Opinion ID: 471760
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Violation of contractual grievance procedure

Text: 25 After plaintiff's contract was not renewed, he invoked the Federation Agreement's grievance procedures to challenge the non-renewal, but did not prevail in those proceedings. Plaintiff contends that defendants rigged the grievance procedure, gave false testimony, and in other ways interfered with his processing of his claim. In so doing, plaintiff says, defendants violated the Federation Agreement and abridged plaintiff's right to petition the government for redress of grievances. 26 None of plaintiff's allegations state a claim of violation of the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. 27 Since we have concluded that plaintiff had no property interest in continued employment and that non-renewal did not affect any liberty interest, defendants were not constitutionally obligated to afford plaintiff any process to challenge the non-renewal. Consequently, even if the grievance proceedings accorded neither with that process which would have been required had plaintiff had a constitutionally protected interest nor with the provisions specified in the Federation Agreement, departure from the contractual grievance procedure did not violate the civil rights acts. See Bleeker v. Dukakis, 665 F.2d 401, 403 (1st Cir.1981) (where state officials violate the terms of an employment contract that does not create a constitutional 'property' interest in the job itself, the proper remedy lies in a suit for breach of contract, not a Sec. 1983 action). At most, plaintiff alleged a contractual claim, but as plaintiff's federal civil rights claims were meritless and as there was no independent federal jurisdictional basis for the contract claim, the district court was not required to entertain it. 28 Plaintiff contends, however, that defendants' motivation for rigging the grievance procedure and interfering with plaintiff's pursuit of contractual remedies was to punish plaintiff for exercising his first amendment rights. We deal with plaintiff's first amendment claim in part III.