Opinion ID: 6498499
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Tennessee-Law Claims

Text: Plaintiffs first argue that the applicable one-year statutes of limitation should not bar their state-law claims. At bottom, Plaintiffs ask us to hold that once a claim is brought in a timely civil action, its statute of limitations cannot bar a subsequent civil action raising a claim that mirrors the earlier claim. They begin by disputing the district court’s decision to strictly construe the applicable statutes of limitation. But we need not reach that issue. Strict construction of a statute of limitations is relevant only when another statute or rule would, in effect, expand the applicable limitations period. See, e.g., Sutton v. Barnes, 78 S.W.3d 908, 913–14 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2002). Plaintiffs have failed to show that any statute or rule could do that here. Start with the cases Plaintiffs have relied on from the beginning to support the argument that filing a lawsuit permanently stops the running of a statute of limitations: Williams v. Cravens, 214 S.W.2d 57 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1948) and Hankins v. Waddell, 167 S.W.2d 694 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1942). Williams involved a suit to recover land sold to Tennessee for taxes. 214 S.W.2d at 247– 48. In holding that Williams’s second lawsuit could proceed, the Tennessee Court of Appeals wrote that filing the first action “cut off the defense of the statute of limitations,” even though it “was improperly brought.” Id. at 250–51. It relied on a Tennessee Supreme Court decision rejecting the notion that “a dismissal for want of jurisdiction . . . precludes plaintiff from relying on the saving statute.” Burns v. Peoples Tel. & Tel. Co., 33 S.W.2d 76, 77 (Tenn. 1930) (citation omitted). It makes no mention of Plaintiffs’ proposed rule. And Hankins is similarly unhelpful. It stands only for the proposition that a pending replevin action tolled the limitations period of a -7- No. 21-5301, Stewart, et al. v. Knox County, Tenn., et al. conversion action because that action became “absolute and unconditional” when “the right to recourse upon the bond was cut off” by a final judgment. Hankins, 167 S.W.2d at 695–96. Plaintiffs’ parenthetical description of Hankins—“statutes of limitation do not run when a related case is pending,” see Appellant Br. at 35—is an overly generous summary of its holding. So the “axiomatic rule” Plaintiffs contend exists is not apparent from either case they cite. At any rate, they now claim they do not “need to rely on [those cases] because of Rule 3 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure.” Reply Br. at 15. Why? Because that rule’s directive that “[a]n action is commenced within the meaning of any statute of limitations upon [] filing of a complaint” apparently means the statutes of limitation “never started running again” after they filed their state-court action. Appellants’ Br. at 36 (citing Tenn. R. Civ. P. 3). We think Plaintiffs’ reading of Rule 3 is a stretch, rooted in their erroneous assumption that this federal action is a mere continuation of their state-court action. In one way, their assumption is mistaken because the claims brought in federal court are different than those they brought in state court.1 But even if the claims were identical, Plaintiffs fail to acknowledge the reality that they filed two separate lawsuits in the courts of different sovereigns: an action in state court and this action in federal court. Though rooted in the same facts and brought under the same Tennessee statutes, this new federal action was subject to new limitations periods. Accord Doyle v. Frost, 49 S.W.3d 853, 859 (Tenn. 2001) (noting the “fundamental difference between filing a second lawsuit and amending an original, timely-filed complaint”). Tennessee law acknowledges that more than 1 In state court, every plaintiff brought a THRA claim and Sanderson alone alleged a TPPA and ETREPA claim. Yet in their opening complaint here, the Captains brought a THRA and TPPA claim, and Sanderson was not even a plaintiff. Sanderson was a named plaintiff in the first amended complaint, but there all four raised a THRA, TPPA, and ETREPA claim. And in the operative pleading, all four make THRA and TPPA claims, and Sanderson alone makes an ETREPA claim. -8- No. 21-5301, Stewart, et al. v. Knox County, Tenn., et al. one “action” arising out of “a common nucleus of operative facts” can exist concurrently in state and federal court—in fact, it prohibits them. See Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-3-104(a)(1)(C). Despite their assertions to the contrary, Plaintiffs filed two actions here, and each was subject to its own statutes of limitation. No statute or rule spares their claims from the applicable statutes of limitation. Nor are we persuaded by Plaintiffs’ miscellaneous policy arguments for allowing their state-law claims to proceed. If they sought a speedy determination on the merits, why file a second lawsuit? With right-to-sue letters in hand, Plaintiffs “could have folded” their federal claims into the “action in state court” under Tennessee’s rule governing the amendment of complaints. See Heyliger v. State Univ. & Comm. Coll. Sys. of Tenn., 126 F.3d 849, 855–56 (6th Cir. 1997). Or if Plaintiffs preferred to bring their claims in federal court, why not start there? Right-to-sue letters are not a jurisdictional requirement, Truitt v. County of Wayne, 148 F.3d 644, 646 (6th Cir. 1998), and nothing prevented Plaintiffs from suing in federal court and seeking a stay while the EEOC investigated their charges. Or, had they amended their state-court complaint, they still could have ended up in federal court had the defendants opted to remove the case. See 28 U.S.C. § 1441(a). These questions go unanswered in Plaintiffs’ briefs. Instead, they ask that we craft a rule allowing state-court plaintiffs to avoid statutes of limitation when they decide, midcourse, that they would rather be litigating in federal court. We decline. One final note. As the above explains, we think Tennessee law provides a straightforward answer to Plaintiffs’ challenge. They still ask us to certify the question to the Tennessee Supreme Court. To do so we must find a “determinative” question of Tennessee law on which “there is no controlling precedent” from the Tennessee Supreme Court. Tenn. Sup. Ct. R. 23, § 1. But when we find “a reasonable clear and principled course” to follow, we disfavor certifying even unsettled -9- No. 21-5301, Stewart, et al. v. Knox County, Tenn., et al. questions. Pennington v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 553 F.3d 447, 450 (6th Cir. 2009). We also prefer when litigants ask the district court to certify a question before it rules, rather than waiting to receive “an unfavorable ruling.” Town of Smyrna v. Mun. Gas Auth. of Ga., 723 F.3d 640, 649 (6th Cir. 2013) (citation omitted). Tennessee law already answers Plaintiffs’ question. But even if it did not, the other factors above would counsel against certifying the question to the Tennessee Supreme Court. So we will deny Plaintiffs’ motion.