By Simon Lazarus and Sergio Munoz, Attorneys, National Senior Citizens Law Center
On May 5 and 6, House and Senate committees held back-to-back hearings on legislation to override a June 2009 Supreme Court decision that stripped older workers of vital protections against bias on which they had relied for over 40 years. In this ruling, which Justice Stevens in dissent characterized as "unabashed judicial law-making," "irresponsible," and in "utter disregard" of the Court's own precedents and "Congressional intent," a narrow 5-4 majority so weakened the 1967 Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), that employers are left with little incentive to comply. The case, Gross v. FBL Financial Services, illustrates the accuracy of President Obama's recent observation that we "are now seeing a conservative jurisprudence" that is both "activist" and bent on gutting laws that, like the ADEA, were enacted to protect ordinary people.