Standards for a Prima Facie Case of Discrimination
1) Applicant belongs to a racial minority
2) Applicant applied and was qualified for a job the
employer was trying to fill
3) Applicant, though qualified, was rejected for the position
4) Employer continued to seek applicants with applicant’s
qualifications
(from McDonnell-Douglas v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973))
Prima Facie --A legal presumption which means "on the face of it" or "at first sight." Lawmakers will often use this device to establish that if a certain set of facts are
proven, then another fact is established prima facie. For example, proof of
mailing a letter is prima facie proof that it was received by the person to
whom it was addressed and will be accepted as such by the court unless
proven otherwise. Other situations may require a prima facie case before
proceeding to another step in the judicial process so that you would have to
at least prove that, at first glance, there appears to be a case.
Application Standard (futile act doctrine)
Does an applicant have to actually apply for a position to
establish a prima facie case?
If an employer should announce his policy of discrimination by a sign reading
"Whites Only" on the hiring-office door, his victims would not be limited to the
few who ignored the sign and subjected themselves to personal rebuffs. The
same message can be communicated to potential applicants more subtly but just
as clearly by an employer's actual practices - by his consistent discriminatory
treatment of actual applicants, by the manner in which he publicizes vacancies,
his recruitment techniques, his responses to casual or tentative inquiries, and
even by the racial or ethnic composition of that part of his work force from
which he has discriminatorily excluded members of minority groups. 51 When
a person's [431 U.S. 324, 366] desire for a job is not translated into a formal
application solely because of his unwillingness to engage in a futile gesture he
is as much a victim of discrimination as is he who goes through the motions of
submitting an application. (from Teamsters v. United States, 431 U.S. 324, 356-66)
Qualification Standard
[ Footnote 44 ] …. Although the McDonnell Douglas formula does not require
direct proof of discrimination, it does demand that the alleged discriminatee
demonstrate at least that his rejection did not result from the two most common
legitimate reasons on which an employer might rely to reject a job applicant: an
absolute or relative lack of qualifications or the absence of a vacancy in the job
sought. Elimination of these reasons for the refusal to hire is sufficient, absent
other explanation, to create an inference that the decision was a discriminatory
one.
Absolute = Possession of minimum qualifications for the job
Relative = An individual’s qualifications compare favorably to other applicants for
the job (e.g., most or best qualified
More information on these standards (“elements”) is contained in Belton, R., & Avery, D.
(1999). Employment Discrimination Law. West Group: St. Paul, MN
McDonnell Douglas v. Green
Respondent must be given a chance to show that the company's stated reason for
refusal to rehire was in fact a pretext for the use of an illegal factor (e.g., race, color)
Some ways to show pretext --• Treatment of White employees who may have been involved in illegal activities
(e.g., were they rehired?)
• Company's treatment of employee during his prior work period
• Reaction (if any) to his participation in legitimate civil rights activities
• Company's general policy and practices regarding minorities (e.g., to present
evidence indicative of a pattern of discrimination). In this regard, the use of
statistics may prove helpful to show such a pattern.