Source: https://m.openjurist.org/673/f2d/272
Timestamp: 2020-07-14 11:55:31
Document Index: 690246365

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 46', '§ 32', '§ 32', '§ 32', '§ 32', '§ 2']

673 F2d 272 Benson Dds v. Arizona State Board of Dental Examiners | OpenJurist
673 F. 2d 272 - Benson Dds v. Arizona State Board of Dental Examiners
673 F2d 272 Benson Dds v. Arizona State Board of Dental Examiners
673 F.2d 272
1982-1 Trade Cases 64,684
Lawrence Abram BENSON, D.D.S., et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants,
ARIZONA STATE BOARD OF DENTAL EXAMINERS et al., Defendants-Appellees.
Under that doctrine, "(g)ood-faith actions of state officials are immune from attack under the antitrust laws if those officials act within the scope of their authority in the furtherance of a declared governmental policy or legislative scheme." 7 J. von Kalinowski, Antitrust Laws and Trade Regulation § 46.01. The doctrine stems from Parker v. Brown, 317 U.S. 341, 63 S.Ct. 307, 87 L.Ed. 315 (1943), where California's cartel program for marketing raisins was held lawful.
The Supreme Court recently examined the state action immunity in California Retail Liquor Dealers Association v. Midcal Aluminum, Inc., 445 U.S. 97, 100 S.Ct. 937, 63 L.Ed.2d 233 (1980). There the Court reviewed the cases applying the doctrine and concluded: "These decisions establish two standards for antitrust immunity under Parker v. Brown. First, the challenged restraint must be 'one clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed as state policy'; second, the policy must be 'actively supervised' by the State itself." Id. at 105, 100 S.Ct. at 943 (quoting the plurality opinion in City of Lafayette v. Louisiana Power & Light Co., 435 U.S. 389, 410, 98 S.Ct. 1123, 1135, 55 L.Ed.2d 364 (1978).
Arizona's regulation of dentistry satisfies both of the Court's criteria. First, the system is laid out in state statutes-title 32, chapter 11 of the Arizona Revised Statutes. In particular, these statutes establish the Board, A.R.S. § 32-1203, confer upon it the power to regulate the practice of dentistry and control admission thereto, § 32-1207, command it to administer examinations "on both theory and clinical proficiency" as a prerequisite for a dental license, § 32-1233, and establish the system of restricted permits, §§ 32-1237 to -1239. Thus the challenged system is " 'clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed as state policy.' "4 Second, the system is " 'actively supervised' by the State itself" because it is supervised by a state agency, the Board.5 Supervision by the Board is just as much active state supervision as was supervision by the Arizona Supreme Court of the state's ban on attorney advertising in Bates v. State Bar, 433 U.S. 350, 362, 97 S.Ct. 2691, 2698, 53 L.Ed.2d 810 (1977).6
Appellants seek to avoid application of the state action immunity by arguing that it applies only when the authority that the legislature conferred on the government entity involved indicates that the legislature contemplated the anticompetitive action at issue. They assert that their complaint-whose allegations must be taken as true on this appeal7-alleges that the members of the Board acted outside the scope of the legislature's directives. The Amended Complaint indeed alleges that the Board acted ultra vires, but this by itself is a conclusory legal assertion that this court is not required to accept. Kennedy v. H & M Landing, Inc., 529 F.2d 987 (9th Cir. 1976) (per curiam). Appellants insist, however, that P 18 of their amended complaint alleges "specific facts" to support their assertion.
Appellants alleged in their complaint that Arizona's "arbitrary" licensing requirements "unreasonably restrict dentists from moving to Arizona." They thus contend that the challenged regulations infringe the constitutional right of interstate travel-a right recognized for over a century12.
The detailed statutory scheme by which Arizona's legislature authorized the system of dentistry regulation challenged here contrasts sharply with the situation presented in Community Communications Co. v. City of Boulder, --- U.S. ----, 102 S.Ct. 835, 70 L.Ed.2d 810 (1982). There, the state had done nothing specifically directing Boulder to adopt its anticompetitive restrictions on the cable television industry; it had merely granted Boulder the general right of "home rule" autonomy. The Court found that this grant left the state in a position "of mere neutrality respecting the ... actions challenged as anticompetitive" and thus did not constitute clear state articulation of the anticompetitive policy. Id. at ----, 102 S.Ct. at 843. The situation in the instant case is quite the contrary-Arizona's legislature has affirmatively mandated the challenged policies
The Court has found this requirement of active supervision violated when the state merely acquiesces in an anticompetitive policy adopted on a private party's initiative, Cantor v. Detroit Edison Co., 428 U.S. 579, 96 S.Ct. 3110, 49 L.Ed.2d 1141 (1976), and where the state merely authorized and enforced price-setting by private parties without setting prices itself or reviewing their reasonableness. Retail Liquor Dealers, supra, 445 U.S. 97, 100 S.Ct. 937, 63 L.Ed.2d 233
The Arizona dental regulations satisfy another criterion stated in Bates, supra, for applying the state action exemption: existence of a strong state interest in the challenged restraint. Bates emphasized that the state had a vital interest in protecting the public by regulating the legal profession, and that such regulation has been a traditional state function. 433 U.S. at 361-62, 97 S.Ct. at 2697-98. State regulation of the healing professions, including dentistry, serves just as vital a role in protecting the public, and is just as traditional. Appellants themselves alleged that the Board has been regulating dental practice since 1913-one year after Arizona became a state
That the statute did not itself lay down all the requirements that the Board imposed in no way shows that the Board exceeded its authority. "(T)he state need not have contemplated the precise action complained of as long as it contemplated the kind of action to which objection was made." Princeton Community Phone Book, Inc. v. Bate, 582 F.2d 706, 717 (3rd Cir.), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 966, 99 S.Ct. 454, 58 L.Ed.2d 424 (1978). See City of Lafayette v. Louisiana Power & Light Co., 435 U.S. 389, 415, 98 S.Ct. 1123, 1138, 55 L.Ed.2d 364 (1978), where the plurality opinion notes that for a municipality to show that its conduct was pursuant to state policy and thus immune from antitrust attack, it need not "be able to point to a specific, detailed legislative authorization" but need only show that the authority it was given implied that the legislature contemplated the kind of action taken
See Crandall v. Nevada, 73 U.S. (6 Wall.) 35, 18 L.Ed. 744 (1868) (holding invalid a state tax on persons leaving the state). The right has been variously traced to the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV, § 2, to the analogous clause in the Fourteenth Amendment, and to the Commerce Clause. Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 630 n.8, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 1329 n.8, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969). The Court in Shapiro declined to pinpoint a source: "We have no occasion to ascribe the source of this right ... to a particular constitutional provision." Id. at 630, 89 S.Ct. at 1329 (footnote omitted)
See, e.g., Memorial Hospital v. Maricopa County, 415 U.S. 250, 94 S.Ct. 1076, 39 L.Ed.2d 306 (1974) (state's conditioning county-paid nonemergency hospitalization or medical care for indigents on year's residence in county penalizes exercise of right to travel and hence requires strict scrutiny; held, statute violates equal protection); Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972) (durational residency requirement for voting impinges on both right to vote and right to travel and hence requires strict scrutiny; held, statute violates equal protection); Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969) (durational residency requirements for welfare benefits penalize exercise of right to travel and hence demand strict scrutiny; held, the requirements violate equal protection)
Appellants seem to be arguing that the right to travel requires Arizona to allow anyone with a dentistry license from another state to practice in Arizona. This is incorrect. See Hawkins v. Moss, 503 F.2d 1171, 1178-79 (4th Cir. 1974), cert. denied, 420 U.S. 928, 95 S.Ct. 1127, 43 L.Ed.2d 400 (1975):
Suspect classifications whose use triggers "strict scrutiny" include race, Hunter v. Erickson, 393 U.S. 385, 391-92, 89 S.Ct. 557, 560-61, 21 L.Ed.2d 616 (1969); nationality, Oyama v. California, 332 U.S. 633, 646, 68 S.Ct. 269, 275, 92 L.Ed. 249 (1948); and alienage, Graham v. Richardson, 403 U.S. 365, 371-72, 91 S.Ct. 1848, 1851-52, 29 L.Ed.2d 534 (1971)-though there are contexts in which discrimination against aliens does not receive strict scrutiny. Foley v. Connelie, 435 U.S. 291, 295-96, 98 S.Ct. 1067, 1070, 55 L.Ed.2d 287 (1978). Gender is treated as a quasi-suspect classification that requires intensified, though not "strict," scrutiny. Orr v. Orr, 440 U.S. 268, 279, 99 S.Ct. 1102, 1111, 59 L.Ed.2d 306 (1979). And illegitimacy classifications receive a somewhat heightened form of rational basis scrutiny. Trimble v. Gordon, 430 U.S. 762, 767, 97 S.Ct. 1459, 1463, 52 L.Ed.2d 31 (1977). None of these classifications is involved here
Dandridge v. Williams, 397 U.S. 471, 485, 90 S.Ct. 1153, 1161, 25 L.Ed.2d 491 (1970); McDonald v. Board of Election Commissioners, 394 U.S. 802, 809, 89 S.Ct. 1404, 1408, 22 L.Ed.2d 739 (1969)