2013 Decisions

Opinions of the United

States Court of Appeals

for the Third Circuit

7-29-2013

Brian Christie v. President USA

Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential

Docket No. 13-2520

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Recommended Citation

"Brian Christie v. President USA" (2013). 2013 Decisions. Paper 469.

http://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/thirdcircuit_2013/469
GLD-341 NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

___________

No. 13-2520

___________

BRIAN T. CHRISTIE,

Appellant

v.

PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

____________________________________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Western District of Pennsylvania

(D.C. Civil No. 2-13-cv-00596)

District Judge: Honorable Mark R. Hornak

____________________________________

Submitted for Possible Summary Action 

Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 27.4 and I.O.P. 10.6

July 18, 2013

Before: FUENTES, FISHER and VANASKIE, Circuit Judges

(Opinion filed: July 29, 2013)

_________

OPINION

_________

PER CURIAM

Brian Christie, pro se, appeals from the District Court’s sua sponte dismissal of his 

complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Appellee, the President of the United 
2

States, moves for summary action pursuant to Local Appellate Rule 27.4. For the reasons 

that follow, we will summarily affirm. See LAR 27.4; I.O.P. 10.6. 

Christie’s complaint alleged that President Barack Obama has committed, and 

continues to commit, high treason against the United States in various ways.

1

 The 

District Court dismissed the complaint because Christie lacked standing, among other 

reasons. The District Court also denied leave to amend as futile. 

We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We exercise plenary review over

the District Court’s dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. See Berg v. Obama, 

586 F.3d 234, 238 (3d Cir. 2009). We take the factual allegations of Christie’s complaint 

as true in assessing whether he has met his burden to establish standing. See id. (citations 

omitted). 

To have standing under Article III, a plaintiff must have an injury-in-fact which is 

1) concrete and particularized to him, and 2) actual or imminent, as opposed to merely 

potential. See id. at 239 (quotation omitted). An injury is not sufficiently particularized 

if, assuming it exists, it would be “shared in substantially equal measure by all or a large 

class of citizens.” Id. Merely asserting every citizen’s “interest in proper application of 

the Constitution and laws” is insufficient to confer Article III standing to a plaintiff. 

Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 573-74 (1992). 

 

1 Christie’s complaint and a document attached to his notice of appeal (which could be 

viewed as an attempt to amend his complaint) list a series of unrelated, current political 

controversies without any indication of Christie’s personal involvement, other than his 

status as a U.S. citizen. 
3

All of Christie’s allegations suffer from this lack of identifying a particularized 

injury. He asserted that President Obama took actions against, and refused to act for, the 

best interests of the United States, and that Christie was thereby injured as a citizen of 

this country. In a document attached to his notice of appeal, Christie urges this Court to 

adjudicate his complaint because “Without our law and Constitution we have nothing!” 

Unfortunately for Christie, it is the Constitution that precludes us from adjudicating his 

case. “The law of Article III standing, which is built on separation-of-powers principles, 

serves to prevent the judicial process from being used to usurp the powers of the political 

branches.” Clapper v. Amnesty Int’l USA, 133 S. Ct. 1138, 1146 (2013). There is no 

general, citizen standing to challenge government actions. 2 See Lujan, 504 U.S. at 573-

74. 

Because we agree with the District Court that Christie lacked standing, we need 

not reach the alternative grounds for dismissal raised by the District Court. The District 

Court dismissed Christie’s original complaint, but did not give him an opportunity to 

amend because it held doing so would be futile. We agree with the District Court that 

amendment would have been futile. Accordingly, it was not an abuse of discretion to 

deny leave to amend Richard’s complaint. See In re New Jersey Title Ins. Litig., 683 

F.3d 451, 462 (3d Cir. 2012) (holding it was not an abuse of discretion to deny leave to 

amend where complaint was properly dismissed for lack of standing). 

 

2

The District Court characterized Christie’s complaint as seeking a general taxpayer 

standing. As the District Court correctly held, merely being a taxpayer is generally 

insufficient to confer standing to challenge a government action. See Lujan, 504 U.S. at 

574; Hein v. Freedom From Religion Found., Inc., 551 U.S. 587, 593 (2007). 
4

For the reasons given, we grant the President’s motion for summary action, and 

will summarily affirm the judgment of the District Court.