National Education Association v. South Carolina, 434 U.S. 1026, 98 S. Ct. 756, 54 L. Ed. 2d 775 (1978)

Facts

  • South Carolina used scores from the National Teacher Examinations (NTE) in hiring, certifying, classifying, and paying public-school teachers.
  • Only two other states used the NTE for teacher certification, and no other state used the NTE to set or determine compensation for experienced teachers.
  • The NTE’s authors advised against using the NTE as the sole criterion for teacher certification and advised against using it to determine compensation for experienced teachers.
  • The United States and additional plaintiffs, including the National Education Association and affected individuals, sued South Carolina, alleging the State’s reliance on NTE scores disadvantaged Black teachers and applicants in violation of the U.S. Constitution and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
  • South Carolina commissioned a study to validate the NTE by comparing the NTE’s content to the content of South Carolina’s teacher-training curriculum.
  • Based on the study, South Carolina issued new minimum-score requirements for use in hiring and certification decisions.
  • The revised minimum-score requirements disqualified about 83% of Black teaching applicants, compared to about 17.5% of White teaching applicants.
  • The revised score requirements resulted in about 96% of newly certified teachers being White and resulted in a higher share of Black teachers being placed in lower-paying classifications.
  • A three-judge federal district court concluded that the content-validation study sufficiently validated the NTE and that additional validation tying test scores to on-the-job performance was not required on the record presented.
  • The district court entered judgment for South Carolina, and the plaintiffs took a direct appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Issues

  1. Whether South Carolina’s use of NTE minimum scores for teacher hiring, certification, classification, and pay violated Title VII because of the tests’ disparate impact on Black applicants and teachers, and whether the State’s content-validation evidence was sufficient to justify the practice.
  2. Whether the State’s reliance on NTE scores violated the Equal Protection Clause based on the racially disproportionate outcomes and the asserted discriminatory purpose behind the policy choices.

Decision

  • The U.S. Supreme Court summarily affirmed the judgment below without a written opinion (“Judgment affirmed.”).
  • The summary affirmance left in place the three-judge district court’s judgment rejecting both the constitutional and Title VII challenges to South Carolina’s NTE-based requirements.
  • The district court accepted the State’s validation approach comparing NTE content to South Carolina’s teacher-training curriculum as sufficient support for continued use of the NTE minimum scores, despite severe racial disparities in outcomes.
  • The district court rejected constitutional liability, finding the record did not establish that South Carolina adopted or maintained the NTE requirements with a discriminatory purpose.

Legal Principles

  • Equal Protection: A racially disproportionate effect, standing alone, does not establish a Fourteenth Amendment violation; plaintiffs must prove discriminatory purpose.
  • Title VII disparate impact: When an employment-related selection device disproportionately excludes a protected group, the employer must justify the device by showing it is job-related and consistent with business necessity.
  • Test validation: Content validation—evidence that a test measures knowledge or skills connected to the relevant training or requirements—may be accepted as support for job-related use, depending on the record; a court may decline to require additional proof tying test scores to measured job performance in a particular case.
  • Supreme Court summary affirmance: A summary affirmance leaves the lower court’s judgment intact and carries precedential effect on issues necessarily decided, even though the Court provides no reasoning.

Conclusion

The Supreme Court’s memorandum affirmance at 434 U.S. 1026 left standing a three-judge district court decision upholding South Carolina’s reliance on NTE minimum scores in teacher hiring, certification, classification, and pay, despite pronounced racial disparities, because the State presented content-validation evidence accepted as sufficient under Title VII and the plaintiffs did not prove discriminatory purpose for an Equal Protection violation.