Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca9-13-15199/USCOURTS-ca9-13-15199-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Arnold Davis
Appellant
Guam
Appellee
Guam Election Commission
Appellee
Anne Perez Hattori
Amicus Curiae
Joseph F. Mesa
Appellee
Pacific Legal Foundation
Amicus Curiae
Leonardo M. Rapadas
Appellee
Joshua F. Renorio
Appellee
Martha C. Ruth
Appellee
Alice M. Taijeron
Appellee
Johnny P. Taitano
Appellee
Donald I. Weakley
Appellee

Document Text:

FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

ARNOLD DAVIS, on behalf of himself

and all others similarly situated,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.

GUAM; GUAM ELECTION

COMMISSION; ALICE M. TAIJERON;

MARTHA C. RUTH; JOSEPH F. MESA;

JOHNNY P. TAITANO; JOSHUA F.

RENORIO; DONALD I. WEAKLEY;

LEONARDO M. RAPADAS,

Defendants-Appellees.

No. 13-15199

D.C. No.

1:11-cv-00035

OPINION

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Guam

Frances Tydingco-Gatewood, Chief District Judge,

Presiding

Argued and Submitted

August 27, 2014—Hagatna, Guam

Filed May 8, 2015

Before: Mary M. Schroeder, Alex Kozinski, and

N. Randy Smith, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Kozinski;

Dissent by Judge N.R. Smith

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2 DAVIS V. GUAM

SUMMARY*

Civil Rights

The panel affirmed in part and reversed in part the district

court’s dismissal, on standing and ripeness grounds, of an

action brought by a resident of Guam who is not eligible to

vote in a plebiscite concerning Guam’s future political

relationship with the United States because he is not a Native

Inhabitant. 

Plaintiff alleged that Guam’s Native Inhabitant

classification is an unlawful proxy for race. Plaintiff sought

a declaration that limiting registration to Native Inhabitants

is unlawful, and an injunction against using any registry other

than Guam’s general voter registry in determining who is

eligible to register for, and vote in, the plebiscite. 

The panel held that plaintiff’s challenge to Guam’s

registration restriction asserted a judicially cognizable injury

that would be prevented or redressed if the district court were

to grant his requested relief. Plaintiff therefore had Article III

standing to pursue his challenge to Guam’s alleged racebased registration classification. The panel further held that

the claim was ripe because plaintiff alleged he was currently

subjected to unlawful unequal treatment in the ongoing

registration process. 

The panel held that because plaintiff did not argue on

appeal that the district court erred by dismissing his claim

* This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has

been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.

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DAVIS V. GUAM 3

against Leonardo Rapadas, the Attorney General of Guam,

any claim of error was waived.

Dissenting, Judge N.R. Smith stated that given the

speculative and remote course of events that stood between

plaintiff and his contemplated injury, the matter was not ripe

for adjudication, and the district court correctly dismissed

plaintiff’s complaint.

COUNSEL

Douglas R. Cox, Scott P. Martin (argued) and Marisa C.

Maleck, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, Washington, D.C.,

Michael E. Rosman, Center for Individual Rights,

Washington, D.C., Mun Su Park, Law Offices of Park and

Associates, Tamuning, Guam and J. Christian Adams,

Election Law Center, PLLC, Alexandria, Virginia for

Plaintiff-Appellant.

Leonardo M. Rapadas, Attorney General, and Robert M.

Weinberg, Assistant Attorney General (argued), Office of the

AttorneyGeneral of Guam, Tamuning, Guam for DefendantsAppellees.

Meriem L. Hubbard, Joshua P. Thompson and Jonathan

Wood, Pacific Legal Foundation, Sacramento, California for

Amicus Curiae Pacific Legal Foundation.

Julian Aguon, Law Office of Julian Aguon, Hagatna, Guam

for Amicus Curiae Anne Perez Hattori.

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4 DAVIS V. GUAM

OPINION

KOZINSKI, Circuit Judge:

Pursuant to a law passed by the Guam legislature, eligible

“Native Inhabitants of Guam” may register to vote in a

plebiscite concerning Guam’s future political relationship

with the United States. Guam will conduct the plebiscite if

and when 70 percent of eligible Native Inhabitants register. 

Plaintiff Arnold Davis is a Guam resident who isn’t eligible

to register because he is not a Native Inhabitant. He alleges

that Guam’s Native Inhabitant classification is an unlawful

proxy for race. At this stage, we must determine only

whether Davis has standing to challenge the classification and

whether his claims are ripe.

I. BACKGROUND

Guam law directs the territory’s Commission on

Decolonization to “ascertain the intent of the Native

Inhabitants of Guam as to their future political relationship

with the United States of America.” 1 Guam Code Ann.

§ 2105. The same law also provides for a “Political Status

Plebiscite.” Id. § 2110. The plebiscite would ask eligible

Native Inhabitants to choose among three options:

(1) “Independence,” (2) “Free Association with the United

States of America” or (3) “Statehood.” Id. It would be

conducted by Guam’s Election Commission on the same day

as a general election. Id. The Commission on

Decolonization would then be required to transmit the

plebiscite’s results to the President, Congress and the United

Nations as reflecting “the intent of the Native Inhabitants of

Guam as to their future political relationship with the United

States.” Id. § 2105.

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DAVIS V. GUAM 5

Guam will hold the plebiscite if and when 70 percent of

all eligible Native Inhabitants1register with the Guam

Decolonization Registry. 1 Guam Code Ann. § 2110;

3 Guam Code Ann. §§ 21000, 21003. Native Inhabitants

aren’t required to register, although some will be registered

automatically unless they submit a written request not to be

registered. 3 Guam Code Ann. § 21002.1. Guam reports that

the 70 percent threshold isn’t close to being met. Thus,

Guam hasn’t set a date for the plebiscite and perhaps never

will.

Davis tried to register with the Decolonization Registry,

but the application was rejected because Davis isn’t a Native

Inhabitant. Davis agrees he’s not a Native Inhabitant but

claims that the Native Inhabitant classification violates the

Fifth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, as well as the

Voting Rights Act and the Guam Organic Act2because it is

1 Guam law defines “Native Inhabitants” as persons who became U.S.

citizens by virtue of the Guam Organic Act of 1950 and their descendants. 

1 Guam Code Ann. § 2102. The Organic Act granted citizenship to three

classes of persons: (1) Spanish subjects who inhabited Guam on April 11,

1899, when Spain ceded Guam to the United States in the Treaty of Paris

(and their children); (2) persons who were born on Guamand resided there

on April 11, 1899 (and their children); and (3) persons born on Guam on

or after April 11, 1899, when Guam was subject to U.S. jurisdiction. See

Organic Act of Guam, Pub. L. No. 630, 64 Stat. 384, 384 (Aug. 1, 1950).

 

2

 The Organic Act extends the rights afforded by several constitutional

provisions to Guam, including the Fifth Amendment, the Equal Protection

Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Fifteenth Amendment. 

48 U.S.C. § 1421b(u); Guam v. Guerrero, 290 F.3d 1210, 1214–15 (9th

Cir. 2002). The Organic Act also contains its own anti-discrimination

provisions. See, e.g., 48 U.S.C. § 1421b(n). The Voting Rights Act

applies to Guam, a U.S. territory. 52 U.S.C. § 10101(a)(1) (formerly

42 U.S.C. § 1971(a)(1)).

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6 DAVIS V. GUAM

a “proxy for race.” Davis seeks a declaration that limiting

registration to Native Inhabitants is unlawful, and an

injunction against using any registry other than Guam’s

general voter registry in determining who’s eligible to

register for, and vote in, the plebiscite.

The district court held that Davis lacks standing and his

claims are unripe. According to the district court, Davis

hasn’t been injured because “there is no discernible future

election in sight.” “To suffer a real discernible injury,” the

district court held, Guam’s restriction on voter registration to

Native Inhabitants “would have to be, by necessity, related to

an election that is actually scheduled.” We have jurisdiction

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and review de novo. Bova v.

City of Medford, 564 F.3d 1093, 1095 (9th Cir. 2009).

II. STANDING AND RIPENESS

To “satisfy the standing requirements imposed by the

‘case’ or ‘controversy’ provision of Article III,” Davis must

show that he has suffered, or will imminently suffer, a

“concrete and particularized” injury to a “judicially

cognizable interest.” Bennett v. Spear, 520 U.S. 154, 167

(1997); see also Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555,

560–61 (1992). That injury must be “fairly traceable to the

challenged action of the defendant[s],” and it must appear

likely that the injury would be prevented or redressed by a

favorable decision. Bennett, 520 U.S. at 167; see also Allen

v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 751 (1984). When determining

Article IIIstanding we “accept as true all material allegations

of the complaint” and “construe the complaint in favor of the

complaining party.” Maya v. Centex Corp., 658 F.3d 1060,

1068 (9th Cir. 2011) (quoting Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490,

501 (1975)).

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DAVIS V. GUAM 7

Guam law gives some of its voters the right to participate

in a registration process that will determine whether a

plebiscite will be held. Davis alleges that the law forbids him

from participating on the basis of his race. Davis’s

allegation—that Guam law provides a benefit to a class of

persons that it denies him—is “a type of personal injury [the

Supreme Court has] long recognized as judicially

cognizable.” Heckler v. Mathews, 465 U.S. 728, 738 (1984). 

The plaintiff in Mathews challenged a provision of the Social

Security Act that required certain male workers (but not

female workers) to make a showing of dependency as a

condition for receiving full spousal benefits. Id. at 731–35. 

The statute, however, “prevent[ed] a court from redressing

this inequality by increasing the benefits payable to” the male

workers. Id. at 739. Thus, the lawsuit couldn’t have resulted

in any tangible benefit to Mathews. The Supreme Court

nevertheless held that Mathews had standing to challenge the

provision because he sought to vindicate the “right to equal

treatment,” which isn’t necessarily “coextensive with any

substantive rights to the benefits denied the party

discriminated against.” Id.; see also Allen, 468 U.S. at 762;

13A Charles Alan Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Edward H.

Cooper, Federal Practice & Procedure §§ 3531.4 at 215–16,

3531.6 at 454–56 (3d ed. 2008). We read Mathews as

holding that equal treatment under law is a judicially

cognizable interest that satisfies the case or controversy

requirement of Article III, even if it brings no tangible benefit

to the party asserting it. Guam’s alleged denial of equal

treatment to Davis is thus a judicially cognizable injury.

Guam concedes that its law excludes Davis from the

registration process because he’s not a Native Inhabitant. It

argues, however, that the Native Inhabitant classification

can’t injure Davis because the plebiscite is “not self executing

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8 DAVIS V. GUAM

and effects no change in political status, right, benefit or

privilege for any individual.” But this contradicts Mathews,

which held that unequal treatment is an injury even if curing

the inequality has no tangible consequences. 465 U.S. at 739. 

Moreover, Guam understates the effect of any plebiscite that

would be held if the registration threshold were triggered. 

After the plebiscite, the Commission on Decolonization

would be required to transmit the results to the President,

Congress and the United Nations, 1 Guam Code Ann. § 2105,

thereby taking a public stance in favor of whatever outcome

is favored by those voting in the plebiscite.3

If the plebiscite

is held, this would make it more likely that Guam’s

relationship to the United States would be altered to conform

to that preferred outcome, rather than one of the other options

presented in the plebiscite, or remaining a territory. This

change will affect Davis, who doubtless has views as to

whether a change is appropriate and, if so, what that change

should be. Guam law thus does provide a tangible benefit to

Native Inhabitants that Davis alleges he is unlawfully denied:

the right to help determine whether a plebiscite is held. This

is not unlike the right to participate in jury service, which

may not be denied on a constitutionally unequal basis. See

Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 87 (1986) (citing Carter v.

3 The U.S. House of Representatives, for one, has indicated that it has

open ears. In a 1998 resolution, it acknowledged the Commission on

Decolonization and “reaffirm[ed] its commitment to the United States

citizens of Guam for increased self-government, consistent with selfdetermination for the people of Guam.” H.R. Res. 494, 105th Cong.,

144 Cong. Rec. 25922, 25922–23 (1998).

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DAVIS V. GUAM 9

Jury Comm’n of Greene Cnty., 396 U.S. 320, 329–30

(1970)).4

Davis’s challenge to the Native Inhabitant classification

is also ripe because he alleges he’s currently being denied

equal treatment under Guam law. The registration process is

ongoing and Guam must hold the plebiscite if 70 percent of

eligible Native Inhabitants register. By being excluded from

the registration process, Davis claims he is unlawfully denied

a right currently enjoyed by others: to help determine whether

a plebiscite will be held. The ripeness question thus

“coincides squarely with standing’s injury in fact prong.” 

Bova, 564 F.3d at 1096 (quoting Thomas v. Anchorage Equal

Rights Comm’n, 220 F.3d 1134, 1138 (9th Cir. 2000) (en

banc)); see also 13B Federal Practice & Procedure

§ 3531.12 at 163.

Guam maintains that its plebiscite law does not, in fact,

violate Equal Protection, the Fifteenth Amendment or the

Voting Rights Act. But we need not resolve these issues to

determine whether Davis’s claims satisfy the case or

controversy requirement of Article III. These are merits

questions, and standing doesn’t “depend[] on the merits of the

4 Although Batson involved a criminal defendant’s challenge to his

conviction, the Court reiterated its holding in Carter that when a state

“den[ies] a person participation in jury service on account of his race, the

[s]tate unconstitutionally discriminate[s] against the excluded juror.” 

Batson, 476 U.S. at 87; see also Carter, 396 U.S. at 329 (“People

excluded from juries because of their race are as much aggrieved as those

indicted and tried by juries chosen under a system of racial exclusion.”). 

Whether participation in Guam’s registration process is “deemed a right,

a privilege, or a duty,” Guam must “hew to federal constitutional criteria”

when determining who is eligible to register. Id. at 330.

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10 DAVIS V. GUAM

plaintiff’s contention that particular conduct is illegal.” 

Warth, 422 U.S. at 500.

CONCLUSION

Davis’s challenge to Guam’s registration restriction

asserts a judicially cognizable injury that would be prevented

or redressed if the district court were to grant his requested

relief. Davis therefore has Article III standing to pursue his

challenge to Guam’s alleged race-based registration

classification. The claim is ripe because Davis alleges he is

currently subject to unlawful unequal treatment in the

ongoing registration process. Therefore, we need not decide

whether any of the other injuries Davis alleges follow from

Guam’s Native Inhabitant restriction would be sufficient to

confer standing independently. In particular, we express no

view as to whether the challenged law resulted in the type of

“stigmatizing” harm that we’ve held may be a judicially

cognizable injury in the Establishment Clause context. See

Catholic League v. City & Cnty. of S.F., 624 F.3d 1043,

1052–53 (9th Cir. 2010) (en banc). Nor do we decide

whether an alleged violation of the Voting Rights Act is itself

a judicially cognizable injury.

In the district court, Davis also sought to enjoin Leonardo

Rapadas, the Attorney General of Guam, from enforcing a

provision of Guam’s criminal law that makes it a crime for a

person who knows he’s not a Native Inhabitant to register for

the plebiscite. See 3 Guam Code Ann. § 21009. The district

court held that Davis lacked standing to seek this injunction

because he had not “shown that he is subject to a genuine

threat of imminent prosecution.” While Rapadas is still listed

as a nominal defendant on appeal, Davis doesn’t argue that

the district court erred in dismissing this claim. Therefore,

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DAVIS V. GUAM 11

any claim of error is waived. See Wagner v. Cnty. of

Maricopa, 747 F.3d 1048, 1059 (9th Cir. 2013).

We decline Davis’s suggestion that we reach the merits of

his claims in the event we find his claims to be justiciable. 

Instead we leave it to the district court to consider the merits

of Davis’s non-waived claims in the first instance.

AFFIRMED in part, REVERSED in part, and

REMANDED.

Appellees other than Rapadas shall pay costs on

appeal. Rapadas shall recover his costs, if any, from

Davis.

N.R. SMITH, Circuit Judge, dissenting:

The majority holds that federal courts have jurisdiction in

this case based on precedent not applicable to its decision. 

For that reason, I must dissent.

Currently Guam is an unincorporated, organized territory

of the United States.1 Guam’s legislature found that the

native inhabitants of Guam “have been subjected to incessant

1 Guam became an “organized” territory after Congress enacted the

Guam Organic Act in 1950, which granted the people of Guam United

States citizenship and established institutions of local government. Guam

is “unincorporated,” because not all provisions of the U.S. Constitution

apply to the territory. DOI Dep’t of Insular Aff., Report on the State of

the Islands (1997), http://www.doi.gov/oia/reports/Chapter-4-Guam.cfm

(last visited Apr. 15, 2015).

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12 DAVIS V. GUAM

control by external colonial powers” and have never been

afforded the right to self-determination as to their political

relationship with the United States. 1 Guam Code. Ann.

§ 2101. Therefore, in 2004, Guam’s legislature enacted

1 Guam Code. Ann. § 2110. It provides:

(a) The Guam Election Commission shall

conduct a “Political Status Plebiscite”, at

which the following question, which shall be

printed in both English and Chamorro, shall

be asked of the eligible voters:

In recognition of your right to

self-determination, which of the following

political status options do you favor? (Mark

ONLY ONE):

1. Independence ( )

2. Free Association with the United States

of America ( )

3. Statehood ( ).

Person eligible to vote shall include those

persons designated as Native Inhabitants of

Guam, as defined within this Chapter of the

Guam Code Annotated, who are eighteen (18)

years of age or older on the date of the

“Political Status Plebiscite” and are registered

voters on Guam.

The “Political Status Plebiscite” mandated in

Subsection (a) of this Section shall be held on

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DAVIS V. GUAM 13

a date of the General Election at which

seventy percent (70%) of the eligible voters,

pursuant to this Chapter, have been registered

as determined by the Guam Election

Commission.

From the plain language of the statute, it is apparent that

(1) the Guam legislature wants to gather the opinion of the

Native Inhabitants of Guam regarding political status options;

(2) to gather that opinion, the legislature scheduled a future

plebiscite (poll) asking for an indication of what political

status option is favored by such Native Inhabitants; and

(3) the poll will not occur unless seventy percent of the

Native Inhabitants of Guam register to be polled.

It is a fundamental principle that federal courts are courts

of limited jurisdiction, limited to deciding “cases” and

“controversies.” U.S. Const. art. III, § 2. The Supreme Court

has repeatedly insisted that a case or controversy does not

exist, unless the plaintiff shows that “he has sustained or is

immediately in danger of sustaining some direct injury as the

result of the challenged official conduct.” City of L.A. v.

Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 102 (1983) (internal quotation marks

omitted) (emphasis added). The Court admonished that the

“injury or threat of injury must be both real and immediate,

not conjectural or hypothetical.” Id. (internal quotation

marks omitted) (emphasis added). “[R]ipeness is peculiarly

a question of timing,” and ripeness is particularly at issue

when a party seeks pre-enforcement review of a statute or

regulation. Thomas v. Anchorage Equal Rights Com’n,

220 F.3d 1134, 1138 (9th Cir. 2000). A “claim is not ripe for

adjudication if it rests upon contingent future events that may

not occur as anticipated, or indeed may not occur at all.” 

Bova v. City of Medford, 564 F.3d 1093, 1096 (9th Cir. 2009)

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14 DAVIS V. GUAM

(quoting Texas v. United States, 523 U.S. 296, 300 (1998)). 

The Supreme Court has consistently held that the ripeness

doctrine aims “to prevent the courts, through premature

adjudication, from entangling themselves in abstract

disagreements.” Thomas v. Union Carbide Agric. Prods. Co.,

473 U.S. 568, 580 (1985) (internal quotation marks omitted). 

“Where a dispute hangs on future contingencies that may or

may not occur, it may be too impermissibly speculative to

present a justiciable controversy.” In re Coleman, 560 F.3d

1000, 1005 (9th Cir. 2009) (internal quotation marks and

citations omitted).

The district court found Davis’s alleged injury was not

ripe. “Although a district court’s determination of federal

subject matter jurisdiction is reviewed de novo, the district

court’s factual findings on jurisdictional issues must be

accepted unless clearly erroneous.” Stock W., Inc. v.

Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, 873 F.2d

1221, 1225 (9th Cir. 1989) (internal citations omitted). The

district court conducted a hearing and then made certain

factual findings as to the ripeness of Davis’s claim. The

district court found that: (1) there is no date currently set for

the plebiscite; (2) “there is no discernible future election in

sight”; (3) there is no “real threat of the election occurring

any time soon”; (4) there is “little likelihood that the

plebiscite will be scheduled any time in the near future”;

(5) Davis’s own statements actually support the conclusion

that the “plebiscite is not likely to occur any time soon, or if

at all”; (6) Davis had not “successfully argued [or]shown that

he is presently threatened with or has already suffered any

irreparable damage or injury because he cannot register for a

plebiscite that is more than likely not to occur.” The district

court concluded that “until the plebiscite [Davis] seeks to

register for is “certainly impending,” that Davis had no claim.

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DAVIS V. GUAM 15

The district court’s factual findings are supported by the

record. Davis does not challenge the findings as clearly

erroneous. The majority does not hold the findings to be

clearly erroneous. Applying the ripeness precedent to these

findings, this controversy fails for ripeness. The inability to

register for an opinion poll, that is not currently scheduled

and unlikely to ever occur, is not a matter of “sufficient

ripeness to establish a concrete case or controversy.” 

Thomas, 473 U.S. at 579. Whether the plebiscite occurs is

contingent on a series of events that have not yet occurred

and may never occur. Thus, at this point, there is not a

“realistic danger” that the plebiscite will occur. Babbitt v.

United Farm Workers Nat’l. Union, 442 U.S. 289, 298

(1979). Our court’s role is “neither to issue advisory opinions

nor to declare rights in hypothetical cases, but to adjudicate

live cases or controversies.” Thomas v. Anchorage Equal

Rights Comm’n, 220 F.3d 1134, 1138 (9th Cir. 2000). 

Davis’s allegations of future injury are too speculative to be

“of sufficient immediacy and reality” to satisfy the

constitutional requirement of ripeness. See In re Coleman,

560 F.3d at 1005.2 Thus, the matter is not ripe and our court

has no jurisdiction.

2 The Sixth Circuit appears to be the only Circuit that has directly

addressed the question of when an alleged deprivation of voting rights is

ripe. The court found the Constitution protects an individual’s

“fundamental right to vote not the right to register to vote.” Lawson v.

Shelby Cnty., 211 F.3d 331, 336 (6th Cir. 2000) (emphasis added). 

Accordingly, the court found that the cause of action accrued on election

day, “when [the plaintiffs] presented themselves at their polling station

and were refused the right to vote,” not when they were “notified that their

registrations had been rejected” for refusing to provide social security

numbers. Id. Unlike this case, the “vote” at issue in Lawson involved an

actual election.

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16 DAVIS V. GUAM

In its decision, the majority instead concludes that Davis

has standing to challenge the plebiscite, not based on voting

rights cases, but based on one’s ability to seek Social Security

benefits.3 In fact, the majority cites no precedent suggesting

that forbidding Davis from registering for this plebiscite

implicates the voting rights protected under the Constitution. 

The Fifteenth Amendment only applies to an “election in

which public issues are decided or public officials selected.” 

Terry v. Adams, 345 U.S. 461, 468 (1953) (emphasis added). 

Davis does not allege that he is being denied the right to

register for an election. Davis does not allege the plebiscite

will select “candidates for public or party office.” See

52 U.S.C. § 10310(c). Davis does not allege the plebiscite

will change Guam’s Constitution. Davis does not allege the

plebiscite will enact, amend, or repeal any statute. Despite

the language in the majority’s opinion to the contrary, Davis

does not allege the plebiscite will change the rights of

Guam’s citizens or that the plebiscite itself will change or

decide Guam’s political status in relationship with the United

States. Rather, the injury alleged by Davis is merely being

denied the right to register to participate in an opinion poll

that will likely never occur. Clearly, the inability to register

3

I note the majority also cites Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 85–86

(1986) to support its position. Op. 8. However, in Batson, the United

States Supreme Court held that a prosecutor’s use of peremptory

challenges based on race violates the Equal Protection Clause of the

Fourteenth Amendment. Batson, 476 U.S. at 85–86. The Court’s focus

was protecting the defendant’s constitutional right to a trial by jury. Id. 

The Court found that the jury must be “indifferently chosen to secure the

defendant’s right under the Fourteenth Amendment.” Id. at 87 (internal

quotation marks omitted) (emphasis added). It is difficult to understand

how the majority extrapolated the holding in this case to its conclusion

that Davis’s right to register for the plebiscite “is not unlike the right to

participate in jury service, which may not be denied on a constitutionally

unequal basis.” Op. 8.

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DAVIS V. GUAM 17

for this opinion poll is not equivalent to being denied the right

to register to vote in the type of vote contemplated and

protected by the Constitution.

Even if prohibiting Davis from registering for the

plebiscite were a violation of his voting rights, this case

“involves too remote and abstract an inquiry for the proper

exercise of the judicial function.” Texas v. United States,

523 U.S. 296, 300 (1998). The plebiscite is not currently

scheduled and as the district court found, it is not likely to

ever occur! The condition precedent to even scheduling the

opinion poll is obtaining the registration of seventy percent of

the eligible voters. Failing to satisfy this requirement (an

event that even Davis describes as a “mirage”), the poll will

not take place. Yet, amazingly, the majority finds these

circumstances present a case ripe for resolution.

The majority mistakenly suggests that Heckler v.

Mathews, 465 U.S. 728 (1984) would apply.

4 However, in

Mathews, there was no question that Social Security pension

benefits would be paid. There was no uncertainty as to

4 The plaintiff in Mathews claimed that he was subjected to unequal

treatment as to Social Security benefits “solely because of his gender.” 

Mathews, 465 U.S. at 738. Specifically, the plaintiff alleged that “as a

nondependent man, he receiv[ed] fewer benefits than he would if he were

a similarly situated woman.” Id. The Court focused on two factors when

determining the plaintiff had standing (1) his injury was concrete as “there

was no doubt about the direct causal relationship between the

government’s alleged deprivation of appellee’s right to equal protection

and the personal injury appellee has suffered—denial of Social Security

benefits solely on the basis of his gender”; (2) that he was denied equal

treatment solely because of gender (a protected class). Id. at 739–40 &

n.9. The court concluded that the plaintiff’s standing did not depend on

his ability to obtain increased Social Security benefits if he prevailed. Id.

at 737.

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18 DAVIS V. GUAM

application of the allegedly unconstitutional pension offset

provision. Thus, there was no question the issue was ripe. 

Indeed, the Court was not asked to determine ripeness and the

Court did not address ripeness. Rather, the issue before the

Court was determining the plaintiff’s standing. The Court

was asked to answer the question of whether the plaintiff’s

standing was dependant on his ability to receive additional

benefits if he prevailed. See Mathews, 465 U.S. at 735–38.

Thus, the majority’s conclusion that this case is ripe is

without precedent and ignores the district court’s extensive

factual findings as to ripeness. Can you imagine the hours the

district court will now have to spend resolving Davis’s many

alleged claims, including claims of alleged unequal treatment

under the Fourteenth Amendment, alleged stigmatizing harm

under the Establishment Clause, alleged violations of the

Voting Rights Act, even though this plebiscite will never

occur?

Given the speculative and remote course of events that

stands between Davis and his contemplated injury, this matter

is not ripe for adjudication, and the district court correctly

dismissed Davis’s complaint.

 Case: 13-15199, 05/08/2015, ID: 9530035, DktEntry: 43-1, Page 18 of 18