Court Opinion

ID: 9496093
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:17:54.531987+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:22.082880
License: Public Domain

GIBBONS, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
The majority opinion appropriately follows the controlling Sixth Circuit precedent, and I generally agree with its application of our precedent to the facts of this case. I therefore concur in the result. I write separately, however, to emphasize the effect of application of the test used by this court in “mixed speech” cases. As set out in the majority opinion, the Sixth Circuit has held that in mixed speech cases, in order to trigger the Pickering balancing test, plaintiffs “need only show that their speech somehow related to a matter of community concern.” Lucas v. Monroe County, 203 F.3d 964, 974 (6th Cir.2000).
This approach, in my view, is not mandated by Supreme Court authority such as Connick v. Myers, 461 U.S. 138, 103 S.Ct. 1684, 75 L.Ed.2d 708 (1983). In Connick, the Supreme Court observed that “government offices could not function if every employment decision became a constitutional matter.” 461 U.S. at 143, 103 S.Ct. 1684. Connick held that the speech of “a public employee [who] speaks not as a citizen upon matters of public concern, but instead as an employee upon matters only of personal interest,” is not protected. Id. at 147, 103 S.Ct. 1684. The Fifth Circuit, applying this authority, has adopted an analysis that differs from the Sixth Circuit’s test. When confronted with a mixed speech case, the Fifth Circuit asks “whether the speech at issue ... was made primarily in the plaintiffs role as citizen or primarily in his role as employee.” Terrell v. Univ. of Texas Sys. Police, 792 F.2d 1360, 1362 (5th Cir.1986). This inquiry imposes a higher standard on plaintiffs than the alternative test, which asks only whether the employee speaks out of an interest that is not solely personal. Kennedy v. Tangipahoa Parish Library Bd. of Control, 224 F.3d 359, 368 (5th Cir.2000).
This court has explicitly rejected the test employed by the Fifth Circuit, stating that “the key question is not whether a person is speaking in his role as an employee or a citizen, but whether the employee’s speech in fact touches on matters of public concern.” Cockrel v. Shelby County Sch. Dist., 270 F.3d 1036, 1052 (6th Cir.2001) (emphasis added). This approach, as noted, requires only that a plaintiffs speech “somehow related to a matter of community concern.” Lucas, 203 F.3d at 974. Our test thus puts the question of whether a disgruntled employee obtains First Amendment protection solely in the control of the employee, who can successfully characterize her dispute as public rather than private by the addition of a few words on matters of public concern. The Fifth Circuit has expressed concern over this problem, stating that it is “unworkable” to allow “[t]he mere insertion of a scintilla of speech regarding a matter of public concern [to] make a federal ease out of a wholly private matter *899fueled by private ... interests.” Teague v. City of Flower Mound, Tex., 179 F.3d 377, 382 (5th Cir.1999). Beyond issues of workability, however, the Sixth Circuit test fails to take into account fully Connick’s recognition that every employment dispute involving a public employee is not a constitutional matter. See Connick, 461 U.S. at 143, 149, 103 S.Ct. 1684.
The difference in application of the two tests is well-illustrated in this case. As the majority opinion notes, the “vast majority of Banks’ complaints are private grievances over her employment situation.” (Maj. Op. at 897.) Yet, Banks’ mention of alleged Board failures to follow procedures and budgetary issues transformed her claims that she did not receive a primary teaching position and that she was transferred in retaliation for her complaint about the teaching position into a First Amendment claim. Under the Fifth Circuit test, the result would almost certainly be different.