Daley Judgment Favors University

By Ike Walker
Editor in Chief

Wesleyan’s tenure process prevailed this summer when a Superior Court jury decided in favor of the University on July 17 in the case of Anthony Daley, former assistant professor of government, versus Wesleyan University.

Kenneth Gage, an attorney for the University, declined to comment in detail about the case, deferring to the University’s official statement instead.

According to the statement, the decision is a "victory for the right of academic institutions to make independent judgments about the quality of tenure candidates’ scholarship."

Due to this decision, the statement claims that faculty and administrators are not required to regard the opinions of outside scholars during the tenure process.

"[The decision] represents a victory for the tenure system. It would be difficult if they lost the authority to make substantive judgments in these cases," said Vice President for Academic Affairs Richard Boyd.

Boyd was also involved in the original tenure decision as a senior faculty member in the Government Department.

The case, which claimed defamation and breach of contract on the part of Wesleyan, was the most recent step in Daley’s protests against the Government Department’s tenure process.

In a document submitted to the court by Daley’s attorneys, they claimed that "Wesleyan University negligently misrepresented the terms and conditions under which [Daley] would be entitled to tenure."

Three copies of the Blue Book, those from 1993-1996, were represented as evidence and referenced extensively in the case.

Daley was denied tenure in 1993 by an 8-1 vote of tenured government faculty. He chose not to appeal the decision, but rather resubmitted his work the following year for an additional review. This is known as the eighth year review since it takes place in the eighth year of employment. Despite additional submissions by Daley for the eighth year review, the department did not reverse its recommendation.

In April 1995 Daley appealed his eighth year review, and in November of the same year he appealed the original decision to the Appeals Board without success. After being denied twice, Daley brought one more internal appeal to the Faculty Committee on Rights and Responsibilities (FCRR). The FCRR upheld the initial recommendation of the government department, and Daley’s contract expired in June of 1995.

At that point, Daley decided to seek outside recourse and filed a civil suit against the University in Superior Court. Following his decision to take Wesleyan to court, Daley stated his position with a Wespeak that appeared in the April 5, 1996 edition of The Argus.

In the Wespeak, Daley claimed the Government Department "distorted and defamed" his academic record. He also maintained that Wesleyan allowed the department to set arbitrary standards for its tenure decisions.

According to the defendant’s trial memorandum filed with the court by Wesleyan’s lawyers, Daley was denied tenure for failing to live up to the Government Department’s "customary standard for scholarship."

The memorandum also asserted that he failed to complete the requirement of a major project of research and writing.

"In our judgment, his principal scholarly work, an unpublished manuscript on the French steel industry, was seriously flawed and required major, substantive revisions before it would be publishable." said a statement sent to the faculty on August 6, 1998. The statement also noted Daley’s "slow pace of production."

Chair of the Government Department Barbara Craig called the August 6 statement the official position of her department, and declined to comment further on the case.

Nine outside scholars were solicited to read and critique Daley’s work before the trial. Although the Chronicle of Higher Education reported that seven of these experts wrote letters supporting Daley, the government department wrote a letter of rebuttal to the Chronicle representing the letters as "mixed" in regard to the quality of Daley’s scholarship.

Daley was originally hired with a four year contract as assistant professor of government in 1987. At the end of the first contract, Daley’s work was reviewed and the University kept him on tenure track by giving him another four year contract that was to expire in June, 1995.

In May of 1993, Daley submitted his book manuscript and other materials to the government department for review. The department informed Daley in October 1993 that he was not being recommended for tenure.

Daley’s original course of action outside of Wesleyan was to file a charge of reverse discrimination with the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, based on his contention that female and minority professors with weaker records than his had been recommended for tenure in the department. His claim was quickly dismissed.

During the trial, the court ordered Wesleyan to reveal many formerly confidential documents. Among these were the tenure files of all government professors promoted since 1983. Daley’s teaching evaluations were submitted to the court as evidence, in addition to selected evaluations from eight other professors.

Boyd said he is concerned about issues of confidentiality of tenure records.

Daley told the Chronicle of Higher Education that the senior professors in the Government Department did not understand his work because they were not experts in the field of Western European politics and employment relations.

During the six week trial, Daley’s attorneys logged several different protests regarding procedural issues in the case. On July 2, they made a motion for mistrial based on judicial misconduct. That motion was dismissed.

The jury handed down its decision in favor of Wesleyan on July 17, and 10 days later Daley’s attorney’s submitted a motion to set aside the verdict. This motion calls for the judge to review the case for any procedural inconsistencies that might have effected the verdict.

If this motion is denied, Daley’s attorneys plan to file an appeal.

"I’m confident that the decision will be reversed upon appeal," said Jacques Parenteau, an attorney representing Daley.

Daley has moved to Washington, DC and was unavailable for comment.