Matlock v. Barnes

• Citation: 932 F.2d 658
• Decision Date: 15 May 1991
• Docket Number: No. 90-1047,90-1047
• Parties: James C. MATLOCK, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Thomas V. BARNES, in his capacity as the Mayor of the City of Gary, et al., Defendants-Appellants.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (7th Circuit)

Page 658

932 F.2d 658

James C. MATLOCK, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Thomas V. BARNES, in his capacity as the Mayor of the City

of Gary, et al., Defendants-Appellants.

No. 90-1047.

United States Court of Appeals,

Seventh Circuit.

Argued Jan. 22, 1991.

Decided May 15, 1991.

Joseph S. VanBokkelen, Paul A. Leonard, Jr., Goodman, Ball & VanBokkelen, Highland, Ind., for plaintiff-appellee.

Hamilton L. Carmouche, Merrillville, Ind., MacArthur Drake, Gary, Ind., for defendants-appellants.

Before CUMMINGS, COFFEY and EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judges.

CUMMINGS, Circuit Judge.

James Matlock sued the city of Gary, Indiana, and four of its officials, including Mayor Thomas V. Barnes, alleging that he had been transferred from his job as a legal investigator for the city's Law Department in retaliation for his support of Barnes' political enemy, former mayor Richard Hatcher. Invoking 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983, Matlock sought damages for violations of his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. After a five-day trial, ¹ the jury agreed with Matlock that his transfer was politically motivated and awarded him $5,307.58 in back pay and $20,000 in damages for emotional distress. Defendants appeal rulings made by the magistrate in response to their motion for summary judgment and the magistrate's refusal to enter a judgment notwithstanding the verdict. Defendants also challenge the jury's award of damages and attorney's fees.

FACTS

James Matlock began working as a legal investigator for the Law Department of the city of Gary in January 1972. The Department employed no more than eight staff members during Matlock's tenure. Most of the staff were attorneys; the number of investigators ranged from one to three. The work in the Department consisted mainly of investigating accidents and litigating small property damage claims brought against the city. According to a job description published by the city of Gary, Matlock's duties included: taking statements from witnesses in a legible manner, taking photographs of sites being investigated and obtaining medical and administrative records when necessary. Matlock In May 1987, Richard Hatcher, who had been Gary's mayor since 1968, was defeated by Thomas Barnes in a hard-fought Democratic primary. Because of the Democratic party's lock on Gary politics, Barnes prevailed in the general election and took office in January 1988. As part of his new administration, Barnes appointed defendant Gilbert King, Jr., as the head of the Law Department. Defendant Beulah Ware became director of the Personnel Department and defendant Richard Comer was named deputy mayor.

apparently performed his job well, for his superiors never complained about the quality of his work during his sixteen years in the Department.

Matlock had campaigned for Hatcher in the primary. On April 30, 1988, Matlock attended the annual Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner in Indianapolis, an affair hosted by the Indiana State Central Committee of the Democratic Party. He escorted former mayor Hatcher, who was at that time the vice-chairman of the Jesse Jackson presidential campaign, to his seat. When Matlock turned to leave, shortly after taking Hatcher to the front row of the hall, he stopped at a table to speak to a friend. Matlock tripped over the feet of deputy mayor Comer while leaning over to shake his friend's hand. Mayor Barnes was seated immediately to Comer's right.

On May 23, 1988, Ware, the Director of Personnel, notified Matlock that he was being transferred to the Gary City Jail to become a correctional officer, or "turnkey," and that his salary would be reduced from $15,192 a year to $11,635. Matlock started as a turnkey in June, though he had no training in the supervision of prisoners. He filed suit in December 1988 against the city of Gary, Barnes, Ware and King, alleging that he had been transferred for exercising his First Amendment rights of free speech and political association. He subsequently amended his complaint to add Comer as a defendant and to sue the officials in their individual as well as official capacities.

The defendants maintained below that Matlock was not transferred for political reasons. Comer admitted in his deposition that he had seen Matlock accompanying Hatcher at the Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner and had reported his observation to King and Ware. King acknowledged that he had discussed the possibility of transferring Matlock with the Mayor after the dinner. All defendants stated, however, that Matlock was not transferred for a public display of allegiance to the former mayor and his political faction, but because he had revealed a personal loyalty to Hatcher at a time when the Department was pursuing litigation against him. The defendants believe that Matlock had to be transferred to protect the confidentiality of the Department's files.

Both parties filed for summary judgment when discovery ended. The magistrate, in a thoughtful memorandum and order, declined to enter summary judgment for either party. He noted that genuine issues of material fact existed in particular about the nature of the legal investigator position. The Supreme Court has held that "policymaking" or "confidential" employees can be fired on political grounds, see Elrod v. Burns, 427 U.S. 347, 96 S.Ct. 2673, 49 L.Ed.2d 547 (1976) and the magistrate believed that he could not accurately categorize Matlock's position as a matter of law. The magistrate did grant partial summary judgment to Matlock, finding that Comer, Ware and King had participated in Matlock's firing and that their actions were politically motivated. The court did not enter summary judgment on the question of Mayor Barnes' participation or motivation.

After a five-day trial, the jury returned a verdict for Matlock. The defendants, renewing an objection they had made in their motion for summary judgment, argued that they were entitled to qualified immunity in the individual capacity suits because the state of the law on politically motivated transfers was unclear at the time of Matlock's transfer. The plaintiffs offered to dismiss the individual capacity suits and as a result judgment was entered against all defendants in their official capacities and the city of Gary. Compensatory damages Defendants appeal the failure of the magistrate to enter summary judgment in their favor on the issue of whether Matlock's job was policymaking or confidential, the magistrate's partial grant of summary judgment to Matlock on the issue of the political motivation of Comer, Ware and King, and the magistrate's refusal to enter a judgment notwithstanding the verdict. Defendants also object to the amount of damages and attorney's fees awarded.

awarded by the jury totalled $25,307. The magistrate later awarded front pay in the amount of $7,500, costs of $1,354 and attorney's fees under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1988 of $57,675.

ANALYSIS

Whether Matlock's Job as a Legal Investigator Was a

Policymaking or Confidential Position

In Elrod v. Burns, 427 U.S. 347, 96 S.Ct. 2673, 49 L.Ed.2d 547, the Supreme Court held that a public employee cannot be fired because of his or her political beliefs unless political loyalty is an acceptable prerequisite for the job. In Rutan v. Republican Party of Illinois, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 2729, 111 L.Ed.2d 52 (1990), decided last Term, the Court held that transfers, promotions, and recalls after layoffs are governed by the same rule.

The prohibition on patronage practices is subject to an important exception. It is permissible to fire public employees who are likely to be formulating and implementing the policies of the party in power for lacking the correct political affiliation. The theory is that a newly elected administration has a legitimate interest in implementing the broad policies it was elected to implement without interference from disloyal employees. Elrod, 427 U.S. at 367, 96 S.Ct. at 2686. Elrod thus distinguishes employees who are either "policymaking" or "confidential" from non-policymaking, non-confidential employees; the former can be dismissed for their political beliefs while the latter cannot. In Branti v. Finkel, 445 U.S. 507, 100 S.Ct. 1287, 63 L.Ed.2d 574 (1980) the Court moved away somewhat from the "policymaking" and "confidential" labels, holding that public employees are protected from patronage dismissals if "party affiliation is an appropriate requirement for the effective performance of the office involved." 445 U.S. at 518, 100 S.Ct. at 1295.

This Court has characterized the Branti test as follows:

The test is whether the position held by the individual authorizes, either directly or indirectly, meaningful input into government decisionmaking where there is room for principled disagreement on goals or their implementation.

Nekolny v. Painter, 653 F.2d 1164, 1170 (7th Cir.1981), certiorari denied, 455 U.S. 1021, 102 S.Ct. 1719, 72 L.Ed.2d 139. We also have noted that though a functional approach is now preferred to a definitional one, the descriptions " 'policymaking' and 'confidential' accurately describe the vast majority of offices that fall within the realm of legitimate patronage." Meeks v. Grimes, 779 F.2d 417, 420 (7th Cir.1985).

Since Matlock filed his suit, defendants have staked much of their defense on their argument that the legal investigator position Matlock occupied was policymaking and confidential and therefore that they were entitled to transfer Matlock even if they were motivated by his politics. They contend that Matlock can be called a "policymaker" because he exercised a great deal of discretion in how he carried out his investigations of suits pending in the Department. In addition, they maintain that a legal investigator position is "confidential" because the investigator has unlimited access to confidential files in the Department and that Matlock's continued presence in the office at a time when litigation was pending against former mayor Hatcher presented a threat to the integrity of the...