Opinion ID: 40549
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The House-Carlson Drive Claims

Text: The success of the Whitakers’ House-Carlson Drive claims hinges on whether the City’s authorization of House-Carlson Drive constituted a breach of the Agreement. We may permit litigation of that question here, however, only if Lange I is not entitled to issue-preclusive effect. As we hold that Lange I is preclusive, however, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment to the City on the Whitakers’ House-Carlson Drive claims. The preclusive effect of a state court judgment in a subsequent federal action is governed by the Full Faith and Credit Act.10 Under this statute, final judgments of state courts “have the same full faith and credit in every court within the United States and its Territories and Possessions as they have by law or usage in the courts of such State, Territory or Possession from 8 Gowesky v. Singing River Hosp. Sys., 321 F.3d 503, 507 (5th Cir. 2003). 9 FED. R. CIV. P. 56(c); see also Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322-23 (1986). 10 28 U.S.C. § 1738. 7 which they are taken.”11 In other words, we must accord preclusive effect to the Lange I court’s final judgment if the law of issue preclusion in Mississippi entitles the judgment to such effect in that state’s courts. In addition, because this case requires us to measure Lange I’s preclusive effect on the dispositive issue in this § 1983 action, Lange I’s holding that the City’s authorization of House-Carlson Drive did not breach the Agreement is preclusive only if the Whitakers had a “full and fair opportunity to litigate [that] . . . issue” before the state court.12 And when, as here, the putatively preclusive judgment was rendered after only a limited review by the state court of a state executive entity’s action,13 the requirement that there have been a “full and fair opportunity to litigate” is met only if the state proceedings satisfied the minimum procedural requirements of the Due Process Clause.14 Therefore, in determining the preclusive effect of Lange I on the House-Carlson Drive claims, we must focus on two questions: (1) Under Mississippi’s law of issue preclusion, must other Mississippi courts give the judgment in Lange I preclusive effect, and (2), if so, could a federal court give the judgment such effect without violating the Due Process Clause? 11 Id. 12 Allen v. McCurry, 449 U.S. 90, 101 (1980). 13 See supra note 4. 14 Kremer v. Chem. Constr. Corp., 456 U.S. 461, 485 (1982). 8 1. Mississippi Law Requires Recognizing Lange I As Issue Preclusive In Mississippi, a prior court judgment precludes relitigation of an issue if the issue was “actually litigated, determined by, and essential to the judgment in [the] former action.”15 We are convinced that under this rule, the district court properly accorded preclusive effect to Lange I’s holding that the City’s authorization of House-Carlson Drive, standing alone, did not breach the Agreement. After all, the Whitakers themselves put that question before the Lange I court by expressly arguing that “‘[t]he City’s decision to abandon a contract . . . is arbitrary and capricious.’”16 Having framed the issue this way, the Whitakers invited the Lange I court’s holding: Despite the City’s authorization of House-Carlson Drive, “no breach of [the City’s] obligations [under the Agreement] has occurred.”17 In the context of this case, it is irrelevant that in Lange I this dispositive question arose within the confines of the limited review authorized by Mississippi’s bill of exceptions process rather than in a full-blown breach-of-contract action. Like purely legal issues that arise in a traditional common law contract action —— the judicial resolution of which would undisputedly be issue 15 Dunaway v. W.H. Hopper & Assocs., 422 So. 2d 749, 751 (Miss. 1982); see also Raju v. Rhodes, 7 F.3d 1210, 1215 (5th Cir. 1993). 16 Emphasis added. 17 Lange I, 832 So. 2d at 1240 (emphasis added). 9 preclusive under Mississippi law18 —— questions of law in a bill of exceptions action are resolved by the court de novo.19 And here, the Lange I court faced only questions of law: (1) Whether the term “public road” is ambiguous,20 which the court had to have decided it is not,21 and (2) the application of this unambiguous contract term to the undisputed facts of this case.22 There is therefore no reason to conclude that the bill of exceptions context of Lange I impinged on or otherwise restricted that court’s resolution of these purely legal questions. Thus, it is a virtual certainty that Mississippi courts would grant issue preclusive effect to the Lange I court’s de novo resolution of these questions. 18 See Harris v. Bd. of Trs. of State Insts. of Higher Learning, 731 So. 2d 588, 590 (Miss. 1999) (recognizing that the doctrine of issue preclusion applies to contract actions if all elements are met). 19 See Hinds County Bd. of Supervisors v. Leggette, 833 So. 2d 586, 590 (Miss. Ct. App. 2002). 20 See Neider v. Franklin, 844 So. 2d 433, 436 (Miss. 2003). 21 Although the Lange I court did not explicitly rule that the term “public road” is unambiguous, the court must have found that it was. Had the Lange I court viewed the term “public road” as ambiguous, it would have had to complete the interim analytical step associated with an ambiguous contract term —— an analysis of extrinsic evidence pertaining to the term’s meaning. See Neider, 844 So. 2d at 436. But the court did not; instead, it ignored any extrinsic evidence and enforced the Agreement as written. See Lange I, 832 So. 2d at 1239-41. Under Mississippi law, such an analytical process is associated with unambiguous contract terms; the Lange I court therefore must have viewed “public road” as such a term. 22 See Clark v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 725 So. 2d 779, 781 (Miss. 1998). 10 2. The Whitakers Waived the Argument that Finding Lange I To Be Issue Preclusive Would Violate the Due Process Clause In their opening brief, reply brief, and supplemental letter brief, the Whitakers never advanced to us any reason to question the constitutional adequacy of the Lange I proceedings. Instead, the Whitakers impugned the non-judicial process afforded to them by the City prior to its voting to authorize construction of HouseCarlson Drive. The sufficiency of that process, however, is not before us today; in this issue preclusion analysis under the Full Faith and Credit Act, we are concerned only with the adequacy of the process afforded the Whitakers in the state courts.23 The Whitakers have therefore waived any argument that our according preclusive effect to Lange I would violate Due Process.24 We shall assume that the process was adequate; and, because Mississippi law requires according preclusive effect to Lange I’s holding that the City’s authorization of House-Carlson Drive did not breach the Agreement, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment to the City on the Whitakers’ House-Carlson Drive claims.25 23 See Kremer, 456 U.S. at 485. 24 See Commc’n Workers of Am. v. Ector County Hosp. Dist., 392 F.3d 733, 748 (5th Cir. 2004); see also FED. R. APP. P. 28(a)(9)(A) (stating that appellant’s brief must contain “appellant’s contentions and the reasons for them, with citations to the authorities and parts of the record on which the appellant relies”). 25 The Whitakers also argue that Lange I should not preclude relitigation in this case because they were forced to bring their breach of contract claim through Mississippi’s bill of exceptions process. For two reasons, though, this argument is meritless. 11