Carter v. Delaware State University

Opinions of the United
2003 Decisions States Court of Appeals
for the Third Circuit
4-16-2003
Carter v. DE State Univ
Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential
Docket 02-1918
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NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
No. 02-1918
DR. KATHLEEN CARTER,
Appellant.
v.
DELAWARE STATE UNIVERSITY;
DR. WILLIAM B. DELAUDER,
PRESIDENT; DR. JOHNNY
TOLLIVER; DEAN JACQUELINE W.
GORUM; DR. ALETA
HANNAH; and DELAWARE STATE
UNIVERSITY BOARD OF TRUSTEES
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Delaware
(C.A. No. 99-cv-642)
District Judge: The Honorable Gregory M. Sleet
Submitted under Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
January 16, 2003
Before: ROTH, FUENTES and ALDISERT, Circuit Judges.
(Filed April 16, 2003)
OPINION OF THE COURT
ALDISERT, Circuit Judge.
Dr. Kathleen Carter appeals from summary judgment entered in favor of Delaware
State University (“DSU”) and several of its officers including its President, its Dean and the
members of the Board of Trustees. In her complaint, Dr. Carter asserted race
discrimination claims under Title VII, 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981, 1983, 1985 and 1986.
The parties are familiar with the facts and the district court proceeding.
Accordingly, we will primarily address the legal issues presented.
I.
DSU is a land-grant college and therefore a public university operated by the state. It
is a historically black institution, and thus the majority of administrators, faculty and
students are African Americans. Dr. Carter, a white female, was hired in 1993 as Associate
Professor of Education and Director of the Vocational and Teacher Education Program in
the Education Department at DSU. In 1995, she accepted an appointment as Chair of the
DSU Education Department. She alleges that several of her African American colleagues
in the Education Department did not appreciate this appointment and the subsequent racial
tension led to the denial of her tenure application. It is the denial of tenure that undergirds
her complaint against the University.
It appears that when Dr. Carter’s application for tenure was originally considered by
the University’s President, Dr. William H. DeLauder, it was not summarily denied but
rather remanded to various stages of the tenure application process for further
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consideration. Upon remand, Professors Aleta Hannah and Jacqueline W. Gorum, along
with University Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Johnny Tolliver, reversed
their previous favorable recommendations, which had been based upon a mistaken belief
that they were not permitted to consider their personal judgments of what they considered
to be Dr. Carter’s ineffective service to DSU.
Dr. DeLauder’s later reconsideration resulted in a denial of her application for
tenure based upon ineffective service as chair of her department, ineffective service in
pursuit of accreditation by the National Conference on Accreditation of Teacher Education
(“NCATE”) and deficient results of performance evaluations. Dr. Carter, however, alleges
that her tenure application was denied because of her ethnicity and that Dr. DeLauder’s
stated reasons were pretextual. Dr. Carter exhausted University grievance procedures
before filing this lawsuit.
She concedes that the Eleventh Amendment prevents her from suing DSU on any of
the statutory claims. App. at 34a; see also Will v. Mich. Dep’t of State Police, 491 U.S. 58(1989).
II.
In granting summary judgment in favor of the Defendants on the Title VII racial and
gender discrimination claim, the district court concluded:
Carter has not proven that race was directly involved in her tenure decision.
Although Carter alleges that she has direct evidence to prove that both Hanna
and DeLauder were racist, the record does not support her contention. Carter
urges that the court should find DeLauder was racist because he believed
Hanna — an African American woman — over Carter and because he failed
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to investigate the allegations by Dr. Taylor that Carter was racist...It is a large
leap of logic to conclude that DeLauder believed Hanna simply because she
is an African American. There are a number of reasons why a person might
believe another person, and there is scant evidence in this record to support
the conclusion that race was the only factor — if it was a factor at all — in
DeLauder’s decision to credit Hannah’s statements. Moreover, the fact that
Delauder did not investigate the allegations of racism against Carter does not
prove that he is a racist. He simply could have believed that the allegations
were unfounded.
* * * *
Carter has similarly failed to present direct evidence of Hannah’s
racism...The Court is not permitted to, and will not, assume that [any of]
Hannah’s actions were racist in the absence of direct evidence, which Carter
has failed to provide.
Carter v. Del. State Univ., No. 99-642, 8-10 (D. Del. Mar. 21, 2001) (Memorandum and
Order), reprinted in App. at 28a-30a.
The court then applied the McDonnell Douglas paradigm in dismissing Dr. Carter’s
attempt to utilize indirect evidence to illustrate Defendants’ actions were racially
motivated. McDonell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973). The court understood
Dr. Carter to make out a prime facie case. Once Dr. Carter was deemed to have established
this, the burden shifted to DSU to “articulate one or more legitimate, non-discriminatory
reasons for its employment decision.” Waldron v. SL Indus., 56 F.3d 491, 494 (3d. Cir.
1995).
The court properly held that DSU provided several non-discriminatory reasons for
its decision — all of which would be relevant to the tenure application of a candidate of any
race. Dr. Carter refutes these reasons with a claim of pretext based upon contentions that:
(1) Dr. DeLauder inappropriately considered her service as department chair; (2) Dr.
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DeLauder’s conflicting reasons for denying tenure; (3) African Americans were tenured
with performance evaluations similar to hers; (4) Dr. Hannah acted with racial animus in her
evaluations; and (5) Dr. DeLauder had previously lauded her for her participation on the
NCATE committee and then reversed himself. The district court determined that Dr. Carter
failed to prove racial animus. Our review of the record persuades us that the district court
did not err and we will affirm that portion of the judgment relating to Title VII.
III.
The parties have agreed that the § 1981 claim is not viable in light of the court’s
ruling — and now our affirmance — of the Title VII claim.
IV.
Defendants were properly granted summary judgment on the § 1983 claim. To
establish that Dr. Carter was denied tenure in retaliation for exercising her First
Amendment rights, she must demonstrate that: (1) her speech was protected; and (2) her
protected speech was a substantial or motivating factor behind the alleged retaliation.
Green v. Phila. Hous. Auth., 105 F.3d 882, 885 (3d Cir. 1997). If these two elements are
satisfied, the burden will shift to the Defendants to demonstrate that the same action would
have been taken if the speech had not occurred. Id.The court found that Dr. Carter’s speech — criticism of DSU’s scheduling policies
— was both entitled to First Amendment protection and a substantial or motivating factor in
the Defendant’s decision to deny tenure. The court then found that Defendants carried their
burden of demonstrating by a preponderance of the evidence that they would have taken the
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same action in the absence of the protected conduct.
Dr. Carter did not provide any facts to rebut the assertions that her evaluations were
neutral and that her performance on the NCATE committee was inadequate. Therefore, we
conclude there was no impediment to the court’s granting of summary judgment in favor of
the Defendants on this claim.
V.
The Defendants were entitled to summary judgment on the §§ 1985, 1986 and civil
conspiracy claims. The court properly noted that if there is no violation of § 1985, there
can be no violation of § 1986 because both claims turn on allegations contained in § 1985.
Similarly, if neither of these statutory claims are implicated, the claim for civil conspiracy
must be dismissed because civil conspiracy claims cannot stand alone without some
independent statutory violation. Accordingly, the court properly focused on the § 1985
claim.
The § 1985 claim fails for two reasons. First, assuming Dr. Carter could prove a
conspiracy took place, “a conspiracy claim [under § 1985] requires a clear showing of
invidious, purposeful and intentional discrimination between classes or individuals.”
Robinson v. McCorkle, 462 F.2d 111, 113 (3d Cir. 1972). For the reasons stated above,
however, Dr. Carter has failed to clearly demonstrate that racial animus motivated the
Defendants’ decision. Second, under § 1985 a conspiracy must involve more than one state
or private agency. Johnson v. Univ. of Pittsburgh, 435 F. Supp. 1328, 1370 (W.D. Pa.
1977). In the present case, each of the Defendants is a member of the same institution —
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DSU.
VI.
Dr. Carter’s claim of deprivation of procedural due process turns on a showing that
she was objectively entitled to tenure and did not merely have an expectation of promotion.
The record does not support such a finding and the summary judgement was properly
granted in favor of the Defendants.
VII.
Dr. Carter’s claims for breach of contract and intentional infliction of emotional
distress were properly barred by the Eleventh Amendment. Mckay v. Del. State Univ., No.
99-219, 2000 WL 1481018, at *12 (D. Del. Sept. 29, 2000).
*****
We have considered all of the arguments advanced by the parties and conclude that
no further discussion is necessary.
The judgment of the district court will be affirmed.
TO THE CLERK:
Please file the foregoing opinion.
/s/ Ruggero J. Aldisert
Circuit Judge
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