Opinion ID: 463530
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Larry v. Lawler

Text: 16 We are first confronted with our fairly recent opinion in Larry v. Lawler, 605 F.2d 954 (7th Cir.1978) (Wood, J., dissenting). Although recognizing that it was possible to distinguish Larry from this case because no broad and absolute employment ban barred Perry from all federal employment as was the situation in Larry, the majority in the original panel opinion in this case considered Larry to be close enough to be controlling. Larry had applied to the Civil Service Commission requesting that he be placed on the list of eligible applicants for employment consideration by various agencies and departments within the federal government. The Commission, as required by statute, conducted a standard background investigation to determine Larry's qualifications and suitability for employment. The investigation disclosed that Larry had a poor employment and arrest record and was a habitual and excessive user of intoxicants. The result was that under the statute Larry was totally barred from all federal employment for up to three years. The panel majority found a liberty interest on the basis that Larry had been stigmatized throughout the entire federal government and deprived of job opportunities in any of the branches of government for a substantial period of time. At the time of the panel's decision that three-year employment ban had terminated, but the majority considered that in reality the stigma had not come to an end, and therefore ordered Larry's adverse civil service record expunged. 17 No member of this en banc court has suggested that we fit Perry into the Larry mold, and, in the name of due process, expunge Perry's allegedly adverse law-enforcement-related record, and then proceed to grant Perry's request, even if we could, to appoint him to one of the federal law enforcement positions he was denied. Due process requires only fairness, not foolhardiness. If Perry does have a life, liberty or property interest in these preemployment circumstances, the Constitution requires that he be treated fairly and receive whatever due process fits the circumstances. 18 There may come a time when this court may have cause to reexamine Larry, but we need not do so now. Perry's difficulties are not government wide, nor is he subject to a statutory employment ban. His employment possibilities were confined to several law enforcement agencies within the executive branch, and those agencies were free to conduct their own background checks and to use their own employment discretion. The FBI did not purport to have done so. It is not its job to make job determinations for those agencies. The adverse information about Perry was not published nor distributed government wide. 19 The majority in Larry limited the application of Larry by emphasizing that Larry had not merely been denied a particular position, but had been totally disbarred throughout the government. Larry, 605 F.2d at 958. There is no justification for extending Larry to the present case. The majority in Larry did concede that the nature of Larry's liberty interest was difficult to define with exactitude. It is not so difficult, however, to determine that there is no liberty interest involved in Perry in its own narrow factual context. 20 Therefore, setting Larry aside, the basic starting point is to ascertain, as Judge Marovitz did, whether Perry's failure to be hired in these circumstances implicates a liberty interest of the type claimed. Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 569, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 2705, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972). It does not, but even if we considered that it did, Perry had the full measure of process due in this preemployment situation. The due process Perry apparently seeks is not an agency hearing about the allegations, but primarily the award to him of a federal law enforcement position. 4