Do You Know Your 7th Amendment Rights?

Lately, the First and Second Amendments have gotten a lot of attention.

We rarely think about the Seventh Amendment—but it’s important. 
It states: “In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.”

For decades, courts have used a ruling called “summary judgment” to decide whether a trial should proceed. (Think of it as a gate.)

Let’s use a simple example. Paula Jones sued President Bill Clinton for sexual harassment (she was a state employee when he allegedly harassed her in his role as governor). He moved for summary judgment, stating that a sitting president could not be sued in a civil trial. The trial court granted the motion. The Supreme Court unanimously reversed this ruling, in effect overruling the “summary judgment” ruling of the trial court. The result? He paid $850,000 to settle this ordinary sex discrimination lawsuit.

A study involving more than 5,000 cases found that courts in employment discrimination cases blocked about 25% of cases from going to trial by ruling in favor of the employer's motion to summarily dismiss these lawsuits (Eisenberg and Lanvers, 2008).

That may be changing.

A secretary for an auto parts maker, Sewon America Inc., applied for a job transfer. She was told to forget about it because the company preferred to fill the role with a Korean employee. She complained—and was fired.

The trial court dismissed her lawsuit, granting the employer’s motion for summary judgment. 
The court believed that since this was a lateral transfer, there was no injury under Title VII (the secretary is claiming race and national origin discrimination as well as retaliation). She said she had a right to a jury trial.  

Now a federal appeals court will take up this important issue.

She will argue that by the text of the Seventh Amendment, she was entitled to the judgment of “a reasonable jury.”

In essence, she is saying that courts are using this short-cut device for judicial economy and blatantly ignoring the express words of the Constitution.

In an age when the Second Amendment is so broadly interpreted to mean that individuals have a right to be armed like militia members with assault weapons, it will be interesting to see how the appeals court deals with her straight-forward “textual” approach to the Seventh Amendment.

We all have a stake in the outcome.