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Ricci V. Destefano

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Ricci v. DeStefano
Jennifer Drab
Baker College

Abstract
Ricci v. DeStefano is case based on reverse discrimination. The New Haven firefighters that brought this suit against the city did so on the belief that the city in its efforts to avoid litigation violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Reverse discrimination is a term that is used widely; however, it is very difficult to move forward with this claim in a court of law. The New Haven firefighters that brought the suit had their case heard before the Supreme Court of the United States. This was not a case that the justices took lightly; they asked many difficult questions, which looked at many different aspects of Title VII. The answer from the high court is that rejecting the test scores in fear of Title VII litigation is not grounds enough to disqualify candidates that qualified for promotion. In the end, the high court upheld the firefighters claim that the city’s rejection of the exam scores violated the rights of those that qualified based on the exam.

Introduction Ricci v. DeStefano, is case of reverse discrimination within the fire department of New Haven, Connecticut. This case is an illustration that affirmative action does not always result in fairness. New Haven city officials created a very comprehensive written examination for testing those fire fighters that were looking to be promoted to captain and lieutenant (Epstein, 2009). Unfortunately, the examination showed that there was disparity between the white fire fighters scores and those scores of African-Americans and Hispanic fire fighters (Epstein, 2009). In 2003, the city of New Haven reviewed the test scores of all the fire fighters that took the examination in hopes of moving up the ladder. The city discovered that if they used the test scores they would be unable to promote any minorities to the rank of captain and

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