Cleveland Board of Education v. Loudermill
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Cleveland Board of Education v. Loudermill | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
||||||||||
| Argued December 3, 1984 Decided March 19, 1985 |
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
| Holding | ||||||||||
| Court membership | ||||||||||
| Chief Justice: Warren E. Burger Associate Justices: William J. Brennan, Jr., Byron White, Thurgood Marshall, Harry Blackmun, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., William Rehnquist, John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor |
||||||||||
| Case opinions | ||||||||||
| Majority by: White Dissent by: Rehnquist |
||||||||||
| Laws applied | ||||||||||
| Ohio Rev. Code Ann. Sec. 124.34 (1984), Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution | ||||||||||
Cleveland Board of Education v. Loudermill, was a case decided by the United States Supreme Court involving two cases of public employees who were dismissed without access to any pretermination hearing.
[edit] Facts
James Loudermill was hired by the Cleveland Board of Education in 1979 as a security guard. Loudermill, in filing out his job application, stated that he had never been convicted of a felony despite having been convicted of grand larceny in 1968. Eleven months later, the Board discovered this fact during a routine examination of employment records and dismissed Loudermill. Loudermill was not afforded an opportunity to respond to the charge of dishonesty or to challenge his dismissal despite an Ohio law, Ohio Rev. Code Ann. Sec. 124.34 (1984), saying that "classified civil servants" could only be terminated for cause and could obtain administrative review if discharged. Loudermill filed an appeal with the Cleveland Civil Service Commission which upheld the dismissal after a hearing. Loudermill then filed suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio alleging that Sec. 124.34 was unconstitutional on its face because it did not afford him an opportunity to respond to the charges against him prior to removal and was a violation of his due process rights to liberty and property. The District Court dismissed for failure to state a claim because Loudermill was afforded all the process that was due.
Richard Donnelly was a bus mechanic for the Parma Board of Education who was fired because he failed an eye examination. He appealed to the Civil Service Commission which ordered him reinstated a year later without backpay. Donnelly, like Loudermill, challenged the constitutionality of the dismissal procedures and the District Court, relying on Loudermill's case, dismissed for failure to state a claim.
A divided panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit reversed in part finding that both respondents had been deprived of due process, concluding that the compelling private interest in retaining employment, combined with the value of presenting evidence prior to dismissal, outweighed the added administrative burden of a pretermination hearing.
[edit] The Supreme Court's decision
In a decision delivered by Justice White, the Supreme Court found that the essential requirements of due process are notice and an opportunity to respond and that tenured public employees are entitled to oral or written notice of charges against them, an explanation of the employer's evidence, and an opportunity to present their sides of the story. Because the respondents alleged that they had no chance to respond, the District Court erred in dismissing for failure to state a claim.
Justice Rehnquist dissented.
