Wednesday, July 8, 2015
DC Circuit Upholds Federal Employment Application Limited to DC Area
As most law students learn, a state or locality cannot limit applicants for employment to its own residents because of a "right to travel." But can the federal government limit applicants to those currently residing in the District of Columbia area? In its opinion in Pollack v. Duff, the DC Court of Appeals has stated that the federal government can do so.
The case began with a 2009 job posting from the Administrative Office (AO) of the United States Courts for an attorney-advisor for a job in DC. The posting provided that the AO would consider applications from any employee of the federal judiciary and from any other person who lived within the "Washington Metropolitan Area."
Malla Pollack, who represented herself in this litigation, is a former DC Court of Appeals clerk and accomplished legal scholar. She applied for the position when she no longer worked for the judiciary and was living in Kentucky. The AO rejected her application because of her residency. She protested based on residency, but was referred to the Fair Employment Practices System; she was then told that such complaints were limited to allegations of discrimination based on race, and other categories that did not include residency. The DC Court of Appeals opinion notes that the AO's actions of referral and then dismissal essentially "played upon" Pollack. The court might also have characterized the AO's argument of judicial review preclusion - - - because the Fair Employment Practices System is the exclusive means for deciding a claim of discrimination - - - as attempting to "play upon" the court. Instead, the court merely gives the argument the brief discussion it merited.
The court also notes that this is the second time the litigation reached the DC Court of Appeals. In late 2012, the court reversed the dismissal of the complaint based on sovereign immunity, concluding that sovereign immunity does not bar a suit seeking specific relief for officers acting outside the bounds of constitutional authority.
On the merits of the right to travel argument, the court's opinion - - - authored by Senior Judge Douglas Ginsburg - - - untangles the various strands of the constitutional right to travel as might be applied to actions by the federal government. The court first looks at Article IV §2, the privileges and immunities clause, but finds it protects state citizens against actions by other states, not by the federal government. The court engages with the erudite originalist argument centered on James Iredell but nevertheless rejects it, noting that although the historical record is not "pellucid," reasoning in part that the
location of the Privileges and Immunities Clause in § 2 of Article IV supports the conclusion that it is directed at the states and not at the national government. Article IV is the “so-called States’ Relations Article.” Section 2 of Article IV, in addition to the Privileges and Immunities Clause, included the Interstate Rendition Clause and the Fugitive Slave Clause, both of which were concerned with comity among the states.
The court's rejection of the equal protection claim does not rest on its inapplicability to the federal government, which "indisputably" applies to the federal government through the Fifth Amendment, including in its right to travel aspects. Instead, the court essentially finds Pollack's claimed right too speculative:
If the AO had reviewed her application, then it might have offered her a job, which might have prompted her to move to the Washington area. Thus, Pollack might have been marginally more likely to travel to the Washington area but for the geographical limitation she is challenging. This effect upon Pollack’s willingness to travel, i.e., to exercise her right to travel, is “negligible” and does not warrant scrutiny under the Constitution.
Additionally, and more remarkably, the court rejects the argument that the AO created a classification that serves to penalize the right to travel by reasoning that the AO classification actually incentivizes the right to travel. Distinguishing the AO classification from the durational residency requirement at issue in the landmark right to travel case of Shapiro v. Thompson (1969), the court reasoned:
The AO’s geographical limitation is quite different, however, because it would not penalize Pollack if she decided to travel from Kentucky to the Washington area. To the contrary, the geographical limitation gives Pollack an incentive to travel to Washington in order to apply for a job with the AO that is open only to residents of the area. In other words, the geographical limitation burdens only Pollack’s decision not to travel interstate.
[emphasis in original]. The court thus did not consider what level of scrutiny should apply or whether any level would be satisfied, but simply held that the classification did not actually implicate the right to travel. On the court's read, Pollack's only viable claim would be if she had been in DC and discouraged from leaving because she wanted to apply for the AO position; a claim the court notes that she did not make and would not have standing to raise on behalf of another person.
After a brief consideration of structural arguments, the court concludes by questioning the wisdom of the AO policy:
We agree with Pollack that it is difficult to comprehend why the AO refused to consider applicants who did not live in the Washington area but were willing to move there if they received an offer of employment. The AO points out that it receives applications from many qualified attorneys and it must limit the total number of applicants for certain positions so that it may focus upon those it is most interested in hiring. It is unclear, however, why the agency would use a geographical limitation to control the size of its applicant pool rather than criteria that are likely to be more closely correlated with job performance.
But the court decides that the AO did not violate Pollack's constitutional rights. And given this decision - - - and the AO's protracted litigation on the issue - - - one can only assume that the AO will limit applicants by geography in future job postings.
https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/conlaw/2015/07/dc-circuit-upholds-federal-employment-application-limited-to-dc-area.html