In Davis v. Scherer, 468 U.S. 183, 104 S.Ct. 3012, 82 L.Ed.2d 139 (1984), a plaintiff making "constitutional tort" claims against state officers under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 (1982) asserted that the defendants were performing a "ministerial" duty because state regulations prescribed certain procedures (with which the officers had allegedly not complied). The Court responded: A law that fails to specify the precise action that the official must take in each instance creates only discretionary authority; and that authority remains discretionary however egregiously abused. Id. at 196-97 n. 14, 104 S.Ct. at 3020 n. 14. The Court upheld the qualified immunity defense and rejected the plaintiff's claim that "the federal constitutional right to a pretermination or a prompt post-termination hearing was well established in the Fifth Circuit at the time of the conduct in question (1977)." 468 U.S. at 191-92, 104 S.Ct. at 3017-18. The Court noted the decision in Weisbrod v. Donigan, 651 F.2d 334 (5th Cir. Unit B July 1981), in which the Court upheld a qualified immunity defense because the plaintiff/civil service employee was unable to cite authority in support of her claim that her superiors had violated a clearly-established due process right when she was discharged without any pretermination hearing