In one case, CBOCS West v. Humphries, the justices ruled in a 7-2 vote that an 1866 law, Congress's first major civil rights act, prohibits retaliation against workers who complain of racial discrimination. The court's two most conservative justices, Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia, dissented.
In another case, Gomez-Perez v. Potter, the court ruled 6-3 that the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 bars retaliation based on the filing of an age discrimination complaint. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. dissented in the case, along with Thomas and Scalia.
The court said in both cases that it was bound by previous Supreme Court rulings that allowed retaliation claims under other laws. The respondents in each case had argued that the law in question did not specifically prohibit retaliation.
