Opinion ID: 474537
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Organizations

Text: 32 Chinese for Affirmative Action is a voluntary membership group that seeks to protect the rights of Chinese-Americans. It monitors compliance with bilingual election requirements and encourages Asian-Americans to register and to vote. The Hispanic Coalition for Human Rights is an association of Hispanic organizations and persons of Mexican descent, with a goal of securing the civil rights of Hispanics. It encourages Hispanic Americans to register and to vote, and advises them on the availability of bilingual election materials. The San Francisco Latino Voter Registration Education Project is a coalition of Hispanic groups that was conducting a voter education and registration drive at the time of the investigation. 33 An association-plaintiff has standing to seek redress of direct injury to the association itself. See Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 40, 96 S.Ct. 1917, 1925, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976); Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 511, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 2211, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975); NAACP v. Button, 371 U.S. 415, 428, 83 S.Ct. 328, 335, 9 L.Ed.2d 405 (1963). Under certain circumstances, an association may also be entitled to seek redress for injury to its members. See, e.g., Hunt v. Washington State Apple Advertising Commission, 432 U.S. 333, 343, 97 S.Ct. 2434, 2441, 53 L.Ed.2d 383 (1977); Simon, 426 U.S. at 40, 96 S.Ct. at 1925; Warth, 422 U.S. at 511, 95 S.Ct. at 2211; Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727, 739, 92 S.Ct. 1361, 1368, 31 L.Ed.2d 636 (1972). 34 In Hunt, the Supreme Court established a three-part test to determine whether an association has standing: (1) either the group or its members must have suffered some direct, cognizable injury; (2) the interests the group seeks to protect must be germane to the organization's purpose; and (3) the claim or relief sought must not require the participation of the individual members in the suit. 432 U.S. at 343, 97 S.Ct. at 2441. A mere abstract concern, Simon, 426 U.S. at 40, 96 S.Ct. at 1925, or special interest in a public issue, Sierra Club, 405 U.S. at 739, 92 S.Ct. at 1368, is legally insufficient to confer standing. 35 First, the Organizations contend that they have been injured in two ways. The investigators questioned foreign voters requesting bilingual ballots concerning who had assisted them in registering. The Organizations assert that the investigation has discouraged its members from participating in their associational activities, because they now fear that participation in the program to register voters will make them targets of a criminal investigation. Therefore, the Organizations contend that the investigation cast a pall over their associational activities in violation of their first amendment rights. Moreover, while Russoniello stated that the federal government would not prosecute illegally registered voters, he raised the possibility that the state might prosecute them under state law. Thus, by discouraging their members from participating in the voter registration drives, and by discouraging citizens from registering to vote, the investigation directly undermined the Organizations' voter education and registration efforts. 36 The Organizations also assert that both they and their members are threatened with possible prosecution for violations of the Voting Rights Act. They contend that they are undoubtedly the targets of Russoniello's investigation and could be charged with improperly influencing ineligible persons to register. 37 We conclude that the Organizations' allegations raise sufficient claims of potential direct injury to both themselves and their members. In the case before us, the Organizations' voter education and registration efforts are unquestionably protected from unwarranted interference by prosecutorial officials; whether the investigation actually involved any unwarranted intrusions into their associational activities affects the merits of their claim, not their standing. Moreover, as stated above, members who participated in the Organizations' counseling activities and voter registration drives are potential targets of future prosecutions. 38 Second, we conclude that the interests the Organizations seek to protect are germane to their purposes. See Hunt, 432 U.S. at 343, 97 S.Ct. at 2441. The Organizations' activities are centered on voter education and registration. Such activities are directly related to the individual member's interests in counseling and registering voters free from unwarranted governmental intrusions. 39 Third, the relief sought by the Organizations does not require the participation of individual members in the suit. See id. The principal claims are for injunctive and declaratory relief; such equitable relief is particularly suited for group representation. See Warth, 422 U.S. at 515, 95 S.Ct. at 2213. Thus, we conclude that the Organizations have standing to sue for equitable relief.