## Facts

- Brenda A. Parks was a sergeant in the Warner Robins Police Department’s Special Investigative Unit.
- Parks became engaged to A.J. Mathern, a captain in the department’s Criminal Investigative Unit; both held supervisory roles within the same department.
- The City adopted an anti-nepotism policy barring relatives of supervisory employees from working in the same department; nonsupervisory employees and relatives in other departments were not covered.
- The City implemented the policy so that if two supervisory employees in the same department married, the less senior spouse would be required to leave the department, effectively losing the job.
- The Police Chief informed Mathern that if he married Parks, Parks (the less senior employee) would have to leave the police department.
- Parks postponed the wedding and sued for declaratory and injunctive relief under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and 28 U.S.C. § 2201, alleging violations of due process (right to marry), First Amendment intimate association, and equal protection (sex-based disparate impact).
- The district court granted summary judgment for the City, and Parks appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether the anti-nepotism policy denied or unconstitutionally burdened the fundamental right to marry under the Fourteenth Amendment.
2. Whether the policy infringed the First Amendment right of intimate association by conditioning continued employment on not marrying a co-employee.
3. Whether the policy violated the Equal Protection Clause due to alleged disparate impact on women or sex discrimination.

## Decision

- The Eleventh Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the City.
- The court held the policy did not directly and substantially interfere with the right to marry because it did not forbid marriage and imposed only an employment consequence.
- Applying rational-basis review, the court found the policy rationally related to legitimate interests, including preventing conflicts of interest, favoritism, and disruption in a police department.
- The court rejected the intimate-association claim for the same reason: the policy did not prohibit the relationship and was rationally justified.
- The court rejected the equal protection claim because the policy was facially neutral (based on seniority, not sex) and disparate impact alone, without discriminatory intent, did not establish a constitutional violation.

## Legal Principles

- Strict scrutiny applies to regulations affecting marriage only when they directly and substantially interfere with the choice to marry; indirect burdens with employment consequences generally do not trigger strict scrutiny.
- A facially neutral anti-nepotism policy affecting spouses in the same supervisory chain or department is constitutional if it is rationally related to legitimate governmental interests such as avoiding conflicts of interest, favoritism, morale problems, and the appearance of impropriety.
- The right of intimate association is not violated by an employment policy that does not bar marriage or the relationship and that survives rational-basis review.
- Disparate impact, without proof that the government acted with discriminatory intent, is insufficient to establish an equal protection violation.

## Conclusion

The court upheld the City’s anti-nepotism policy, concluding it imposed only an indirect employment burden on marriage and intimate association and was justified by legitimate governmental interests; the policy also did not violate equal protection absent proof of sex-based discriminatory intent.


Parks v. City of Warner Robins, 43 F.3d 609 (11th Cir. 1995)