Opinion ID: 202664
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Residency Requirements.

Text: 38 The plaintiffs' first line of attack is directed at section 3-5-10. A liquor-license residency requirement has been in force in Rhode Island since 1933 (albeit with modifications over time). With exceptions not relevant here, the current version of the Rhode Island law provides that Class A package store licenses are to be issued only to . . . residents of this state. R.I. Gen. Laws § 3-5-10(a)(1). Relatedly, no such license shall be issued to [a] corporation unless each officer, director or stockholder is a suitable person to hold a license. Id. § 3-5-10(b)(1). 3 39 These requirements, the plaintiffs contend, violate the dormant commerce clause because they discriminate on their face against out-of-state residents. The district court did not reach the merits of this contention. Rather, the court ruled that the plaintiffs lacked standing to contest the residency requirements. It based this ruling on its findings (i) that the Retail Stores were Rhode Island entities, each of which already possessed a Class A license; (ii) that W & S, a Rhode Island corporation, had never expressed an interest in obtaining a license; and (iii) that Haronian, also a Rhode Islander, had displayed a similar indifference to acquiring a Class A license. Given these facts, the plaintiffs had failed to demonstrate any injury in fact stemming from section 3-5-10's residency requirements. See Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992) (describing the requirements for Article III standing); Pagán v. Calderón, 448 F.3d 16, 26-27 (1st Cir.2006) (similar). 40 On appeal, the plaintiffs do not challenge the district court's findings of fact. They do, however, argue that as a legal matter the district court took too crabbed a view of standing. They urge us to apply the doctrine that, under the dormant commerce clause, cognizable injury is not restricted to those members of the affected class against whom states . . . ultimately discriminate. Houlton Citizens' Coal. v. Town of Houlton, 175 F.3d 178, 183 (1st Cir.1999) (citing Gen. Motors Corp. v. Tracy, 519 U.S. 278, 286, 117 S.Ct. 811, 136 L.Ed.2d 761 (1997)). The plaintiffs insist that this doctrine enables them to challenge a law that violates the dormant commerce clause even though the law's harmful effects on them are only indirect. 41 We have no quarrel with the abstract statements of law set forth in Houlton. But context is all-important, and those statements are of no help to the plaintiffs in the circumstances of this case. Here, significantly, the plaintiffs have failed to show any cognizable harm, direct or indirect, attributable to the residency requirements of section 3-5-10. We explain briefly. 42 The injuries of which the plaintiffs complain arise in consequence of Rhode Island's ban on franchise and chain-store arrangements, not in consequence of the residency requirements per se. After all, the plaintiffs are all Rhode Island residents and, if favoritism exists, none of them could conceivably have suffered any cognizable harm as a result of it. This deficiency distinguishes the plaintiffs' case from cases like Houlton in which claimants have succeeded in making out the rudiments of standing. See, e.g., Gen. Motors, 519 U.S. at 286-87, 117 S.Ct. 811; Bacchus Imports, Ltd. v. Dias, 468 U.S. 263, 267, 104 S.Ct. 3049, 82 L.Ed.2d 200 (1984); Alliance of Auto. Mfrs., 430 F.3d at 37; Houlton Citizens' Coal., 175 F.3d at 183. Consequently, we uphold the district court's determination that the plaintiffs lack standing to challenge the residency requirements for Class A liquor licensees.