Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca3-19-01730/USCOURTS-ca3-19-01730-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
CVS Pharmacy Inc
Amicus Appellant
Giant Eagle Inc
Amicus Appellant
Janssen Biotech Inc
Appellee
Johnson & Johnson
Appellee
Kroger Co
Appellant
Rite Aid Corp
Amicus Appellant
Walgreen Co
Appellant

Document Text:

PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

_____________

No. 19-1730

_____________

WALGREEN CO; KROGER CO,

 Appellants 

v.

JOHNSON & JOHNSON; JANSSEN BIOTECH INC.

_______________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania

(D.C. No. 2-18-cv-02357)

District Judge: Hon. J. Curtis Joyner

_______________

Argued

November 12, 2019

Before: JORDAN, SCIRICA, and RENDELL, Circuit 

Judges.

(Filed February 21, 2020)

_______________

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2

Anna T. Neill

Scott E. Perwin [ARGUED]

Michael A. Ponzoli

Lauren C. Ravkind

Kenny Nachwalter

1441 Brickell Avenue

Four Seasons Tower, Ste. 1100

Miami, FL 33131

 Counsel for Appellants

William F. Cavanaugh, Jr. [ARGUED]

George A. LoBiondo

Adeel A. Mangi

Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler

1133 Avenue of the Americas

New York, NY 10036

Thomas O. Barnett

Ashley E. Bass

Covington & Burling

850 10th Street, NW

One City Center

Washington, DC 20001

Leslie E. John

Burt M. Rublin

Ballard Spahr

1735 Market Street -51st Floor

Philadelphia, PA 19103

 Counsel for Appellees

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3

Eric L. Bloom

Monica L. Kiley

Hangley Aronchick Segal Pudlin & Schiller

2805 Old Post Road – Suite 100

Harrisburg, PA 17110

Barry L. Refsin

Hangley Aronchick Segal Pudlin & Schiller

One Logan Square

18th & Cherry Streets, 27th Floor

Philadelphia, PA 19103

 Counsel for Amicus Appellants 

 CVS Pharmacy Inc. and Rite Aid Corp

Moira E. Cain-Mannix

Brian C. Hill

Marcus & Shapira

301 Grant Street

One Oxford Centre – 35th Floor

Pittsburgh, PA 15219

 Counsel for Amicus Appellant

 Giant Eagle Inc.

_______________

OPINION OF THE COURT

_______________

JORDAN, Circuit Judge.

This case raises the question of whether an assignment

of federal antitrust claims is barred by a contract provision

proscribing the assignment of any “rights or obligations under”

that contract. The District Court answered in the affirmative

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4

and granted summary judgment against the appellants, who all

want to assert antitrust claims they purportedly obtained by

assignment from a party bound by the anti-assignment clause. 

We conclude that the District Court erred. The antitrust claims

are a product of federal statute and thus are extrinsic to, and

not rights “under,” a commercial agreement. Accordingly, we

will reverse the grant of summary judgment and remand for

further proceedings.

I. BACKGROUND

Appellants Walgreen Co. and the Kroger Co. (which,

for convenience, we refer to collectively and in the singular as

“Walgreen”) operate retail pharmacies throughout the United

States. One of the many pharmaceuticals that Walgreen

dispenses to the public is Remicade, a biologic drug used to

treat various autoimmune diseases. Remicade is marketed and

manufactured by Appellees Johnson & Johnson and Janssen

Biotech, Inc. (which, again, for convenience we refer to

collectively and in the singular as “Janssen”). Janssen does not

sell Remicade directly to Walgreen. Instead, Walgreen

procures Remicade from two wholesale distributors:

AmerisourceBergen and Cardinal Health (once more,

collectively and in the singular “Wholesaler”). Wholesaler

acquires Remicade pursuant to a Distribution Agreement with

JOM Pharmaceutical Services, Inc. (“JOM”), a Janssen

affiliate.1

 Only Wholesaler and JOM are identified as parties

1 Although JOM entered into a separate Distribution 

Agreement with each of AmerisourceBergen and Cardinal 

Health, those agreements are identical in all material respects. 

Consequently, and for the sake of simplicity, we refer only to 

a single Distribution Agreement. 

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to the Distribution Agreement. It is undisputed that New

Jersey law governs the Distribution Agreement. 

This appeal pertains to the scope of the anti-assignment

language in Section 4.4 (the “Anti-Assignment Provision”) of

the Distribution Agreement. In relevant part, the AntiAssignment Provision states that “neither party may assign,

directly or indirectly, this agreement or any of its rights or

obligations under this agreement ... without the prior written

consent of the other party.... Any purported assignment in

violation of this section will be void.” (JA at 102 (emphasis

added).) 

In January 2018, Wholesaler assigned to Walgreen “all

of its rights, title and interest in and to” its claims against

Janssen “under the antitrust laws of the United States or of any

State arising out of or relating to [Wholesaler]’s purchase of

Remicade[.]”2

 (JA at 217.) Less than six months later,

2 Specifically, AmerisourceBergen assigned its rights to 

Walgreen Co. and Cardinal Health assigned its rights to Kroger 

Co. Because the assignments are worded slightly differently 

but are identical in all material respects, for the sake of 

simplicity, we refer only to a single assignment. 

The parties dedicated a significant portion of their 

briefing to disputing the question of whether federal common 

law or New Jersey law governs the “validity” of Wholesaler’s 

assignment to Walgreen. (See, e.g., Opening Br. at 13-26; 

Answering Br. at 9-14, 17-22). However, that dispute is 

contingent on the assignment at issue falling within the scope 

of the Anti-Assignment Provision. As discussed infra, we hold 

that the assignment does not convey “rights under” the 

Distribution Agreement, and, thus, is not subject to the AntiCase: 19-1730 Document: 80 Page: 5 Date Filed: 02/21/2020
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Walgreen exercised the rights Wholesaler had assigned to it

and filed suit against Janssen, asserting various federal antitrust

claims relating to Remicade. At bottom, Walgreen alleges that

Janssen used its size and bargaining power in the broader

pharmaceutical market to enter into exclusive contracts and

anticompetitive bundling agreements with health insurers that

suppressed generic competition to Remicade, which in turn

allowed Janssen to sell Remicade at supracompetitive prices. 

Janssen moved to dismiss Walgreen’s complaint on the

ground that the Anti-Assignment Provision invalidated

Wholesaler’s purported assignment of its antitrust claims to

Walgreen. It is undisputed that, if the Anti-Assignment

Provision prevents the assignment, then, under the Supreme

Court’s seminal decision in Illinois Brick Co. v. Illinois, 431

U.S. 720 (1977), Walgreen, an “indirect” Remicade purchaser,

would lack antitrust standing to assert claims against Janssen

relating to Remicade.3

 To take account of the potentially

Assignment Provision. Accordingly, we do not reach the 

parties’ subsidiary choice-of-law arguments pertaining to the

assignment’s “validity.” 

3 In Illinois Brick, the Supreme Court created a “direct 

purchaser” rule for antitrust claims, “providing that only 

entities that purchase goods directly from alleged antitrust 

violators have statutory standing to bring a lawsuit for 

damages[.]” Wallach v. Eaton Corp., 837 F.3d 356, 365 (3d 

Cir. 2016). “The rule of Illinois Brick was founded on the 

difficulty of analyzing pricing decisions, the risk of multiple 

liability for defendants, and the weakening of private antitrust 

enforcement that might result from splitting damages for 

overcharges among direct and indirect purchasers.” 

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dispositive Distribution Agreement, the District Court

converted Janssen’s motion to dismiss into a motion for

summary judgment. 

After full briefing, on March 25, 2019, the District

Court granted the motion for summary judgment and entered

judgment in Janssen’s favor on all counts. In reaching its

decision, the Court concluded that Janssen was a party to the

Distribution Agreement with standing to enforce its terms, and

that, under New Jersey law, the Anti-Assignment Provision

precluded Wholesaler from assigning its federal antitrust

claims against Janssen to Walgreen, thus depriving Walgreen

of antitrust standing. This timely appeal followed. 

II. DISCUSSION4

Walgreen presses a number of arguments in opposition

to the District Court’s dismissal of its claims, but we need only

Gulfstream III Assocs., Inc. v. Gulfstream Aerospace Corp., 

995 F.2d 425, 439 (3d Cir. 1993). Because only Wholesaler, 

and not Walgreen, purchased Remicade directly from Janssen, 

the alleged antitrust violator, Walgreen is an “indirect 

purchaser” under Illinois Brick. 

4 The District Court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. 

§§ 1331 and 1337. We have appellate jurisdiction pursuant to 

28 U.S.C. § 1291. “It is well established that we employ a 

plenary standard in reviewing orders entered on motions for 

summary judgment, applying the same standard as the district 

court.” Blunt v. Lower Merion Sch. Dist., 767 F.3d 247, 265 

(3d Cir. 2014).

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address one: whether Wholesaler’s assignment to Walgreen of

its antitrust claims against Janssen was barred by the AntiAssignment Provision.5

 Because the answer to that question is

no, we will reverse and remand for further proceedings.

The facts of this case are in all material respects the

same as those of Hartig Drug Company Inc. v. Senju

Pharmaceutical Company Ltd., 836 F.3d 261 (3d Cir. 2016). 

In Hartig, an indirect purchaser of medicated eyedrops asserted

antitrust claims against the eyedrops’ manufacturer pursuant to

an assignment of antitrust claims from a “direct purchaser”

distributor. Id. at 264. The district court granted the defendant

manufacturer’s motion to dismiss the indirect-purchaser

plaintiff’s claims on the ground that “an anti-assignment clause

in a distribution agreement between [the manufacturer] and

[the distributor] barred any assignment of antitrust claims from

[the distributor] to [the indirect purchaser], leaving [the

indirect purchaser] without standing to sue and divesting the

Court of subject matter jurisdiction.” Id. We vacated and

remanded, holding that the district court erred both in

concluding that the anti-assignment clause implicated that

court’s subject matter jurisdiction and in considering the terms

of the distribution agreement, which was neither integral to nor

attached to the indirect-purchaser plaintiff’s complaint. Id. at

269, 273-74.

5 Walgreen disputes whether Janssen, as a matter of law, 

actually is a party to the Distribution Agreement with 

concomitant rights to enforce the Anti-Assignment Provision. 

Because we conclude that the Anti-Assignment Provision does 

not reach Wholesaler’s assignment of its antitrust claims to 

Walgreen, we need not, and do not resolve Janssen’s disputed 

party status.

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Given that the district court might have occasion to

again interpret the distribution agreement on remand,

considerations of judicial economy prompted us to note our

“doubt about the Court’s interpretation of the [distribution

agreement] as barring the assignment of antitrust causes of

action[.]” Id. at 274. In that regard, we observed, albeit in

dictum, that “[b]ecause [the wholesaler]’s antitrust causes of

action arise by statute, there is a serious argument that they do

not fall within the [distribution agreement]’s plain language

limiting assignment of ‘rights and obligations hereunder’—

that is, they arise by operation of an extrinsic legal regime

rather than by contract.” Id. at 275 n.17.

That observation in Hartig provides the appropriate rule 

of decision here: the statutory federal antitrust claims asserted 

in Walgreen’s complaint are extrinsic to, and not “rights 

under,” the Distribution Agreement. Applied to the AntiAssignment Provision, the scope of which is limited to 

Wholesaler’s “rights under” the Distribution Agreement, it 

becomes evident that the provision has no bearing on 

Wholesaler’s antitrust claims, which rely only on statutory 

rights and do not implicate any substantive right under the 

Distribution Agreement. Accordingly, the Anti-Assignment 

Provision does not invalidate Wholesaler’s assignment of 

antitrust claims to Walgreen or otherwise present a bar to 

Walgreen’s standing to assert those antitrust claims against 

Janssen. Our holding here is consistent with the substantial 

weight of decisions on this issue, which do not bind us but 

nevertheless are persuasive.6

 

6 See, e.g., In re Opana ER Antritrust Litig., No. 14-C10150, 2016 WL 738596, at *5 (N.D. Ill. Feb. 25, 2016) (“Even 

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Janssen raises three arguments in opposition to the

holding we adopt today: (i) New Jersey law, which governs the

Distribution Agreement, recognizes statutory causes of action

as “rights under” an agreement; (ii) the term “rights under” an

agreement “encompasses any rights engendered by virtue of

the relationship the agreement established” and thus includes

under a broad reading of the non-assignment provisions, the 

prohibition on assigning ‘this Agreement’ or ‘delegat[ing]’ any 

‘duties or responsibilities’ would only serve to limit the parties’

ability to assign their rights and obligations under the 

[agreement]. The Court does not read this language to include 

statutorily-based antitrust claims, because such claims are not 

based on any substantive right or duty found in the 

[agreement]s themselves.”) (alteration in original); United 

Food & Commercial Workers Local 1776 & Participating 

Employers Health & Welfare Fund v. Teikoku Pharma USA, 

Inc., No. 14-MD-02521-WHO, 2015 WL 4397396, at *6 (N.D. 

Cal. July 17, 2015) (“The [distribution agreements]’ nonassignment clauses are limited to the assignment of duties and 

obligations under the [distribution agreements] themselves and 

do not include causes of action sounding in antitrust arising 

from those agreements.”); In re TFT-LCD (Flat Panel) 

Antitrust Litig., No. C 11-00711 SI, 2011 WL 3475408, at *4 

(N.D. Cal. Aug. 9, 2011), reconsidered in-part on other 

grounds, No. C 11-00711 SI, 2011 WL 5573930 (N.D. Cal. 

Nov. 16, 2011) (“Here, the anti-assignment clauses are limited 

to each party’s rights and obligations under the contracts....

[L]itigation over antitrust claims cannot be seen as a ‘right or 

duty’ contemplated by the contract. The State has not brought 

the assigned claims based on any substantive right or duty 

found in the contract itself.”).

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Walgreen’s antitrust claims, which ultimately flow from the

Distribution Agreement; and (iii) the rationale of Hartig has

been “eclipsed” by our subsequent decisions in Wallach v.

Eaton Corp., 837 F.3d 356 (3d Cir. 2016), and American

Orthopedic & Sports Medicine v. Independence Blue Cross

Blue Shield, 890 F.3d 445 (3d Cir. 2018). (Answering Br. at

22-30 (internal quotation marks omitted).) Each of those

arguments falls short.

Regarding the application of New Jersey law to the

Anti-Assignment Provision, Janssen correctly notes that

neither Hartig nor any of the antitrust cases interpreting the

scope of anti-assignment clauses that Walgreen cites (and

which we find persuasive) applied New Jersey law. But that

fact is not dispositive. Janssen cites no case, let alone a case

applying New Jersey law, in which any court has found that

federal antitrust claims fall within the scope of an antiassignment clause prohibiting the assignment of “rights under”

an agreement. Nor does Janssen identify any particular feature

of New Jersey law that suggests it would diverge from the

weight of authority on this issue.7

 To the contrary, the New

Jersey cases that Janssen does cite, in which anti-assignment

7 Courts that have considered the scope of antiassignment clauses in the antitrust context often have looked 

to Section 322 of the Restatement (Second) of Contracts as part 

of their analysis. In re Opana ER Antritrust Litig., 2016 WL 

738596, at *5; In re TFT-LCD (Flat Panel) Antitrust Litig., 

2011 WL 4345316, at *3. New Jersey courts similarly look to 

the Restatement when analyzing anti-assignment clauses.

Owen v. CNA Ins./Cont’l Cas. Co., 771 A.2d 1208, 1218 (N.J. 

2001). 

 

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clauses were held to foreclose statutory causes of action, are

readily distinguishable. In each of those cases, unlike the

antitrust claims at issue here, the statutory claims that were

precluded by an anti-assignment provision all flowed from an

underlying breach of one or more provisions of the contract

containing the anti-assignment provision. See Somerset

Orthopedic Assocs., P.A. v. Horizon Blue Cross & Blue Shield

of New Jersey, 785 A.2d 457, 459–60 (N.J. App. Div. 2001)

(out-of-network physician’s claims for payment pursuant to

terms of benefit plan foreclosed by plan’s anti-assignment

language); Chee Li v. BMW of N. Am., LLC, No. L-3014-13,

2017 WL 2625965, at *3 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. June 19,

2017) (claim under federal warranty statute foreclosed by antiassignment provision where cause of action stemmed from car

dealer’s purported refusal to honor warranty and the antiassignment provision specifically included “the right to pursue

the remedy under the [ ] warranty.” (alteration in original)).

8

 

8 Janssen also cites Prospect Medical, P.C. v. Horizon

Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, Inc., No. L-8681-09,

2011 WL 3629180, at *5 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. Aug. 19,

2011), asserting that in that case a “clause prohibiting

insurance policyholders from assigning benefits under their

insurance plan to healthcare providers barred providers’ claims

against insurer under state Consumer Fraud Act and RICO

statute.” (Answering Br. at 23.) However, that misstates

Prospect Medical’s holding. The court in Prospect Medical

held that no claims were properly dismissed pursuant to the

anti-assignment clause because there was an outstanding issue

of fact as to whether the insurer had waived its right to invoke

that clause. Prospect Medical, 2011 WL 3629180, at *5. The

court dismissed the Consumer Fraud Act and RICO claims

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At most, those cases suggest that, when a dispute ultimately

centers on the vindication of contractual rights, a valid antiassignment clause can prevent an assignee from enforcing

those contractual rights through non-contractual means,

including related statutory causes of action. However, none of

those cases, directly or indirectly, stands for the proposition

that, under New Jersey law, a statutory claim that is separate

from any contractual right constitutes a “right” under that

agreement. 

In an unpersuasive attempt to overcome that reality,

Janssen next argues that Wholesaler’s antitrust claims are

“rights under” the Distribution Agreement because that term

“encompasses any rights ‘engendered by virtue of the

relationship the agreement established,’” and Wholesaler could

not have purchased Remicade and accrued standing to assert

antitrust claims but for the Distribution Agreement. 

(Answering Br. at 24-26 (quoting Am. Fin. Capital Corp. v.

Princeton Elecs. Prods., No. CIV. A. 95-4568, 1996 WL

131145, at *9 (E.D. Pa. Mar. 20, 1996)).) But that argument is

derived from plainly inapposite case law, namely cases from

the arbitration context that address the question of when claims

“arise out of” or “arise under” an agreement. See Scherk v.

Alberto-Culver Co., 417 U.S. 506, 508 (1974) (addressing

arbitration clause covering “any controversy or claim (that)

shall arise out of this agreement or the breach thereof”); Am.

Fin. Capital Corp., 1996 WL 131145, at *7, *9 (holding scope

of arbitration clause mandating arbitration of “any disputes

arising under” agreement covered claims “engendered by

virtue of the relationship the agreement established or

based on pleading failures that were entirely independent of the

anti-assignment clause. Id. 

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otherwise addressable by reference to the duties and

obligations set out in the agreement.”).9

 The terms “arise out

of” and “arise under” are facially broader, more encompassing,

and ultimately distinct from, the concept of “rights under” an

agreement. 

Moreover, Janssen’s argument substantially overstates

the degree to which Walgreen’s antitrust claims are derived

from the Distribution Agreement. Through its antitrust claims,

Walgreen is not attempting to invoke any substantive right

specified in the Distribution Agreement. Although the

9 Janssen’s reliance on equally distinguishable case law 

from the forum selection and choice-of-law contexts, which 

similarly fail to address the question of whether a statutory 

claim is a “right under” an agreement, is also misplaced. See 

Hitachi Credit Am. Corp. v. Signet Bank, 166 F.3d 614, 624 

(4th Cir. 1999) (common law fraud claim within scope of 

choice-of-law provision covering “[t]his Agreement and the 

rights and obligations of the parties hereunder ... including all 

matters of construction, validity and performance.” (alteration 

in original)); Cheney v. IPD Analytics, LLC, 583 F. Supp. 2d 

108, 121 (D.D.C. 2008) (analyzing scope of forum selection 

clause encompassing any claim which “arises out of” the 

agreement); Rini Wine Co. v. Guild Wineries & Distilleries, 

604 F. Supp. 1055, 1057–59 (N.D. Ohio 1985) (forum 

selection clause applicable to “any action entered under the 

[distributor] agreement” encompassed antitrust claims where 

“[t]he incident from which this dispute arises is indeed the 

termination of the distributor agreement,” and “Plaintiff has 

chosen to explain defendant’s conduct as an ‘unlawful 

combination and conspiracy’ in violation of federal and state 

antitrust laws in its complaint.”).

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Distribution Agreement contains a provision requiring the

parties to comply with applicable law, even if Walgreen was

asserting a claim under that provision, which it is not, the

“existence of a boilerplate duty to abide by applicable law does

not manifest the requisite intent to expand the scope of the nonassignment provision[] beyond [its] plain language[,]” In re

Opana, 2016 WL 738596, at *5, particularly where, as here,

the Distribution Agreement “do[es] not specifically mention

antitrust law or the assignment of legal claims[,]” United Food,

2015 WL 4397396, at *6. Similarly, the fact that the

Distribution Agreement set the price that Wholesaler paid for

Remicade does not bring Walgreen’s antitrust claims within

the Anti-Assignment Provision’s scope. The mere existence of

a fact that is relevant to both the antitrust claims at issue and

the Distribution Agreement does not transform those claims

into “rights under” the Distribution Agreement. Cf. CardioNet,

Inc. v. Cigna Health Corp., 751 F.3d 165, 173, 175 (3d Cir.

2014) (holding “factual connections between the Agreement

and the factual underpinnings of the Complaint do not render

these claims arbitrable,” where arbitration clause broadly

required arbitration of disputes “regarding the performance or

interpretation of the Agreement”).

Finally, we disagree with Janssen’s assertion that the

“persuasive force” of our reasoning in Hartig has been

“eclipsed” by our decisions in Wallach and American

Orthopedic. (Answering Br. at 27-29.) Wallach did not

involve a contractual anti-assignment provision. Instead, we

addressed the entirely distinct question of whether the

assignment of antitrust claims must be supported by

consideration. Wallach, 837 F.3d at 361. In that context, we

maintained our prior recognition that both contractual rights

and non-contractual causes of action are assignable, and that

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the argument that non-contractual causes of action cannot be

assigned rests “on an antiquated distinction between

contractual rights and choses in action that no longer has a

significant effect on the common law.” Id. at 369. Nowhere

did we hold, or even suggest, that statutory antitrust claims are

rights under a contract.

10 

Janssen’s reliance on American Orthopedic also lacks

merit. Although American Orthopedic did involve an antiassignment clause in an ERISA benefit plan, only the clause’s

validity, not its scope, was at issue. Am. Orthopedic, 890 F.3d

at 449-53. To the extent we opined indirectly on the clause’s

scope by affirming the district court’s holding that the clause

foreclosed an assignee plaintiff’s ERISA claims, Janssen’s

attempt to extrapolate that ERISA-centric conclusion beyond

its proper context to the antitrust facts of this case is not

persuasive. American Orthopedic, like the other case law

Janssen cites, is inapposite because the statutory ERISA claims

foreclosed by the anti-assignment clause flowed directly from

an underlying breach of a contractual right,11 which right could

10 We likely would not have had occasion to do so even 

if the scope of the assignment in that case was at issue. The 

assignment in Wallach conveyed all antitrust causes of action 

“arising out of or relating to” purchases of certain vehicles. 

Wallach, 837 F.3d at 371 n.17. That language is very different

from, and appreciably broader than, the disputed portion of the 

Anti-Assignment Provision here. 

 

11 Indeed, we have recognized that “[c]laims for benefits

based on the terms of an ERISA plan are contractual in nature

and are governed by federal common law contract principles.” 

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not be assigned. No such concern exists here, as Walgreen is

seeking to enforce a purely statutory right, not a substantive

right originating from the Distribution Agreement.

12

Baldwin v. Univ. of Pittsburgh Med. Ctr., 636 F.3d 69, 75 (3d

Cir. 2011).

12 Janssen also overstates both the holding in City of 

Hope National Medical Center v. HealthPlus, Inc., 156 F.3d 

223 (1st Cir. 1998), and the extent to which we adopted the 

reasoning of that case in American Orthopedic. Contrary to 

Janssen’s assertion, the First Circuit did not “expressly reject[] 

the argument that an anti-assignment clause prohibiting 

assignments of rights or benefits does not extend to statutory 

causes of action arising [out of] the denial benefits.” 

(Answering Br. at 28 (second alteration in original and internal 

quotation marks omitted).) Rather, the First Circuit simply 

held that the Eighth Circuit’s analysis of an anti-assignment 

clause that prohibited the assignment of “rights or benefits 

under” an ERISA plan and related trust was inapplicable to the 

much broader anti-assignment clause at issue in the matter 

before it (and much broader than the Anti-Assignment 

Provision here), which provided that “[a]ll entitlements of a 

member to receive covered rights are personal and may not be 

assigned.” City of Hope, 156 F.3d at 229 (citing Lutheran 

Med. Ctr. v. Contractors, Laborers, Teamsters, & Engineers 

Health & Welfare Plan, 25 F.3d 616, 619 (8th Cir.1994)). 

Moreover, while it is accurate that we cited City of Hope in 

American Orthopedic, we did so only as support for the 

proposition that anti-assignment clauses in ERISA plans are 

permissible. Am. Orthopedic, 890 F.3d at 453. 

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In short, we observed in Hartig that there was a serious

argument that statutory antitrust claims were not “rights under”

an agreement. We now come down clearly on this question:

statutory antitrust claims are not “rights under” a contract, such

as the Distribution Agreement. Janssen’s arguments

attempting to avoid or undermine that conclusion are

unconvincing. 

III. CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, we will reverse the decision

of the District Court and remand for further proceedings.

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