Opinion ID: 545194
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Implication of a Clearly Established Right

Text: 12 Stewart argues that he was discharged from his employment because he refused to embrace the School Superintendent's position on an upcoming tax referendum and because he objected to the Superintendent's campaigning among the employees on this issue. Stewart claims that he expressed his objections to the Superintendent's position by walking out of an employee meeting conducted by the Superintendent, held for the purpose of discussing the tax referendum. Stewart argues that his discharge violated his clearly established constitutional right to communicate his disagreement with the Superintendent and his clearly established right not to be coerced into attending, on his own time, a meeting advocating a given political position. 13 Prior law provides guidance in determining whether the defendants' actions violated clearly established constitutional rights. The Supreme Court, in Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. at 641, 107 S.Ct. at 3039, noted that the appropriate inquiry is particularized and fact-specific; a generalized allegation of an abstract right is not sufficient. An official will be immune from liability if the applicable law was unclear or if a reasonable officer could have believed that his actions were lawful in light of the clearly established law and the information possessed by the officer. McDaniel v. Woodard, 886 F.2d 311, 314 (11th Cir.1989). Although the standard is fact-specific, it is not one of factual rigidity. The very conduct in question need not have been explicitly held to be unlawful prior to the time the official acted; rather, in light of the preexisting law the unlawfulness must be apparent. Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. at 641, 107 S.Ct. at 3039. See also People of Three Mile Island v. Nuclear Regulatory Comm'rs., 747 F.2d 139, 144 (3d Cir.1984) (Although officials need not 'predic[t] the future course of constitutional law' ... they are required to relate established law to analogous factual settings.) (citations omitted); Rakovich v. Wade, 850 F.2d 1180, 1209 (7th Cir.1988) (en banc); Eastwood v. Dep't. of Corrections, 846 F.2d 627, 630 (10th Cir.1988); Lappe v. Loeffelholz, 815 F.2d 1173, 1177 (8th Cir.1987). Using this standard, we must determine whether, under Stewart's version of the facts, the defendants in this case reasonably could have believed that discharging Stewart was lawful in light of the clearly established law. 14 An initial issue we must address in this case is whether it was clear at the time of Stewart's discharge that his conduct in walking out of the meeting amounted to protected speech. The law at the time of the discharge clearly established that certain forms of conduct are considered speech and are protected by the First Amendment. See, e.g., Clark v. Community for Creative Non-Violence, 468 U.S. 288, 293-94, 104 S.Ct. 3065, 3069, 82 L.Ed.2d 221 (1984) (assuming that overnight camping in a public park in connection with a demonstration in support of the homeless was expressive conduct protected by the First Amendment); Schad v. Borough of Mount Ephraim, 452 U.S. 61, 66, 101 S.Ct. 2176, 2181, 68 L.Ed.2d 671 (1981) (nude dancing is constitutionally protected expression); Tinker v. Des Moines School District, 393 U.S. 503, 505-06, 89 S.Ct. 733, 736, 21 L.Ed.2d 731 (1969) (wearing black armbands in school is akin to pure speech); Brown v. Louisiana, 383 U.S. 131, 141-42, 86 S.Ct. 719, 723-24, 15 L.Ed.2d 637 (1966) (sit-in by blacks in a whites only area to protest segregation was expression protected by First Amendment); West Virginia State Bd. of Educ. v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624, 632-33, 63 S.Ct. 1178, 1182, 87 L.Ed. 1628 (1943) (compulsory flag salute is a form of utterance within the protection of the First Amendment); Florida Gulf Coast Bldg. & Constr. Traders Council, 796 F.2d 1328, 1332 (11th Cir.1986) (distribution of handbills protected by First Amendment); Monroe v. State Court of Fulton County, 739 F.2d 568, 572 (11th Cir.1984) (burning American flag is a form of protected speech); Leonard v. City of Columbus, 705 F.2d 1299, 1303-04 (11th Cir.1983) (taking flag patch off of police uniform is protected speech). 15 The Supreme Court, in Spence v. Washington, 418 U.S. 405, 410-11, 94 S.Ct. 2727, 2730, 41 L.Ed.2d 842 (1974), set out the following test for determining whether symbolic acts constitute speech for First Amendment purposes: there must be (1) an intent on the part of the actor to convey a particularized message, and (2) circumstances surrounding the act such that the likelihood is great that the message will be understood by those who view it. Accord Monroe v. State Court of Fulton County, 739 F.2d at 571. Stewart alleges that by leaving the meeting early he sought to communicate to his fellow employees that he wanted to be able to make up [his] own mind on the tax referendum issue without pressure from [the Superintendent] and that an employee [has] the right to go home when the whistle [blows] and not stay around on his own time to listen to the Superintendent talk about an upcoming election. Affidavit of Stewart. He also claims that he had spoken with his fellow employees prior to the meeting and had told them he planned to leave precisely at 4:00 p.m., the normal quitting time. All of these factors demonstrate that Stewart intended his departure to communicate a particularized message--that he objected to being required to listen to a campaign supporting the tax referendum. 2 16 In addition, Stewart's supervisors undoubtedly received the message that Stewart objected to the proposed increase of the school taxes, or at least that he objected to the manner in which the Superintendent presented the issue to the employees. It is apparent that Stewart's supervisors were offended not by the bare act of Stewart's departure from the meeting, but rather by the message he wished to communicate. In his deposition, Superintendent Newton stated that Stewart violated none of his duties when he left the meeting at 4:00; it was within Stewart's prerogative to leave at 4:00, if he so desired. Yet Newton called Stewart into his office to discuss Stewart's early departure from the meeting. Newton testified that if a person didn't want to hear what--any information concerning the raising of two hundred and ten million dollars for a system, then he probably didn't have any real dedication to the system, and I wanted to know why he didn't have an interest in the system. A fair inference from this testimony is that the Superintendent believed that Stewart's departure from the meeting signaled an unwillingness to support the Superintendent's position on the tax referendum and that any employee who did not support his position lacked concern for the system and could be called on the carpet for that reason. 17 We conclude that Stewart has adduced sufficient evidence to show that his departure from the Superintendent's meeting was intended to convey and did convey the message that he objected to the Superintendent's position and methods. Thus, Stewart's act of leaving the meeting was conduct sufficiently imbued with elements of communication, Spence, 418 U.S. at 409, 94 S.Ct. at 2730, to implicate the protections guaranteed by the First Amendment. 18 Although the law is well-established that the state may not discharge a public employee in retaliation for speech protected under the First Amendment, Rankin v. McPherson, 483 U.S. 378, 107 S.Ct. 2891, 2896, 97 L.Ed.2d 315 (1987); Connick v. Myers, 461 U.S. 138, 142, 103 S.Ct. 1684, 1687, 75 L.Ed.2d 708 (1983), the employee's right to freedom of speech is not absolute. Bryson v. City of Waycross, 888 F.2d 1562, 1565 (11th Cir.1989) (citing Rankin v. McPherson, 483 U.S. 378, 107 S.Ct. 2891, 97 L.Ed.2d 315 (1987)). The Supreme Court held, in Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U.S. 563, 568, 88 S.Ct. 1731, 1734-35, 20 L.Ed.2d 811 (1968), that a public employee's right to free speech is limited by the state's need to preserve efficient governmental functions. This balancing is necessary in order to accomodate the dual role of the public employer as a provider of public services and as a government entity operating under the constraints of the First Amendment. Rankin, 483 U.S. at 384, 107 S.Ct. at 2896. Pickering acknowledges that the discharge of an employee because of that employee's speech will not always be an illegal termination. 19 An employee's speech will be protected if it meets two requirements. First, the speech must be fairly characterized as constituting speech on a matter of public concern. Rankin, 483 U.S. at 384, 107 S.Ct. at 2896-97. The court examines the content, form, and context of the employee's speech to determine whether it addresses a matter of public concern. Id. at 384-85, 107 S.Ct. at 2897. Second, the speech must pass muster under the Pickering balancing test: the employee's interest in making the statement must outweigh the interest of the state, as an employer, in promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees. Pickering, 391 U.S. at 568, 88 S.Ct. at 1734-35 quoted in Rankin, 483 U.S. at 384-85, 107 S.Ct. at 2896-98. 20 Stewart's speech in opposition to the Superintendent's position on the upcoming tax referendum clearly implicates a matter of public concern. Indeed, the Supreme Court in Pickering held that the issue of a proposed school tax was a matter of public concern. Pickering, 391 U.S. at 571, 88 S.Ct. at 1736. 21 The Pickering balance is similarly clear in this case; it is clear that Stewart's interest in making his statement outweighs any interest articulated by the Superintendent or the School Board in the efficient and effective operation of the school system's maintenance department. Stewart's speech raised the important issue of an employee's freedom to disagree with his supervisor on a matter submitted to a county-wide election. It is not contested that Stewart raised this issue in a nondisruptive manner. Moreover, the defendants cannot point to any disruption, inefficiency, or ineffectiveness in the general workplace that was caused by Stewart's speech. They do not allege that Stewart violated any of his duties by leaving the meeting when he did. 22 This case is remarkably similar to Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U.S. 563, 571-73, 88 S.Ct. 1731, 1736-37, 20 L.Ed.2d 811 (1968), in which the Court held that a teacher could not be discharged on the basis of speech criticizing the School Board's sponsorship of a school bond referendum. The Court held that the school tax issue was one of public concern and that there was no showing that the teacher's speech had impeded the teacher's performance or interfered with the operations of the schools generally. While we recognize that the Pickering balancing test is necessarily conducted on a case-by-case basis, and thus will often result in a balancing of interests that is insufficiently one-sided so as to clearly establish the plaintiff's constitutional right, Dartland v. Metropolitan Dade County, 866 F.2d 1321, 1323 (11th Cir.1989), we conclude that such clarity is present in this case. Defendants can point to no interests which the squelching of Stewart's speech served in this case, and, in addition, there is Supreme Court precedent that is directly on point. We therefore conclude that, assuming that Stewart was discharged because of his speech (as we must assume in this summary judgment posture), Stewart clearly prevails on the Pickering balancing test. 23 We conclude, therefore, that Stewart has articulated a clearly established constitutional right to walk out of the Superintendent's meeting as an expression of opposition to the Superintendent's campaign in favor of the proposed tax referendum. The defendants could not reasonably have believed that it would be lawful to discharge Stewart for expressing opposition to the Superintendent's position on the tax referendum. Thus, we proceed to the second step of our analysis, i.e. whether Stewart has raised a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the defendants committed acts which violated the foregoing clearly established right. 24