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Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1332', '§ 1331', '§ 1332', '§ 1332', '§ 1332', '§ 1332', '§ 1332', '§ 1332', '§ 9', '§ 1332', '§ 1331', '§ 1332', '§ 1331']

ZAHN V. INTERNATIONAL PAPER CO., 414 U. S. 291 (1973) - US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE
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WHITE, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which BURGER, C.J.,and STEWART, BLACKMUN, POWELL, and REHNQUIST, JJ., joined. BRENNAN, J., filed dissenting opinion, in which DOUGLAS and MARSHALL, JJ., joined, post, p. 414 U. S. 302.
Petitioners, asserting that they were owners of property fronting on Lake Champlain in Orwell, Vermont, chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
From the outset, Congress has provided that suits between citizens of different States are maintainable in the district courts only if the "matter in controversy" chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
exceeds the statutory minimum, now set at $10,000. 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a). [Footnote 1] The same jurisdictional amount requirement has applied when the general federal question jurisdiction of the district courts, 28 U.S.C. § 1331(a), is sought to be invoked. [Footnote 2] A classic statement of the dichotomy that developed in construing and applying chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
This distinction and rule that multiple plaintiffs with separate and distinct claims must each satisfy the jurisdictional amount requirement for suit in the federal courts were firmly rooted in prior cases dating from 1832, [Footnote 3] and have continued to be the accepted construction chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
306 U.S. at 306 U. S. 589. Upon ascertaining on its own motion that only one of the plaintiffs in the District Court had presented a claim satisfying the chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The same rules were applied to class actions contemplated by Fed.Rule Civ.Proc. 23. The spurious class action authorized by Rule 23(a)(3), as it stood prior to amendment in 1966, [Footnote 5] was viewed by Judge Frank, writing for himself and Judges Learned and Augustus Hand, as, "in effect, but a congeries of separate suits so that each claimant must, as to his own claim, meet the jurisdictional requirements." Steele v. Guaranty Trust Co. of N.Y., 164 F.2d 387, 388 (CA2 1947). [Footnote 6] The direct precedent chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
for Steele was 1941 decision in the same Circuit expressed in an opinion written by Judge Charles Clark, who, as a member of and Reporter for the Advisory Committee, was a principal architect of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. That case, Hackner v. Guaranty Trust Co. of N.Y., 117 F.2d 95 (CA2 1941), involved a class action brought on behalf of plaintiffs with separate and distinct claims. Judge Clark invoked a long line of authority in this Court, and in other courts, to hold that, among parties related only by a common question of law and fact, "aggregation is improper," and that jurisdiction cannot be supplied for those without claims in the requisite amount "by adding a plaintiff who can how jurisdiction." Id. at 98. (Citations omitted.) This was the accepted view in the federal courts with respect to class actions. [Footnote 7] In consequence, district courts were to chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The meaning of the "matter in controversy" language of § 1332 as it applied to class actions under Rule 23 reached this Court in Snyder v. Harris, supra, the occasion being a division of opinion in the courts of appeals as to whether the 1966 amendments to Rule 23 had changed the jurisdictional amount requirement of § 1332 as applied to class actions involving separate and distinct claims. [Footnote 8] None of the named plaintiffs and chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
This follows inescapably from the Court's heavy reliance on Clark v. Paul Gray, Inc., supra, where only one of several plaintiffs had a sufficiently large claim and all other plaintiffs were dismissed from the suit. [Footnote 9] Moreover, chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
We conclude, as we must, that the Court of Appeals in the case before us accurately read and applied Snyder v. Harris: [Footnote 10] each plaintiff in a Rule 23(b)(3) class action must satisfy the jurisdictional amount, and any plaintiff who does not must be dismissed from the case -- "one plaintiff may not ride in on another's coattails." 469 F.2d 1035.
Neither are we inclined to overrule Snyder v. Harris, nor to change the Court's longstanding construction of the "matter in controversy" requirement of § 1332. The Court declined a like invitation in Snyder v. Harris after surveying all relevant considerations and concluding that to do so would undermine the purpose and intent of Congress in providing that plaintiffs in diversity cases must present claims in excess of the specified jurisdictional amount. At this time, we have no good reason to disagree with Snyder v. Harris or with the historic construction of the jurisdictional statutes, left undisturbed by Congress over these many years. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Court holds that, in a diversity suit, a class action under Fed.Rule Civ.Proc. 23(b)(3) is maintainable only when every member of the class, whether an appearing party or not, meets the $10,000 jurisdictional amount requirement of 28 U.S.C. § 1332(a). It finds this ruling compelled by the "rationale of this Court's prior cases construing the statutes defining the jurisdiction of the District Court." I disagree, and respectfully dissent. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The jurisdictional amount provision of § 1332(a) tersely states that "the matter in controversy [must exceed] the sum or value of $10,000. . . ." Those words, substantially unchanged since the passage of the Judiciary Act of 1789, [Footnote 2/1] apply to "civil actions," and say nothing about the requirements applicable to individual claimants and individual claims. Although Congress has several times altered the amount required, [Footnote 2/2] generally upward, [Footnote 2/3] it has left the task of defining those requirements to the judiciary. [Footnote 2/4] The result has been a relatively chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
One "bright line" has emerged to control all § 1332 actions: there must be at least one plaintiff, or joint interest, seeking more than the statutory amount. Snyder v. Harris, 394 U. S. 332 (1969); Troy Bank v. G. A. Whitehead & Co., 222 U. S. 39 (1911). The "longstanding" and "well established" rule on aggregation of claims that the Court invokes was developed to determine whether a group of claims was sufficiently interrelated to constitute such a "joint" claim or "common and undivided interest." [Footnote 2/5] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Ancillary jurisdiction to adjudicate claims that cannot be fitted within the aggregation rules has long been recognized by this Court, See Freeman v. Howe, 24 How. 450 (1861); Phelps v. Oaks, 117 U. S. 236 (1886); Wichita R. Light Co. v. Public Utilities Comm'n, 260 U. S. 48 (1922). But, as one commentator has pointed out, the rules developed to control the exercise of that jurisdiction cannot be explained by "any single rationalizing principle." C. Wright, Federal Courts § 9, p. 21 (2d ed.1970). They are instead accommodations that take into account the impact of the adjudication on parties and third persons, the susceptibility of the dispute or disputes in the case to resolution in a single adjudication, and the structure of the litigation as governed by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. [Footnote 2/6] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Class actions under Rule 23(b)(3) are equally appropriate for such treatment. There are ample assurances chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
It is, of course, true that an exercise of ancillary jurisdiction in such cases would result in some increase in the federal courts' workload, for unless the class action is permitted many of the claimants will be unable to obtain any federal determination of their rights. But that objection is applicable to every other exercise of ancillary chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Not only does the practical desirability of sustaining ancillary jurisdiction bring Rule 23(b)(3) class actions within the logic of our decisions, but the Court has long chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
since recognized that fact, and has sustained ancillary jurisdiction over the nonappearing members in a class action who do not meet the requirements of traditional rule of complete diversity laid down in 7 U. S. 366. Particularly in view of the constitutional background on which the statutory diversity requirements are written, see 469 F.2d 1033, 1038 (CA2 1972) (Timbers, J., dissenting), it is difficult to understand why the practical approach the Court took in Supreme Tribe of [email protected] must be abandoned where the purely statutory "matter in controversy" requirement is concerned.
It would be far more consistent with Clark for the Court to rule, as it did in Supreme Tribe of Ben-Hur, that only the original named plaintiffs must meet the jurisdictional requirements, and that nonappearing class members chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
and intervenors need not. Such a ruling, while going a step farther than petitioners seek, would be reasonable and pragmatically justified. There is a substantial difference between the impact on a case of an appearing party and a nonappearing class member, and intervention poses no threat since the district courts are given discretion by Rule 23(d)(3) to permit intervention subject to appropriate conditions. See 3B J. Moore, Federal Practice ¦ 23.73(3), p. 1441 (2d ed.1969). The question in this case is not whether the class action must be permitted, but whether the District Court has the power to determine whether to permit it, taking into account the elaborate guidance and discretion provided by Rule 23.
But this case presents no suggestion that the 1966 amendments override the Court's decisions construing § 1332. There are no earlier decisions construing the jurisdictional amount requirements for the nonappearing members of a "spurious" class, probably because the old Rule did not bind members of the class unless they chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Indeed, the effects of today's decision will also be influenced by the form of Rule 23. The District Court, after ruling that ancillary jurisdiction could not be exercised, was confronted with a dilemma that did not exist prior to the 1966 amendments: identification of the members of the class that would be bound by the decision so that they could be provided the required notice. [Footnote 2/14] After chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
See Troy Bank v. G. A. Whitehead & Co., 222 U. S. 39 (1911), and cases cited in n 3 of the Court's opinion. The Court also observes, quite correctly, that the same rule on aggregation has been applied to the federal question jurisdiction, 28 U.S.C. § 1331. But the assertion, in the Court's final footnote, that the same jurisdictional rules it announces for § 1332 will apply to § 1331 is even more questionable than its application of those rules in this case. The continued need for exercise of diversity jurisdiction, at least where a showing of prejudice is not made, has been challenged by respected authorities. See Wechsler, Federal Jurisdiction and the Revision of the Judicial Code, 13 Law & Contemp. Prob. 216, 234240 (1948); Currie, The Federal Courts and the American Law Institute (pts. I & II), 36 U.Chi.L.Rev. 1, 268 (1968, 1969). Cf. S.Rep. No. 1830, supra, 414 U. S. 3. But a sharply different view has been taken of the federal question jurisdiction, and the Court has reflected that view in its decisions upholding the exercise of jurisdiction over pendent claims under state law. See Mine Workers v. Gibbs, 383 U. S. 715 (1966). Similarly significant disincentives to assertion of federal rights in federal forums are likely if claimants are barred from combining to reduce the time and cost of litigation.
See Rules 23(a)(1), (2), (3) and (b)(3)(A), (B), (C). Cf. H. Hart & H. Wechsler, supra, 414 U. S. 6, at 1078. ("Under the revised rule, which contemplates that, in a class action all members of the class not properly excluded will be bound by the judgment, the spurious' class action no longer exists, and ancillary jurisdiction may support intervention by class members in all cases.")
Kaplan, supra, 414 U. S. 6, at 400.