This work crystallizes the sorts of questions that academics know the answer to, as well as the questions that would be hard for academics to answer but quite easy for practitioners to address.
Professor Elizabeth "Liz" Tippett
University of Oregon School of Law
Employment Law Scholar Elizabeth Tippett recently contributed to the ABA Labor and Employment section’s fall newsletter. Her column Supreme Court Review 2024–2025, offers a concise round-up on the last term’s impact on labor and employment law.
Heading her list for the most important ruling is Ames v. Ohio, which resolved a long-standing circuit split over the “background circumstances” test. The Court unanimously held that majority group plaintiffs face the same burden of proof as minority group plaintiffs in Title VII discrimination cases. Also getting top billing, an immigration case: Trump v. CASA, which challenged President Trump’s efforts to revoke birthright citizenship. The Court restricted district court use of universal injunctions, a remedy frequently sought in challenges to new labor and employment regulations.
This is not the first time Professor Tippett has contributed to the quarterly newsletter. In the July 2024 issue she wrote Bostock after Bostock: What Happened to Bostock v. Clayton County after the Supreme Court’s 2020 Decision, which revealed the little known facts and subsequent history of the landmark case extending Title VII protections to individuals discriminated against based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Professor Tippett’s newsletter contributions grew out of her participation in the American Bar Association’s annual Labor & Employment conference. At the 2024 conference in New York City, she spoke alongside expert practitioners on the panel “Advertising, Solicitation and Public Statements in the Digital Age.” She credits New York attorney Mark Risk with creating a collaborative experience and spurring follow-on opportunities for the participants.
Professor Tippett considers the ABA Section a place where academics and practitioners on both sides of the field can learn from each other. As she explains, “This work crystallizes the sorts of questions that academics know the answer to, as well as the questions that would be hard for academics to answer but quite easy for practitioners to address.” She has continued to reach out to her collaborators and envisions future projects that would rely on practitioner interviews as part of her research and data gathering.