Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

The Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Act (matching funds provision), Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. 16-940 et seq., created a voluntary public financing system to fund the primary and general election campaigns of candidates for state office. Petitioners, candidates and independent expenditure groups, filed suit challenging the constitutionality of the matching funds provision. The Court held that the matching funds provision substantially burdened the speech of privately financed candidates and independent expenditure groups without serving a compelling state interest where the professed purpose of the state law was to cause a sufficient number of candidates to sign up for public financing, which subjected them to the various restrictions on speech that went along with that program. Therefore, the Court held that the matching funds scheme violated the First Amendment and reversed the judgment of the Ninth Circuit.

Respondents, representing the video game and software industries, filed a preenforcement challenge to California Assembly Bill 1179 (Act), Cal. Civ. Code Ann. 1746-1746.5, which restricted the sale or rental of violent video games to minors. At issue was whether the Act comported with the First Amendment. The Court held that, because the Act imposed a restriction on the content of protected speech, it was invalid unless California could demonstrate that it passed strict scrutiny. The Court held that California had a legitimate interest in addressing a serious social problem and helping concerned parents control their children. The Court held, however, that as a means of protecting children from portrayals of violence, the legislation was seriously underinclusive, not only because it excluded portrayals other than video games, but also because it permitted a parental or avuncular veto. The Court also held that, as a means of assisting concerned parents, it was seriously overinclusive because it abridged the First Amendment rights of young people whose parents think violent video games were a harmless pastime. The Court further held that the overbreadth in achieving one goal was not cured by the overbreadth in achieving the other and therefore, the legislation could not survive strict scrutiny. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the Ninth Circuit enjoining the Act's enforcement.

This case concerned the extent of the protection, if any, that the Petition Clause granted public employees in routine disputes with government employers where petitioner filed a 42 U.S.C. 1983 suit after respondent's termination of petitioner as police chief and where petitioner was subsequently reinstated, with directives instructing petitioner in the performance of his duties. Petitioner alleged that the directives were issued in retaliation for the filing of his first grievance and violated his First Amendment right to "petition the Government for a redress of grievances." At issue was whether the public concern test applied when the employee invoked the Petition Clause. The Court held that a government employer's allegedly retaliatory actions against an employee did not give rise to liability under the Petition Clause unless the employee's petition related to a matter of public concern. Therefore, the Court held that the Third Circuit's conclusion that the public concern test did not limit public employees' Petition Clause claims was incorrect. Accordingly, the Court concluded that, absent full briefs by the parties, the Court need not consider how the foregoing framework would apply to this case and therefore, vacated the judgment and remanded for further proceedings.

Petitioner administered and enforced Nevada's Ethics in Government Law, Nev. Rev. Stat. 281A.420, and investigated respondent, an elected official who voted to approve a hotel/casino project proposed by a company that used respondent's long-time friend and campaign manager as a paid consultant. Petitioner concluded that respondent had a disqualifying conflict of interest under section 281A.420(8)(e)'s catch-all provision and censured him for failing to abstain from voting on the project. At issue was whether legislators have a personal, First Amendment right to vote on any given matter. The Court held that the Nevada Ethics in Government Law was not unconstitutionally overbroad where the law prohibited a legislator who had a conflict both from voting on a proposal and from advocating its passage or failure; where a universal and long-established tradition of prohibiting certain conduct created a strong presumption that the prohibition was constitutional; and where restrictions on legislators' voting were not restrictions on legislators' protected speech because the legislator's vote was the commitment of his apportioned share of the legislature's power to the passage or defeat of a particular proposal and the legislative power thus committed was not personal to the legislator but belonged to the people. The Court also concluded that additional arguments raised in respondent's brief were not decided or raised in his brief in opposition and were thus considered waived. Accordingly, the Court reversed the judgment of the Nevada Supreme Court and remanded the case for further proceedings.

Claiming that he was subjected to dirty tricks during his successful campaign to become the police chief of Vinton, La., plaintiff filed a state court suit against the incumbent chief and the town (collectively, "defendant") asserting both state and federal law claims. Defendant removed the case to federal court based on plaintiff's 42 U.S.C. 1983 claims and after discovery, defendant sought summary judgment on the federal claims, which plaintiff conceded were not valid. The District Court accordingly dismissed the federal claims with prejudice and remanded the remaining claims to state court, noting that defendant's attorneys' work could be useful in the state court proceedings. Defendant then asked the federal court for attorney's fees. At issue was whether a court could grant reasonable fees to defendant when plaintiff's suit involved both frivolous and non-frivolous claims. The Court held that, when a plaintiff's suit involved both frivolous and non-frivolous claims, a court could grant reasonable fees to defendant, but only for costs that defendant would not have incurred but for the frivolous claims. The Court concluded that, although the District Court noted the usefulness of the attorneys' work in defending against the state law claims, it failed to take proper account of the overlap between the frivolous and non-frivolous claims; the District Court's reasoning that the close relationship between the federal and state law claims supported the award could not be squared with the congressional policy of sparing defendant from the costs only of frivolous litigation; and the Fifth Circuit did not uphold the award on proper ground where it seemed to think that defendant could receive fees for any work useful to defendant against a frivolous claim, even if his lawyers would have done that work regardless. Accordingly, the court vacated and remanded for further proceedings.

The Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America and various business and civil rights organizations (collectively, "Chamber") filed a federal preenforcement suit against those charged with administering the Legal Arizona Workers Act, Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. 23-211, 212, 212.01, which provided that the licenses of state employers that knowingly or intentionally employed unauthorized aliens could be, and in certain circumstances, must be, suspended or revoked. The law also required that all Arizona employers use E-Verify, an internet-based system employers could use to check the work authorization status of employees. At issue was whether federal immigration law preempted those provisions of Arizona law. The Court held that Arizona's licensing law fell within the confines of the authority Congress chose to leave to the states and therefore, was not expressly preempted where the Immigration Reform and Control Act ("IRCA"), 8 U.S.C. 1324a(h)(2), prohibited states from imposing civil or criminal sanctions on those who employed unauthorized aliens but preserved state authority to impose sanctions through licensing and similar laws. The court also held that Arizona's requirement that employers use E-Verify did not conflict with the federal scheme and in no way obstructed achieving the aims of the federal program.

Nearly a decade ago, petitioners, a state child protective services worker and a county deputy sheriff, interviewed then 9-year-old S.G. at her Oregon elementary school about allegations that her father had sexually abused her. Her father stood trial for that abuse but the jury failed to reach a verdict and the charges were later dismissed. S.G.'s mother subsequently sued petitioners on S.G.'s behalf for damages under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging that the in-school interview breached the Fourth Amendment's proscription on unreasonable seizures. The Ninth Circuit held that petitioners' conduct violated the Fourth Amendment but that they were entitled to qualified immunity from damages liability because no clearly established law had warned them of the illegality of the conduct. Although judgment was entered in petitioners' favor, they petitioned the Court to review the Ninth Circuit's ruling that their conduct violated the Fourth Amendment. At issue was whether government officials who prevailed on grounds of qualified immunity could obtain the Court's review of a court of appeals' decision that their conduct violated the Constitution. Also at issue was, if the Court could consider cases in this procedural posture, did the Ninth Circuit correctly determine that this interview breached the Fourth Amendment. The Court held that it could generally review a lower court's constitutional ruling at the behest of a government official granted immunity but could not do so in this case for reasons peculiar to it. The case had become moot because the child had grown up and moved across the country and so would never again be subject to the Oregon in-school interviewing practices whose constitutionality was at issue. Therefore, the Court did not reach the Fourth Amendment question in this case and vacated the part of the Ninth Circuit's opinion that decided the Fourth Amendment issue.