Opinion ID: 221071
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Charities' Standing to Challenge the (c) Provisions

Text: [T]he requirement that a claimant have `standing is an essential and unchanging part of the case-or-controversy requirement of Article III.' Davis v. FEC, 554 U.S. 724, 733, 128 S.Ct. 2759, 171 L.Ed.2d 737 (2008) (quoting Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992)). To qualify for standing, a claimant must present an injury that is concrete, particularized, and actual or imminent; fairly traceable to the defendant's challenged behavior; and likely to be redressed by a favorable ruling. Id. (citing Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560-61, 112 S.Ct. 2130). To prove an injury in fact sufficient to raise a First Amendment facial challenge, however, a plaintiff must produce evidence of an intention to engage in a course of conduct arguably affected with a constitutional interest, but proscribed by statute. Miss. State Democratic Party v. Barbour, 529 F.3d 538, 545 (5th Cir.2008) (alteration in original) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). Specifically, plaintiffs must demonstrate a `serious [ ] interest [ ]' in acting contrary to a statute. Id. at 545 n. 8 (alteration in original) (quoting Int'l Soc'y for Krishna Consciousness v. Eaves, 601 F.2d 809, 818 (5th Cir.1979)) (citations omitted). The Charities bear the burden to demonstrate standing for each claim they seek to press. See DaimlerChrysler Corp. v. Cuno, 547 U.S. 332, 352, 126 S.Ct. 1854, 164 L.Ed.2d 589 (2006). It is undisputed that the Charities have standing to challenge the (d) provisions: the stipulated facts before the district court clearly demonstrate that they retain for-profit entities to solicit donations on a flat-fee basis, a course of conduct arguably affected with a constitutional interest, but proscribed by statute. Barbour, 529 F.3d at 545. But the stipulated facts are silent as to whether the Charities retain for-profit entities to solicit donations on a percentage-based basis. To be certain, the Charities allege in their briefing before this court that they are seriously interested in engaging in a course of conduct affected by the (c) provisions. To establish standing, however, the Charities must demonstrate that their alleged injury is actual or imminent rather than conjectural or hypothetical. Id. The Charities have not met their burden because they have demonstrated no injury-in-fact with respect to the percentage provisions. As the district court correctly noted, the Charities have not offered any evidence to show that they intend to hire professional resellers to engage in activity covered by the (c) provisions. Nat'l Fed'n of the Blind of Tex., 682 F.Supp.2d at 706. We have previously held that standing is not created by a declaration in court pleadings. Barbour, 529 F.3d at 545. The Charities' assertions before this court that they are seriously interested in operating under the (c) provisions fail to satisfy the irreducible constitutional minimum of standing. Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560, 112 S.Ct. 2130. We are cognizant that the flat-fee and the percentage provisions are seemingly identical in all material respects and that, should the former fall as unconstitutional, a subsequent challenge to the latter will almost certainly succeed. But the seemingly intertwined fates of the two provisions does not eviscerate Article III's requirements. [S]tanding is not dispensed in gross. Lewis v. Casey, 518 U.S. 343, 358 n. 6, 116 S.Ct. 2174, 135 L.Ed.2d 606 (1996). And although the Charities' conduct under the (d) provisions raises similar constitutional concerns to those it advances under the (c) provisions, a plaintiff who has been subject to injurious conduct of one kind [does not] possess by virtue of that injury the necessary stake in litigating conduct of another kind, although similar, to which he has not been subject. Blum v. Yaretsky, 457 U.S. 991, 999, 102 S.Ct. 2777, 73 L.Ed.2d 534 (1982).
The Charities alternatively argue that even if their activities are not directly affected by the (c) provisions, they should be afforded third-party standing to raise the rights of other charities not before the court. This argument misapprehends the nature of third-party standing, which is a prudential, not a constitutional, limitation on standing. When a party asserts a facial challenge to a statute under the First Amendment, courts may permit third-party standing when a plaintiff demonstrates that a provision that validly restricts its own speech is overbroad. Sec'y of State of Md. v. Joseph H. Munson Co., 467 U.S. 947, 956-57, 104 S.Ct. 2839, 81 L.Ed.2d 786 (1984). An statute is overbroad if it validly regulates some expressive conduct but also reaches substantial protected speech. See City of Houston, Tex. v. Hill, 482 U.S. 451, 456-57, 107 S.Ct. 2502, 96 L.Ed.2d 398 (1987). The overbreadth doctrine permits a litigant to challenge a statute not because their own rights of free expression are violated, but because of a judicial prediction or assumption that the statute's very existence may cause others not before the court to refrain from constitutionally protected speech or expression. Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U.S. 601, 612, 93 S.Ct. 2908, 37 L.Ed.2d 830 (1973). But the overbreadth doctrine applies on a provision by provision basis: the plaintiff must establish injury under a particular provision of a regulation that is validly applied to its conduct, then `assert a facial challenge, under the overbreadth doctrine, to vindicate the rights of others not before the court under that provision.' SEIU, Local 5 v. City of Hous., 595 F.3d 588, 598 (5th Cir.2010) (quoting CAMP Legal Def. Fund, Inc. v. City of Atlanta, 451 F.3d 1257, 1271 (11th Cir.2006)). Article III standing retains rigor even in an overbreadth claim. Fairchild v. Liberty Indep. Sch. Dist., 597 F.3d 747, 754 (5th Cir.2010). [I]f [the Charities are] limited by one provision of an ordinance and make[ ] a facial challenge due to the overbreadth of a different provision, there is no constitutional standing, i.e., there is no `case or controversy,' as to the separate provision. SEIU, Local 5, 595 F.3d at 598. Although various prudential standing principles have been relaxed in some First Amendment cases, this relaxation does not eliminate the distinct and independent requirement of Article III that the dispute between the parties must amount to a case or controversy. Henderson v. Stalder, 287 F.3d 374, 385 n. 4 (5th Cir.2002) (Jones, C.J., concurring). As set forth above, the Charities have not demonstrated any injury, actual or threatened, with respect to the (c) provisions. Accordingly, and despite the limits imposed on them by the (d) provisions, they lack Article III standing to challenge the (c) provisions of the statute. See SEIU, Local 5, 595 F.3d at 598.
The Charities also argue that they should be extended standing to challenge the (c) provisions because those provisions are not severable from the (d) provisions. The district court agreed with this position, holding that [b]ecause the effect of these two [types of solicitation] agreements are so similar ... this Court cannot sever the flat fee provision from the percentage disclosure requirement, as it would create a large hole in the regulatory structure. Nat'l Fed'n of the Blind of Tex., 682 F.Supp.2d at 708 (citing Randall v. Sorrell, 548 U.S. 230, 262, 126 S.Ct. 2479, 165 L.Ed.2d 482 (2006)). This was error. Whether unconstitutional provisions of a state statute are severable is of course a matter of state law. Virginia v. Hicks, 539 U.S. 113, 121, 123 S.Ct. 2191, 156 L.Ed.2d 148 (2003). In Texas, severability of statutes is governed by § 311.032 of the Texas Government Code. See TEX. GOV'T CODE ANN. § 311.032. Relevant here, § 311.032(c) provides: In a statute that does not contain a provision for severability or nonseverability, if any provision of the statute or its application to any person or circumstance is held invalid, the invalidity does not affect other provisions or applications of the statute that can be given effect without the invalid provision or application, and to this end the provisions of the statute are severable. Id. at 311.032(c); Quick v. City of Austin, 7 S.W.3d 109, 115 (Tex.1999) ([I]f any provision of the statute is held to be invalid, the invalidity does not affect other provisions that can properly be given effect in the absence of the invalid provisions.). Thus, the proper inquiry under Texas law focuses on whether, if one provision of a statute is invalid, the remaining provisions can still be given effect in the absence of the invalid provision. If so, the invalid provision will be severed. If not, the entire statute will be held invalid. The district court properly analyzed the Charities' standing to challenge each provision, finding that the Charities had standing to challenge the (d) provisions, but that they did not have standing to challenge the (b) or (c) provisions. Then, before analyzing the constitutionality of the (d) provisions, the district court conducted a severability analysis. It held that the (d) provisions and the (c) provisions are not severable from each other, and on that basis held that the Charities had standing to challenge the (c) provisions. This was error in two ways. First, the normal rule is that severability comes into play only when a constitutional judgment on the merits has already proven unavoidable and has already been rendered. Adrian Vermeule, Saving Constructions, 85 GEO. L.J. 1945, 1957 (1997). In unusual circumstances, courts may avert a constitutional or jurisdictional question by ordering the issues for decision to make severability itself a threshold question. Id. at 1957 n. 71 (citing INS v. Chadha, 462 U.S. 919, 929, 931 n. 7, 103 S.Ct. 2764, 77 L.Ed.2d 317 (1983) (addressing severability of a federal statute first because a finding of nonseverability would have vitiated the challenger's standing)). It is a rare case where addressing severability prior to the constitutional adjudication of a provision of a statute is appropriate. This is not that case. Second, in addition to being conducted out of order, the severability analysis conducted by the district court misapprehends Texas law. The critical inquiry is whether the (d) provisions or any portion of them are severable from the statute as a whole, not whether they are severable from the (c) provisions. E.g., Quick, 7 S.W.3d at 115. We reemphasize, however, that a severability analysis should almost always be deferred until after the determination that the portion of a statute that a litigant has standing to challenge is unconstitutional. Consistent with this rule, we shall defer further discussion of the severability of the (d) provisions until first addressing their constitutionality. We will not address the constitutionality of the (b) or (c) provisions because the Charities lack standing to challenge them. Accordingly, we VACATE the portion of the district court's opinion addressing the (c) provisions.