Opinion ID: 779635
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Removal of the Commission

Text: 13 Appellants argue that Bass' speech and association rights were not violated by the removal of his commission. They contend that Bass lost his job with Pagosa Lakes ten months after the removal of his commission, and since the removal had no immediate effect on Bass' employment it could not infringe on his constitutional rights. 3 We disagree. Appellants fail[] to recognize that there are deprivations less harsh than dismissal that nevertheless press state employees ... to conform their belief and associations to some state-selected orthodoxy. Rutan v. Republican Party of Ill., 497 U.S. 62, 75, 110 S.Ct. 2729, 111 L.Ed.2d 52 (1990). A government need not cause an individual to lose his job in order to infringe on constitutionally protected activity. Rather, the government infringes upon protected activity whenever it punishes or threatens to punish protected speech. See Phelan v. Laramie County Cmty. Coll. Bd., 235 F.3d 1243, 1247 (10th Cir.2000). The commission was a valuable government benefit. The commission entitled Bass to effect arrests and investigate crimes, necessary experience to any individual interested in a law-enforcement career. Depriving and threatening to deprive Bass of such a benefit was punishment that could inhibit speech and thus could infringe on Bass' First Amendment rights. Compare Andersen v. McCotter, 100 F.3d 723, 727 (10th Cir.1996) (depriving government intern of valuable volunteer experience because of protected speech infringes on her constitutional rights), with Phelan, 235 F.3d at 1248 (censure of Board member did not infringe protected activity since it carried no penalties; it did not prevent her from performing her official duties). Moreover, it was clearly established in 1997 that such punishment, which cannot be labeled minimal or wholly subjective, infringed upon Bass' rights. See Andersen, 100 F.3d at 727. See generally Phelan, 235 F.3d at 1247-48 (citing Supreme Court precedent from the 1950s through the 1980s).