Kota v. Little, 71-2127.

• Decision Date: 16 January 1973
• Docket Number: No. 71-2127.,71-2127.
• Citation: 473 F.2d 1
• Parties: Verriah V. KOTA, Appellant, v. Hal W. LITTLE et al., the Board of Trustees of Pembroke State University, et al., Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

473 F.2d 1 (1973)

Verriah V. KOTA, Appellant, v. Hal W. LITTLE et al., the Board of Trustees of Pembroke State University, et al., Appellees.

No. 71-2127.

United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.

Argued November 1, 1972.

Decided January 16, 1973.

Adam Stein, Charlotte, N.C. (J. LeVonne Chambers and Chambers, Stein, Ferguson & Lanning, Charlotte, N.C., on brief), for appellant.

Burley B. Mitchell, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen. of N.C. (Robert Morgan, Atty. Gen. of N.C., on brief), for appellees.

Before BUTZNER, FIELD and WIDENER, Circuit Judges.

FIELD, Circuit Judge:

Dr. Verriah V. Kota, a nontenured college professor, appeals from an order of the district court, 351 F.Supp. 1059, denying his constitutional protest against the officials of Pembroke State University in North Carolina for their alleged failure to provide procedural due process safeguards prior to nonrenewal of his employment contract.

Dr. Kota was initially employed by Pembroke in the spring of 1965 as professor of mathematics for the 1965-66 academic year, and was re-appointed for each succeeding year through the 1969-70 session. Each year Pembroke required of Dr. Kota that he submit a letter of intent indicating his proposed plans for employment for the following year, and each year a new contract was signed covering the ensuing academic year. In December of 1969 President Jones, acting upon the recommendations of the chairman of the math department and the dean of the university, advised Dr. Kota by letter that his contract of employment would not be renewed at the end of that academic year. Dr. Kota protested the decision and sought specific reasons for the action which the university authorities declined to give. Subsequently, at his own request, Dr. Kota appeared before the Board of Trustees to further object to the decision not to renew his contract, but after his presentation, the Board voted to support the administration's recommendation.

Thereafter, in May of 1970, Dr. Kota instituted this action in the district court. Suing under the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983, with jurisdiction invoked pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1343(3), (4), plaintiff sought declaratory and injunctive relief, back pay, attorney's fees and costs. In his original complaint Dr. Kota charged that the university's refusal to grant him tenure as well as the nonrenewal of his contract were racially motivated, and further alleged that the absence of a meaningful hearing prior to termination¹ denied him due process.² The complaint was later amended to include the allegation that tenure was wrongfully withheld under the established tenure policy of Pembroke as prescribed in the Faculty Handbook in violation of the terms of Kota's contract and the Fourteenth Amendment. At trial Dr. Kota abandoned his allegation that the actions of the university were in any manner racially motivated and, in fact, the district court noted that no evidence was introduced which disclosed any consideration of race or national origin in the administrative determinations. Thus the sole issue was whether the defendants violated procedural due process in failing to renew Dr. Kota's contract of employment.

The district court, after a full hearing on the merits, concluded that Dr. Kota was a nontenured professor, and that tenure was not wrongfully withheld.³ The court further found that the administration's decision of nonrenewal was not influenced by any constitutionally impermissible factors and, thus, there was no denial of due process. While the court's decision antedated Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972), and its companion case, Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U.S. 593, 92 S.Ct. 2694, 33 L.Ed.2d 570 (1972), the law applied by the district judge comports with the principles enunciated in those decisions. "The requirements of procedural due process apply only to the deprivation of interests encompassed by the Fourteenth Amendment's protection of liberty and property." Roth, supra, 408 U.S. at 569, 92 S.Ct. at 2705. The district court concluded, and we agree, that nothing in the conduct or policies of the Pembroke authorities created any obligation of an expectation of employment.⁴ While the "absence of such an explicit contractual provision tenure may not always foreclose the possibility that a teacher has a `property' interest in re-employment," Sindermann, supra, 408 U.S. at 601, 92 S.Ct. at 2699, a mere subjective expectancy on the part of a teacher is not a property interest within the meaning of the Fourteenth...