Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/17pdf/16-1466_2b3j.pdf
Page Number: 68.0

Cite as:  585 U. S. ____ (2018) 

13 

KAGAN, J., dissenting 

First  Amendment  cases  toward  the  regulation  of  public
employees’  speech.  That  attitude  is  one  of  respect—even 
solicitude—for  the  government’s  prerogatives  as  an  em-
ployer.  So long as the government is acting as an employ-
er—rather  than  exploiting  the  employment  relationship 
for other ends—it has a wide berth, comparable to that of 
a  private  employer.  And  when  the  regulated  expression 
concerns  the  terms  and  conditions  of  employment—the
very  stuff  of  the  employment  relationship—the  govern-
ment  really  cannot  lose.  There,  managerial  interests  are
obvious and strong.  And so government employees are . . . 
just  employees,  even  though  they  work  for  the  govern-
ment.  Except  that  today  the  government  does  lose,  in  a 
first for the law.  Now, the government can constitutionally
adopt  all  policies  regulating  core  workplace  speech  in 
pursuit of managerial goals—save this single one. 

2 
The  majority  claims  it  is  not  making  a  special  and  un-
justified  exception.  It  offers  two  main  reasons  for  declin-
ing to apply here our usual deferential approach, as exem-
plified  in  Pickering,  to  the  regulation  of  public  employee 
speech.  First,  the  majority  says,  this  case  involves  a 
“blanket” policy rather than an individualized employment
decision, so Pickering  is a “painful fit.”   Ante,  at 23.  Sec-
ond,  the  majority  asserts,  the  regulation  here  involves 
compelling rather than restricting speech, so the pain gets 
sharper still.  See ante, at 24–25.  And finally, the majority
claims  that  even  under  the  solicitous  Pickering  standard, 
the  government  should  lose,  because  the  speech  here 
involves  a  matter  of  public  concern  and  the  government’s
managerial  interests  do  not  justify  its  regulation.    See 
ante, at 27–31.  The majority goes wrong at every turn.

First,  this  Court  has  applied  the  same  basic  approach
whether  a  public  employee  challenges  a  general  policy  or 
an  individualized  decision.  Even  the  majority  must  con-