Opinion ID: 77840
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Availability of an Individual Capacity Suit for Damages Under RLUIPA

Text: The distinction between an individual capacity suitalso referred to as a personal capacity suitand an official capacity suit is a significant one. When a plaintiff sues a municipal officer in the officer's individual capacity for alleged [] violations, the plaintiff seeks money damages directly from the individual officer. Busby v. City of Orlando, 931 F.2d 764, 772 (11th Cir.1991) (citation omitted). In contrast, an official capacity suit is, essentially, pleading an action against the entity of which an officer is an agent. Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159, 165, 105 S.Ct. 3099, 3105, 87 L.Ed.2d 114 (1985) (citation and quotations omitted). Moreover, in an individual capacity suit, a defendant may, depending on his position, be able to assert personal immunity defenses, such as qualified immunity. Id. at 166-67, 105 S.Ct. at 3105. [8] In contrast, in an official capacity action, the only immunities that can be claimed . . . are forms of sovereign immunity that the entity, qua entity, may possess, such as the Eleventh Amendment. Id. at 167, 105 S.Ct. at 3106. In this case, Smith's RLUIPA action seeks damages from the defendant-appellees both in their individual and official capacities. The case law on RLUIPA, however, is not clear as to whether the statute permits a suit for monetary damages against government employee defendants in their individual capacities. Indeed, the district courts have been split on this question. Compare Agrawal v. Briley, No. 02-C-6807, 2006 WL 3523750, at -10 (N.D.Ill. Dec. 6, 2006) (permitting an individual capacity suit for monetary damages under RLUIPA) and Orafan v. Goord, No. 00CU2022 (LEK/RFT), 2003 WL 21972735, at  (N.D.N.Y. Aug.11, 2003) (stating that [c]learly [RLUIPA] contemplates individual liability) with Hammons v. Jones, No. 00-CV-0143-CVE-SAJ, 2006 WL 353448, at  (N.D.Ok. Feb. 14, 2006) (RLUIPA only allows for official capacity actions) and Hale O Kaula Church v. Maui Planning Comm'n, 229 F.Supp.2d 1056, 1067 (D.Haw.2002) (stating that RLUIPA does not appear to allow causes of action against individuals). RLUIPA's section 3 provides that [a] person may assert a violation of this chapter as a claim . . . in a judicial proceeding and obtain appropriate relief against a government. 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc-2(a). The term government is defined as: (i) a State, county, municipality, or other governmental entity created under the authority of a State; (ii) a branch, department, agency, instrumentality, or official of an entity listed in clause; and (iii) any other person acting under color of State law. Id. at § 2000cc-5. Smith cites to this language, especially the latter references to [an] official of an entity and to any other person acting under color of state law, id., as evidence that RLUIPA was designed to provide for monetary relief from individual governmental employees, in addition to permitting a recovery from the governmental entity itself. Smith contends that the phrase under color of state law in RLUIPA is similar to the under color of language that appears in 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which creates a cause of action against any person who, while acting under color of any statute ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State, causes the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution. Just as the latter provides for an action against individual government employees for damages, argues Smith, so too should the former. A flaw with this argument, however, is that section 3 of RLUIPA was enacted pursuant to Congress' Spending Power under Article I of the Constitution; RLUIPA [s]ection 3 applies when the substantial burden on religious exercise is imposed in a program or activity that receives federal financial assistance. Cutter, 544 U.S. at 716, 125 S.Ct. at 2118 (alterations and internal quotations omitted). Our court, in addressing other federal statutes that emanate directly from Congress' Spending Powerthat is, federal statutes that condition a state's receipt of federal funding on the state's adherence to certain conditionshas repeatedly held that Congress cannot use its Spending Power to subject a non-recipient of federal funds, including a state official acting his or her individual capacity, to private liability for monetary damages. See, e.g., Hartley v. Parnell, 193 F.3d 1263, 1270 (11th Cir.1999) (stating that individual school officials cannot be held liable under Title IX, because a Title IX claim can only be brought against the grant recipient). As we discuss below, this fact strongly militates against a recognition of a private action against an individual capacity defendant for monetary damages. The Spending Clause of the Constitution provides, in pertinent part, that Congress shall have the Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States. U.S. CONST. art I., § 8, cl. 1. Pursuant to this authority, the Supreme Court has held that Congress may attach conditions on the receipt of federal funds and may further its broad policy objectives by conditioning receipt of federal moneys upon compliance by the recipient with federal statutory and administrative directives. South Dakota v. Dole, 483 U.S. 203, 206, 107 S.Ct. 2793, 2795-96, 97 L.Ed.2d 171 (1987) (citation and quotations omitted). Congress' Spending legislation typically grants federal funds to state institutions in exchange for the state's compliance with certain conditions. Such legislation has been described as creating a contract between the federal government and the state that receives the federal funds. See Floyd v. Waiters, 133 F.3d 786, 789 (11th Cir.1998) (citation omitted), vacated on other grounds, 525 U.S. 802, 119 S.Ct. 33, 142 L.Ed.2d 25, reinstated at 171 F.3d 1264 (11th Cir.1999). As a result, [t]he legitimacy of Congress' power to legislate under the spending power [] rests on whether the State voluntarily and knowingly accept[ed] the terms of the `contract.' Pennhurst State Sch. & Hosp. v. Halderman, 451 U.S. 1, 17, 101 S.Ct. 1531, 1540, 67 L.Ed.2d 694 (1981) (citations omitted). Additionally, pursuant to this arrangement, Congress may create a funding contract that conditions the award of federal monies to the state's waiver of sovereign immunity to private lawsuits seeking to enforce the legislation. See, e.g., Franklin, 503 U.S. at 74-75, 112 S.Ct. at 1037 (finding that the Spending Power permitted Congress to create a private cause of action against a state institution for a violation of Title IX). Congress has enacted a number of laws creating a private action in the event the federal funds recipient fails to adhere to the conditions of the contractmost notably Title IX, which allows for a private cause of action when an education program. . . receiving Federal financial assistance subjects a person to discrimination on the basis of sex. 20 U.S.C. § 1681(a). With Title IX, Congress effectively condition[ed] an offer of federal funding on a promise by the recipient not to discriminate, in what amounts essentially to a contract between the Government and the recipient of funds. Gebser v. Lago Vista Indep. Sch. Dist., 524 U.S. 274, 286, 118 S.Ct. 1989, 1997, 141 L.Ed.2d 277 (1998) (citations omitted). Courts, however, in addressing Title IX, have placed limits on its scope, holding that the statute does not go so far as to allow a private cause of action against an defendant in his individual capacity, since an individual defendant is not the recipient of the federal funds. See Floyd, 133 F.3d at 789 (Because the contracting party is the grant-receiving local school district, a Title IX claim can only be brought against a grant recipient . . . and not an individual.) (citation, quotations, and alterations omitted). In other words, the courts have consistently recognized the limited reach of Congress' Spending Power legislation, concluding that statutes passed under the Spending Clause may, as a condition of funding, subject the grant recipient to liability in a private cause of action, but that the Spending Power cannot be used to subject individual defendants, such as state employees, to individual liability in a private cause of action. See, e.g., id. ; Hartley, 193 F.3d 1263, 1270 (same); Rosa H. v. San Elizario Indep. Sch. Dist., 106 F.3d 648, 654 (5th Cir.1997) (stating that Title IX does not instruct courts to impose liability based on anything other than the acts of the recipients of federal funds and finding that [w]hen the school board accepted federal funds, it agreed not to discriminate on the basis of sex, but that it is unlikely that it further agreed to suffer liability whenever its employees discriminate on the basis of sex); see also Jennings v. Univ. of N.C. at Chapel Hill, 444 F.3d 255, 268 n. 9 (4th Cir.2006), rev'd on other grounds, 482 F.3d 686 (2007) ( en banc ), pet. for cert. filed, (U.S. July 9, 2007) (No. 07-43) (Title IX was enacted pursuant to Congress' spending power and prohibits discriminatory acts by funding recipients. Because school officials are not funding recipients under Title IX, school officials may not be sued in their individual capacities under Title IX.). Put simply, the federal circuits are in agreement that Title IX, because of its nature as Spending Power legislation, does not authorize suits against public officials in their individual capacities. Similar to Title IX, section 3 of RLUIPA derives from Congress' power under the Spending Clause. See 42 U.S.C. 2000cc-1(b) (stating that section 3 applies in any case where the substantial burden is imposed in a program or activity that receives Federal financial assistance); Cutter, 544 U.S. at 716, 125 S.Ct. at 2119. [9] In Benning v. Georgia, in reviewing the constitutionality of section 3 of RLUIPA, we concluded that section 3 constituted a valid exercise of Congress' Spending Power. See 391 F.3d at 1306. In light of this Spending Clause authority, Congress may, under RLUIPA, award federal funds to state prison institutions who, as a condition of receiving federal funds, agree not to impose a substantial burden on the religious exercise of its prisoners. 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc-1(a). It is much less clear, however, whether section 3 of RLUIPA should be construed as further providing a cause of action against individual defendants, such as the ADOC Committee members who have been sued in their individual capacities in this case. In light of our jurisprudence construing Congress' Spending Power in other settings, it is clear that the contracting party in the RLUIPA context is the state prison institution that receives federal funds; put another way, these institutions are the grant recipients that agree to be amenable to suit as a condition to receiving fundsbut their individual employees are not recipients of federal funding as we have construed that term. See Floyd, 133 F.3d at 789. [10] We agree that a construction of RLUIPA providing for individual liability raises substantial constitutional concerns. Consequently, we conclude that section 3 of RLUIPAa provision that derives from Congress' Spending Powercannot be construed as creating a private action against individual defendants for monetary damages. See id. Thus, Smith is not entitled to pursue a claim against these defendant-appellees in their individual capacities under section 3 of RLUIPA. [11]