Jimmy Ginn v. F. David Mathews, Secretary, United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare

The three plaintiffs below, Jimmy Ginn, Helen Valdez, and Mitchell Zimmerman, appeal from the order of the district court granting the defendants’ motions to dismiss and denying the plaintiffs’ motions for summary judgment. The action was dismissed on May 30, 1974. The claim was that the defendant, the Economic Opportunity Council of San Francisco (EOC), a private nonprofit corporation, discharged the three without according them their due process rights under the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. It is the plaintiffs’ position that EOC was in reality a de facto arm of the state and federal governments and its action constituted “state action,” and thus was subject to federal constitutional limitations.

The Economic Opportunity Council of San Francisco was a private corporation incorporated under the laws of the State of California. It operated the Project Head-start Program in San Francisco, which was a “community action program” within the meaning of the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2701 et seq. Project Headstart was created by statute, 42 U.S.C. § 2809 (a)(1), and focused upon children…