Three recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions based on Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, along with a fourth ruling based on the Fair Labor Standards Act, are viewed by experts as expanding the scope of employees' retaliation protections under the law.

The first of the Title VII cases was t-he court's decision in Burlington Northern & Santa Fe Railway Co. vs. Sheila White. Ms. White, a forklift operator and the only woman working in the maintenance department at the BNSF yard in Memphis, Tenn., had complained to company officials of alleged harassment by her supervisor. She later was reassigned to a different, more arduous, track laborer position and then temporarily suspended without pay due to insubordination.

In its unanimous 2006 ruling, the Supreme Court upheld a lower court's ruling that said reassigning Ms. White to a different job and temporarily suspending her pay were retaliation for her sexual harassment complaint.

The court's ruling set a national standard by redefining retaliation as employer actions that are “harmful to the point that they could well diss—uade a reasonable worker from making or supporting a charge of discrimination.” It also ruled that retaliatory actions are not limited to those that affect only the terms and conditions of employment.

The Supreme Court's 2009 decision in Vicky S. Crawford vs. Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County, Tenn. involved a 30-year employee, Ms. Crawford.

When asked, as part of an internal investigation, whether she had witnessed inappropriate behavior by the Metro school district employee relations director, Gene Hughes, Ms. Crawford described several instances of sexual discrimination that were directed at her.

Metro took no action against Mr. Hughes, but later fired Ms. Crawford and accused her of embezzlement. It also fired two other employees who had reported being sexually harassed by Mr. Hughes.

In its ruling, the court held that Title VII protection extends beyond employees who file complaints about discrimination to those who cooperate in an employer's investigation.

The Supreme Court's decision this year in Eric L. Thompson vs. North American Stainless L.P. involved a metallurgical engineer, Mr. Thompson, and his then-fiancée and later wife, Miriam Regalado, both of whom worked for Ghent, Ky.-based North American Stainless.

Ms. Regalado filed a sex discrimination claim against the company with the EEOC, which notified North American Stainless of the charge in February 2003.

Mr. Thompson was terminated three weeks later.

The court held in its ruling that an employee linked to a co-worker who has alleged discrimination should also be protected from workplace retaliation.

In Kevin Kasten vs. Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics Corp., Mr. Kasten had brought an anti-retaliation lawsuit against his former Valley Forge, Pa.-based employer, stating he was terminated in retaliation for repeatedly complaining about the location of the firm's time clock.

The Supreme Court held in its March decision that oral complaints to management can be used to invoke the FLSA's anti-retaliation provisions.