Carter v. Local 556: Clarifying Religious Belief vs. Practice under Title VII and the Scope of RLA Remedies

Introduction

In Carter v. Local 556, 5th Cir. No. 23-10008 (May 8, 2025), flight attendant Charlene Carter sued Southwest Airlines (“Southwest”) and its bargaining representative, Transport Workers Union Local 556 (“the Union”), after her termination for sending graphic anti-abortion videos and images to the union president and posting similar material on her personal social media. Carter claimed that her termination violated Title VII’s protections for religious beliefs and practices and the Railway Labor Act’s (“RLA”) guarantees for employee and union rights. The underlying dispute spanned an internal union grievance, arbitration, district-court litigation, a jury trial, and appeals. The Fifth Circuit’s opinion delivers three major rulings:

It draws a clear statutory distinction between religious-belief-based and religious-practice-based claims under Title VII, confirming that only practice-based claims trigger the “undue hardship” defense.
It affirms liability on Carter’s practice-based Title VII claims but reverses her belief-based claim as a matter of law for lack of evidence.
It narrows the scope of RLA actions in federal court, rejecting Carter’s post-certification interference and retaliation claims against Southwest and upholding only her breach-of-fair-representation claim against the Union.

Summary of the Judgment

The Fifth Circuit reversed the jury’s verdict on Carter’s Title VII claim based on her religious beliefs and remanded with instructions to enter judgment for Southwest. It affirmed the verdict on Carter’s Title VII practice-based claims—finding Southwest discriminated against and failed to accommodate her social-media conduct in furtherance of her pro-life convictions. The court also rejected Carter’s RLA interference and retaliation claims against Southwest for lack of a private cause of action in a post-certification context, but it upheld her breach-of-fair-representation claim against the Union. Finally, the Fifth Circuit vacated in full the district court’s overly broad permanent injunction and punitive civil-contempt sanctions against Southwest, remanding for corrective proceedings and narrower relief.

Analysis

Precedents Cited

Trans World Airlines, Inc. v. Hardison, 432 U.S. 63 (1977): Established that an employer need not accommodate a religious practice if it imposes “‘more than a de minimis cost.’”
Weber v. Roadway Express, 199 F.3d 270 (5th Cir. 2000): Adopted the “de minimis cost” undue-hardship test for Title VII accommodations.
Groff v. DeJoy, 600 U.S. 447 (2023): Overruled “de minimis” as too low a bar, holding that an employer must show substantial increased costs in light of its size, nature, and operations before denying a religious accommodation.
Hebrew v. Texas Dep’t of Criminal Justice, 80 F.4th 717 (5th Cir. 2023): Applied Groff in the Fifth Circuit and emphasized that “belief-based” claims do not trigger an undue-hardship analysis.
Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 575 U.S. 768 (2015): Confirmed that Title VII’s causation standard is “motivating factor,” not but-for causation, for religious discrimination and accommodation claims.
Steele v. Louisville & Nashville R. Co., 323 U.S. 192 (1944) and Vaca v. Sipes, 386 U.S. 171 (1967): Recognized an implied private right of action under the RLA for breach of the union’s duty of fair representation.
Mitchell v. Continental Airlines, 481 F.3d 225 (5th Cir. 2007): Held that employees governed by an RLA collective bargaining agreement must litigate minor disputes in arbitration, except for breach of duty of fair representation.

Legal Reasoning

1. Title VII Distinction Between Belief and Practice
The court held that Title VII’s definition of “religion” (§ 2000e(j)) splits into two enforceable paths:

Intentional discrimination “because of . . . religious beliefs”—no undue-hardship defense.
Intentional discrimination or failure to accommodate “religious observance or practice”—subject to the “undue hardship” defense.

Because Carter’s evidence showed Southwest disciplined her for posting and messaging graphic videos—conduct in furtherance of her beliefs, not the beliefs themselves—the court affirmed the practice-based verdicts. However, she presented no direct or indirect proof that Southwest bore animus against her pro-life beliefs per se, so the belief-based claim failed as a matter of law.

2. Undue Hardship Jury Instruction
The court found that the district court’s “more than a de minimis cost” instruction correctly stated Fifth Circuit law at trial. It then declined Southwest’s request for a new trial under the post-Groff standard—concluding Southwest offered no additional evidence that substantial business costs would follow accommodation beyond the employee-morale arguments it already presented.

3. RLA Remedies Limitation
The RLA channels post-certification disputes into arbitration and allows federal courts to intervene only when a carrier acts with anti-union animus or a union breaches its duty of fair representation. The Fifth Circuit held Carter’s claims for interference and retaliation against Southwest lacked any anti-union animus showing and thus no private cause of action in federal court. By contrast, her duty-of-fair-representation claim against the Union survived because the union’s president had “arbitrarily” reported Carter, triggering the Supreme Court’s Steele/Vaca framework.

4. Injunctive Relief and Civil Contempt
The Fifth Circuit vacated the district court’s permanent injunction for violating Rule 65(d)’s specificity requirements and for overbreadth—prohibiting vague “discrimination” against all flight attendants beyond the dispute. It also struck down punitive contempt sanctions, ruling that civil contempt may only coerce compliance or compensate a complainant, not punish with attorney-training mandates or public-interest objectives.

Impact

Title VII compliance: Employers must separate belief-based claims (no undue‐hardship defense) from practice‐based claims (defense applies), tailoring policies accordingly and training HR staff to analyze accommodations in light of Groff’s substantial‐cost standard.
Union Discipline and Speech: Unions may face duty-of-fair-representation liability for purely internal, non-work-related conduct if they “arbitrarily” penalize or report employees, but employees cannot circumvent arbitration by invoking RLA rights absent anti-union animus.
RLA Jurisdiction: Reinforces the limited federal-court role under the RLA, barring claims based solely on union‐related “protected speech” outside of an anti-union conspiracy or breach of representation duties.
Contempt Limits: Clarifies that civil contempt relief must be narrowly tailored to remedy non‐compliance—not to punish or advance broad public policy goals—and underscores strict adherence to Rule 65(d) specificity.

Complex Concepts Simplified

“Religious belief” vs. “religious practice”: Beliefs are doctrinal convictions; practices are actions taken because of those convictions. Title VII treats them differently when an employer must decide if a requested accommodation imposes undue hardship.
Undue hardship: Post‐Groff, an employer must show substantial increased costs relative to its overall business, not merely a de minimis impact on co‐workers or operations.
RLA major vs. minor disputes: Major disputes concern negotiating new contracts—federal-court jurisdiction lies here. Minor disputes concern interpretation or application of an existing collective bargaining agreement—arbitration is the proper forum, except when anti‐union animus or a breach of fair representation leaves no adequate remedy.
Civil vs. criminal contempt: Civil contempt aims to coerce future compliance or compensate a party for past noncompliance. Criminal contempt punishes past disobedience and requires full criminal‐procedure safeguards.

Conclusion

Carter v. Local 556 marks a milestone in Title VII and RLA jurisprudence. It instructs employers to distinguish belief-based discrimination from practice-based discrimination and reaffirms that only practice claims trigger the undue-hardship defense. It also tightens the gateway for RLA claims in federal court, directing employees to arbitration except where unions breach representation duties or carriers act out of anti-union animus. Finally, it curbs judicial overreach in injunctive relief and contempt, insisting on precision, narrow tailoring, and lawful coercion rather than punitive coercion. Together, these rulings refine the legal landscape for religious accommodations, union relations, and the contours of federal-court intervention in labor disputes.