Harlow v. Fitzgerald

457 U.S. 800 (1982)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Fitzgerald (P) lost his job as a management analyst with the Department of the Air Force. The official reason was that of departmental reorganization. However, there was tremendous public attention because two years before, he had testified in front of a congressional committee. His testimony was embarrassing to his superiors and related to the cost overruns and technical problems with the C5-A transport plane. They were so angered in fact that the Air Force Secretary’s, Harold Brown’s, staff prepared a memorandum outlining the ways of removing P from his post. One of those ways was a reduction in force. Fourteen months after the testimony, P’s job was eliminated as part of a department-wide reduction in force. There was some concern on Congress’s part that P had really been fired for retaliation over his earlier testimony. Public hearings were held. The White House refused to give him another job. P filed a complaint with the Civil Service Commission. The Civil Service Commission determined that P had been dismissed for purely personal reasons in violation of civil service regulations. The Commissioner also ruled that P had failed to prove that he was fired in retaliation for his congressional testimony. P blamed Harlow and others (Ds) for his dismissal. Ds had advised President Nixon that P was disloyal and should be dismissed whether or not he was qualified for the job. P sued Ds in a Bivens action claiming that Ds had intended to deprive him of constitutional and statutory rights. P claimed that Ds joined in a conspiracy to can him, but the evidence was rather sparse. Ds disputed the evidence and after exhaustive discovery adduced that P had no direct evidence of Ds’ involvement in any wrongful activity. Ds (which included Richard Nixon, Butterfield, and Harlow) less Nixon made a motion for summary judgment, claiming that they were presidential aides, and were immune from private action. The trial court denied the motion and found that there were genuine issues of disputed fact and it also found that Ds were not entitled to absolute immunity. Ds, less Nixon, invoked the collateral order doctrine and appealed the denial of their immunity defense to the Court of Appeals. It dismissed the appeal without opinion. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.