2012 Decisions

Opinions of the United

States Court of Appeals

for the Third Circuit

9-20-2012

Eugene LaVergne v. Secretary United States Depart

Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential

Docket No. 12-1171

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NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

_____________

No. 12-1171

_____________

EUGENE MARTIN LAVERGNE,

 Appellant

v.

JOHN BRYSON, in his official capacity as the Secretary 

of the United States Department of Commerce;

JOHN GROVER, in his official capacity as the Director 

of the United States Census Bureau;

KAREN L. HAAS, in her official capacity as the Clerk 

of the United States House of Representatives;

JOHN BOEHNER, in his official capacity as the Speaker 

of the United States House of Representatives;

DANIEL INOUYE, in his official capacity as the President Pro Tempore 

of the United States Senate;

JOSEPH BIDEN; in his official capacity as the President of the Senate;

DAVID FERRIERO, in his official capacity as the Archivist of the United States 

of America

_____________

 

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of New Jersey

(No. 3-11-cv-07117)

District Judge: The Honorable Peter G. Sheridan

_____________

Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)

September 14, 2012

Before: SMITH and CHAGARES, Circuit Judges

and ROSENTHAL, 

, 

District Judge*

 * The Honorable Lee H. Rosenthal, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Texas, sitting 

by designation.

 
2

(Filed: September 20, 2012)

_____________________

 OPINION

_____________________

PER CURIAM

Eugene Martin LaVergne, proceeding pro se,1 appeals an order of the United 

States District Court for the District of New Jersey denying his request to convene 

a three-judge panel under 28 U.S.C. § 2284 and dismissing his complaint. We 

summarily affirm. See

I.

3d Cir. L.A.R. 27.4; 3d Cir. I.O.P. 10.6.

LaVergne, a New Jersey citizen and registered voter, alleges in this suit that 

the method of congressional apportionment under 2 U.S.C. § 2a is unconstitutional. 

LaVergne asserts that the method violates (1) separation of powers, (2) the 

nondelegation doctrine, (3) the principle of “one person, one vote,” and (4) 

“Article the First,” an amendment to the United States Constitution proposed in 

1789 that LaVergne asserts was ratified and is part of the Constitution. LaVergne 

sought a declaratory judgment and an injunction ordering the leaders of Congress 

to enact an apportionment plan consistent with Article the First’s ratio of one 

member of Congress per 50,000 citizens and ordering the Vice-President of the 

 1 Although LaVergne is pro se, he received his license to practice law in New Jersey in 1990. His license 
3

United States to count 15 electoral votes for New Jersey in the 2012 presidential 

election. The relief LaVergne sought would expand the House of Representatives 

from the 435-member size that has been statutorily set since the 1910s to over 

6,160 members.

On December 16, 2011, the District Court on its own denied LaVergne’s 

application for a show-cause order and his request for a three-judge panel, and 

dismissed the case. LaVergne timely appealed. In this court, LaVergne moved for 

a preliminary injunction, an expedited appeal, and an expedited initial en banc 

review or panel review. This court denied the motions.

II.

We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. Our review of the District 

Court’s order dismissing the complaint is plenary. Ill. Nat’l Ins. Co. v. Wyndham 

Worldwide Operations, Inc., 653 F.3d 225, 230 (3d Cir. 2011). “To survive a 

motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as 

true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Id. (quoting Ashcroft v.

Iqbal

III.

, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009)). We may summarily affirm if an appeal presents 

no substantial question. 3d Cir. LAR 27.4; 3d Cir. I.O.P. 10.6. 

 

was temporarily suspended in January 2011and indefinitely suspended by the New Jersey Supreme Court 

in July 2011. In re LaVergne, 21 A.3d 1181 (N.J. 2011).
4

This appeal presents two threshold issues: standing and justiciability. The 

District Court concluded that LaVergne lacked standing because, among other 

reasons, he did not suffer the injury he complained about. The District Court 

concluded that, if there was an injury, it was only to certain government officials, 

such as the governor of New Jersey, who is responsible for implementing 

redistricting under § 2a; New Jersey members of the House of Representatives, 

who could lose their congressional seats as a result of redistricting; or certain 

presidential candidates, who would want New Jersey to have a larger number of 

electoral votes. (See A5). LaVergne disagrees with that conclusion, relying on 

Department of Commerce v. U.S. House of Representatives, 525 U.S. 316 (1999). 

In that case, the Supreme Court held that state voters’ “expected loss of a 

Representative to the United States Congress” based on redistricting ordered under 

§ 2a “undoubtedly satisfies the injury-in-fact requirement of Article III standing.” 

Id. at 331. But in that case, statistical evidence showed that the plaintiffs’ votes 

would be diluted through the loss of a congressional seat to another state. See id.

at 331–34; see also Schaffer v. Clinton, 240 F.3d 878, 885 (10th Cir. 2001) 

(interpreting House of Representatives). Here, by contrast, the relief LaVergne 

seeks would result in every state, based on its population, gaining congressional 

seats under Article the First. The result would be an increase for each state in the 

same proportion as the present method produces. If there will be “dilution” to 
5

LaVergne’s vote when New Jersey is redistricted using the § 2a apportionment 

method, LaVergne’s proposed solution would neither affect it nor change the size 

of New Jersey’s congressional delegation relative to the size of other states’ 

delegations. 

In addition to this problem, LaVergne at most alleges “a type of institutional 

injury”—an allegedly unconstitutionally low number of representatives—“which 

necessarily damages” all United States voters “equally.” Raines v. Byrd, 521 U.S. 

811, 821 (1997); see also Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 573–74 

(1992) (explaining that the Supreme Court has “consistently held that a plaintiff . . 

. seeking relief that no more directly and tangibly benefits him than it does the 

public at large—does not state an Article III case or controversy”). He “has not 

alleged a sufficiently personal injury to establish standing[.]” Schaffer, 240 F.3d at 

885 (citing Raines, 521 U.S. at 821). Cf. also Clemons v. U.S. Dep’t of

Commerce

LaVergne’s claims also fail on other grounds, including lack of justiciability. 

LaVergne’s constitutional challenge to § 2a is primarily based on his argument that 

the apportionment method violates Article the First. He alleges that this proposed 

constitutional amendment was ratified by the states in November 1791 or June 

1792. Putting aside the considerable factual and historical problems with his 

, 131 S. Ct. 821 (2010) (summarily ordering voters’ constitutional 

challenge to § 2a dismissed for lack of jurisdiction).
6

argument, “[t]he issue of whether a constitutional amendment has been properly 

ratified is a political question.” United States v. McDonald, 919 F.2d 146, 1990 

WL 186103 (table), at *3 (9th Cir. 1990) (per curiam) (citing Coleman v. Miller, 

307 U.S. 433, 450 (1939)). In Coleman, the Supreme Court held that “the question 

of the efficacy of ratifications by state legislatures . . . should be regarded as a 

political question pertaining to the political departments, with the ultimate 

authority in the Congress in the exercise of its control over the promulgation of the 

adoption of the amendment.” 307 U.S. at 450. See also Luther v. Borden, 48 U.S. 

(7 How.) 1, 39 (1849) (holding that “the political department has always 

determined whether the proposed constitution or amendment was ratified or not by 

the people of the State, and the judicial power has followed its decision”); United

States v. Foster, 789 F.2d 457, 463 n.6 (7th Cir. 1986) (holding that the issue of 

“the validity of an amendment’s ratification [is] a non-justiciable political 

question” and citing, among other cases, Leser v. Garnett, 258 U.S. 130, 137 

(1922), and Coleman

LaVergne also argues that the § 2a apportionment method violates the 

nondelegation doctrine and separation of powers. To the extent that these 

arguments present justiciable questions,

, 307 U.S. at 450).

2

 2

 See U.S. Dep’t of Commerce v. Montana, 503 U.S. 442, 456–59 (1992) (rejecting the government’s 

contention that a constitutional challenge to § 2a presented a nonjusticiable question because the 

challenge was to whether “specific congressional action”—the enactment of § 2a—violated constitutional 

principles); but cf. Clemons, 131 S. Ct. 821 (summarily ordering that voters’ constitutional challenge to 

§ 2a—which the three-judge district court had determined was justiciable—be dismissed for lack of 

they fail on the merits. As to the first 
7

argument, the Supreme Court has recognized that “in our increasingly complex 

society, replete with ever changing and more technical problems, Congress simply 

cannot do its job absent an ability to delegate power under broad general 

directives.” United States v. Amirnazmi, 645 F.3d 564, 575 (3d Cir. 2011) 

(quoting Mistretta v. United States, 488 U.S. 361, 372 (1989)). Congress may 

“endow a coordinate branch of government with a measure of discretion” if the 

delegation includes “‘an intelligible principle to which the person or body 

authorized to [exercise the delegated authority] is directed to conform.’” Id.

(quoting J.W. Hampton, Jr. & Co. v. United States, 276 U.S. 394, 409 (1928)). 

Section 2a clearly contains an intelligible principle to guide the exercise of 

delegated authority: “the method of equal proportions,” which is automatic in 

character and which provides “procedural and substantive rules that are 

consistently applied year after year[.]” Montana

LaVergne’s separation-of-powers argument similarly fails. The Supreme 

Court’s “separation-of-powers jurisprudence generally focuses on the danger of 

one branch’s aggrandizing its power at the expense of another branch.” 

, 503 U.S. at 465. LaVergne’s 

nondelegation argument is meritless.

Freytag v. 

Comm’r, 501 U.S. 868, 878 (1991). Congress acted within its authority by 

delegating the ministerial tasks of implementing the method of equal proportions, 

for redistricting, to the Department of Commerce and its employees. Cf. also

 

jurisdiction).
8

Montana

Finally, LaVergne’s appeal of the District Court’s order denying his request 

to convene a three-judge panel is limited to passing references to that issue. (

, 503 U.S. at 465 (holding, with regard to § 2a, that there is “no 

constitutional obstacle preventing Congress from adopting such a sensible 

procedure”).

See

Opening Br. at 5, 6 n.1, 9, 29–30). Such cursory presentation waives the issue on 

appeal. See Skretvedt v. E.I. DuPont De Nemours, 372 F.3d 193, 202–03 (3d Cir. 

2004) (“We have held on numerous occasions that an issue is waived unless a 

party raises it in its opening brief, and for those purposes a passing reference to an 

issue will not suffice to bring that issue before this court.” (internal quotation 

marks and alterations omitted)); John Wyeth & Bro. Ltd. v. CIGNA Int’l Corp.

IV.

, 

119 F.3d 1070, 1076 n.6 (3d Cir. 1997) (Alito, J.) (“[A]rguments raised in passing 

(such as, in a footnote), but not squarely argued, are considered waived.”). 

Moreover, LaVergne does not seek reversal on this basis, or remand, but rather 

states that this three-judge panel’s review of his claims suffices. (Opening Br. at 

30). 

This appeal does not raise a substantial question. We summarily affirm the 

judgment of the District Court.