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Equal Employment Opportunity Commission v. Arabian American Oil Co.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 February 2017

David M. Barbash
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Extract

Ali Boureslan, a naturalized U.S. citizen of Lebanese descent, was employed by the Arabian American Oil Co. (Aramco) as a cost engineer. Boureslan began his tenure with Aramco in 1979 in its Houston, Texas, office, but a year later he requested and received a transfer to the company’s offices in Saudi Arabia. Boureslan alleged that in the ensuing four years he was the victim of racial and religious harassment from his immediate supervisor. He was finally dismissed on June 16, 1984, for allegedly poor work performance.

Keywords

Jurisdictionapplication abroad of title VII of Civil Rights Act of 1964presumption against extraterritorial extension of U.S. statutes
Type
International Decisions
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 85 , Issue 3 , July 1991 , pp. 552 - 557
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 1991

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References

1 Pub. L. No. 88-352, §718, 78 Stat. 241 (1964). Title VII is found at 42 U.S.C. §§2000e–2000e–17 (1988).

2 Boureslan v. Aramco, 653 F.Supp. 629 (S.D. Tex. 1987), aff’d, 857 F.2d 1014 (5th Cir. 1988), summarized in 83 AJIL 375 (1989), reh’g en banc, 892 F.2d 1271 (5th Cir. 1990).

3 111 S.Ct. 1227, 1230 (quoting Foley v. Filardo, 336 U.S. 281, 285 (1949)). The parties conceded that Congress “has the authority to enforce its laws beyond the territorial boundaries of the United States.” Id.

4 Id. See McCulloch v. Sociedad Nacional de Marineros de Honduras, 372 U.S. 10, 21–22 (1963) (“We therefore conclude … that for us to sanction the exercise of local sovereignty under such conditions in this ‘delicate field of international relations there must be present the affirmative intention of the Congress clearly expressed’ ”).

5 Benz v. Compania Naviera Hidalgo, S.A., 353 U.S. 138, 147 (1956).

6 Foley v. Filardo, 336 U.S. at 285.

7 See Griggs v. Duke Power, 401 U.S. 424, 429–30 (1971) (“The objective of Congress in the enactment of Title VII … was to achieve equality of employment opportunities and remove barriers that have operated in the past to favor an identifiable group of white employees over other employees”).

8 42 U.S.C. §2000e(b).

9 Id. §2000e(g).

10 111 S.Ct. at 1231.

11 372 U.S. 10 (1963).

12 29 U.S.C. §152(6).

13 McCulloch, 372 U.S. at 15 n.3.

14 15 U.S.C. §§1051–1127 (1988).

15 Steele v. Bulova Watch Co., 344 U.S. 280 (1952) (federal district court has jurisdiction under the Lanham Act to award relief to a U.S. company against trademark infringement consummated in Mexico).

16 15 U.S.C. §1127.

17 344 U.S. 280 (1952).

18 111 S.Ct. at 1232.

19 29 U.S.C. §§401–531 (1988).

20 42 U.S.C. §2000e-l (1982).

21 This negative inference argument has been widely advocated by various commentators and was the basis for a number of lower federal court decisions prior to the Boureslan decisions that upheld the extraterritorial extension of title VII. Comment, Boureslan v. Aramco: Equal Employment Opportunity for U.S. Citizens Abroad, 12 Fordham Int’l L.J. 566 (1989); Street, Application of U.S. Fair Employment Laws to Transnational Employers in the United States and Abroad, 19 N.Y.U.J. Int’l L. & Pol. 357 (1987); Love v. Pullman, 13 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 423 (1976), aff’d on other grounds, 569 F.2d 1074 (10th Cir. 1978); Bryant v. International School Servs., 502 F.Supp. 472 (D. N.J. 1980), rev’d on other grounds, 675 F.2d 562 (3d Cir. 1982); Seville v. Martin Marietta Corp., 638 F.Supp. 590 (D. Md. 1986).

22 Under title VII, “employee” is defined as

an individual employed by an employer, except that the term “employee” shall not include any person elected to public office in any State or political subdivision of any State by the qualified voters thereof, or any person chosen by such officer to be on such officer’s personal staff, or an appointee on the policy making level or an immediate adviser with respect to the exercise of the constitutional or legal powers of the office. The exemption set forth in the preceding sentence shall not include employees subject to the civil service laws of a State government, government agency or political subdivision.

42 U.S.C. §2000e(f).

23 111 S.Ct. at 1233.

24 Id.

25 Vermilya-Brown Co. v. Connell, 335 U.S. 377 (1948).

26 111 S.Ct. at 1234.

27 According to the majority, there is no basis for distinguishing between foreign and U.S. employers under title VII. In the dissent’s view, however, title VII’s extraterritorial applicability could be limited to U.S. employers.

28 111 S.Ct. at 1234.

29 429 U.S. 125 (1976).

30 Id. at 141 (quoting Albemarle Paper Co. v. Moody, 422 U.S. 405, 431 (1975)).

31 Id. at 141–42.

32 29 U.S.C. §631 (1982 & Supp. V 1987), as amended by Age Discrimination in Employment Amendments of 1986, Pub. L. No. 99-592, §2, 100 Stat. 3342 (1986).

33 See, e.g., Pfeiffer v. Wm. Wrigleyjr. Co., 755 F.2d 554 (7th Cir. 1985); Cleary v. United States Lines, 728 F.2d 607 (3d Cir. 1984); Thomas v. Brown & Root, Inc., 745 F.2d 279 (4th Cir. 1984); De Yoreo v. Bell Helicopter Textron, Inc., 608 F.Supp. 377 (N.D. Tex. 1985), aff’d, 785 F.2d 1282 (5th Cir. 1986); Zahourek v. Arthur Young & Co., 567 F.Supp. 1453 (D. Colo. 1983), aff’d, 750 F.2d 827 (10th Cir. 1984).

34 See Note, Same Boss, Different Rules: An Argument for Extraterritorial Extension of Title VII to Protect U.S. Citizens Employed Abroad by U.S. Multinational Corporations, 30 Va. J. Int’l L. 479 (1990) (concluded that the burden of ensuring the international coverage of title VII was on Congress and not the courts).

35 467 U.S. 837 (1984) (holding that federal courts are to defer responsibility to define the scope of a particular statute to the appropriate administrative agency when Congress has failed to address the point at issue).

36 111 S.Ct. at 1237.

37 This issue was addressed recently in Florida, where a federal district court held in favor of a woman who brought a claim under title VII against a foreign-owned cruise line that had discriminated against her on the basis of her sex in refusing to hire her for a position on one of its cruise ships. EEOC v. Bermuda Star Line, 744 F.Supp. 1109 (M.D. Fla. 1990).