AFEW DAYS AFTER CBS Radio fired Don Imus for referring to black female basketball players at Rutgers as "nappy-headed hos," the U.S. Supreme Court winked at an even uglier racial slur. The justices on Monday declined to review a lower-court decision against a black IBM contract worker who was fired after complaining that a co-worker had described two African American murder suspects as "black monkeys."In October 2002, Robert L. Jordan was in a room at an IBM office in Maryland watching a news report about the arrest of two suspected snipers, both black, who had terrorized the Washington area. A co-worker in the room allegedly declared that "they should put those two black monkeys in a cage with a bunch of black apes and let the apes [sexually assault] them."
Jordan complained to his superiors and, in his version of events, was repaid for his whistle-blowing by being verbally harassed, given a heavier workload and eventually fired. Yet two lower courts refused to allow Jordan's complaint to go to trial because the "isolated racial slur" did not signify a "hostile workplace environment."
Contrary to popular belief, the Supreme Court does not decide to hear cases based on righting wrongs. But in passing up Jordan's case, the justices did more than close the courthouse door to an individual with a compelling story. They placed a cloud of uncertainty over the scope of the Civil Rights Act while weakening one of their own precedents.
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