Employment

Employers unfortunately often provide termination notices at the end of the calendar year. The timing of such termination notices around the holidays when an employee may be looking forward to beginning a new year, when there is no indication of loss of employment ominously looming on the horizon, can be particularly traumatic for older long-term workers.

While the harsh timing may be the worst time of year to inform workers that they no longer have a job, the year’s end year termination does not make it any more illegal than at any other time and it is only significant if employer applies an illegal basis, such as age, when choosing which employees will be let go and which will remain.

If you are a long-term employee who is let go, with or without notice, you may contact this office for a free consultation if you think that your age possibly was a factor in the termination decision.

I have represented numerous public and private employees who were let go, where the employer alleged a bogus “business justification” for the illegal termination was successful in obtaining multiple six figure moneys for them.

The Legislature enacted CEPA, New Jersey Conscientious Employee Protection Act, N.J.S.A. 34:19-1 et seq.

Whistleblower employees who complain that their NJ employer is violating “public policy”, should be cautious when identifying such “public policy”. If they are subsequently terminated after they complain, they may have a hard time prevailing in a claim for wrongful termination under New Jersey’s whistleblower statute, Conscientious Employee Protection Act, CEPA, N.J.S.A.

Employment discrimination practices biased against promotions for workers over 70 is no longer legally tolerated for most NJ employment positions, thanks to the amendments to the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination. Prejudice in the sense of a judgment or opinion formed predicated on a person’s age is the fountainhead of all age discrimination, which opinion proves on examination to be unrelated to the employee’s job performance or to be completely nonexistent. The adoption of the amendments carries out the elemental intent of discrimination law - to protect workers against such prejudgment.

The prior loophole in the NJ law which allowed severe and egregious consequences against persons in their 70's and often leading to dire economic realities for such persons,  was because of the following clauses. This offending language has since been deleted from and is no longer part of the statute: “provided further that nothing herein contained shall be construed to bar an employer from refusing to accept for employment or to promote any person over 70 years of age.

Typically, persons think of employee whistleblower claims in terms of their employer or supervisor violating a law. Sometimes, however, an employee may reasonably believe that a co-worker is breaking the law.

The NJ Supreme Court held that minor infractions that violate company policies are not "unlawful conduct” as contemplated by New Jersey’s employee whistleblower statute, the Conscientious Employee Protection Act , N.J.S.

Even today in 2022, many LGBTQ, non-binary, non-cisgender, gender non-conforming employees fearing discrimination in their workplace, keep their relationships private. A recent comprehensive study by a collaboration of independent and non-partisan research groups found that LGBTQ individuals fear potential discrimination due to their gender identity and/or sexual orientation and choose to hold back on disclosing their relationship status to others within their workplace.

Although the survey found that discrimination events occurred frequently in public places and in some in educational facilities and rental housing, a whopping 36 percent of the discrimination reported was in the workplace. Among transgendered individuals, the reported discrimination increased dramatically to over 60 percent.

Older generations, Generation X and Baby-boomers reported the most occurrences of discrimination overall occurred in the workplace, while Generation Z reported most discrimination took place in educational facilities.

NJ Employees who experience discrimination in the workplace because of their sex may have multiple claims. They can file directly in NJ State Court under NJ’s anti-discrimination statute and avoid having to first jump through the delay of time-consuming administrative hurdles. In addition, the NJ statute, The New Jersey Law Against Discrimination, can award treble damages in some instances.

The New Jersey Law Against Discrimination ( NJLAD) is considered by many to be the strongest employee protection law in the United States .

The NJLAD has employment protections similar to the federal law, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits an employer from treating an employee differently, or less favorably, because of your sex.

The dilution of the voting power of Black voters is at issue for the 2022 midterm elections in a case currently before the Supreme Court. In Merrill v. Mulligan, in  a challenge to a redistricting map drawn by the state of Alabama, civil rights organizations and group of Black voters claim that a re-redistricting map drawn by and sought to be enforced by the State of Alabama dilutes the voting power of Black Alabamans for the 2022 midterm election cycle and beyond. Alabama has a long history of Black voter suppression.

The Uniform Congressional District Act and Gerrymandering

In December 1967, single-member House of Representative districts were mandated by Federal law pursuant to the Uniform Congressional District Act (2 U.

The US Supreme Court ruled that a Congressional redistricting plan in Alabama, whose opponents argue dilutes the voting power of Black Alabama voters, may remain to be used in Alabama for the 2022 midterm elections.

The State of Alabama, based on its population, is currently divided into seven (7) congressional districts, each represented by a member of the United States House of Representatives. Blacks comprise approximately 27 percent of Alabama’s voting age population. Under the Congressional District Map sought to be used by Alabama, a state with a long history of extreme Black voter suppression, Alabama drew the congressional district lines in a manner so that only one district out of seven would have a majority of Blacks.

Challengers to this map asked for lines to be redrawn so that there will be two (2) voting districts that are comprised of a Black majority.

The Current Supreme Court Case Regarding the Drawing of Congressional Maps and the Voting Rights Act, May Subsequently Affect All Civil Rights Statutes and Employment Discrimination Laws.

On October 4, 2022, the US Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Merrill v. Milligan, et al., a case seeking to maintain a state’s discriminatory congressional map and undermine Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. In Merrill v.

Recently, the US Supreme Court in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, decided June 24, 2022 overturned the long-established precedent of a woman’s Constitutional right to an abortion, thereby returning the issue of abortion rights left to be decided by individual states. When important legal issues are left to individual states to decide, it gives rise to a vast discrepancy in the breadth of legal rights (or in some situations, no legal right) granted to an individual dependent on which state the person resides in, although the facts of two such individuals living in different states may otherwise be identical facts.

The Court in Dobbs overturned the 50-year-old legal precedent of Roe v. Wade, 410 U.