Alaska Employment Law

The 9th Circuit, per Judge Sidney Thomas, has concluded that some confidential public employees have 1st Amendment protections against dismissal:

the patronage dismissal doctrine does not extend to adverse employment actions motivated by the employee’s personal, rather than political, loyalties. The patronage dismissal doctrine is designed to ensure the integrity of the political process. To force a public official to work towards his or her goals with the assistance of employees who may be working against those goals has the potential to frustrate the will of the electorate. Personal disagreements do not give rise to the same potential for electoral frustration. Some personal conflict exists in nearly every workplace, and severe personal conflicts may be resolved through performance evaluations or by resorting to the balancing test set out in Pickering.  Extending the patronage dismissal doctrine to matters of personal loyalty would give public employers unjustified power to abridge their employees’ First Amendment rights.  We decline to extend the doctrine in that way.

The plaintiff had been the administrative assistant to a school district general counsel.  After the school board fired the general counsel, the district allegedly constructively discharged the assistant for her perceived loyalty to her former boss.

Nichols v. Dancer, ___ F.3 ___ (9th Cir. May 18, 2009)