Last time, we reviewed the data on the Court’s employment law cases from 2000 to 2010 and began looking at the data for the past nine years. Today, we review the remainder of the data, as well as looking at the overall numbers.
Since employment law cases have been so rare since 2010, we combine the data for defendants who won at the Appellate Court and plaintiffs who won below. Since 2010, defendants who won below have won once and lost twice at the Supreme Court. Plaintiffs who had won at the Appellate Court, on the other hand, are 0-3 since 2010 at the Supreme Court. Overall since 1990, defendants who prevailed below have eleven wins and eleven losses at the Supreme Court. Plaintiffs who won below have ten wins and seven losses at the Supreme Court.
Combining the data below into a single graphic tracking employment law defendants’ won-loss record (regardless of who won below), we see that since 2010, defendants have won four cases and lost two. Since 1990, employment law defendants have won eighteen and lost twenty-one at the Supreme Court.
Since 2010, the Court has decided one case relating to tort and contract liability, one discrimination case, three wage and hour/collective bargaining cases, one posing public employment issues and one “other.” Since 1990, the Court has decided sixteen cases involving wage and hour or collective bargaining issues, eleven involving tort or contract liability, six involving discrimination, five involving public employment issues and two “other.”
Next, we review the data for how many times each year the individual Justices supported an employment law defendant’s position. Justices Garman, Thomas, Karmeier and Burke each voted for employment law defendants four times since 2010. The remaining Justices (aside from Justice Fitzgerald) supported defendants in three cases.
As for each Justice’s votes against employment law defendants, Justices Garman and Burke lead with five apiece and Justices Freeman, Kilbride and Theis are next, all with three.
As we noted above, since 1990, defendants in employment law cases have won eighteen and lost twenty-one – a winning percentage of 46.15%. So which Justices have been more likely to support defendants in these cases than the Court as a whole? We see the numbers in Table 1121. Chief Justice Karmeier is first, having voted for the defendant to prevail in 76.92% of employment law cases. Justice Ryan is next at 66.67, followed by Justice Garman (56.52%), Justice Thomas (55%) and Justice McMorrow (52.63%). Justices Nickels, Fitzgerald, Rarick, Stamos and Theis have supported defendants exactly half the time.
And in Table 1122, we see the flip side – Justices who have voted for employment law defendants to prevail less often than the Court as a whole. Justice Miller voted for defendants in 45% of his cases. Justices Heiple and Bilandic were at 43.75%, Justice Freeman was at 41.18% and Justices Kilbride and Burke have voted for defendants 40% of the time. Justices Moran and Ward supported defendants in 33.33% of employment law cases, and Justices Harrison and Calvo did so in 25%. Justice Clark voted for defendants in only 11.11% of his employment law cases. Finally, Justices Cunningham and Rathje never did during their comparatively short tenures.
Join us back here next week as we move on to a new area of law.
Image courtesy of Flickr by Jeffrey Zeldman (no changes).