Second Circuit Holds that Eleventh Amendment does not Immunizes State from ADEA Claim
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Conflicting with a recent decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit (see C&C Newsletter for November, 1998,
item 26), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has held that states charged with violating the Age Discrimination
in Employment Act do not have immunity under the Eleventh Amendment to the Constitution. (Remember that Section 5 of the Fourteenth
Amendment to the United States Constitution gives Congress the power to abrogate the states' sovereign immunity under the
Eleventh Amendment if Congress unequivocally expresses that intent and validly exercises its enforcement power.) Following
a majority of other courts that have decided the same issue, the Second Circuit found that ADEA was properly adopted pursuant
to Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. Cooper v. New York State Office of Mental Health, Case No. 97-9433 (2d Cir., December 23, 1998).
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