Human Resources

JDT2 Human Resources Task 1
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JDT2 Human Resources Task 1
The civil rights act of 1964 was a landmark legislation in the history of the United States. The legislation made previous laws pertaining to prejudice based on race, color, ethnicity, sex and religion illegal. The Act had ten titles, which touched on several social aspects of the American people. Most notable was Title 1, which encouraged the minorities to register as voters, Title 2 which spoke against discrimination in public accommodations. Title 3 and 4 talked about desegregation in public places and public education respectively. Title 7 on the other hand, outlawed discrimination of persons in employment for any business that employed twenty-five or more people. The main idea behind to this legislation was that everybody would have an equal employment opportunity.
However, at the time, the law did not have much effect and therefore the legislation has gone through a series of amendments. For instance, in 1991 the act was amended to include persons with disability (Major Features of the Civilian Rights, 2012). The enacted law has been controversial and over the years, some employees have used the legislation to further their own agendas. As a result, employers have had to deal with constructive discharge. Constructive discharge is a legal term in employment law that compels an employee to resign from work after being subjected to intolerable working conditions or the employer suddenly changes the working conditions. The term working conditions can be ambiguous because it can have a broad meaning. Issues of sexual harassment and demotion, transfers and hostility towards workers have often been grounds for constructive discharge or constructive dismissal.
Constructive discharge occurs when an employee makes working conditions unbearable and an employee is forced to quit. Unbearable conditions can range from harassment, discrimination, getting a negative pay for work and even working for unrelated jobs. In such a case, an employee can quit and file for wrongful dismissal at work. Constructive dismissal is different from voluntary resignation because a worker can file for unemployment benefits. A worker needs to file for unemployment as soon they quit their job so that they can be eligible for unemployment benefits. However, for the case of voluntary quitters, they cannot file for unemployment benefits because they automatically lose their rights to sue the Company for wrongful termination (Silver, 2001).
For that reason, wrongful termination is an exception when it comes to filing for unemployment. All a worker need to do is file for unemployment as soon as the wrongful claim is filed. A worker can also file for constructive dismissal if they feel that the workload at work has either increased or decreased. A claim can also be filed when a worker feel that the employer has been abusive especially when a worker belongs to a certain class in the society. This may be caused by the employee’s affiliation to a certain ethnic group, sex, gender or religion (1964 Civil Rights Act, 2012). For the case of the former employee who felt that the religious rights were infringed on, the civil rights has a provision for such cases. According to the employee, the work schedule policy change infringed on his/ her right to religion. This was because the schedule forced the worker to work on a holy day and was contrary to the workers religious practices.
Under the civil rights act, a worker can file a claim against the Company for constructive discharge after quitting work. The claim has to meet certain conditions this includes: First, the employer’s conduct has to be questionable in other words the employer’s intent has to be in check. The employer must have acted in a way that forced the employee to resign. Second, the employer’s behavior has to be consistent. The subject in question has to be from a continuous behavior and not just an occasional event that rarely occurred. Third, the conditions in which the worker was subjected to must have been very egregious and intolerable that any reasonable human being would have quit. A constructive discharge claim can also be filed if the employee informs the employee of a change in working conditions on a fifteen-day notice and the employer fails to act on it (Silver, 2001).
Threats of violence can also be grounds to file for when it come to wrongful termination. According to this case, the employee’s religious rights have been trespassed and this may be sufficient grounds to file for wrongful termination. However, in my opinion I feel that the case does not meet the required conditions to prove that the Company was discriminatory on religion. The work schedule does not target the litigant rather the schedule change was as result of increased workload. The work schedule change was therefore universal as it affected all production workers. Second, the employer at any point had not exhibited a pattern of misconduct in time. Third, the employee had not been subjected to intolerable condition that reasonable persons would have quit. If that were the case, then all employees would have resigned (Silver, 2001). Finally, the employee had not handed a written notice highlighting the change in working conditions.
The civil rights act of 1964 had several titles. Some of the most notable ones include title one’s voting rights which allowed African American to acquire voting rights. Title II, III and IV outlawed discrimination in public accommodation, public facilities and public institutions respectively. Title VII on the other hand, outlawed discrimination of people rooted in religion, nationality, race, sex or color (Silver, 2001). Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a law enacted to protect employees from any sort of discrimination. Therefore, the act empowers any person from any background to apply for the job they desire because they are protected by equal employment opportunity law. According to the stated case where an employee has filed for constructive discharge, the worker may file for discrimination under two criteria. First, the employee may claim discrimination based on religion.
Title VII of the Civil Rights offers provision in which workers can sue their employers if they feel their religion rights have been infringed. In this case, the work schedule change affects the employee’s working conditions. This is because the employee is not accustomed to working on a holy day but now this will have to change. The employee can claim a change in the environment because the employer introduced an extraordinary change that was intolerable to the employee’s faith. Therefore, this could be sufficient grounds for winning the case. In addition, the employee can file for further discrimination by claiming that the work schedule was extraordinary due to the increased workload and number of hours worked. If the employee believes that the sudden change is intolerable then the employee can file for constructive discharge.
In other words, the employee can resign and file a claim against the Company if he or she feels that the Company refrained from sacking him or her. Rather the Company opted to engage in a conduct that would likely cause the employer to resign (Teaching With Documents: The Civil rights movement, 2012). In such a case, the sudden change of working schedule may be viewed as a sign of discrimination. This may occur if the employee for instance is a single parent and does not have somebody else to take care of the children at home. An employee may argue that the change in work schedule is a plot to disrupt one’s working condition and further disrupt their social life. In addition, the employee can solidify their claim by arguing that the normal working hours are between 8.00am-5.00pm on Mondays through Fridays and not the new suggested working schedule.
If the employee can prove that the working schedule is something very new and was not addressed their job application the employee may have an edge. If for example, the employee can prove that the work schedule has always been forty hours a week and that they have never worked on weekends then the employer may have a difficult case. If the employee may able to ascertain that the working ...