WASHINGTON, June 10 (UPI) -- The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday that the federal law banning discrimination against the disabled does not entitle a disabled person to a job that might cause injury or death to the employee.
The decision reverses a lower court ruling.
The Americans with Disabilities Act covers all workplaces with 15 or more employees. In general, the act bans discrimination against the disabled and tells employers they must make a reasonable attempt to accommodate the disabled, either as employees or as customers.
The case that led to Monday's decision involves Mario Echazabal, who was employed by an independent contractor to work at the Chevron refinery in El Segundo, Calif.
Twice Echazabal tried to be employed directly by Chevron, and twice the company approved his employment on the condition that he pass a physical exam. Each time the employment offer was rescinded.
The first time, doctors found a liver abnormality and concluded that exposure to toxic fumes at the refinery would exacerbate it. The second time, doctors found he had significant liver damage, and that exposure to the chemicals at Chevron could harm or kill him, according to court records.
Echazabal's personal physician wrote Chevron in 1996 to say the worker's hepatitis C was not contagious and he could return to his job. However, Chevron told the contractor that Echazabal should not be employed at the refinery and the contractor fired him.
Echazabal then filed suit against Chevron in state court, saying the company had violated the Americans with Disabilities Act when it withdrew its 1995 work offer. Chevron had the case removed to federal court.
A federal judge ruled for the company, saying the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, an agency that helps enforce the ADA, lets an employer refuse to hire someone when the job would be a threat to the potential employee's health.
A federal appeals court reversed. The judges' panel ruled 2-1 the language of the ADA allows an employer not to hire someone when that person's disability is a "direct threat" to another worker, but does not allow an employer to refuse a job to someone whose own health would be threatened.
Chevron then asked the Supreme Court for review.
Speaking for the company during argument last February, Chicago attorney Stephen Shapiro told the justices, "The chemicals in this (El Segundo) refinery were liver toxins," and cited the 8,000 to 10,000 deaths caused each year by hepatitis C.
"Now, none of this matters, according to the (appeals court majority)," Shapiro said.
The Bush administration supported Chevron. Monday, the Supreme Court did, too.
Writing for the full court, liberal Justice David Souter said the EEOC must act reasonably when interpreting federal law.
"The EEOC was certainly acting within the reasonable zone when it saw a difference between rejecting workplace paternalism and ignoring specific and documented risks to the employee himself," Souter said, "even if the employee would take his chances for the sake of getting a job."
Monday's Supreme Court decision reverses the appeals court ruling, but sends the case back down for a rehearing and another ruling in line with the high court decision.
(No. 00-1406, Chevron vs. Echazabal)
