Doe v. City University of New York

Background

Joseph Collins brought a lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal law allowing claims against people acting under state authority for violating constitutional rights. He sued The City University of New York (CUNY), CUNY employees Karol V. Mason, Brian A. Kerrr, Tony Balkissoon, Jill Maxwell, Gabriela Leal, and Jane Does 1–10.

Collins enrolled at CUNY’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice in August 2021. CUNY required students attending in-person or hybrid classes to receive a COVID-19 vaccination unless they obtained a medical or religious exemption. Collins requested a religious exemption based on his belief that COVID-19 vaccines were produced or tested using cell lines derived from aborted fetuses. CUNY denied his first request in September 2021. After he did not become vaccinated, John Jay withdrew him from in-person classes and barred him from campus.

Collins submitted a second exemption request in January 2022. By then, a central CUNY religious-exceptions team handled such requests. CUNY denied the second request because it lacked a sufficient basis and did not adequately demonstrate a sincerely held religious belief. Collins was again withdrawn from in-person classes. He alleged that this delayed his graduation and violated his federal constitutional rights, New York State constitutional rights, and New York State and City human-rights laws.

The defendants moved to dismiss the amended complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), which addresses subject-matter jurisdiction, and Rule 12(b)(6), which addresses whether a complaint states a legally sufficient claim.

Eleventh Amendment immunity

The court ruled that CUNY is an arm of New York State and therefore generally has immunity from suits in federal court under the Eleventh Amendment. The same immunity applied to the individual defendants to the extent Collins sued them in their official capacities.

The court rejected Collins’s argument that an exception for prospective injunctive relief applied to CUNY, the state-law claims, damages claims, declaratory-relief claims, and the five named individual defendants. Those five defendants did not have authority to reinstate Collins’s campus access because the central CUNY religious-exceptions team—not those officials—handled the relevant exemption decisions.

The court did allow Collins’s official-capacity claim for prospective injunctive relief to proceed past the immunity issue against the Jane Does who were members of the central religious-exceptions team. The court concluded that Collins alleged an ongoing federal-law violation and sought prospective relief—restoration of campus access—from officials who allegedly could provide that relief. The court dismissed all claims against CUNY and most of the official-capacity claims against the individual defendants for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction under Rule 12(b)(1).

Personal involvement

For claims against officials in their individual capacities under § 1983, Collins had to allege each defendant’s personal involvement in the alleged constitutional violation.

The court dismissed Collins’s § 1983 claims based on the second exemption request against Mason, Kerr, Balkissoon, Maxwell, and Leal because the complaint alleged that the central CUNY religious-exceptions team handled that request. The court found that Collins sufficiently alleged personal involvement by the Jane Doe members of that team.

For the first exemption request, the court dismissed the individual-capacity claims against Mason and Kerr because Collins’s allegations about their supervisory responsibilities were vague and conclusory. It also dismissed the claims against Leal because her referral of Collins’s father to other officials did not show participation in the policy’s implementation or the exemption denial. The court dismissed the claims against Maxwell because being copied on emails, without more, did not establish personal involvement. The court found that Collins had sufficiently alleged that Balkissoon participated in denying the first request.

Free-exercise claim

The court dismissed Collins’s claim that CUNY’s vaccination policy violated the First Amendment’s protection for religious exercise. Relying on controlling Second Circuit precedent, the court held that the policy was neutral and generally applicable because it applied to all CUNY students attending fully in-person or hybrid courses and did not single out religious conduct.

The court also held that the existence of a religious-exemption process did not itself make the policy non-neutral or non generally applicable. Collins did not allege facts showing that CUNY favored secular conduct over religious conduct or that defendants acted with religious hostility. Because the policy was neutral and generally applicable, the court applied rational-basis review, meaning the policy needed only to be rationally related to a legitimate goal. The court held that requiring vaccination was rationally related to limiting COVID-19 transmission and safely allowing in-person education.

Equal-protection claim

The court dismissed Collins’s equal-protection claim. Because his free-exercise challenge failed on the same grounds, the court applied rational-basis review to the equal-protection claim as well. The court also found that Collins did not identify similarly situated students who were treated differently and that his claim of purposeful religious discrimination was conclusory.

Procedural-due-process claim

The court dismissed Collins’s procedural-due-process claim. It held that the vaccination policy was legislative in nature because it applied generally to students and operated prospectively. Government action that is legislative in nature generally does not require individualized procedural protections.

The court further held that Collins had not plausibly alleged a protected property interest. Although New York recognizes an implied contract between a college and its students, the court stated that students do not have a property interest in a particular educational program, and Collins had not been excluded from the entire educational process. He continued attending classes remotely, even though he was barred from certain in-person classes.

The court also concluded that Collins had not shown a constitutional deprivation. He was not expelled from John Jay; rather, he had to attend classes online because he did not become vaccinated. The court declined to decide whether the procedures CUNY used were constitutionally sufficient because Collins had not shown the required protected interest and deprivation. It nevertheless stated that his allegations showed he had received notice of the vaccination requirement and its possible consequences.

State and local claims

After dismissing the federal claims, the court declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction—the court’s authority to hear related state-law claims—over Collins’s claims under the New York State Constitution and New York State and City Human Rights Laws.

Disposition

Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss. The court dismissed the amended complaint in its entirety with prejudice, directed the clerk to terminate the motion, and closed the case. The court did not decide whether the individual defendants were entitled to qualified immunity.