SUMMARY OF THE ARGUMENT
The University of Houston Downtown created a designated public forum when it established an email system for communication
among faculty and staff and sanctioned its use by faculty members for a variety of communicative purposes. UHD violated Plaintiffs’
First and Fourteenth Amendment rights when it imposed restrictions on the use of that electronic forum and the associated email
accounts by adjunct faculty, where such restrictions were not imposed on other account holders, on messages on other subjects,
and on messages on similar topics that expressed a different viewpoint.
The denial of representation and voting rights to Adjuncts in the Faculty Senate, and in UHD committees, is subject to strict scrutiny
because it affects fundamental rights, and fails to pass muster under the Equal Protection Clause because UHD is a teaching
(rather than a research) institution where part-time and full-time faculty essentially perform the same work and are thus similarly
situated, adjuncts teach approximately half of the student credit hours, and coverage of courses by part-timers and full-timers is
treated as interchangeable by the administration.
The Plaintiffs have standing to challenge provisions of the Texas Labor Code which expressly prohibit conduct Plaintiffs proposed
to engage in and were forced to refrain from to avoid punishment, or were altogether precluded from.
ARGUMENT AND AUTHORITIES (Table of Contents)
I. STANDARDS OF REVIEW
II. THE ADJUNCTS’ FIRST AMENDMENT CLAIM
A. A Public University’s E-mail System: What Kind of Forum?
B. The Form and Content of the Speech at Issue
1. Naderi’s Speech.
2. De Mino’s Speech in Support of Naderi
3. The Adjuncts’ Petition for Redress
C. Did a Constitutional Violation Occur?
D. Denial of Access to Adjunct E-mail Accounts in the Summer
E. The Spam-filter Claim
III. THE ADJUNCTS’ OTHER EQUAL PROTECTION CLAIMS
IV. CONSTITUTIONAL CHALLENGE TO THE UNIVERSITY’S LABOR UNION POLICY
V. CONSTITUTIONAL CHALLENGE TO ALIEN EXCLUSION CLAUSE IN THE TEXAS LABOR CODE
VI. DE MINO’S FIRST AMENDMENT RETALIATION CLAIM
VII. NON-JOINDER OF ADOLFO SANTOS AND DENIAL OF DISCOVERY
VIII. AWARD OF COSTS
IX. DENIAL OF RECONSIDERATION UNDER RULE 59 BASED ON INTERVENING 5TH CIRCUIT DECISION
CONCLUSION
ISSUES PRESENTED
1. Does the email system of the University of Houston Downtown (UHD), and the associated DT_All_Users email distribution list,
constitute a public forum for a designated group of speakers?
2. Does the First Amendment protect the use of a state university’s email system for the articulation of labor and employment
issues and labor union organizing?
3. Did the District Court properly deny Plaintiffs’ constitutional challenge to the University’s restrictions on the use of its email
system on server-capacity grounds?
4. Did the Defendants discriminate against the Plaintiffs on the basis of the content and viewpoint of their speech (and attempted
speech) in violation of the First Amendment?
6. Did the Defendants discriminate impermissibly against the Plaintiffs in denying them access to their email accounts during the
summer?
7. Is the denial of representation and active and passive voting rights to adjunct faculty in UHD’s Faculty Senate, and in UHD’s
shared governance process, subject to strict scrutiny?
9. Did the District Court err in dismissing the Plaintiffs’ challenge to a state law and university policy prohibiting labor union
organizing and collective bargaining for lack of standing?
10. Did the District Court err in holding the Named Plaintiff did not have standing to challenge the Texas Labor Code’s alien
exclusion rule?
11. Did UHD retaliate against the Named Plaintiff for exercising his first amendment rights?
12. Did the District Court err in awarding $444.40 in costs incurred by the Defendants to ascertain the legal structure of Plaintiff
Faculty Rights Coalition?