Opinion ID: 391158
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: HRL and ERISA

Text: 17 We turn first to the question of the validity of the HRL under § 514(a) of ERISA. Although at first glance our summary affirmance in the Pervel case, discussed above, would seem to require us to find the HRL invalid, equally summary action from another quarter compels a different result. 18 After the decision below was rendered, the United States Supreme Court dismissed, for want of a substantial federal question, appeals from decisions of two state courts, each holding that ERISA § 514(a) does not preempt state laws similar to the HRL. Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Co. v. Minnesota, 444 U.S. 1041, 100 S.Ct. 725, 62 L.Ed.2d 726 (1980), dismissing appeal from 289 N.W.2d 396 (Minn.1979) (hereinafter Minnesota ); Mountain States Telephone & Telegraph Co. v. Commissioner of Labor & Industry, 445 U.S. 921, 100 S.Ct. 1304, 63 L.Ed.2d 754 (1980), dismissing appeal from 608 P.2d 1047 (Mont.1979) (hereinafter Mountain States ). The Commissioner here contends that Minnesota and Mountain States require us to hold that ERISA does not preempt the HRL, despite our contrary holding, relied on below, with respect to a comparable Connecticut statute in Pervel, supra. We agree. 19 It is well-established that Supreme Court summary affirmances and dismissals for want of a substantial federal question are judgments on the merits that bind lower courts with respect to the precise issues presented (to the Supreme Court) and necessarily decided by it in disposing of the appeal. Mandel v. Bradley, 432 U.S. 173, 176, 97 S.Ct. 2238, 2240, 53 L.Ed.2d 199 (1977) (per curiam). See also Illinois State Board of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party, 440 U.S. 173, 182-83, 99 S.Ct. 983, 989-90, 59 L.Ed.2d 230 (1979); Washington v. Confederated Bands & Tribes of the Yakima Indian Nation, 439 U.S. 463, 477-78 n.20, 99 S.Ct. 740, 749-50 n.20, 58 L.Ed.2d 740 (1979); Hicks v. Miranda, 422 U.S. 332, 95 S.Ct. 2281, 45 L.Ed.2d 223 (1975). In attempting to apply the rule resulting from such a summary decision, however, lower courts must undertake a careful analysis of the precise reach and content of the Supreme Court's action. Mandel v. Bradley, supra, 432 U.S. at 176, 97 S.Ct. at 2240 (quoting Hicks v. Miranda, supra, 422 U.S. at 345 n.14, 95 S.Ct. at 2289 n.14). Such summary dispositions affirm only the judgment of the court below and do not necessarily adopt its reasoning. Illinois State Board of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party, supra; Mandel v. Bradley, supra. Thus, a court seeking to apply such a precedent must carefully examine the appellant's jurisdictional statement in order to determine which questions the Supreme Court necessarily decided. Washington v. Yakima Indian Nation, supra; Mandel v. Bradley, supra; Hicks v. Miranda, supra. Applying this analysis to the dismissal in the Minnesota case, we conclude that it compels a holding that ERISA does not preempt the HRL. 20 In Minnesota, an employee who had been denied benefits for pregnancy-related disability sued her employer under a state law that explicitly required employers to treat pregnancy the same as other disabling conditions for purposes of disability benefits plans. The state court held that the employer's disability program violated state law, and further held that ERISA § 514(a) did not preempt the state statute. 289 N.W.2d 396. 10 In its jurisdictional statement on appeal to the Supreme Court, the employer framed the question presented as whether ERISA preempts Minnesota's effort, by means of its fair employment practice statute, to dictate the contents of (the employer's) national employee benefit plan. The jurisdictional statement as a whole presented arguments, substantially similar to those presented by the plaintiffs here, to the effect that § 514(a) preempted the Minnesota law. 21 We can see no sound reason to decline to follow Minnesota here. The state statute at issue in that case is virtually identical to the HRL. 11 Moreover, the ERISA preemption issue was squarely presented to the Supreme Court in the appeal papers, and the appeal was plainly within the Supreme Court's obligatory appellate jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1257(2) (1976). We can discern no possible basis for the Minnesota dismissal other than a holding that ERISA does not preempt a state law requiring that disability benefits plans treat pregnancy the same as other disabling conditions. Therefore, Minnesota requires us to uphold the HRL against the ERISA challenge mounted here. 22 The plaintiffs' arguments for a contrary course are unpersuasive. For the most part, plaintiffs reiterate the Supreme Court's cautionary remarks about the danger of reading summary decisions too broadly, citing, e. g., Illinois State Bd. of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party, supra, 440 U.S. at 183, 99 S.Ct. at 990. While we have recognized this danger in our own decisions, see, e. g., New York Telephone Co. v. New York State Dep't of Labor, 566 F.2d 388, 391 n.2 (2d Cir. 1977), aff'd, 440 U.S. 519, 99 S.Ct. 1328, 59 L.Ed.2d 553 (1979); In re Letourneau, 559 F.2d 892, 893 n.4 (2d Cir. 1977), our analysis has satisfied us that the issue presented in the instant case is virtually identical to that decided in Minnesota. Moreover, while it is true, as plaintiffs note, that summary actions carry less precedential weight in the Supreme Court than do decisions rendered with opinion after argument, see, e. g., Washington v. Yakima Indian Nation, supra, 439 U.S. at 476-77 n.20, 99 S.Ct. at 749-50 n.20; Edelman v. Jordan, 415 U.S. 651, 670-71, 94 S.Ct. 1347, 1359-60, 39 L.Ed.2d 662 (1974), it is also true that the privilege of disregarding even summary Supreme Court holdings rests with that court alone, and not with us. Doe v. Hodgson, 500 F.2d 1206, 1207-08 (2d Cir. 1974). 23 Plaintiffs also argue that the timing of the Minnesota dismissal weakens its precedential force. The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal in Minnesota exactly one week after it had denied certiorari in both Pervel, supra, in which we summarily struck down under ERISA a Connecticut pregnancy benefits law, and Bucyrus-Erie Co. v. Department of Industry, Labor & Human Relations, 599 F.2d 205 (7th Cir. 1979), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 1031, 100 S.Ct. 701, 62 L.Ed.2d 667 (1980), in which the Seventh Circuit, taking the opposite view, rejected an ERISA-based challenge to a similar Wisconsin statute. Because the Court let stand these divergent circuit court rulings at a time when it could easily have remanded them for further consideration in light of the forthcoming affirmance in Minnesota, plaintiffs conclude that the Justices did not intend to create a unified body of precedent on the ERISA preemption issue, Brief on Appeal at 14, and that Pervel therefore retains its vitality in this Circuit, Minnesota notwithstanding. 24 We reject this contention. Like the plaintiffs, we find the sequence of events described above rather mystifying. Nonetheless, it remains the law that dismissals of appeals are binding precedents, while denials of certiorari have no precedential force. Compare Hicks v. Miranda, supra, with Maryland v. Baltimore Radio Show, Inc., 338 U.S. 912, 70 S.Ct. 252, 94 L.Ed. 562 (1950) (opinion of Frankfurter, J., with respect to denial of certiorari). See generally R. Stern & E. Gressman, Supreme Court Practice §§ 4.31, 5.7 (5th ed. 1978); Linzer, The Meaning of Certiorari Denials, 79 Colum.L.Rev. 1227 (1979). Although courts have sometimes disregarded the latter rule on the ground that special circumstances surrounding a particular denial of certiorari revealed the Justices' view of the merits, see Linzer, supra, at 1277-91, we see no reason for such an undertaking here, where the denials have tended more to obscure than to illuminate the Court's position. 25 Accordingly, we hold that the HRL was not preempted by ERISA.