have never delegated to the feds, expressly via the Constitution, the specific power to regulate intrastate commerce, which reasonably includes not interfering with an employer’s decision to fire employees.

”State inspection laws, health laws, and laws for regulating the internal commerce of a State, and those which respect turnpike roads, ferries, &c. are not within the power granted to Congress [emphases added].” —Gibbons v. Ogden, 1824.

Next, even if the states had delegated such powers to the feds, the Founding States had made the first numbered clauses in the Constitution, Sections 1-3 of Article I, evidently a good place to hide them from Congress, to clarify that all federal legislative powers are vested in the elected members of Congress, not in the executive or judicial branches, or in non-elected bureacrats like those running the EPA, FCC or EEOC. So Congress has a constitutional “monopoly” on federal legislative powers whether it wants it or not imo.

But by delegating federal legislative / regulatory powers to non-elected bureaucrats, powers that Congress doesn’t have in the first place in this case, corrupt Congress is wrongly protecting such powers from the wrath of the voters in blatant defiance of Sections 1-3 mentioned above.

Next …

Regarding the idea of an employer violating an employee’s constitutional rights, please consider the following. The Supreme Court had clarified in United States v. Cruikshank, that case dealing with the scope of constitutional rights, that the Constitution protects a citizen’s enumerated rights only from the state and federal governments, not from other citizens.

So the constitutionally undefined EEOC actually has no constitutional basis for its religious freedom violation accusations against the referenced employer imo. And I don’t think that religious issues were the main reason that the employer fired the employees. After all, the employer had hired them!

Finally, it appears that the EEOC was intended to police all kinds of INTRAstate discrimination issues related to Civil Rights Acts of the 1960s & 70s. The problem with this is the following.

The only civil rights issues that the states have amended the Constitution to expressly protect, for which the feds have the 14th Amendment power to legislatively address, are three of the four voting rights amendments as evidenced by the 15th, 19th and 26th Amendments. So the low-information, Democratic-controlled (I think) Congress of the 60s and 70s actually had no constitutional authority to make laws addressing intrastate discrimination issues outside the scope of constitutionally enumerated voting rights.

In fact, the corrupt, post-17th Amendment ratification, low-information Senate once again failed to protect the states as the Founding States had established the Senate to do. In this case the Senate failed to kill the constitutionally indefensible bills that led to the civil rights acts.

Note that the Senate also failed to use its constitutional Article V power to lead Congress to propose civil rights amendments to the Constitution to the states. If the states had chosen to ratify such amendments, then Congress would have the constitutional authority to make such laws.

As mentioned in related threads, the ill-conceived 17th Amendment needs to disappear, and corrupt, Constitution-ignoring senators who help to pass unconstitutional bills along with it.

[napscoordinator]

Well isn’t that special. Rag heads make a ton of money but Kimmy refusing to do certificates get vilified. Interesting.

[Another Post-American]

Yes, it happened quickly. All I could think to do was stare at the boxes of the nearest skids to see if I recognized anything going to/from the automotive electronics plant where I work (thankfully, no). He’d already paid, and was acting in a hurry so he was off as soon as he’d tossed it in.

We did manage to give him a free Mark Cahill book, though, as part of the deal. Hopefully it does some good. :-)

[trebb]

Where were these folks when that gal in Kentucky was raked across the coals for not signing homo marriage licenses?????

[trebb]

All religious freedoms were created equal. But some religious freedoms were created more equal than others.

Now for a short public service announcement to those on FR:

GO CRUZ!! Keep it up Trump!!

Donate to Cruz

Donate to FR

[ronnie raygun]

Companies fault, include specifics in your hiring notice

[Mamzelle]

But Christian bakers have to bake cakes with homosexual decorations.

[BitWielder1]

Next: Refusal to deliver pork, bacon or anything non-halal.

[UCANSEE2]

The Muslim truck drivers probably went to a bar and got drunk to celebrate their ‘win’.

[Uncle Miltie]

But Christians must bake gay cakes.

[ROCKLOBSTER]

So, does this not set a legal precedent for all subsequent cases involving religious freedoms and conscientious objections...regardless of the “religion” involved?

[hattend]

Don’t ask them to bake a cake or make a pizza, though.