Court Opinion

ID: 9493889
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 15:22:29.717356+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:56:05.480433
License: Public Domain

CUDAHY, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
Although the majority opinion is persuasive, I am not convinced that the first branch of the plaintiffs’ procedural due process argument must fail here. In form and in potential effect, the zoning amendment at issue here was, as the majority points out, of general application. On the specific facts of this case, however, the amendment was designed to apply to these plaintiffs, had no current application to anyone else and, at least arguably, these facts were known to the defendants. Therefore, although legislative in form, the amendment was essentially adjudicative in application. In Harris v. County of Riverside, a leading case cited by the majority, the Ninth Circuit said:
In determining when the dictates of due process apply ... we find little guidance in formalistic distinctions between “legislative” and “adjudicatory” or “administrative” government actions. As the Supreme Court impliedly recognized in BiMetallic [Inv. Co. v. State Bd. of Equalization, 239 U.S. 441, 36 S.Ct. 141, 60 L.Ed. 372 (1915)], the character of the action, rather than its label, determines whether those affected by it are entitled to constitutional due process.
904 F.2d 497, 501-02 (9th Cir.1990). See also Nasierowski v. City of Sterling Heights, 949 F.2d 890, 896 (6th Cir.1991) (“Government determinations of a general nature ... do not give rise to a due process right.... But when a relatively small number of persons is affected on individual grounds, the right to a hearing is triggered.”).
These observations would suggest reversal here if the plaintiffs had been deprived of property within the meaning of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. However, the immediate effect of the Tavern Amendment was to subject the plaintiffs to additional regulation, not to deprive them of property. For this and other reasons cited in the majority opinion, the plaintiffs have not been able to make their case that they have been deprived of a property interest. This is an essential part of the showing required on summary judgment and I therefore join in the judgment.