Opinion ID: 791477
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Wallace Plaintiffs

Text: 7 The Wallace plaintiffs' suit landed before a different federal district judge in New Orleans. Caroline Wallace and Emily Maw are nonimmigrant aliens who seek leave to sit for the Louisiana bar exam. Both are citizens of the United Kingdom who were admitted to the United States on temporary visas. Wallace holds an H-1B temporary worker visa and is licensed as an attorney in England and Wales. Wallace is currently employed doing non-attorney legal work. Maw was admitted to the United States pursuant to an F-1 student visa 14 and remains on an H-1B temporary worker visa. 15 Maw holds a law degree from Tulane University Law School in New Orleans and is currently employed as a paralegal. 8 Before filing suit, Wallace applied for an equivalency determination, and avers that after she was initially granted permission to sit for the Bar, permission was revoked for her noncompliance with Section 3(B). Although the record is unclear, Maw either applied to sit for the Bar exam or moved for admission by reciprocity. Either way, the defendants denied her application for lack of Section 3(B) qualification. 16 Neither plaintiff appealed her denial to the Louisiana Supreme Court pursuant to Rule 9. 9 On May 2, 2003, the plaintiffs filed a suit against the defendants, which is parallel in all relevant respects to the LeClerc action. However, their motion to consolidate their action with the LeClerc suit was inexplicably denied. Cross-motions for judgment followed as in LeClerc, but with different results. 10 The Wallace district court denied the defendants' motion to dismiss and partially denied the plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment. Like the LeClerc court, the Wallace court rejected the defendants' jurisdictional arguments. The court dismissed the plaintiffs' preemption claim, but denied their Due Process claim as moot. On the plaintiffs' Equal Protection claim, however, the court applied strict scrutiny review and held that because Section 3(B) is not the least restrictive means to achieve the state's asserted compelling interests, it is unconstitutional. Defendants timely noticed their appeal. 11 The two cases are consolidated on appeal in this court. Because the issues raised are nearly identical, any references to plaintiffs in the following discussion include, unless otherwise noted, the LeClerc and Wallace plaintiffs.