Opinion ID: 431987
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Retroactivity of Rose v. Lundy

Text: 12 We are aware that almost all of the circuits have applied Rose v. Lundy retroactively. See, e.g., Bowen v. Tennessee, 698 F.2d 241, 242-43 (6th Cir.1983) (en banc); Burns v. Estelle, 695 F.2d 847, 851-52 & n. 2 (5th Cir.1983); Gulliver v. Dalsheim, 687 F.2d 655, 657 & n. 3 (2d Cir.1982); Harding v. North Carolina, 683 F.2d 850, 851-52 (4th Cir.1982); Slotnick v. O'Lone, 683 F.2d 60, 61 (3d Cir.1982), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 103 S.Ct. 1206, 75 L.Ed.2d 447 (1983); Jones v. Hess, 681 F.2d 688, 695 & n. 9 (10th Cir.1982); United States ex rel. Clauser v. Shadid, 677 F.2d 591, 593 (7th Cir.1982). Contra Johnson v. Balkcom, 695 F.2d 1320, 1322 (11th Cir.1983); Niziolek v. Ashe, 694 F.2d 282, 285-87 (1st Cir.1982). 6 We also are aware that this circuit has mixed opinions on the subject. Compare Dunn v. Wyrick, 679 F.2d 731, 733 (8th Cir.1982) (Rose v. Lundy will not be applied to habeas corpus petitions where exhausted claims have been fully litigated and decided in the federal district court prior to the Rose v. Lundy decision), and Romano v. Wyrick, 681 F.2d 555, 556 & n. 3 (8th Cir.1982) (mixed petition need not be dismissed in its entirety), with Stewart v. Parratt, 682 F.2d 757, 758 (8th Cir.1982) (remanding case to district court to reconsider in light of Rose v. Lundy). 13 This court's most recent opinion on the effect of Rose v. Lundy was Richards v. Solem, 693 F.2d 760, 763-64 (8th Cir.1982), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 103 S.Ct. 1898, 77 L.Ed.2d 286 (1983). In Richards, the court chose to follow Dunn for three reasons: (1) Dunn was directly on point because it involved a district court judgment that denied the writ; (2) it felt Dunn was persuasive in arguing that retroactive application of the exhaustion requirement would waste judicial resources; and (3) non-retroactive application of Rose v. Lundy to the petition before it comported with the comity purpose of the total exhaustion rule because the federal district court and circuit courts in Richards agreed with the state courts that post-conviction relief should be denied. See also Royal v. Wyrick, 694 F.2d 525, 527 n. 2 (8th Cir.1982). 14 In following Dunn, the Richards panel stated that three post-Rose v. Lundy United States Supreme Court orders did not require a different result. Richards, 693 F.2d at 764. All three orders involved cases in which mixed habeas petitions were decided on the merits by the federal district and circuit courts before Rose v. Lundy was handed down. In two of these orders, Duckworth v. Cowell, 455 U.S. 996, 102 S.Ct. 1626, 71 L.Ed.2d 858 (1982), and Rodriquez v. Harris, 455 U.S. 997, 102 S.Ct. 1627, 71 L.Ed.2d 858 (1982), the Court granted certiorari, vacated the judgment, and remanded the case to the court of appeals with instructions to direct the district court to dismiss the petition for writ of habeas corpus. In the third case, Bergman v. Burton, 456 U.S. 953, 102 S.Ct. 2026, 72 L.Ed.2d 478 (1982) (order), the Court vacated the judgment and remanded the case to the court of appeals for further consideration in light of Rose v. Lundy. The Supreme Court's orders in Duckworth and Rodriquez, which direct the lower courts to apply the total exhaustion rule to cases decided before Rose v. Lundy, permit no other conclusion than that the Supreme Court is applying Rose v. Lundy retroactively. 7 15 The Richards panel, however, distinguished these cases because they all involved lower federal court decisions which granted the writ of habeas corpus, while in Richards, the writ was denied. The reasoning implicit in this distinction is that the failure to retroactively apply the total exhaustion rule to cases that granted the writ would create the kind of federal-state friction assailed in Rose v. Lundy, yet no such friction would be generated when the federal court agrees with the state courts in denying post-conviction relief. Thus, while all the reasons militating against the total exhaustion rule are present in cases in which the federal court has already agreed with the state courts on the merits, none of the purposes justifying the total exhaustion rule would be served by retroactively applying Rose v. Lundy to such cases. 16 This distinction has the force of logic behind it, but it overlooks the fact that both the district court and the court of appeals in Rodriquez denied the petition for writ of habeas corpus. See Rodriquez v. Harris, No. 79-CIV-4177 (S.D.N.Y. July 9, 1980) (order adopting magistrate's recommendation to deny the writ), aff'd mem., 659 F.2d 1062 (2d Cir.1981). The Supreme Court's order that the total exhaustion rule must be applied even to a lower court's pre-Rose v. Lundy denial of a mixed habeas petition shows that it is not up to the courts of appeals to re-balance federal-state comity against conservation of judicial resources. That balance was struck in Rose v. Lundy. As the Third Circuit recently said in holding that Rose v. Lundy must be applied retroactively, we are not free to consider whether the burdens imposed by the Rose v. Lundy rule will be commensurate with the benefits articulated in its support by the Supreme Court. Slotnick v. O'Lone, 683 F.2d at 61. We now conclude, en banc, that Rose v. Lundy must be applied retroactively. 17 In his federal appellate brief, Graham requests that should we find any of his claims to be unexhausted, we should summarily dismiss the unexhausted claims as a means of complying with the total exhaustion rule. Appellee's Brief at 29-30. Graham has filed an affidavit in this court and in the district court below waiving any claims raised in his petition which this court finds to be unexhausted for purposes of Rose v. Lundy. This procedure is functionally equivalent to Justice O'Connor's suggestion in Rose v. Lundy that a habeas petitioner can always amend the petition to delete the unexhausted claims, rather than returning to state court to exhaust all of his claims. 455 U.S. at 520, 102 S.Ct. at 1204. It has been adopted by this and other circuits. Stewart v. Parratt, 682 F.2d at 758. See Rock v. Coombe, 694 F.2d 908 (2d Cir.1982), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 103 S.Ct. 1773, 76 L.Ed.2d 345 (1983); Guthrie v. Warden, 683 F.2d 820, 821 n. 1 (4th Cir.1982). Contra Bowen v. Tennessee, 698 F.2d at 245-46. We will adopt this procedure also and accept Graham's waiver of issues 5, 6, 9, 10, 11, 14 and 15. Thus, Graham's petition, as amended, only contains exhausted claims. 18