Opinion ID: 221719
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Guthrie's claims based upon the Oklahoma constitution

Text: Ordinarily, this court must resolve jurisdictional issues, such as sovereign immunity and standing, before addressing the merits of the claim, even if the [jurisdictional] question[s] [a]re difficult and we could easily decide the merits. Starkey ex rel. A.B. v. Boulder Cnty. Soc. Servs., 569 F.3d 1244, 1259 (10th Cir.2009); see also id. at 1259-60; Carolina Cas. Ins. Co. v. Pinnacol Assurance, 425 F.3d 921, 923-24, 927-28 (10th Cir.2005). But the Supreme Court, in Steel Co. v. Citizens for a Better Environment, 523 U.S. 83, 98-100, 118 S.Ct. 1003, 140 L.Ed.2d 210 (1998), recognized an exception to the general rule  that jurisdiction must be established before turning to the merits.... Occasionally a court may rule that a party loses on the merits without first establishing jurisdiction because the merits have already been decided in the court's resolution of a claim over which it did have jurisdiction. In that circumstance, resolution of the merits is `foreordained,' so the court is not producing an advisory opinion. Rather, it is merely parroting a prior decision. Such parroting is not an improper aggrandizement of power by the court. The court is not overreaching to decide an issue; after all, the issue has already been decided. Starkey, 569 F.3d at 1260 (citation omitted). That exception applies here to Guthrie's claims asserted against the USDA based upon the asserted conflict between § 1926(b) and the Oklahoma Constitution. The Oklahoma Supreme Court, in resolving our certified question raised by Logan-1's § 1926(b) claims against Guthrie, over which we clearly have jurisdiction, rejected the merits of that argument. The Oklahoma Supreme Court's decision also resolves the merits of Guthrie's third-party claims based on the same theory. We therefore need not address whether the United States has waived its sovereign immunity as to these claims, nor do we need to decide whether Guthrie has standing to assert them. Instead, we affirm the district court's dismissal of Guthrie's claims against the USDA which are based upon the alleged § 1926(b)/Oklahoma Constitution conflict, but we do so based on these claims' merit, or more precisely on their lack of merit. [8] We, therefore, remand these claims to the district court with instructions to dismiss them with prejudice. [9]