Source: http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0457_0922_ZO.html
Timestamp: 2013-05-20 05:39:56
Document Index: 408563965

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 8', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 43', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 7', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 519', '§ 1983', '§ 242', '§ 242', '§ 1983', '§ 43', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 242', '§ 52', '§ 1983', '§ 242', '§ 1983', '§ 1983']

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the [p924] United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Title 42 U.S.C. § 1983 provides a remedy for deprivations of rights secured by the Constitution and laws of the United States when that deprivation takes place "under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory. . . ." [n1] This case concerns the relationship between the § 1983 requirement of action under color of state law and the Fourteenth Amendment requirement of state action.
In 1977, petitioner, a lessee-operator of a truckstop in Virginia, was indebted to his supplier, Edmondson Oil Co., Inc. Edmondson sued on the debt in Virginia state court. Ancillary to that action and pursuant to state law, Edmondson sought prejudgment attachment of certain of petitioner's property. Va.Code § 8.01-533 (1977). [n2] The prejudgment attachment procedure required only that Edmondson allege, in an ex parte petition, a belief that petitioner was disposing of or might dispose of his property in order to defeat his creditors. Acting upon that petition, a Clerk of the state court issued a writ of attachment, which was then executed by the County Sheriff. This effectively sequestered petitioner's [p925] property, although it was left in his possession. Pursuant to the statute, a hearing on the propriety of the attachment and levy was later conducted. Thirty-four days after the levy, a state trial judge ordered the attachment dismissed because Edmondson had failed to establish the statutory grounds for attachment alleged in the petition. [n3]
Petitioner subsequently brought this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against Edmondson and its president. His complaint alleged that, in attaching his property, respondents had acted jointly with the State to deprive him of his property without due process of law. The lower courts construed the complaint as alleging a due process violation both from a misuse of the Virginia procedure and from the statutory procedure itself. [n4] He sought compensatory and punitive damages for specified financial loss allegedly caused by the improvident attachment.
Relying on Flagg Brothers, Inc. v. Brook, 436 U.S. 149 (1978), the District Court held that the alleged actions of the respondents did not constitute state action, as required by the Fourteenth Amendment, and that the complaint therefore did not state a claim upon which relief could be granted under § 1983. Petitioner appealed; the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, sitting en banc, affirmed, with three dissenters. [n5] 639 F.2d 1058 (1981). [p926]
Although the Court of Appeals correctly perceived the importance of Flagg Brothers to a proper resolution of this case, [p927] it misread that case. [n6] It also failed to give sufficient weight to that line of cases, beginning with Sniadach v. Family Finance Corp., 395 U.S. 337 (1969), in which the Court considered constitutional due process requirements in the context of garnishment actions and prejudgment attachments. See North Georgia Finishing, Inc. v. Di-Chem, Inc., 419 U.S. 601 (1975); Mitchell v. W. T. Grant Co., 416 U.S. 600 (1974); Fuentes v. Shevin, 407 U.S. 67 (1972). Each of these cases involved a finding of state action as an implicit predicate of the application of due process standards. Flagg Brothers distinguished them on the ground that, in each, there was overt, official involvement in the property deprivation; there was no such overt action by a state officer in Flagg Brothers, 436 U.S. at 157. Although this case falls on the Sniadach, and not the Flagg Brothers, side of this distinction, the Court of Appeals thought the garnishment and attachment cases to be irrelevant because none but Fuentes arose under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and because Fuentes was distinguishable. [n7] [p928] It determined that it could ignore all of them because the issue in this case was not whether there was state action, but rather whether respondents acted under color of state law.
As we see it, however, the two concepts cannot be so easily disentangled. Whether they are identical or not, the state action and the "under color of state law" requirements are obviously related. [n8] Indeed, until recently, this Court did not distinguish between the two requirements at all.
In cases under § 1983, "under color" of law has consistently been treated as the same thing as the "state action" required under the Fourteenth Amendment. [n9]
In support of this proposition, the Court cited Smith v. Allwright, 321 U.S. 649 (1944), and Terry v. Adams, 345 U.S. 461 (1953). [n10] In both of these [p929] cases, black voters in Texas challenged their exclusion from party primaries as a violation of the Fifteenth Amendment, and sought relief under 8 U.S.C. § 43 (1946 ed.). [n11] In each case, the Court understood the problem before it to be whether the discriminatory policy of a private political association could be characterized as "state action within the meaning of the Fifteenth Amendment." Smith, supra, at 664. [n12] Having found state action under the Constitution, there was no further inquiry into whether the action of the political associations also met the statutory requirement of action "under color of state law."
[m]isuse of power, possessed by virtue of state law and made possible only because the wrongdoer is clothed with the authority of state law, is action taken "under color of state law," was founded on the rule announced in Ex parte Virginia, 100 U.S. 339, 346-347 (1880), that the actions of a state officer who exceeds the limits of his authority constitute state action for purposes of the Fourteenth Amendment. [n13] [p930]
The two-part approach to a § 1983 cause of action, referred to in Flagg Brothers, was derived from Adickes v. [p931] S. H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. 144, 150 (1970). Adickes was a § 1983 action brought against a private party, based on a claim of racial discrimination in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Although stating that the § 1983 plaintiff must show both that he has been deprived "of a right secured by the ‘Constitution and laws' of the United States" and that the defendant acted "under color of any statute . . . of any State," ibid., we held that the private party's joint participation with a state official in a conspiracy to discriminate would constitute both "state action essential to show a direct violation of petitioner's Fourteenth Amendment equal protection rights" and action "‘under color' of law for purposes of the statute." Id. at 152. [n14] In [p932] support of our conclusion that a private party held to have violated the Fourteenth Amendment "can be liable under § 1983," ibid., we cited that part of United States v. Price, 383 U.S. at 794, n. 7, in which we had concluded that state action and action under color of state law are the same (quoted supra, at 928). Adickes provides no support for the Court of Appeals' novel construction of § 1983. [n15]
Beginning with Sniadach v. Family Finance Corp., 395 U.S. 337 (1969), the Court has consistently held that constitutional requirements of due process apply to garnishment and prejudgment attachment procedures whenever officers [p933] of the State act jointly with a creditor in securing the property in dispute. Sniadach and North Georgia Finishing, Inc. v. Di-Chem, Inc., 419 U.S. 601 (1975), involved state-created garnishment procedures; Mitchell v. W. T. Grant Co., 416 U.S. 600 (1974), involved execution of a vendor's lien to secure disputed property. In each of these cases, state agents aided the creditor in securing the disputed property; but in each case, the federal issue arose in litigation between creditor and debtor in the state courts, and no state official was named as a party. Nevertheless, in each case, the Court entertained and adjudicated the defendant debtor's claim that the procedure under which the private creditor secured the disputed property violated federal constitutional standards of due process. Necessary to that conclusion is the holding that private use of the challenged state procedures with the help of state officials constitutes state action for purposes of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Fuentes v. Shevin, 407 U.S. 67 (1972), was a § 1983 action brought against both a private creditor and the State Attorney General. The plaintiff sought declaratory and injunctive relief, on due process grounds, from continued enforcement of state statutes authorizing prejudgment replevin. The plaintiff prevailed; if the Court of Appeals were correct in this case, there would have been no § 1983 cause of action against the private parties. Yet they remained parties, and judgment ran against them in this Court. [n16] [p934]
Id.App. 81. [n17] [p935]
In sum, the line drawn by the Court of Appeals is inconsistent with our prior cases, and would substantially undercut the congressional purpose in providing the § 1983 cause of action. If the challenged conduct of respondents constitutes state action as delimited by our prior decisions, then that conduct was also action under color of state law, and will support a suit under § 1983. [n18] [p936]
Careful adherence to the "state action" requirement preserves an area of individual freedom by limiting the reach of federal law and federal judicial power. It also avoids imposing on the State, its agencies or officials, responsibility for conduct for which they cannot fairly be blamed. A major consequence is to require the courts to respect the limits of [p937] their own power as directed against state governments and private interests. Whether this is good or bad policy, it is a fundamental fact of our political order.
Although related, these two principles are not the same. They collapse into each other when the claim of a constitutional deprivation is directed against a party whose official character is such as to lend the weight of the State to his decisions. See Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167, 172 (1961). The two principles diverge when the constitutional claim is directed against a party without such apparent authority, i.e., against a private party. The difference between the two inquiries is well illustrated by comparing 365 U.S. 167, 172 (1961). The two principles diverge when the constitutional claim is directed against a party without such apparent authority, i.e., against a private party. The difference between the two inquiries is well illustrated by comparing Moose Lodge No. 107 v. Irvis, 407 U.S. 163 (1972), with Flagg Brothers, supra.
In Moose Lodge, the Court held that the discriminatory practices of the appellant did not violate the Equal Protection Clause because those practices did not constitute "state action." The Court focused primarily on the question of [p938] whether the admittedly discriminatory policy could in any way be ascribed to a governmental decision. [n19] The inquiry, therefore, looked to those policies adopted by the State that were applied to appellant. The Court concluded as follows:
407 U.S. at 177. In other words, the decision to discriminate could not be ascribed to any governmental decision; those governmental decisions that did affect Moose Lodge were unconnected with its discriminatory policies. [n20]
Flagg Brothers focused on the other component of the state action principle. In that case, the warehouseman proceeded under New York Uniform Commercial Code, § 7-210, and the debtor challenged the constitutionality of that provision on the grounds that it violated the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment. Undoubtedly the State was responsible for the statute. The response of the Court, however, focused not on the terms of the statute, but on the character of the defendant to the § 1983 [p939] suit: action by a private party pursuant to this statute, without something more, was not sufficient to justify a characterization of that party as a "state actor." The Court suggested that that "something more" which would convert the private party into a state actor might vary with the circumstances of the case. This was simply a recognition that the Court has articulated a number of different factors or tests in different contexts: e.g., the "public function" test, see Terry v. Adams, 345 U.S. 461 (1953); Marsh v. Alabama, 326 U.S. 501 (1946); the "state compulsion" test, see Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. at 170; the "nexus" test, see Jackson v. Metropolitan Edison Co., 419 U.S. 345 (1974); Burton v. Wilmington Parking Authority, 365 U.S. 715 (1961); and, in the case of prejudgment attachments, a "joint action test," Flagg Brothers, 436 U.S. at 157. [n21] Whether these different tests are actually different in operation or simply different ways of characterizing the necessarily fact-bound inquiry that confronts the Court in such a situation need not be resolved here. See Burton, supra, at 722 ("Only by sifting facts and weighing circumstances can the nonobvious involvement of the State in private conduct be attributed its true significance").
Count one is a different matter. That count describes the procedures followed by respondents in obtaining the prejudgment attachment as well as the fact that the state court subsequently ordered the attachment dismissed because respondents had not met their burden under state law. Petitioner [p941] then summarily states that this sequence of events deprived him of his property without due process. Although it is not clear whether petitioner is referring to the state-created procedure or the misuse of that procedure by respondents, we agree with the lower courts that the better reading of the complaint is that petitioner challenges the state statute as procedurally defective under the Fourteenth Amendment. [n22]
In summary, petitioner was deprived of his property through state action; respondents were, therefore, acting under color of state law in participating in that deprivation. Petitioner did present a valid cause of action under § 1983 insofar as he challenged the constitutionality of the Virginia statute; he did not insofar as he alleged only misuse or abuse of the statute. [n23]
So ordered. [p943]
1. Title 42 U.S.C. § 1983 at the time in question, provided in full:
2. At the time of the attachment in question, this section was codified as Va.Code § 519 (1973).
3. The principal action then proceeded to the entry of judgment on the debt in favor of Edmondson, and some of petitioner's property was sold in execution of the judgment.
4. In his answer to respondents' motion to dismiss on abstention grounds, petitioner stated that "[n]o question of the constitutional validity of the State statutes is made." Plaintiff's Memorandum in Opposition to Motion to Dismiss 3. The District Court responded to this as follows:
6. JUSTICE POWELL suggests that our opinion is not "consistent with the mode of inquiry prescribed by our cases." Post at 946. We believe the situation to be just the opposite. We rely precisely upon the ground that the majority itself put forth in Flagg Brothers to distinguish that case from the earlier prejudgment attachment cases:
7. The Court of Appeals held Fuentes v. Shevin not to be relevant because the defendants in that case included the State Attorney General, as well as the private creditor. In the court's view, the presence of a state official made the "private party defendant . . . merely a nominal party to the action for injunctive relief." 639 F.2d at 1068, n. 22. Judge Butzner, in dissent, found Fuentes to be directly controlling.
8. The Court of Appeals itself recognized this when it stated that, in two of three basic patterns of § 1983 litigation -- that in which the defendant is a public official and that in which he is a private party -- there is no distinction between state action and action under color of state law. Only when there is joint action by private parties and state officials, the court stated, could a distinction arise between these two requirements.
9. We also stated that, if an indictment "allege[s] conduct on the part of the ‘private' defendants which constitutes ‘state action,' [it alleges] action ‘under color' of law within [18 U.S.C.] § 242." 383 U.S. at 794, n.7. In Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167, 185 (1961), the Court held that "under color of law" has the same meaning in 18 U.S.C. § 242 as it does in § 1983.
10. Besides these two Supreme Court cases, the Court cited a number of lower court cases in support of the proposition that the constitutional concept of state action satisfies the statutory requirement of action under color of state law. Simkins v. Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital, 323 F.2d 959 (CA4 1963); Smith v. Holiday Inns, 336 F.2d 630 (CA6 1964); Hampton v. City of Jacksonville, 304 F.2d 320 (CA5 1962); Bowman v. Birmingham Transit Co., 280 F.2d 531 (CA5 1960); Kerr v. Enoch Pratt Free Library, 149 F.2d 212 (CA4 1945). Each of these cases involved litigation between private parties in which the plaintiffs alleged unconstitutional discrimination. In each case, the only inquiry was whether the private party defendant met the state action requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment. Once that requirement was met, the courts granted the relief sought.
11. Title 8 U.S.C. § 43 (1946 ed.) was reclassified as 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in 1952.
13. United States v. Classic did not involve § 1983 directly; rather, it interpreted 18 U.S.C. § 242 (then 18 U.S.C. § 52 (1940 ed.)), which is the criminal counterpart of 42 U.S.C. § 1983. See n. 9, supra, on the relationship between 18 U.S.C. § 242 and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
14. The Adickes opinion contained the following statement, 398 U.S. at 162, n. 23:
15. JUSTICE POWELL's discussion of Adickes confuses the two counts of the complaint in that case. There was a conspiracy count which alleged that respondent -- a private party -- and a police officer had conspired
16. We thus find incomprehensible JUSTICE POWELL's statement that we cite no cases in which a private decision to invoke a presumptively valid state legal process has been held to be state action. Post at 950. Likewise, his discussion of these cases, post at 952-953, steadfastly ignores the predicate for the holding in each case that the debtor could challenge the constitutional adequacy of the private creditor's seizure of his property. That predicate was necessarily the principle that a private party's invocation of a seemingly valid prejudgment remedy statute, coupled with the aid of a state official, satisfies the state action requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment and warrants relief against the private party.
17. In fact, throughout the congressional debate over the 1871 Act, the bill was officially described as a bill "to enforce the provisions of the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and for other purposes." See also, e.g., remarks of Senator Trumbull in describing the purpose of the House in passing the Act:
18. Our conclusion in this case is not inconsistent with the statement in Flagg Brothers that "these two elements [state action and action under color of state law] denote two separate areas of inquiry." 436 U.S. at 155-156. First, although we hold that conduct satisfying the state action requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment satisfies the statutory requirement of action under color of state law, it does not follow from that that all conduct that satisfies the "under color of state law" requirement would satisfy the Fourteenth Amendment requirement of state action. If action under color of state law means nothing more than that the individual act "with the knowledge of and pursuant to that statute," Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. at 162, n. 23, then clearly, under Flagg Brothers, that would not, in itself, satisfy the state action requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment. Second, although we hold in this case that the "under color of state law" requirement does not add anything not already included within the state action requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment, § 1983 is applicable to other constitutional provisions and statutory provisions that contain no state action requirement. Where such a federal right is at issue, the statutory concept of action under color of state law would be a distinct element of the case not satisfied implicitly by a finding of a violation of the particular federal right.
19. There are elements of the other state action inquiry in the opinion as well. This is found primarily in the effort to distinguish the relationship of Moose Lodge and the State from that between the State and the restaurant considered in Burton v. Wilmington Parking Authority, 365 U.S. 715 (1961). See 407 U.S. at 175.
21. Contrary to the suggestion of JUSTICE POWELL's dissent, we do not hold today that
22. This confusion in the nature of petitioner's allegations continued in oral argument in this Court. Although at various times counsel for petitioner seemed to deny that petitioner challenged the constitutionality of the statute, see, e.g., Tr. of Oral Arg. 11, he also stated that
23. JUSTICE POWELL is concerned that private individuals who innocently make use of seemingly valid state laws would be responsible, if the law is subsequently held to be unconstitutional, for the consequences of their actions. In our view, however, this problem should be dealt with not by changing the character of the cause of action, but by establishing an affirmative defense. A similar concern is at least partially responsible for the availability of a good faith defense, or qualified immunity, to state officials. We need not reach the question of the availability of such a defense to private individuals at this juncture. What we said in Adickes, 398 U.S. at 174, n. 44, when confronted with this question is just as applicable today: