Webster v. Redmond, s. 78-1978

• Decision Date: 19 June 1979
• Docket Number: Nos. 78-1978,78-2032,s. 78-1978
• Citation: 599 F.2d 793
• Parties: 19 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 1653, 19 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 9247 Douglas Warren WEBSTER, Plaintiff-Appellee, Cross-Appellant, v. James F. REDMOND et al., Defendants-Appellants, Cross-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 793

599 F.2d 793

19 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 1653, 19 Empl. Prac.

Dec. P 9247

Douglas Warren WEBSTER, Plaintiff-Appellee, Cross-Appellant, v. James F. REDMOND et al., Defendants-Appellants, Cross-Appellees.

Nos. 78-1978, 78-2032.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued Feb. 23, 1979.

Decided May 22, 1979.

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc Denied June 19, 1979.

Robert J. Krajcir, Chicago Bd. of Ed. Law Dept., Chicago, Ill., for defendants-appellants, cross-appellees.

Terry Yale Feiertag, Chicago, Ill., for plaintiff-appellee, cross-appellant.

Before SWYGERT and SPRECHER, Circuit Judges, and NOLAND, District Judge. ¹

SWYGERT, Circuit Judge.

This appeal concerns an alleged employment discrimination. The plaintiff, a black schoolteacher in the Chicago public school system, claims that he was the victim of such discrimination at the hands of the Chicago Board of Education.

The threshold issue is whether the Board of Education deprived the plaintiff of a protectable liberty or property interest when it refused to promote him to the position of principal. The district court found that the plaintiff had been deprived of both a liberty and a property interest without due process of law. Because we find no protectable interest to be implicated in this case, we reverse. On the other hand, we affirm the district court's entry of judgment for the defendants as to plaintiff's claims based on racial discrimination in employment.

I

Douglas Warren Webster is currently a public schoolteacher employed by the City of Chicago, and except for a brief period of suspension, he has been so employed since 1953. In August of 1970 Webster received a principal's certificate, having taken and passed the examination established by the Board of Examiners for the Board of Education of the City of Chicago.

In January 1971, while he was a teacher in a school maintained by the Board of Education at the Cook County Jail, Webster was arrested and later indicted for the felony of being the receiver of stolen property. As a result of his arrest, Webster was suspended from his teaching duties by the General Superintendent of Schools.

On March 5, 1971 Webster's attorney moved the state trial court to suppress evidence seized at the time of his arrest, alleging that the search of his apartment conducted at that time had been conducted in violation of his constitutional rights. The court sustained the motion and later ordered that the indictment of Webster be stricken. ²

Webster then demanded reinstatement of his teaching position, and in May of 1971 he instituted a mandamus action in state court to this end. That action was compromised by the parties on the basis of plaintiff's reinstatement to a teaching position with backpay. Webster was subsequently reinstated, but was transferred from the Cook County Jail program to a teaching position at Whittier School in Chicago.

In the fall of 1971 Webster was recommended by a local principal nominating committee for the principalship of Delano Elementary School. This nomination was processed through the proper channels and resulted in the recommendation of Webster by the General Superintendent to the Board of Education. The Board met in executive session on January 14, 1972 to consider the promotion.

After Webster's name had been proposed and the information concerning his career as a teacher had been distributed to the Board, a deputy superintendent reviewed for the Board the arrest and indictment. The Board's attorney supplemented these remarks regarding the circumstances involved and informed the Board of the granting of the suppression motion and the striking of the indictment. The Board then voted against the promotion by a vote of six to four, with one abstention. ³

In keeping with the Board's policy, no public disclosure was made regarding the failure to approve the promotion. When representatives of the Delano School sought information, they were told that the Board knew facts which they did not. When Webster met with the deputy Superintendent on January 19, 1972, he was not told the reasons for the Board's failure to approve his promotion.

Following the January disapproval, Webster was nominated by the local principal nominating committee of the Doolittle East Elementary School. During an executive session of the Board on April 26, 1972, the General Superintendent sought the consensus of the Board regarding this nomination. The Board voted down a motion to give consideration to Webster's promotion to the rank of principal without prejudice. Perceiving that there was not "a reasonable likelihood of appointment by the Board," the General Superintendent did not recommend Webster for promotion to the Doolittle East principalship.

After the April meeting, members of the Doolittle East committee made numerous attempts to ascertain the reasons behind the failure to promote Webster. In November 1972 a member of the Board gave committee members her opinion that Webster would not be promoted to the principalship of any school, but she declined to state the reasons for her view.

On November 29, 1972 Webster instituted this action, which was tried to the court without a jury. The case against certain defendants, primarily those who had been appointed to the Board after the April 26, 1972 meeting, was dismissed at the close of plaintiff's case. Plaintiff's claims of racial discrimination were dismissed as to all defendants at the close of the evidence. Judgment against the plaintiff was entered in favor of three defendants who had voted for Webster's promotion at the January 14, 1972 meeting of the Board. Judgment for the plaintiff and against the remaining defendants was entered on the grounds that they had deprived Webster of his property and liberty in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. These defendants filed an appeal in this court, and plaintiff cross-appealed from the dismissal of his racial discrimination claims.

II

The determining issue in the main appeal is whether liberty or property interests sufficient to invoke the protection of the Fourteenth Amendment have been implicated. "The requirements of procedural due process apply only to the deprivation of interests encompassed by the Fourteenth Amendment's protection of liberty and property . . . (and) the range of interests protected by procedural due process is not infinite." Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 569-70, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 2705, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972). "(T)o determine whether due process requirements apply in the first place, we must look . . . to the Nature of the interest at stake." Id. at 570-71, 92 S.Ct. at 2705-2706 (emphasis in original).

Before making that determination, it is important to define the relatively narrow scope of the inquiry. At this stage of the analysis, the reasons for the Board's decision are irrelevant. If no protectable liberty or property interest is found to be implicated, no process is "due" and no reasons or hearing need be given. Certainly this is true to the extent that the reasons have not been made public, although public explanations may affect liberty interests. ⁴ With these limitations in mind, we begin by inquiring into whether any constitutionally protectable interests are involved. We must determine (1) whether the Board's decision not to promote Webster affected his protectable interest in liberty, and (2) whether Webster had a property interest in obtaining the promotion to the principalship in question.

The inquiry begins with a review of recent Supreme Court cases which have dealt with this issue. In Board of Regents v. Roth, supra, a teacher hired for a fixed term of one academic year was told without explanation that he would not be rehired. In evaluating the implication of liberty interests, the Supreme Court noted that all it had before it was the fact that the teacher was not rehired. On this basis, the Court did not find a constitutionally protectable liberty interest, at least where the person remained free to seek jobs other than the one for which he was not rehired. 408 U.S. at 575, 92 S.Ct. 2701.

The Court also noted in Roth that certain factors were not present:

The State, in declining to rehire the respondent, did not make any charge against him that might seriously damage his standing and associations in his community. It did not base the nonrenewal of his contract on a charge, for example, that he had been guilty of dishonesty, or immorality. Had it done so, this would be a different case. For "(w)here a person's good name, reputation, honor, or integrity is at stake because of what the government is doing to him, notice and an opportunity to be heard are essential." Wisconsin v. Constantineau, 400 U.S. 433, 437 (91 S.Ct. 507, 510, 27 L.Ed.2d 515) . . . . In such a case, due process would accord an opportunity to refute the charge before University officials. In the present case, however, there is no suggestion whatever that the respondent's "good name, reputation, honor, or integrity" is at stake.

Similarly, there is no suggestion that the State, in declining to re-employ the respondent, imposed on him a stigma or other disability that foreclosed his freedom to take advantage of other employment opportunities. The State, for example, did not invoke any regulations to bar the respondent from all other public employment in state universities. Had it done so, this, again, would be a different case.

Id. at 573-74, 92 S.Ct. at 2707 (footnote and citations omitted).

Two more recent Supreme Court cases serve to clarify the Roth holding. In Paul v. Davis, 424 U.S. 693, 96 S.Ct. 1155, 47 L.Ed.2d 405 (1976), the Court was required to evaluate the liberty or property interests at stake in a suit brought by a person whose photograph and name were included in a circulated list of "active shoplifters" after he had been arrested on a shoplifting charge which was later dismissed. The list was distributed by the police in...