Sandra G. Bundy v. Delbert Jackson, Director, D.C. Department of Corrections

In Barnes v. Costle, 561 F.2d 983 (D.C. Cir. 1977), we held that an employer who abolished a female employee’s job to retaliate against the employee’s resistance of his sexual advances violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. (1976 & Supp. III 1979). The appellant in this case asserts some claims encompassed by the Barnes decision, arguing that her rejection of unsolicited and offensive sexual advances from several supervisors in her agency caused those supervisors unjustifiably to delay and block promotions to which she was entitled. Equally important, however, appellant asks us to extend Barnes by holding that an employer violates Title VII merely by subjecting female employees to sexual harassment, even if the employee’s resistance to that harassment does not cause the employ *939 er to deprive her of any tangible job benefits.

The District Court in this case made an express finding of fact that in appellant’s agency “the making of improper sexual advances to female employees [was] standard operating procedure, a fact of life, a normal condition of employment,” Finding of Fact No. 38, Appellant’s Appendix (App.) 15, and that the director of the agency, to whom she complained of the harassment, failed to investigate her complaints or take them seriously, id. No. 44, App. 16. Nevertheless, the District Court refused to grant appellant any declaratory or injunctive relief, concluding that sexual harassment does not in itself represent discrimination “with respect to * * * terms, conditions, or privileges of employment” within the meaning of Title VII, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(l) (1976). Further, the court denied appellant’s request for back pay to compensate for the allegedly improper delay in her promotion to GS-9, and for elevation to GS--11 and back pay for the delay in that promotion, holding that the employer had independent, legitimate reasons for delaying and denying the promotions.

Because we believe the District Court wrongly construed Title VII on the claim for declaratory and injunctive relief and failed to apply the proper burden of proof analysis to the promotion claims, we reverse. 1

I. BACKGROUND

Appellant Sandra Bundy is now, and was at the time she filed her lawsuit, a Vocational Rehabilitation Specialist, level GS-9, with the District of Columbia Department of Corrections (the agency). Bundy began with the agency as a GS-4 Personnel Clerk in 1970, was promoted to GS-5 that same year, and became a GS-6 Staffing Technician in the Personnel Department in 1973. After training as a technician in employment staffing, she became a GS-7 Employment Development Specialist (the predecessor classification to Vocational Rehabilitation Specialist) in 1974, and achieved her current GS-9 level in 1976, one year after she filed her formal complaint of sexual harassment with the agency. In recent years Bundy’s chief task has been to find jobs for former criminal offenders.

The District Court’s finding that sexual intimidation was a “normal condition of employment” in Bundy’s agency finds ample support in the District Court’s own chronology of Bundy’s experiences there. Those experiences began in 1972 when Bundy, still a GS-5, received and rejected sexual propositions from Delbert Jackson, then a fellow employee at the agency but now its Director and the named defendant in this lawsuit in his official capacity. Findings of Fact Nos. 28-29, App. 11-12. It was two years later, however, that the sexual intimidation Bundy suffered began to intertwine directly with her employment, when she received propositions from two of her supervisors, Arthur Burton and James Gainey.

Burton became Bundy’s supervisor when Bundy became an Employment Development Specialist in 1974. Shortly thereafter Gainey became her first-line supervisor and Burton her second-line supervisor, although Burton retained control of Bundy’s employ *940 ment status. Id. Nos. 32-33, App. 12. Burton began sexually harassing Bundy in June 1974, continually calling her into his office to request that she spend the workday afternoon with him at his apartment and to question her about her sexual proclivities. Id. No. 34, App. 12-13. 2 Shortly after becoming her first-line supervisor Gainey also began making sexual advances to Bundy, asking her to join him at a motel and on a trip to the Bahamas. Id. No. 35, App. 13-14. Bundy complained about these advances to Lawrence Swain, who supervised both Burton and Gainey. Swain casually dismissed Bundy’s complaints, telling her that “any man in his right mind would want to rape you,” id. No. 37, App. 14, and then proceeding himself to request that she begin a sexual relationship with him in his apartment. Id. No. 36, App. 14. Bundy rejected his request.

We add that, although the District Court made no explicit findings as to harassment of other female employees, its finding that harassment was “standard operating procedure” finds ample support in record evidence that Bundy was not the only woman subjected to sexual intimidation by male supervisors. 3

In denying Bundy any relief, the District Court found that Bundy’s supervisors did not take the “game” of sexually propositioning female employees “seriously,” and that Bundy’s rejection of their advances did not evoke in them any motive to take any action against her. Id. No. 38, App. 15. The record, however, contains nothing to support this view, and indeed some evidence directly belies it. For example, after Bundy complained to Swain, Burton began to derogate her for alleged malingering and poor work performance, though she had not previously received any such criticism. App. 30. Burton also arranged a meeting with Bundy and Gainey to discuss Bundy’s alleged abuse of leave, though he did not pursue his charges at this meeting. App. 94-95.

Beyond these actions, Bundy’s supervisors at least created the impression that they were impeding her promotion because she had offended them, and they certainly did nothing to help her pursue her harassment claims through established channels. Bundy became eligible for promotion to GS-9 in January 1975. App. 178. When she contacted Gainey to inquire about a promotion he referred her to Burton, who then referred her back to Gainey, who then told her that because of a promotion freeze he could not recommend her for a promotion. App. 41-43. One month later, however, Bundy learned that the personnel office had indeed recommended other employees for promotion despite the freeze. App. 44. *941 Bundy then informally consulted an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Officer who was working in her office, and then requested a meeting with Claude Burgin, Swain’s supervisor. On February 18, 1975 Bundy met with Burton and Burgin and told the latter that Burton and Gainey had sexually harassed her and denied her a promotion because she had resisted their advances. Burgin simply responded that she was denied the promotion because her work was unsatisfactory, and that she was free to pursue the matter further if she cared to. App. 46-48. Bundy then informally complained about the sexual harassment to Aquila Gilmore, the Chief EEO Officer in the agency. Gilmore, however, simply advised that her charges might be difficult to prove, and cautioned her against bringing unwarranted complaints. He never brought the issue to the attention of Delbert Jackson, by then Director of the agency. App. 187-190.

On April 11, 1975 Bundy met with Jackson and showed him the draft of a letter summarizing her complaint. Jackson then arranged an April 14 meeting with Burgin, Burton, and Bundy, Finding of Fact No. 39, App. 14, but Gilmore, who had become Chief of Manpower Management at the agency, and Charles Rogers, Assistant Director of Operations, also attended the meeting. Bundy, purportedly embarrassed at the unexpected presence of the latter two men, did not take the opportunity of discussing her sexual harassment claims at this meeting, nor did Jackson or Gilmore raise the issue. Instead, the meeting focused on Bundy’s possible promotion and her alleged work deficiencies. Id. No. 40, App. 15-16. On April 23 Gainey and Burton completed a memorandum offering Bundy’s inadequate work performance as the reason for denying her a promotion to GS-9. Plaintiff’s Exh. 2, Appellant’s Supplemental Appendix (SA) 217. Bundy responded to this memorandum, arguing that her supervisors had never presented her with any written criticism of her performance until she raised the harassment issue. See App. 145-148. 4

Bundy proceeded to pursue her complaint beyond her immediate supervisors. She registered an informal complaint with EEO Officer Philip Matthews, App. 64-65, 5 and then filed a formal complaint and supplemental complaints with the agency. Jackson, having learned of the formal complaints, took no steps to investigate them beyond simply asking Burton, Gainey, and Swain whether they had made improper advances to Bundy. Finding of Fact No. 44, App. 16-17; App. 125-127. Bundy was finally promoted to GS-9 in July 1976. Having received “satisfactory” ratings for her work performance, she became eligible for promotion to GS-11 in July 1977, but has not yet received that promotion.

Bundy filed her complaint in the District Court on August 3, 1977. 6

II. CLAIM FOR DECLARATORY AND INJUNCTIVE RELIEF

The District Court appeared to find that even Bundy took a casual attitude toward the pattern of unsolicited sexual advances in the agency, Finding of Fact No. 47, App. 17, thereby implying that these advances by *942 themselves did no harm to female employees. We find little or no basis in the record for the District Court’s finding or implication, especially since Bundy’s testimony that the sexual harassment she endured did her serious emotional harm, App. 40, was essentially unrefuted. In any event, the essential basis for the District Court’s refusal to hold that the sexual harassment was in itself a violation of Title VII, Conclusion of Law No. 5, App. 18, was not this factual finding, but the District Court’s construction of Title VII.

The key provision of Title VII states:

It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer—

(1) to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to [her] compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual’s * * * sex * *[.]

42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(l) (1976). The specific provision of Title VII applying to employment with the District of Columbia, as well as to a federal agency as in Barnes v. Costle, supra, states:

All personnel actions affecting employees * * * in those units of the Government of the District of Columbia having positions in the competitive service * * * shall be made free from any discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.

Id. § 2000e-16(a). Despite the difference in language between these two sections, we have held that Title VII places the same restrictions on federal and District of Columbia agencies as it does on private employers, Barnes v. Costle, supra, 561 F.2d at 988, and so we may construe the latter provision in terms of the former. We infer that the District Court in this case did the same, and that it refused Bundy declaratory and injunctive relief because it believed that sexual harassment not leading to loss or denial of tangible employment benefits for the harassed employee fell outside the scope of discrimination with respect to “terms, conditions, or privileges of employment.”

Because Paulette Barnes had had her job terminated after she refused her supervisor’s sexual importunings, we were not required in Barnes to construe the phrase “terms, conditions, or privileges of employment.” Instead, our task of statutory construction in Barnes was to determine whether the disparate treatment Barnes suffered was “based on * * * sex.” Id. at 989. We heard arguments there that whatever harm Barnes suffered was not sex discrimination, since Barnes’ supervisor terminated her job because she had refused sexual advances, not because she was a woman. We rejected those arguments as disingenuous in the extreme. The supervisor in that case made demands of Barnes that he would not have made of male employees. Id. “But for her womanhood * * [Barnes’] participation in sexual activity would never have been solicited. To say, then, that she was victimized in her employment simply because she declined the invitation is to ignore the asserted fact that she was invited only because she was a woman subordinate to the inviten in the hierarchy of agency personnel.” Id. at 990 (emphasis added; footnotes omitted). 7

We thus made clear in Barnes that sex discrimination within the meaning of Title VII is not limited to disparate treatment founded solely or categorically on gender. Rather, discrimination is sex discrimination whenever sex is for no legitimate reason a substantial factor in the discrimination. Id. at 990 & n.50, citing Phil *943 lips v. Martin Marietta Corp., 400 U.S. 542, 91 S.Ct. 496, 27 L.Ed.2d 613 (1971); see 29 C.F.R. § 1604.4(a) (1979) (“so long as sex is a factor in the application of [an employer’s decision], such application involves a discrimination based on sex”). Other circuits have agreed. Tomkins v. Public Service Electric & Gas Co., 568 F.2d 1044 (3d Cir. 1977); Garber v. Saxon Business Products, Inc., 552 F.2d 1032 (4th Cir. 1977); see Miller v. Bank of America, 600 F.2d 211 (9th Cir. 1979).

We thus have no difficulty inferring that Bundy suffered discrimination on the basis of sex. Moreover, applying Barnes, we have no difficulty ascribing the harassment — the “standard operating procedure” — to Bundy’s employer, the agency. Although Delbert Jackson himself appears not to have used his position as Director to harass Bundy, an employer is liable for discriminatory acts committed by supervisory personnel, Barnes v. Costle, supra, 561 F.2d at 993, and there is obviously no dispute that the men who harassed Bundy were her supervisors. Barnes did suggest that the employer might be relieved of liability if the supervisor committing the harassment did so in contravention of the employer’s policy and without the employer’s knowledge, and if the employer moved promptly and effectively to rectify the offense. Id.; see Croker v. Boeing Co. (Vertol Div.), 437 F.Supp. 1138, 1194 (E.D. Pa. 1977). Here, however, Delbert Jackson and other officials in the agency who had some control over employment and promotion decisions had full notice of harassment committed by agency supervisors and did virtually nothing to stop or even investigate the practice. 8 See id. at 1191. And though there was ample evidence in this case that at least two other women in the agency suffered from this harassment, see note 3 supra, Barnes makes clear that the employer could be held liable even if Bundy were the only victim, since Congress intended Title VII to protect individuals against class-based prejudice. Barnes v. Costle, supra, 561 F.2d at 993. 9

We thus readily conclude that Bundy’s employer discriminated against her on the basis of sex. What remains is the novel question whether the sexual harassment of the sort Bundy suffered amounted by itself to sex discrimination with respect to the “ terms, conditions, or privileges of employment.” Though no court has as yet so held, we believe that an affirmative answer follows ineluctably from numerous cases finding Title VII violations where an employer created or condoned a substantially discriminatory work environment, regardless of whether the complaining employees lost *944 any tangible job benefits as a result of the discrimination.

Bundy’s claim on this score is essentially that “conditions of employment” include the psychological and emotional work environment — that the sexually stereotyped insults and demeaning propositions to which she was indisputably subjected and which caused her anxiety and debilitation, App. 40, illegally poisoned that environment. This claim invokes the Title VII principle enunciated by Judge Goldberg in Rogers v. Equal Employment Opportunity Com’n, 454 F.2d 234 (5th Cir. 1971), cert. denied, 406 U.S. 957, 92 S.Ct. 2058, 32 L.Ed.2d 343 (1972). The plaintiff in Rogers, a Hispanic, did not claim that her employer, a firm of opticians, had deprived her of any tangible job benefit. Rather, she claimed that by giving discriminatory service to its Hispanic clients the firm created a discriminatory and offensive work environment for its Hispanic employees. Granting that the express language of Title VII did not mention this situation, Judge Goldberg stated:

Congress chose neither to enumerate specific discriminatory practices, nor to elucidate in extenso the parameter of such nefarious activities. Rather, it pursued the path of wisdom by being unconstrictive, knowing that constant change is the order of our day and that the seemingly reasonable practices of the present can easily become the injustices of the morrow. Time was when employment discrimination tended to be viewed as a series of isolated and distinguishable events, manifesting itself, for example, in an employer’s practices of hiring, firing, and promoting. But today employment discrimination is a far more complex and pervasive phenomenon, as the nuances and subtleties of discriminatory employment practices are no longer confined to bread and butter issues. As wages and hours of employment take subordinate roles in management-labor relationships, the modern employee makes ever-increasing demands in the nature of intangible fringe benefits. Recognizing the importance of these benefits, we should neither ignore their need for protection, nor blind ourselves to their potential misuse.

454 F.2d at 238. The Fifth Circuit then concluded that the employer had indeed violated Title VII, Judge Goldberg explaining that “terms, conditions, or privileges of employment”

is an expansive concept which sweeps within its protective ambit the practice of creating a work environment heavily charged with ethnic or racial discrimination. * * * One can readily envision working environments so heavily polluted with discrimination as to destroy completely the emotional and psychological stability of minority group workers * * *.

Id.; accord, Carroll v. Talman Federal Savings & Loan Ass’n, 604 F.2d 1028, 1032-1033 & n.13 (7th Cir. 1979), petition for cert, pending (forcing female bank employees to wear uniforms while allowing males to wear own suits violates Title VII by perpetuating demeaning sexual stereotypes; “terms and conditions of employment” mean more than tangible compensation and benefits); Cariddi v. Kansas City Chiefs Football Club, Inc., 568 F.2d 87 (8th Cir. 1977) (though employee could only prove isolated incidents, a pattern of offensive ethnic slurs would violate his Title VII rights); Firefighters Institute for Racial Equality v. City of St. Louis, 549 F.2d 506, 514-515 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 434 U.S. 819, 98 S.Ct. 60, 54 L.Ed.2d 76 (1977) (segregated employee eating clubs condoned— though not organized or regulated — by employer violate Title VII by creating discriminatory work environment); Gray v. Greyhound Lines, East, 178 U.S.App.D.C. 91, 545 F.2d 169, 176 (D.C. Cir. 1976) (pattern of racial slurs violates Title VII rights to nondiscriminatory environment); United States v. City of Buffalo, 457 F.Supp. 612, 631-635 (W.D. N.Y. 1978) (black employees entitled to work environment free of racial abuse and insult); Compston v. Borden, Inc., 424 F.Supp. 157 (S.D. Ohio 1976) (demeaning religious slurs by supervisor violate Title VII); Steadman v. Hundley, 421 F.Supp. 53, 57 (N.D. Ill. 1976) (racial slurs may lead to Title VII violation); cf. Harrington v. Vandalia-Butler Board of Educ., 585 F.2d 192, *945 194 n.3 (6th Cir. 1978), cert. denied, 441 U.S. 932, 99 S.Ct. 2053, 60 L.Ed.2d 660 (1979) (giving female physical education teachers inferior locker and shower facilities is illegal discrimination; Title VII reaches “actual working conditions,” not just equal opportunity for employment); Waters v. Heublein, Inc., 547 F.2d 466 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 433 U.S. 915, 97 S.Ct. 2988, 53 L.Ed.2d 1100 (1977) (white plaintiff has standing to sue employer who discriminates against blacks, since she has statutory right to work environment free of racial prejudice); Swint v. Pullman-Standard, 539 F.2d 77 (5th Cir. 1976) (discriminatory job assignments violate Title VII even where no discrimination in salary; Title VII claimant need not prove tangible economic harm). 10

The relevance of these “discriminatory environment” cases to sexual harassment is beyond serious dispute. Racial or ethnic discrimination against a company’s minority clients may reflect no intent to discriminate directly against the company’s minority employees, but in poisoning the atmosphere of employment it violates Title VII. Sexual stereotyping through discriminatory dress requirements may be benign in intent, and may offend women only in a general, atmospheric manner, yet it violates Title VII. Racial slurs, though intentional and directed at individuals, may still be just verbal insults, yet they too may create Title VII liability. How then can sexual harassment, which injects the most demeaning sexual stereotypes into the general work environment and which always represents an intentional assault on an individual’s innermost privacy, not be illegal?

Moreover, an important principle articulated in Rogers v. Equal Employment Opportunity Com’n, supra, suggests the special importance of allowing women to sue to prevent sexual harassment without having to prove that they resisted the harassment and that their resistance caused them to lose tangible job benefits. Judge Goldberg noted that even indirect discrimination is illegal because it

may constitute a subtle scheme designed to create a working environment imbued with discrimination and directed ultimately at minority group employees. As patently discriminatory practices become outlawed, those employers bent on pursuing a general policy declared illegal by Congressional mandate will undoubtedly devise more sophisticated methods to perpetuate discrimination among employees. * * *

454 F.2d at 239. Thus, unless we extend the Barnes holding, an employer could sexually harass a female employee with impunity by carefully stopping short of firing the employee or taking any other tangible actions against her in response to her resistance, thereby creating the impression — the one received by the District Court in this case — that the employer did not take the ritual of harassment and resistance “seriously.”

Indeed, so long as women remain inferiors in the employment hierarchy, they may have little recourse against harassment beyond the legal recourse Bundy seeks in this case. The law may allow a woman to prove that her resistance to the harassment cost her her job or some economic benefit, but this will do her no good if the employer never takes such tangible actions against her.

And this, in turn, means that so long as the sexual situation is constructed with enough coerciveness, subtlety, suddenness, or one-sidedness to negate the effectiveness of the woman’s refusal, or so long as her refusals are simply ignored while her job is formally undisturbed, she is not considered to have been sexually harassed.

*946 C. MacKinnon, Sexual Harassment of Working Women 46-47 (1979). It may even be pointless to require the employee to prove that she “resisted” the harassment at all. So long as the employer never literally forces sexual relations on the employee, “resistance” may be a meaningless alternative for her. If the employer demands no response to his verbal or physical gestures other than good-natured tolerance, the woman has no means of communicating her rejection. She neither accepts nor rejects the advances; she simply endures them. She might be able to contrive proof of rejection by objecting to the employer’s advances in some very visible and dramatic way, but she would do so only at the risk of making her life on the job even more miserable. Id. at 43-47. It hardly helps that the remote prospect of legal relief under Barnes remains available if she objects so powerfully that she provokes the employer into firing her.

The employer can thus implicitly and effectively make the employee’s endurance of sexual intimidation a “condition” of her employment. The woman then faces a “cruel trilemma.” She can endure the harassment. She can attempt to oppose it, with little hope of success, either legal or practical, but with every prospect of making the job even less tolerable for her. Or she can leave her job, with little hope of legal relief 11 and the likely prospect of another job where she will face harassment anew.

Bundy proved that she was the victim of a practice of sexual harassment and a discriminatory work environment permitted by her employer. Her rights under Title VII were therefore violated. We thus reverse the District Court’s holding on this issue and remand it to that court so it can fashion appropriate injunctive relief. 12 And on this novel issue, we think it advisable to offer the District Court guidance in framing its decree. 13

*947 The Final Guidelines on Sexual Harassment in the Workplace (Guidelines) issued by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on November 10, 1980, 45 Fed. Reg. 74676-74677 (1980) (to be codified at 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(a)-(f)), offer a useful basis for injunctive relief in this case. Those Guidelines define sexual harassment broadly:

Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature constitute sexual harassment when (1) submission to such conduct is made either explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of an individual’s employment, (2) submission to or rejection of such conduct by an individual is used as the basis for employment decisions affecting such individual, or (3) such conduct has the purpose or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual’s work performance or creating an intimidating, hostile, or offensive work environment.

Guidelines, supra, 45 Fed.Reg. at 74677 (to be codified at 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(a)). The Guidelines go on to reaffirm that an employer is responsible for discriminatory acts of its agents and supervisory employees with respect to sexual harassment just as with other forms of discrimination, regardless of whether the employer authorized or knew or even should have known of the acts, id. (to be codified at 29 C.F.R. § 1604.-11(d)), and also remains responsible for sexual harassment committed by nonsupervisory employees if the employer authorized, knew of, or should have known of such harassment, id. (to be codified at 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(d)). The general goal of these Guidelines is preventive. An employer may negate liability by taking “immediate and appropriate corrective action” when it learns of any illegal harassment, id., but the employer should fashion rules within its firm or agency to ensure that such corrective action never becomes necessary, id. (to be codified at 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(f)).

Applying these Guidelines to the present case, we believe that the Director of the agency should be ordered to raise affirmatively the subject of sexual harassment with all his employees and inform all employees that sexual harassment violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Guidelines of the EEOC, the express orders of the Mayor of the District of Columbia, 14 and the policy of the agency itself. The Director should also establish and publicize a scheme whereby harassed employees may complain to the Director immediately and confidentially. The Director should promptly take all necessary steps to investigate and correct any harassment, including warnings and appropriate discipline directed at the offending party, and should generally develop other means of preventing harassment within the agency.

Perhaps the most important part of the preventive remedy will be a prompt and effective procedure for hearing, adjudicating, and remedying complaints of sexual harassment within the agency. Fortunately, the District Court need not establish an entire new procedural mechanism for harassment complaints. Under regulations promulgated by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 29 C.F.R. §§ 1613.201-1613.283 (1979), the Department of Corrections, like all other federal and District of Columbia agencies, is required to establish procedures for adjudication of complaints of denial of equal employment op *948 portunity, whether the ground of discrimination is race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. The required procedures guarantee the complainant a prompt and effective investigation, an opportunity for informal adjustment of the discrimination, and, if necessary, a formal evidentiary hearing. Moreover, if the complaint proves meritorious the agency may be required to take disciplinary action against any employee found to have committed discriminatory acts. Id. § 1613.221(c). Finally, the agency must inform any employee denied relief within the agency of his or her right to file a civil action in the District Court. Id. § 1613.282.

Since we have held that sexual harassment, even if it does not result in loss of tangible job benefits, is illegal sex discrimination, the District Court may simply order the Director of the agency to ensure that complaints of sexual harassment receive thorough and effective treatment within the formal process the agency has already established to comply with the Civil Service Commission regulations. Finally, we believe the District Court should retain jurisdiction of the case so that it may review the Director’s plans for complying with the injunction. 15

III. CLAIMS FOR BACK PAY AND PROMOTION

Beyond claiming that the sexual harassment she suffered was illegal in itself, Bundy claims that her supervisors illegally retaliated against her refusal of their sexual propositions by delaying her promotion to GS-9 level, and that they continue to retaliate by denying her a promotion to GS-11. Bundy thus requests back pay for the delay in promotion to both levels, and an order requiring her immediate promotion to GS-11. The District Court held against Bundy on these claims, essentially finding that the supervisors were not offended by Bundy’s refusal of their advances, and hence had no motive to retaliate against her, and that Bundy’s flawed qualifications and work performance gave them legitimate reasons for delaying and denying the promotions. Bundy now argues that the District Court’s factual findings were clearly erroneous, Fed.R.Civ.P. 52(a), and notes that in a dis *949 crimination case the appellate court may make an independent review of the record to determine whether the District Court was correct in finding the “ultimate fact” of discrimination or no discrimination. Kinsey v. First Regional Securities, Inc., 557 F.2d 830, 836 (D.C. Cir. 1977). The parties presented to the District Court, and present to us now, a fairly confusing set of facts with respect to the promotion claims. We review them only very briefly.

Bundy became eligible for promotion to GS-9 in January 1975 after 12 months as a GS-7. She was not promoted until July 1976. 16 At the time she became technically eligible for a promotion she was told that a temporary job freeze made even a recommendation of promotion impossible. Nevertheless, other employees in her unit were recommended for promotion and even promoted during the purported freeze. App. 41-44. Specifically, William Hill, another Vocational Rehabilitation Specialist, was promoted to GS-9 in May 1975 after 15 months as a GS-7 and three months of technical eligibility, App. 184, and William Goff, who was hired as a GS-9 Vocational Rehabilitation Specialist, was promoted to GS-11 in July 1975 after 15 months as a GS-9, App. 183. Bundy cites evidence that she performed the same work as these men, and that she performed it every bit as well as they did. App. 107-108.

The trial court found that Bundy’s work was in fact deficient, and that her qualifications were inferior to those of Hill and Goff. It found that Bundy had taken excessive sick leave, failed to file required reports, made insufficient field contacts, and neglected to report her duty assignments, Findings of Fact Nos. 16-19, App. 10, and that her supervisors had properly informed her of these deficiencies, id. No. 20, App. 10. It also found that Hill and Goff, unlike Bundy, had had considerable experience working with ex-offenders or disadvantaged youths before they joined the agency, and that Goff, unlike Bundy, possessed a college degree. The District of Columbia now supports the .District Court decision by noting that Bundy’s consistent “satisfactory” work ratings are not in themselves a sufficient basis for promotion, Defendant’s Exh. No. 17, SA 294, and that had Bundy been promoted in January 1975 she would have achieved the promotion faster than any employee in her unit, male or female, and much earlier than several male employees, Defendant’s Exh. No. 14, SA 288. Bundy responds that there is no basis for the District’s challenges to her work performance, that — in the testimony ,of her colleague Ann Blanchard — all employees iii the unit had difficulty with filing and other procedures, App. 107-114, and that her allegedly excessive sick leave was in fact