Opinion ID: 787069
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Challenges to the Parties

Text: 29 As a threshold matter, the state raises several issues concerning whether this suit can go forward at all, or can go forward only in a truncated form, because the parties are not properly before the court. The contentions are: (1) neither plaintiff has standing to challenge the statute; (2) one of the two defendants, Idaho's attorney general, is not a proper defendant to any claim because he does not enforce the challenged law; and (3) the other defendant, the Ada County prosecutor, is not involved in the administration of the judicial bypass provision and so is only properly a defendant for some of the claims. The district court held that Weyhrich had standing to challenge the entire statute; that, because Weyhrich had standing, there was no need to decide Planned Parenthood's right to sue; and that both defendants were proper. We review those determinations de novo. Gospel Missions of Am. v. City of Los Angeles, 328 F.3d 548, 553 (9th Cir.2003).
30 A plaintiff has standing to sue under Article III of the Constitution only when he can allege (1) an actual or imminent, concrete and particularized injury in fact, (2) causally connected to the defendants' conduct, that (3) will likely (and not merely speculative[ly]) be redressed by a favorable judgment. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992). 31 Weyhrich has stated his clear intention to continue to perform abortions for his patients, of whom some are minors. He has alleged a sufficiently concrete and imminent injury — possible prosecution and imprisonment — to challenge the provisions that ban abortion providers from performing abortions on minors except in accord with the statutory requirements. See Diamond v. Charles, 476 U.S. 54, 65, 106 S.Ct. 1697, 90 L.Ed.2d 48 (1986) (A physician has standing to challenge an abortion law that poses for him a threat of criminal prosecution.). Whether he continues to perform abortions subject to the statute, desists from performing them to avoid the statute's penalties, or violates the statute so as to practice his profession in accord with his medical judgment, his liberty will be concretely affected. See Babbitt v. United Farm Workers Nat'l Union, 442 U.S. 289, 298, 99 S.Ct. 2301, 60 L.Ed.2d 895 (1979) ([O]ne does not have to await the consummation of threatened injury to obtain preventive relief. If the injury is certainly impending that is enough. (internal quotation marks omitted)); Doe v. Bolton, 410 U.S. 179, 188, 93 S.Ct. 739, 35 L.Ed.2d 201 (1973) (stating that abortion providers should not be required to await and undergo a criminal prosecution as the sole means of seeking relief). Weyhrich need not claim a specific intent to violate the statute. See California Pro-Life Council, Inc. v. Getman, 328 F.3d 1088, 1094-95 (9th Cir.2003) (allowing a challenge where plaintiff had a reasonable fear a statute would be enforced against it if it engaged in certain conduct). 32 Weyhrich's potential punishment for violating the parental consent statute extends to all of the challenged provisions. As his complaint notes, should any aspect of the bypass provisions, including those not on their face directed toward physicians, prevent or chill a minor from seeking an abortion she would otherwise seek, she will not seek his care. By discouraging potential patients from engaging his services, these provisions could result in a primary injury to Weyhrich. For example, should a minor desiring an abortion decline to seek a bypass for fear that her boyfriend will be sent to prison if a judge learns that the boyfriend impregnated her, she may never consult Weyhrich and never obtain a procedure Weyhrich would recommend as medically indicated. Weyhrich's own interests, both financial and professional, in practicing medicine pursuant to his best medical judgment, are thus affected by a statutory provision that he alleges violates the federal constitutional rights of potential abortion patients. Such a threatened injury in fact is neither speculative nor inchoate. Weyhrich therefore has Article III standing to raise each of his challenges. 33 As a prudential matter, even when a plaintiff has Article III standing, we ordinarily do not allow third parties to litigate on the basis of the rights of others. See Coalition of Clergy, Lawyers, & Professors v. Bush, 310 F.3d 1153, 1163 (9th Cir.2002), cert. denied, 538 U.S. 1031, 123 S.Ct. 2073, 155 L.Ed.2d 1060 (2003). Since at least Singleton v. Wulff, however, it has been held repeatedly that physicians may acquire jus tertii standing to assert their patients' due process rights in facial challenges to abortion laws. 428 U.S. 106, 117-18, 96 S.Ct. 2868, 49 L.Ed.2d 826 (1976) (plurality opinion) ([I]t generally is appropriate to allow a physician to assert the rights of women patients as against governmental interference with the abortion decision....); cf. Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, 481, 85 S.Ct. 1678, 14 L.Ed.2d 510 (1965) (allowing physician to assert privacy rights of patients because of the confidential nature of the relationship and because the rights of the latter were likely to be diluted or adversely affected if they could not be asserted by the physician). Indeed, physicians and clinics performing abortions are routinely recognized as having standing to bring broad facial challenges to abortion statutes. See, e.g., City of Akron v. Akron Ctr. for Reprod. Health, 462 U.S. 416, 440 n. 30, 103 S.Ct. 2481, 76 L.Ed.2d 687 (1983) ( Akron I ), overruled on other grounds by Casey, 505 U.S. at 882, 112 S.Ct. 2791; Planned Parenthood of Cent. Mo. v. Danforth, 428 U.S. 52, 62 & n. 2, 96 S.Ct. 2831, 49 L.Ed.2d 788 (1976); Planned Parenthood of S. Ariz. v. Lawall, 180 F.3d 1022, amended by 193 F.3d 1042 (9th Cir.1999). We may therefore consider the constitutional arguments Weyhrich raises solely on his patients' behalf. See Singleton, 428 U.S. at 117, 96 S.Ct. 2868; Akron I, 462 U.S. at 440 n. 30, 103 S.Ct. 2481. 5
34 Planned Parenthood's standing poses different questions. Unlike Planned Parenthood affiliates in several other states who have been found to have standing to challenge abortion regulations, see, e.g., Planned Parenthood of Wis. v. Doyle, 162 F.3d 463, 465 (7th Cir.1998), the Idaho chapter does not provide abortion services directly. Instead, the Idaho chapter provides only counseling, contraceptive, and referral services. 35 Idaho contends that Planned Parenthood therefore lacks standing. Unlike Weyhrich, Planned Parenthood's conduct is not threatened by enforcement of the statute, and it can, under Idaho law, have no abortion patients whose interests it may espouse. If Planned Parenthood can enunciate no more than an ideological interest in seeing the statute invalidated, it lacks standing to challenge it. Id. 36 On appeal, Planned Parenthood articulates no independent theory for its standing. It instead piggybacks on Weyhrich, defending the district court's conclusion that because Planned Parenthood shares an attorney with Weyhrich, its presence in the suit poses no threat of enhanced legal fees, and that because Weyhrich has standing, we need not decide whether Planned Parenthood may maintain this suit. 37 We agree that there is no reason to address Planned Parenthood's standing. Where the legal issues on appeal are fairly raised by one plaintiff [who] had standing to bring the suit, the court need not consider the standing of the other plaintiffs. Laub v. U.S. Dep't of the Interior, 342 F.3d 1080, 1086 (9th Cir.2003) (citing and explaining Watt v. Energy Action Educ. Found., 454 U.S. 151, 160, 102 S.Ct. 205, 70 L.Ed.2d 309 (1981), and Arlington Heights v. Metro. Housing Dev. Corp., 429 U.S. 252, 264 & n. 9, 97 S.Ct. 555, 50 L.Ed.2d 450 (1977)); Guam Soc'y of Obstetricians & Gynecologists v. Ada, 962 F.2d 1366, 1369 (9th Cir.1992); see also Planned Parenthood of Cent. N.J. v. Farmer, 220 F.3d 127, 147 n. 10 (3d Cir.2000). As our jurisdiction and our duty to answer the questions raised here would be unaffected by the resolution of Idaho's challenge to Planned Parenthood's standing, we decline to decide the issue. 6 38
39 The Idaho attorney general denies having authority to enforce any part of the statute. The Ada County prosecutor acknowledges, correctly, that he is a proper defendant with regard to those provisions creating the potential for prosecution, see Idaho Code § 31-2604(2) (2003), but denies any involvement in judicial bypass proceedings or the administrative penalties that the Idaho Board of Medicine can impose under section 18-605(2). 40 Whether these officials are, in their official capacities, proper defendants in the suit is really the common denominator of two separate inquiries: first, whether there is the requisite causal connection between their responsibilities and any injury that the plaintiffs might suffer, such that relief against the defendants would provide redress, see Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560, 112 S.Ct. 2130; Valley Forge Christian Coll. v. Ams. United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 472, 102 S.Ct. 752, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982); and second, whether our jurisdiction over the defendants is proper under the doctrine of Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 157, 28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714 (1908), which requires some connection between a named state officer and enforcement of a challenged state law. See Los Angeles County Bar Ass'n v. Eu, 979 F.2d 697, 704 (9th Cir.1992). This connection must be fairly direct; a generalized duty to enforce state law or general supervisory power over the persons responsible for enforcing the challenged provision will not subject an official to suit. Id. 41 State attorneys general are not invariably proper defendants in challenges to state criminal laws. Where an attorney general cannot direct, in a binding fashion, the prosecutorial activities of the officers who actually enforce the law or bring his own prosecution, he may not be a proper defendant. See, e.g., Long v. Van de Kamp, 961 F.2d 151, 152 (9th Cir.1992) (doubting that the general supervisory powers of the California attorney general present a sufficient connection to the enforcement of a search and seizure statute); S. Pac. Transp. Co. v. Brown, 651 F.2d 613, 614 (9th Cir.1980) (holding that the Oregon attorney general, who had the power to consult with, advise, and direct the district attorneys, had an insufficient connection to the challenged statute, because his advice to prosecutors that the statute was unconstitutional could not bind them and he could not bring a prosecution on his own). 42 Under Idaho law, the attorney general may assist county prosecutors in a collaborative effort, but may not assert[ ] dominion and control over prosecutions against the county prosecutor's wishes. Newman v. Lance, 129 Idaho 98, 922 P.2d 395, 399-401 (1996); see also Idaho Code § 67-1401(7). 7 Idaho's governor may also direct the attorney general to assist a local prosecutor. Id. § 67-802(7). 43 However, and determinatively here, unless the county prosecutor objects, [t]he attorney general may, in his assistance, do every act that the county attorney can perform. Newman, 922 P.2d at 399 (quoting State v. Taylor, 59 Idaho 724, 87 P.2d 454, 457 (1939)) (emphasis added). 8 That is, the attorney general may in effect deputize himself (or be deputized by the governor) to stand in the role of a county prosecutor, and in that role exercise the same power to enforce the statute the prosecutor would have. That power demonstrates the requisite causal connection for standing purposes. An injunction against the attorney general could redress plaintiffs' alleged injuries, just as an injunction against the Ada County prosecutor could. For the same reasons, both defendants are properly named under Ex parte Young with regard to the exposure to the risk of prosecution created by section 18-605, for noncompliance with the parental consent provisions of section 18-609A. 44 In the circumstances of this case, we need not decide whether the two are proper defendants for each and every claim appellants make, because, under our ensuing analysis, a defect involving the parental consent provisions is fatal to the entire statute. Having decided that the suit by Weyhrich against the county prosecutor and the attorney general presents a justiciable case or controversy regarding the outcome-determinative facet of the statute, we turn to the merits now.