Manley v. Bruce Law & Hinsdale Twp. High Sch. Dist. 86

• Decision Date: 10 May 2018
• Docket Number: No. 16-3846,16-3846
• Citation: 889 F.3d 885
• Parties: Claudia MANLEY and Noel Manley, Plaintiffs–Appellants, v. Bruce LAW and Hinsdale Township High School District 86, Defendants–Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

889 F.3d 885

Claudia MANLEY and Noel Manley, Plaintiffs–Appellants,

v.Bruce LAW and Hinsdale Township High School District 86, Defendants–Appellees.

No. 16-3846

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued October 24, 2017

Decided May 10, 2018

Rehearing Denied June 8, 2018

Bruce C. Davidson, Attorney, Bruce Davidson, Hinsdale, IL, for Plaintiffs–Appellants.

Robert E. Swain, Attorney, Hodges, Loizzi, Eisenhammer, Rodick & Kohn LLP, Arlington Heights, IL, for Defendants–Appellees.

Before Easterbrook, Rovner, and Hamilton, Circuit Judges.

Hamilton, Circuit Judge.

American politics is not for the thin-skinned. In this case, a dispute between an elected school board member and a student outside a high school play escalated quickly. The school board launched an investigation into the board member’s alleged bullying of the student. The board member and her husband filed this lawsuit, originally to try to stop the investigation. After that did not work, the plaintiffs asserted that the school board and superintendent violated their federal constitutional rights by conducting the investigation and publicly criticizing the board member for her handling of the dispute with the student. The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, plaintiffs tell us, protects their emotional well-being and entitles them to feel that the government treated them fairly. We affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment dismissing the case.

I. Factual and Procedural Background

Because the plaintiffs appeal the grant of summary judgment against them, we view the facts in the light reasonably most favorable to them, giving them the benefit of all inferences drawn from the evidence in the record. Brunson v. Murray , 843 F.3d 698, 701 (7th Cir. 2016). This does not mean, however, that we vouch for the objective truth of all the facts presented. Id.

Plaintiff Claudia Manley was a member of the school board for Hinsdale Township High School District 86 in DuPage County, Illinois. In the winter of 2015, the district was preparing for a contested election in April for three school board seats. Manley was not up for reelection, but her allies on the board were. On the evening of March 12, 2015, Manley got into a verbal altercation with a student who was leafletting for Manley’s political opponents outside a high school play. Manley insisted that the leafletting violated school board policy.

The altercation between Manley and the student sparked a wider controversy. The student accused Manley of bullying, and a wave of support for the student crashed against Manley. The night of the incident, the student’s parents called Manley and left her several voicemails. When those messages were not returned, the student and her parents pursued a public campaign to embarrass Manley that included online petitions, newspaper articles, and comments at public meetings, all aimed at removing Manley from her position on the board. As the pressure increased, the school district’s superintendent, defendant Bruce Law, began an investigation into Manley’s behavior outside the play. After Law announced the investigation, Manley and her husband Noel filed suit in state court to enjoin the investigation.

No injunction was issued, and the investigation ended with no change in Manley’s legal rights or legal status. Manley has alleged bias and unfairness on the part of the board, the superintendent, and his investigator, but the investigation ended with nothing more than a public report finding that Manley violated a board policy calling for "mutual respect, civility and orderly conduct" at school events. The board adopted the investigative report’s findings and formally admonished Manley for violating the board’s policy and for overstepping her authority in attempting to enforce unilaterally the district’s leafletting policy. Manley is no longer on the school board, but not because of district action against her. She decided not to seek reelection in 2017.

As these events unfolded, the Manleys’ lawsuit evolved in state court from an action to enjoin the investigation to a suit seeking a declaratory judgment that numerous alleged procedural irregularities violated state and local law. The amended complaint, however, also sought damages that "might, for example, be awarded pursuant to the remedies provided by 42 U.S.C. § 1983."

Based on this reference to relief under a federal statute for alleged federal constitutional violations, the defendants removed the suit to federal court. The plaintiffs fought to support their federal claims. Both sides moved for summary judgment, and the district court granted the defendants’ motion. The court found that the plaintiffs failed to offer evidence of a required element of a due process claim: the deprivation of a constitutionally recognized liberty or property interest. The district court also found that Noel Manley lacked standing to assert his federal claims. With no remaining questions of federal law and no diversity of citizenship between the parties, the district court declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the plaintiffs’ state law claims through 28 U.S.C. § 1367, remanding the remaining claims to state court. Plaintiffs have appealed. We review de novo the district court’s grant of summary judgment. Brunson , 843 F.3d at 704.

II. Analysis

Bitter disagreements and harsh words are not new to American politics. Nearly two centuries ago, Tocqueville wrote that in American politics, "electioneering intrigues, the meanness of candidates, and the calumnies of their opponents ... are occasions of enmity which occur the oftener, the more frequent elections become." Alexis de Tocqueville, 2 Democracy in America 125 (Henry Reeve trans., 1862). The legal system leaves most of these matters to the political process, not the courts.

The Constitution does not guarantee good feelings or regulate manners in political disputes. Toward the ends of liberty and self-rule, the Constitution’s embrace of free speech and popular elections ensures robust and sometimes even rude public discourse. These side effects of liberty and representative government are well-known. If the transient evils of "an election accidentally severs two friends, the electoral system brings a multitude of citizens permanently together.... Freedom produces private animosities, but despotism gives birth to general indifference." Id. at 125.

These insights form the foundation of New York Times Co. v. Sullivan , 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964), where the Supreme Court described "a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials." Id. at 270, 84 S.Ct. 710. More recently, Justice Scalia observed that public accountability for political acts "fosters civic courage, without which democracy is doomed." Doe v. Reed , 561 U.S. 186, 228, 130 S.Ct. 2811, 177 L.Ed.2d 493 (2010) (Scalia, J., concurring in the judgment). That courage is needed because of the sometimes harsh and unfair attacks on public officials and candidates. As we said, American politics is not for the thin-skinned, even, or perhaps especially, at the local level.

Neither does the Constitution forbid official investigations carried out by public officials, even when undertaken for political reasons. Framer and Justice James Wilson found in our tradition the power of legislators to act as "grand inquisitors of the realm." James Wilson, Considerations on the Nature and Extent of the Legislative Authority of the British Parliament , in 3 The Works of the Honourable James Wilson, L.L.D. 199, at 219 (1804). Writing of the British House of Commons, he observed: "The proudest ministers of the proudest monarchs have trembled at their censures; and have appeared at the bar of the house, to give an account of their conduct, and ask pardon for their faults." Id.

Congress has assumed that investigative power over public officials since the Nation’s birth. See David P. Currie, The Constitution in Congress at 20–21, 163 (1997); Kilbourn v. Thompson , 103 U.S. 168, 189–90, 26 L.Ed. 377 (1881) ("[T]he Constitution expressly empowers each House to punish its own members for disorderly behavior."). In the First Congress, the House of Representatives decided it had authority to investigate the Superintendent of Finance of the United States under the Articles of Confederation. James Madison supported the investigation, saying that the legislature "should possess itself of the fullest information in order to doing justice to the country and to public officers," 2 Annals of Cong. 1515 (1790), and Madison’s view prevailed. In its early years, Congress exercised this power in other circumstances, often investigating and criticizing Secretary Alexander Hamilton’s administration of the Treasury Department. See 3 Annals of Cong. 899–906 (1793); 4 Annals of Cong. 465–466 (1794). If Congress may investigate and censure public officials for political purposes, a local school board’s admonishment of a member is not likely to be the stuff of constitutional violation. Against this backdrop, we proceed to the specific legal questions at hand.

A. Procedural Due Process

The Due Process Clause imposes basic procedural obligations on the government—in most cases, prior notice and a meaningful opportunity to be heard—before it deprives a person of life, liberty, or property. Cleveland Board of Education v.Loudermill , 470 U.S. 532, 542, 105 S.Ct. 1487, 84 L.Ed.2d 494 (1985). When a state or local government violates these obligations, 42 U.S.C. § 1983 may authorize an award of damages against the government and/or its officers. These damages may include compensation for intangible emotional harm and even nominal damages where no actual injury occurs. Carey v. Piphus , 435 U.S. 247, 263–64, 266, 98 S.Ct. 1042, 55 L.Ed.2d 252 (1978)....