Jennifer A. Holmes, a lawyer with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which has urged the court to take the case, says she hopes the conversations taking place nationally will push the justices in that direction.
Doing so gives the court an “opportunity to show that they’re not insensitive to issues of race,” Holmes said. And courts are all the time confronting workplace discrimination claims involving use of the racial slur, she said. The question for the justices, she said, is just whether someone who experiences an isolated instance of the racial slur can “advance their case beyond the beginning stage.”
Jessica Gresko
FILE - In this Jan. 22, 2020, file photo, night falls on the Supreme Court in Washington. The Supreme Court is considering whether to hear the case of a Black man who says he suffered discrimination because the N-word was carved into the wall of the hospital elevator where he worked. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File) May 13, 2021 - 4:39 PM
WASHINGTON (AP) â Robert Collier says that during the seven years he worked as an operating room aide at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, white nurses called him and other Black employees âboy. Management ignored two large swastikas painted on a storage room wall. And for six months, he regularly rode an elevator with the N-word carved into a wall.
Supreme Court considers hearing case on the ‘most offensive word’
Updated May 13, 2021;
Posted May 13, 2021
In this June 20, 2019, file photo, the Supreme Court is seen in Washington. (AP Photo)AP
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WASHINGTON (AP) Robert Collier says that during the seven years he worked as an operating room aide at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, white nurses called him and other Black employees “boy.” Management ignored two large swastikas painted on a storage room wall. And for six months, he regularly rode an elevator with the N-word carved into a wall.
Collier ultimately sued the hospital, but lower courts dismissed his case. Now, however, at a private conference Thursday, the Supreme Court will consider for the first time whether to hear his case. Focusing on the elevator graffiti, Collier is asking the justices to decide whether a single use of the N-word in the workplace can create a hostile work environment, giving an employee the ability to pursue a cas
U.S. Supreme Court considers hearing case over racial slur in the workplace
Updated May 13, 2021;
Posted May 13, 2021
The American flag waves in front of the U.S. Supreme Court building on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.
AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, 2020AP Photo/Patrick Semansky
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By JESSICA GRESKO, The Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) Robert Collier says that during the seven years he worked as an operating room aide at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, white nurses called him and other Black employees “boy.” Management ignored two large swastikas painted on a storage room wall. And for six months, he regularly rode an elevator with the N-word carved into a wall.
Supreme Court justices consider hearing a case on the N-word
Robert Collier is asking the justices to decide whether a single use of the N-word in the workplace can create a hostile work environment
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Robert Collier says that during the seven years he worked as an operating room aide at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, white nurses called him and other Black employees “boy.” Management ignored two large swastikas painted on a storage room wall. And for six months, he regularly rode an elevator with the N-word carved into a wall.
Collier ultimately sued the hospital, but lower courts dismissed his case. Now, however, at a private conference Thursday, the Supreme Court will consider for the first time whether to hear his case. Focusing on the elevator graffiti, Collier is asking the justices to decide whether a single use of the N-word in the workplace can create a hostile work environment, giving an employee the ability to pursue a case under Title VII