On June 30, 2023, the United States Supreme Court ended its October 2022 term. Many of the Court’s decisions from this past term are likely to impact employers of all sizes. Accordingly, this post is the first in a limited blog series highlighting key changes for employers emanating from the Court’s decisions from this past term.
The Supreme Court released its opinion in Groff v. DeJoy, No. 22-174, 600 U.S. ____ (Slip Op.), on June 29, 2023. Groff will likely have a far-reaching impact on how employers handle Title VII religious accommodation requests by employees.
The case involved Gerald Groff, a USPS mail carrier and a devout Christian evangelical who sought a religious accommodation from his employer USPS so that he would not have to work on Sundays, his religious day of rest. Id. at 2. USPS, citing a memorandum of understanding with Amazon and the need for rural Sunday deliveries, refused to fully accommodate Mr. Groff’s request and gave him progressive discipline for his failure to work on Sundays. Id. at 2-3. After receiving progressive discipline for his failure to work on Sundays, Mr. Groff resigned in 2019. Id. Mr. Groff then sued USPS under Title VII for “failing to accommodate his Sunday Sabbath practice ‘without undue hardship on the conduct of [USPS’s] business.” Id. at 3 (quoting 42 U. S. C. §2000e(j)).
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 mandates that certain employers “make reasonable accommodations to the religious needs of employees[,]” so long the accommodation would not result in “undue hardship on the conduct of the employer’s business.” 42 U. S. C. §2000e–2(a)(1); 29 CFR § 1605.1. Since the 1970s, the test for whether an accommodation posed an “undue hardship” on an employer’s business was a “de minimis” standard. Groff, No. 22-174 at 11. The de minimis standard essentially allowed large employers to deny religious accommodations, such as voluntary shift changes so that an employee may observe the Sabbath, if the employer could point to some cost or burden that the accommodation would impose. See, e.g., id. at 14, n. 12 (describing EEOC v. Walmart Stores East, L.P., 992 F. 3d 656, 659–660 (8th Cir. 2021)).
The Supreme Court’s holding in Groff that a de minimis cost is not enough to constitute an “undue burden” changes how employers should evaluate religious accommodation requests. Id. at 15. Now, when evaluating requests, an employer under Title VII must consider whether “the burden of granting an accommodation would result in substantial increased costs in relation to the conduct of its particular business.” Id. at 18.
What constitutes “substantial increased costs?” While we know that it is more than a de minimis burden, the Court largely left the boundaries of the test undefined. Id. Instead, the Court said that such an inquiry is fact specific and must take into account “all relevant factors in the case at hand, including the particular accommodations at issue and their practical impact in light of the nature, ‘size and operating cost of [an] employer.” Id.
Without a clear test, the extent to which a burden or cost is required to be “substantial” will be determined by the lower courts. Id. at 21 (“Having clarified the Title VII undue-hardship standard, we think it appropriate to leave the context-specific application of that clarified standard to the lower courts in the first instance.”). For now, employers should stay tuned and pay particular attention to religious accommodation cases in jurisdictions in which the employer operates. Employers may also want to re-evaluate their methodology when evaluating religious accommodation requests.
