OCTOBER TERM, 1998
Syllabus
CENTRAL STATE UNIVERSITY
v. AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF
UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS, CENTRAL STATE UNIVERSITY CHAPTER
ON PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF
OHIO
No. 98-1071. Decided March 22, 1999
Pursuant to Ohio Rev. Code Ann. § 3345.45, petitioner university
adopted standards for its professors' instructional workloads and
notified respondent, the certified collective-bargaining agent for
the professors, that it would not bargain over the workload issue.
Respondent then filed a complaint in state court for declaratory
and injunctive relief, alleging that § 3345.45 created a class of
public employees not entitled to bargain regarding their workload
in violation of the Equal Protection Clauses of the Ohio and United
States Constitutions. The Ohio Supreme Court held that the
collective-bargaining exemption bore no rational relationship to
the State's interest in correcting the imbalance between research
and teaching at its public universities, and concluded that the
State had not shown any rational basis for singling out university
professors as the only public employees precluded from bargaining
over their workload.
Held: The Ohio Supreme Court's holding cannot be
reconciled with the requirements of the Equal Protection Clause.
This Court has repeatedly held that where a classification involves
neither fundamental rights nor suspect proceedings it cannot run
afoul of the Clause if there is a rational relationship between
disparity of treatment and some legitimate governmental purpose.
E. g.,
Heller v.
Doe, 509 U. S. 312, 319321.
The legislative classification here passes that test. Imposing a
workload policy not subject to collective bargaining was an
entirely rational step to accomplish the statute's objective of
increasing the time faculty spent in the classroom. The fact that
the record before the Ohio courts did not show that collective
bargaining had lead to the decline in faculty classroom time does
not detract from the legislative decision's rationality.
Certiorari granted; 83 Ohio St. 3d 229, 699 N. E. 2d 463,
reversed and remanded.
125
PER CURIAM.
Petitioner Central State University challenges a ruling of the
Ohio Supreme Court striking down on equal protection grounds a
state law requiring public universities to develop standards for
professors' instructional workloads and exempting those standards
from collective bargaining. We grant the petition and reverse the
judgment of the Ohio Supreme Court.
In an effort to address the decline in the amount of time that
public university professors devoted to teaching as opposed to
researching, the State of Ohio enacted Ohio Rev. Code Ann. §
3345.45 (1997). This provision provides in relevant part:
"On or before January 1, 1994, the Ohio board of regents jointly
with all state universities ... shall develop standards for
instructional workloads for full-time and part-time faculty in
keeping with the universities' missions and with special emphasis
on the undergraduate learning experience ....
"On or before June 30, 1994, the board of trustees of each state
university shall take formal action to adopt a faculty workload
policy consistent with the standards developed under this section.
Notwithstanding [other provisions making faculty workload at public
universities a proper subject for collective bargaining], the
policies adopted under this section are not appropriate subjects
for collective bargaining. Notwithstanding [these
collective-bargaining provisions], any policy adopted under this
section by a board of trustees prevails over any conflicting
provisions of any collective bargaining agreement between an
employees organization and that board of trustees."*
* As part of the same bill codified at § 3345, the Ohio General
Assembly also enacted uncodified legislation providing that the
Board of Regents
126
126 CENTRAL STATE UN IV.
v. AMERICAN ASSN. OF UNIV.
PROFESSORS, CENTRAL STATE UNIV. CHAPTER
Per Curiam
In 1994, petitioner Central State University adopted a workload
policy pursuant to § 3345.45 and notified respondent, the certified
collective-bargaining agent for Central State's professors, that it
would not bargain over the issue of faculty workload. Respondent
subsequently filed a complaint in Ohio state court for declaratory
and injunctive relief, alleging that § 3345.45 created a class of
public employees not entitled to bargain regarding their workload
and that this classification violated the Equal Protection Clauses
of the Ohio and United States Constitutions.
By a divided vote, the Ohio Supreme Court agreed with respondent
that § 3345.45 deprived public university professors the equal
protection of the laws. See 83 Ohio St. 3d 229, 699 N. E. 2d 463
(1998). The court acknowledged that Ohio's purpose in enacting the
statute was legitimate and that all legislative enactments enjoy a
strong presumption of constitutionality.
Id., at 234-235,
699 N. E. 2d, at 468469. Nonetheless, the court held that § 3345's
collectivebargaining exemption bore no rational relationship to the
State's interest in correcting the imbalance between research and
teaching at its public universities. See id., at 236-239, 699 N. E.
2d, at 469-470. The State had argued that achieving uniformity,
consistency, and equity in faculty workload was necessary to
recapture the decline in teaching, and that collective bargaining
produced variation in workloads across universities in departments
having the same academic mission.
Id., at 236, 699 N. E. 2d,
at 469. Reviewing evidence that the State had submitted in support
of this
shall work with state universities "to ensure that no later than
[the] fall term 1994, a minimum ten percent increase in statewide
undergraduate teaching activity be achieved to restore the
reductions experienced over the past decade. Notwithstanding
section 3345.45 of the Revised Code, any collective bargaining
agreement in effect on the effective date of this act shall
continue in effect until its expiration date." Amended Substitute
House Bill No. 152, § 84.14, 145 Ohio Laws 4539 (effective July 1,
1993).
127
contention, the Ohio Supreme Court held that "there is not a
shred of evidence in the entire record which links collective
bargaining with the decline in teaching over the last decade, or in
any way purports to establish that collective bargaining
contributed in the slightest to the lost faculty time devoted to
undergraduate teaching."
Ibid. Based on this determination,
the court concluded that the State had failed to show "any rational
basis for singling out university faculty members as the only
public employees ... precluded from bargaining over their
workload."
Id., at 237, 699 N. E. 2d, at 470.
The dissenting justices pointed out that the majority's
methodology and conclusion conflicted with this Court's standards
for rational-basis review of equal protection challenges. See id.,
at 238-241, 699 N. E. 2d, at 471-472. In their view, "that
collective bargaining has not
caused the decline in teaching
proves nothing in assessing whether the faculty workload standards
imposed pursuant to R. C. 3345.45 legitimately relate to that
statute's purpose of restoring losses in undergraduate teaching
activity."
Id., at 238,699 N. E. 2d, at 471 (emphasis in
original). The majority's review of the State's evidence was
therefore "inconsequential" to the only question in the case:
whether the challenged legislative action was arbitrary or
irrational. See id., at 239-242, 699 N. E. 2d, at 472-473.
Answering this question, the dissent concluded that imposing
uniform workload standards via the exemption "is not an irrational
means of effecting an increasing in teaching activity. In fact, it
was probably the most direct means of accomplishing that objective
available to the General Assembly."
Id., at 241, 699 N. E.
2d, at 473.
We agree that the Ohio Supreme Court's holding cannot be
reconciled with the requirements of the Equal Protection Clause. We
have repeatedly held that "a classification neither involving
fundamental rights nor proceeding along sus-
128
128 CENTRAL STATE UN IV.
v. AMERICAN ASSN. OF UNIV.
PROFESSORS, CENTRAL STATE UNIV. CHAPTER
Per Curiam
pect lines ... cannot run afoul of the Equal Protection Clause
if there is a rational relationship between disparity of treatment
and some legitimate governmental purpose."
Heller v.
Doe, 509 U. S.
312, 319-321 (1993) (citations omitted);
FCC v.
Beach
Communications, Inc., 508 U. S. 307, 313-314
(1993); Nordlinger v.
Hahn, 505 U. S. 1, 11 (1992). The
legislative classification created by § 3345.45 passes this test.
One of the statute's objectives was to increase the time spent by
faculty in the classroom; the imposition of a faculty workload
policy not subject to collective bargaining was an entirely
rational step to accomplish this objective. The legislature could
quite reasonably have concluded that the policy animating the law
would have been undercut and likely varied if it were subject to
collective bargaining. The State, in effect, decided that the
attainment of this goal was more important than the system of
collective bargaining that had previously included university
professors. See
Vance v.
Bradley, 440 U. S. 93 (1979)
(upholding a similar enactment of Congress providing that federal
employees covered by the Foreign Service retirement system, but not
those covered by the Civil Service retirement system, would be
required to retire at age 60).
The fact that the record before the Ohio courts did not show
that collective bargaining in the past had lead to the decline in
classroom time for faculty does not detract from the rationality of
the legislative decision. See
Heller, supra, at 320 ("A
State ... has no obligation to produce evidence to sustain the
rationality of a statutory classification"). The legislature wanted
a uniform workload policy to be in place by a certain date. It
could properly conclude that collective bargaining about that
policy in the future would interfere with the attainment of this
end. Under our precedent, this is sufficient to sustain the
exclusion of university professors from the otherwise general
collective-bargaining scheme for public employees.
129
The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted, the judgment
of the Supreme Court of Ohio is reversed, and the case is remanded
for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
JUSTICE GINSBURG, with whom JUSTICE BREYER joins,
concurring.
I join the
per curiam opinion recognizing, as the Court
did in
Nordlinger v.
Hahn, 505 U. S. 1 (1992), that
for the mine run of economic regulations that do not trigger
heightened scrutiny, it is appropriate to inquire whether the
lawmaker's classification
"rationally furthers a legitimate state interest. In general,
the Equal Protection Clause is satisfied so long as there is a
plausible policy reason for the classification, see United
States Railroad Retirement Bd. v. Fritz, 449 U. S. 166,
174, 179 (1980), the legislative facts on which the classification
is apparently based rationally may have been considered to be true
by the governmental decisionmaker, see Minnesota v.
Clover Leaf Creamery Co., 449 U. S. 456, 464
(1981), and the relationship of the classification to its goal is
not so attenuated as to render the distinction arbitrary or
irrational, see Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center,
Inc., 473 U. S. [432, 446 (1985)]." Id., at 11.
I also recognize that a summary disposition is not a fit
occasion for elaborate discussion of our rational-basis standards
of review. See
Hohn v.
United States, 524 U. S. 236, 251 (1998)
(opinions rendered without full briefing or argument have muted
precedential value). JUSTICE STEVENS emphasizes that this case is
of dominant importance to the state universities in Ohio, see
post, at 131 (dissenting opinion); in that light, the Ohio
Supreme Court is of course at liberty to resolve the matter under
the Ohio Constitution.
130
130 CENTRAL STATE UN IV.
v. AMERICAN ASSN. OF UNIV.
PROFESSORS, CENTRAL STATE UNIV. CHAPTER
STEVENS, J., dissenting
JUSTICE STEVENS, dissenting.
While surveying the flood of law reviews that crosses my desk, I
have sometimes wondered whether law professors have any time to
spend teaching their students about the law. Apparently, a majority
of the legislators in Ohio had a similar reaction to the work
product of faculty members in Ohio's several state universities. By
enacting Ohio Rev. Code Ann. § 3345.45 (1997), the legislators
decided to do something about what they perceived to be a problem
that neither the State Board of Regents nor the trustees of those
universities could solve for themselves. Section 3345.45 directs
that board and those trustees to develop standards and policies for
instructional workloads for university faculty members. It provides
that faculty members of public universities, unlike any other group
of public employees, may not engage in collective bargaining about
their workload.
How the intellectually gifted citizens of Ohio who have selected
teaching as their profession shall allocate their professional
endeavors between research and teaching is a matter of great
importance to themselves, to their students, and to the consumers
of their scholarly writing. Who shall decide how the balance
between research and teaching shall be struck presents a similarly
important question.
Prior to § 3345.45, the faculty members' freedom to make such
decisions was constrained only by the teaching or research
assignments imposed by their superiors in the educational
establishment. By its enactment of § 3345.45, the Ohio General
Assembly has asserted an interest in playing a role in making these
decisions. As a result of the filing of this lawsuit, first the
Ohio courts and now this Court have also participated in this
decisional process.
Buried beneath the legal arguments advanced in this case lies a
debate over academic freedom. In my judgment the relevant sources
of constraint on that freedom are (1) the self-discipline of the
teacher, (2) her faculty or department supervisors, (3) the
trustees of the university where she
131
teaches, (4) the State Board of Regents, (5) the state
legislature, (6) state judges, and, finally, (7) the judges sitting
on this Court. I omit any reference to the collectivebargaining
representatives of the teachers because, as everyone agrees, there
is no evidence that collective bargaining has had any effect on the
increased emphasis on research over teaching that gave rise to the
enactment of § 3345.45.1
I have neither the mandate nor the inclination to assess whether
the decision of the Ohio General Assembly to enact § 3345.45 was
wise or unwise. I am equally convinced that this Court should not
review the role played by the Ohio judiciary in deciding how to
resolve this dispute. The case is important to the state
universities in Ohio, but it has little, if any, national
significance. Seven of the eleven Ohio judges who reviewed the case
concluded that the Ohio statute violated the Ohio Constitution.2
Indeed, the majority
1 After reviewing studies prepared by the Legislative Office of
Education Oversight, by a Special Task Force on Challenges &
Opportunities for Higher Education in Ohio, by the Regents'
Advisory Committee on Faculty Workload Standards & Guidelines,
by the Regents' Advisory Committee on Faculty Workload, and by the
Ohio Board of Regents, as well as statistical data collected from
Ohio colleges and universities, the Ohio Supreme Court
concluded:
"We have reviewed each of these reports [relied upon by Central
State University], and all other evidence contained in the record,
and can conclude with confidence that there is not a shred of
evidence in the entire record which links collective bargaining
with the decline in teaching over the last decade, or in any way
purports to establish that collective bargaining contributed in the
slightest to the lost faculty time devoted to undergraduate
teaching. Indeed, these reports appear to indicate that factors
other than collective bargaining are responsible for the decline in
teaching activity." 83 Ohio St. 3d 229, 236, 699 N. E. 2d 463, 469
(1998).
2 The seven judges include the four from the majority opinion of
the State Supreme Court and the three judges of the Court of
Appeals who originally struck down § 3345.45.
The State Supreme Court held that the statute violated Article
I, § 2, of the Ohio Constitution, which provides:
"All political power is inherent in the people. Government is
instituted for their equal protection and benefit, and they have
the right to alter,
132
132 CENTRAL STATE UN IV.
v. AMERICAN ASSN. OF UNIV.
PROFESSORS, CENTRAL STATE UNIV. CHAPTER
STEVENS, J., dissenting
opinion of the Ohio Supreme Court did not cite a single case
decided by this Court.
If the State Supreme Court did misconstrue the Equal Protection
Clause of the Federal Constitution, the impact of that arguable
error is of consequence only in the State of Ohio, and will, in any
event, turn out to be totally harmless if that court adheres to its
previously announced interpretation of the State Constitution. I
therefore believe that the Court should deny the petition for
certiorari.
If the case does warrant this Court's review, it should not be
decided summarily. I t surely should not be disposed of simply by
quoting descriptions of the rational-basis standard of review
articulated in four nonunanimous opinions of this Court deciding
wholly dissimilar issues. Cases applying the rational-basis test
have described that standard in various ways. Compare,
e.
g., the Court's opinions in
F. S.
Royster Guano
Co. v.
Virginia, 253 U. S. 412, 415
(1920), and
Cleburne v.
Cleburne Living Center, Inc.,
473 U. S. 432,
446 (1985), with the majority opinion in
Railroad Retirement
Bd. v.
Fritz, 449 U. S. 166, 174-177
(1980). Indeed, in the latter case there were three opinions, each
of which formulated the rational-basis standard differently from
the other two.
Ibid. (majority opinion); id., at 180-181
(STEVENS, J., concurring in judgment); id., at 183-184 (Brennan,
J., dissenting).3
reform, or abolish the same, whenever they may deem it
necessary; and no special privileges or immunities shall ever be
granted, that may not be altered, revoked, or repealed by the
General Assembly." The court found it unnecessary to consider
respondent's additional arguments based, in part, on other
provisions of the State Constitution.
Id., at 237, 699 N. E.
2d, at 470.
3 In a footnote to the opinion in
Fritz that cited a
number of rationalbasis cases, the Court made this observation:
"The most arrogant legal scholar would not claim that all of
these cases applied a uniform or consistent test under equal
protection principles. And realistically speaking, we can be no
more certain that this opinion will remain undisturbed than were
those who joined the opinion in
Lindsley [v.
Natural
Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U. S. 61 (1911)], [F.
S.]
Royster Guano
133
The Court's disposition of this case seems to assume that an
incantation of the rational-basis test, together with speculation
that collective bargaining might interfere with the adoption of
uniform faculty workload policies, makes it unnecessary to consider
any other facts or arguments that might inform an exercise of
judgment about the underlying issue. While I am not prepared to
express an opinion about the ultimate merits of the case, I can
identify a serious flaw in the Court's mechanistic analysis. The
Court assumes that the question improperly answered by the Ohio
Supreme Court is whether collective bargaining may interfere with
the attainment of a uniform workload policy.4 But that is not the
issue, because this case involves the Equal Protection Clause, and
not the principles of substantive due process.
The question posed by this case is whether there is a rational
basis for discriminating against faculty members by depriving them
of bargaining assistance that is available to all other public
employees in the State of Ohio.5 Even the Court's speculation about
the possible adverse consequences of collective bargaining about
faculty workload does not explain why collective bargaining about
the workloads of all other public employees might not give rise to
the same adverse consequences arising from lack of statewide
uniform-
Co. [v.
Virginia, 253 U. S. 412 (1920)], or
any of the other cases referred to in this opinion and in the
dissenting opinion." 449 U. S., at 176-177, n.1O.
4 In addition, the Court's opinion assumes that the ultimate
objective of having teachers spend more time in classrooms requires
that there be a single workload policy for each of the State's
universities and for each of the subjects taught in those schools,
whether Latin, medicine, or astrophysics. I am not at all sure that
such an assumption is rational.
5 Ohio Rev. Code Ann. §4117.03(A)(4) (1998) provides: "Public
employees have the right to: ... Bargain collectively with their
public employers to determine wages, hours, terms and other
conditions of employment and the continuation, modification, or
deletion of an existing provision of a collective bargaining
agreement, and enter into collective bargaining agreements ....
"
134
134 CENTRAL STATE UN IV.
v. AMERICAN ASSN. OF UNIV.
PROFESSORS, CENTRAL STATE UNIV. CHAPTER
STEVENS, J., dissenting
ity. Indeed, I would suppose that the interest in protecting the
academic freedom of university faculty members might provide a
rational basis for giving them
more bargaining assistance
than other public employees. In any event, no one has explained why
there is a rational basis for concluding that they should receive
less.
I respectfully dissent.
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