Opinion ID: 2111141
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Application of preemption principles to plaintiff's claims.

Text: Having reviewed our prior cases concerning the preemption doctrine and the rules established therein, we consider how these rules apply to plaintiff Wright's claims against American Cyanamid in this case.
In his petition, plaintiff Wright alleged that American Cyanamid defectively manufactured and/or rendered defective application instructions for the herbicides. We agree with the district court's finding that plaintiff presented no evidence to support his claim that defendant defectively manufactured Pursuit. Thus, all that remained of plaintiff's claim was that defendant's application instructions were defective and that Pursuit did not work, and thus, control of tall waterhemp should not have appeared on the label. As the district court properly found, plaintiff's claim was a direct challenge to the information contained on the label and thus was preempted by FIFRA. Accordingly, the district court properly sustained American Cyanamid's motion for summary judgment concerning plaintiff's claims for defective manufacture and defective application instructions.
Plaintiff's petition made no reference to negligent or inadequate testing or design. Rather, plaintiff first made assertions concerning inadequate testing in his resistance to defendant's motion for summary judgment. Specifically, plaintiff asserted that American Cyanamid improperly tested its Pursuit herbicide for its effectiveness against tall waterhemp as well as that [American Cyanamid] falsely claimed in advertisements and sales literature that Pursuit would control tall waterhemp. Plaintiff makes this same argument on appeal. The district court's ruling on defendant's summary judgment motion did not address plaintiff's assertions concerning improper/inadequate testing and false advertising. However, the court granted defendant's motion for summary judgment and dismissed plaintiff's petition. As noted above, a negligent testing claim can only survive a preemption challenge if adequate testing would have caused the manufacturer to alter the product. If the manufacturer, upon further testing, would have altered only the label, then any claim based on inadequate testing is preempted by FIFRA. Our review of the record shows there is no merit to plaintiff's negligent testing claim. We first point out that plaintiff's negligent testing claim is merely based on the fact that American Cyanamid removed reference to tall waterhemp from the Pursuit label after Pursuit was applied to plaintiff's fields in 1994. Plaintiff's counsel asserted during oral argument that the fact that American Cyanamid later removed reference to tall waterhemp from the Pursuit label implies that American Cyanamid failed to properly test Pursuit for its effectiveness on tall waterhemp, and that if proper testing had been done, American Cyanamid would have discovered a potential problem concerning Pursuit's effectiveness on tall waterhemp before it was applied to plaintiff's fields. We do not believe that the fact that American Cyanamid later changed the Pursuit label is sufficient evidence to support plaintiff's negligent testing claim. This is because plaintiff presented no evidence concerning American Cyanamid's testing procedures, that those procedures were inadequate, or that additional testing would have caused American Cyanamid to change the product itself, which, as we discussed above, would be necessary for plaintiff's claim to survive preemption under FIFRA. The fact that American Cyanamid changed the Pursuit label after 1994 suggests that any problems concerning Pursuit's effectiveness on tall waterhemp could in fact be remedied by changing the product's label rather than by changing the product itself. This case is therefore different from our Ackerman decision where we noted that plaintiff's claim asserted that adequate testing and proper design would have caused American Cyanamid, in order to prevent carryover damage, to alter the product itself, not merely the label, and thus we concluded that plaintiff's negligent testing claim was not preempted. 586 N.W.2d at 215-16. Furthermore, plaintiff presented no evidence that the Pursuit applied to his fields was somehow defective or ineffective on tall waterhemp so as to give American Cyanamid reason to do further testing. In fact, the deposition testimony of plaintiff's expert, Dr. Robert Ascheman, focused more on the negligent application of Pursuit rather than on whether tall waterhemp was resistant to Pursuit. [3] Specifically, Ascheman testified that the primary cause of plaintiff's claimed damages was [a] disruption in the spray pattern. It was the application of the spray in an uneven manner, resulting in much less herbicide in the area, ... and as a consequence, a lesser rate of herbicide getting under the plant and poor weed control, a matter of uneven application, not a matter of materials not working. The following excerpt from Ascheman's deposition testimony explains this point: Q. I want to ask you, Doctor, can you state within a reasonable degree of certainty, based on your knowledge and experience in your field of expertise, that resistance to Pursuit was a substantial producing factor of Mr. Wright's weed problems in 1994? A. I'm of the opinion that it was not a-at least not the major factor. To say it had no contribution to it I couldn't be certain, of course. The fact that there was weedy strips and clean strips pretty well negated that argument. David Simonson, an employee of Cropmate, stated in his deposition that the weed problem was due to the effectiveness of the chemicals themselves rather than the effectiveness of the application. This comment, at best, bears more on the accuracy of statements on the Pursuit label that Pursuit would control tall waterhemp than on whether the Pursuit applied to plaintiff's fields was defective. The record also contains a field trial summary by American Cyanamid concerning the effectiveness of Pursuit on tall waterhemp. The report states that application of Pursuit applied alone in June 1992 to a field in Kansas resulted in poor to no control of tall waterhemp. This isolated incident alone is not sufficient to create a genuine issue of fact that the Pursuit applied to plaintiff's fields was defective or that by performing additional testing, American Cyanamid would have changed the composition of Pursuit, rather than just the label. We conclude that plaintiff simply failed to present evidence that the Pursuit applied to his fields was defective or that American Cyanamid's testing of Pursuit for control of tall waterhemp was inadequate. In fact, plaintiff's own expert, Dr. Ascheman, testified that the simplest way to resolve the problem [of Pursuit's performance] was not to make [a] claim for that weed species on the label. Given this, plaintiff's negligent testing claim is really nothing but a claim that American Cyanamid should have removed reference to tall waterhemp from the label or otherwise warned potential customers that Pursuit was not effective against tall waterhemp. Plaintiff's negligent testing claim is a disguised label-based claim and is therefore preempted by FIFRA. Cf. Schuver, 546 N.W.2d at 614-15.
In his brief and during oral argument, plaintiff's counsel asserted that defendant falsely advertised that Pursuit would control tall waterhemp. Counsel thus argued that plaintiff's claim really was based on false advertising, rather than a challenge to the information listed on the Pursuit label, and thus is not preempted by FIFRA. We have never specifically examined whether claims based on false advertising are preempted by FIFRA. We did note in Ackerman, however, that a plaintiff's claim for negligence in marketing was a common-law-duty-to-warn and was clearly preempted by FIFRA. 586 N.W.2d at 214. Some courts, however, have recognized that a false advertising claim may survive preemption under FIFRA when statements in a manufacturer's advertising substantially differ from claims made as part of the statement required in connection with the product's registration with the EPA. See Lowe v. Sporicidin Int'l, 47 F.3d 124, 130 (4th Cir.1995) (citing 7 U.S.C. § 136j(a)(1)(B)) (noting that a State is not preempted from imposing common law liability on a defendant if the defendant's advertisements made claims as part of its distribution of sale that substantially differ from claims made for it as part of the statement required in connection with its [the product's] registration). We need not decide whether plaintiff's false advertising claim as urged in this case is preempted under FIFRA. This is because plaintiff has no evidence in the record of any Pursuit advertisements that he relied upon in connection with the 1994 application of Pursuit to his fields. [4] Thus, the district court had no opportunity-and neither do we-to compare any alleged false statements in advertising that existed at the time of the 1994 application with information contained on the 1994 Pursuit label. In essence, plaintiff's claim is really a challenge that the Pursuit label incorrectly stated that it would control tall waterhemp. Such a claim is no different from that raised by the plaintiff in Schuver, 546 N.W.2d at 614-15, and is therefore preempted by FIFRA.
Plaintiff's breach of express and implied warranty claims are based solely on statements made in the Pursuit label-that Pursuit will control tall waterhemp. This information is specifically required by federal law and approved by the EPA. [5] Plaintiff's breach of express and implied warranty claims are therefore preempted under our Iowa cases, Ackerman, 586 N.W.2d at 213-14 (claim for breach of implied warranty of merchantability preempted by FIFRA); Clubine, 534 N.W.2d at 387 (claims for breach of implied warranty of merchantability and breach of express warranty are preempted by FIFRA), and under those cases following the general rule that a `state law claim for breach of an express warranty is preempted by FIFRA' when the `express warranty claim ar[i]se[s] solely on the basis of a labeling statement specifically required by federal law and approved by the EPA.' Kawamata Farms v. United Agri Prods., 86 Hawaii 214, 948 P.2d 1055, 1077 (Haw.1997) (quoting Welchert v. American Cyanamid, Inc., 59 F.3d 69, 73 (8th Cir.1995)) (citing general rule but holding that plaintiffs' breach of express warranty claims against agricultural fungicide manufacturer were not preempted: although the product's express warranty was EPA approved, it was not EPA mandated under FIFRA; defendants, rather than State of Hawaii, voluntarily imposed the express warranty upon themselves); see also National Bank of Commerce v. Dow Chem. Co., 165 F.3d 602, 608 (8th Cir.1999) (express and implied warranty claims are preempted); Lowe, 47 F.3d at 129 (an express warranty claim based on EPA-approved labeling materials is preempted); Gooch v. E.I. Du Pont de Nemours & Co., 40 F.Supp.2d 863, 873-74 (W.D.Ky.1999) (plaintiffs' breach of express and implied warranty claims were preempted; claims that herbicide was not fit for purpose stated in directions for use were based on statements on label, which in turn were related to FIFRA requirements concerning the use and directions for use of the herbicide).
As with the negligence claim, the gist of plaintiff's strict liability claim really is that the label should have warned that Pursuit was not effective against tall waterhemp. This clearly is a challenge to the adequacy of the label and thus plaintiff's strict liability claim is preempted by FIFRA. Cf. Schuver, 546 N.W.2d at 614-15 (strict liability claim was challenge to adequacy of label and thus was preempted under FIFRA). In any event, plaintiff presented no evidence that Pursuit was in a defective condition or unreasonably dangerous as those terms are used in strict liability analysis and thus failed to show there was a genuine issue of material fact concerning this claim. Cf. id. (noting that there was no evidence in the record that Preview was in a defective condition or unreasonably dangerous).