U.S. Court in Tennessee Holds Hospital Employee Vaccine Mandate Doesn’t Violate Fourteenth Amendment
- June 03, 2022
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee dismissed with prejudice May 31 an action brought by a hospital employee alleging the hospital’s mandate that all employees be vaccinated against COVID-19 or qualify for an exemption violated her constitutional rights to procedural and substantive due process.
Plaintiff Rachel Clark was employed as a Registered Nurse at Erlanger Hospital. On November 5, 2021, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published a proposed rule requiring all non-exempt staff at Medicare and Medicaid-certified providers to receive their first COVID-19 vaccination by December 6, 2021.
To comply with the CMS vaccine mandate, defendant William Jackson, the President and CEO of Erlanger Hospital, advised all Erlanger staff to either be vaccinated or qualify for an exemption by December 5, 2021 and to be fully vaccinated by January 4, 2022.
Clark did not receive a COVID-19 vaccine or apply for an exemption. Following her suspension without pay, Clark sued Jackson on behalf of herself and others similarly situated, alleging the vaccination requirement violated her "constitutional rights to privacy and to refuse medical treatment under the 14th Amendment." Jackson filed a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim.
The court rejected Clark’s claim that Jackson violated her substantive Fourteenth Amendment right to refuse unwanted medical care.
The court found Clark was never forced to receive a COVID-19 vaccination without her consent. The Erlanger vaccine requirement is distinguishable from the fundamental right to refuse medical treatment discussed in the seminal Supreme Court case Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Dept. of Health, 497 U.S. 261, 262 (U.S. 1990), the court said, because it is tied to Clark's continued employment at a health care facility and was not forced upon her without her consent. “Indeed, Clark continues to successfully refuse vaccination against COVID-19,” the court noted.
Since 1905, the Supreme Court has applied rational basis analysis to vaccine mandates, suggesting that the right to refuse a vaccine is not a fundamental right, the court reasoned.
Given that rational basis applies, Clark has the burden to show the CMS vaccine mandate is not rationally related to a legitimate governmental interest. Here, “[t]here is no dispute that preserving public health by slowing the spread of disease is a legitimate public interest,” the court said.
Clark argued the vaccine mandate violated her right to procedural due process because she was not given “individual consideration.” But the court said Clark failed to explain why she was entitled to such consideration and “has not established an interest in life, liberty, or property that has allegedly been violated by the Erlanger mandate, nor does she allege a constitutionally deficient procedure.”
The court also found Clark failed to plausibly allege Jackson violated her right to equal protection. According to Clark, she had already contracted the COVID-19 virus, and therefore it would violate her constitutional rights to treat her the same as an employee who hadn’t yet had the virus.
The court found Clark never alleged she was treated differently from those similarly situated to her (i.e. those who have contracted COVID-19), but rather alleged she was treated similarly to people different from her (i.e. those who have not contracted COVID-19), which “does not constitute a cognizable equal protection claim.”
In addition, the right to remain unvaccinated and employed in a CMS-covered facility that is subject to a vaccine mandate is not a fundamental right, and Clark's alleged class—individuals who have recovered from COVID-19 but are subject to the Erlanger vaccine mandate—is not a suspect class, the court said.
Clark v. Jackson, No. 1:21-CV-00303-DCLC (E.D. Tenn. May 31, 2022).