Court Opinion

ID: 9497508
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:52:53.362192+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:14.054766
License: Public Domain

KING, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I write separately because I disagree with the panel majority’s reading of § 1348 of Title 28. As explained below, I have concluded that proper application of the term “located” in § 1348 means that diversity jurisdiction exists in this dispute. As a result, I must respectfully dissent.
*433Section 1332(a)(1) of Title 28 provides the district courts with original jurisdiction over suits between citizens of different states involving more than $75,000. As the majority recognizes, Wachovia’s citizenship, and thus the presence of federal court jurisdiction, turns on the meaning of “located” in § 1348 (providing that national banks are “citizens of the States in which they are respectively located”). In this case, the defendants are citizens of South Carolina; plaintiff Wachovia is, pursuant to § 1348, located in North Carolina; and federal court jurisdiction is thus present.
As explained herein, the majority’s conclusion that the term “located” also includes Wachovia’s branch offices in South Carolina is incorrect for at least two reasons. First, as it is used in § 1348, “located” is an ambiguous term, implicating congressional intent. Congress has never sought or intended to relegate disputes involving national banks to the state courts. It has, on the contrary, consistently intended to provide national banks with the same access to the federal courts as that accorded other banks and corporations. And the Supreme Court has recognized and enforced congressional intent on this point. Second, I disagree with the view that the Court’s decision in Citizens & Southern National Bank v. Bougas, 434 U.S. 35, 98 S.Ct. 88, 54 L.Ed.2d 218 (1977) — construing the term “located” as it was used in a separate statute, 12 U.S.C. § 94 — controls our resolution of this issue.
I.
In construing an enactment of Congress, a court is to utilize two steps of analysis. See Newport News Shipbldg. & Dry Dock Co. v. Brown, 376 F.3d 245, 248 (4th Cir.2004). First, a reviewing court must assess whether the statutory term being construed is plain or ambiguous. If the term is unambiguous, the court simply applies the term’s plain meaning. If the term is ambiguous, however, the reviewing court must take a second step and seek to determine the construction intended by Congress. See id. In this dispute, the term “located,” as found in § 1348, is ambiguous, and Congress intended for that term to refer to Wachovia’s principal place of business in North Carolina. My dissenting view on this issue is supported by the history of § 1348 and its statutory predecessors, by Supreme Court precedent, and by decisions of the courts of appeals that have addressed the meaning of “located” in the context of federal court jurisdiction.1
A.
We are obliged first to assess whether the pertinent provision of § 1348 “ ‘has a plain and unambiguous meaning’ ” in this proceeding. United States ex rel. Wilson v. Graham County Soil & Water Conservation Dist., 367 F.3d 245, 250 (4th Cir.2004) (quoting Robinson v. Shell Oil Co., 519 U.S. 337, 340, 117 S.Ct. 843, 136 L.Ed.2d 808 (1997)). If “a statute speaks with clarity to an issue,” then its meaning is plain and there is no need for further judicial inquiry. Estate of Cowart v. Nicklos Drilling Co., 505 U.S. 469, 475, 112 S.Ct. 2589, 120 L.Ed.2d 379 (1992); see also S.C. Dep’t of Health & Envtl. Control v. Commerce & Indus. Ins. Co., 372 F.3d 245, 255 (4th Cir.2004). By contrast, a statutory term must be deemed ambiguous, if, when examined in context, it is susceptible to more than one reasonable interpretation. Wilson, 367 F.3d at 248. If such an ambiguity is apparent, we must then ascertain the “ ‘interpretation which *434can most fairly be said to be imbedded in the statute, in the sense of being most harmonious with its scheme and with the general purposes that Congress manifested.’ ” Comm’r v. Engle, 464 U.S. 206, 217, 104 S.Ct. 597, 78 L.Ed.2d 420 (1984) (quoting NLRB v. Lion Oil Co., 352 U.S. 282, 297, 77 S.Ct. 330, 1 L.Ed.2d 331 (1957) (Frankfurter, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part)).
Put most simply, I part company with the panel majority on its view that “located” is an unambiguous statutory term. Under the accepted definitions of “locate,” the term refers to a particular or specific position, rather than to a general physical presence. See, e.g., Black’s Law Dictionary 958 (8th ed.2004) (defining “location” as “[t]he specific place or position of a person or thing”); Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 1327 (reprint 1993) (1981) (defining “locate” as “to set or establish in a particular spot or position”).2 In this proceeding, “located” could refer either to Wachovia’s principal place of business (North Carolina), to the place named in its certificate of organization (North Carolina), or to any state in which Wachovia has established branch offices (such as South Carolina). As the majority observes, the Bougas Court recognized such an ambiguity in how the term “located” was used in § 94 of Title 12, a separate statute addressing state court venue for proceedings involving national banks.3 Significantly, the Court there observed that “[tjhere is no enduring rigidity about the word ‘located,’ ” Bougas, 434 U.S. at 44, 98 S.Ct. 88, and it pronounced the term to be ambiguous. As a result,, the Court proceeded to the second step of statutory construction and assessed the concerns Congress had sought to address in its adoption of § 94. Bougas, 434 U.S. at 44, 98 S.Ct. 88. We must do likewise.
B.
' The relevant history of our national banks reveals that Congress intended for such banks to enjoy the same access to federal courts as that accorded other banks and corporations. When Congress first authorized the creation of national banks in 1863, it provided that suits by and against them could be initiated in the federal courts. See Act of Feb. 25, 1863, ch. 58, 12 Stat. 665, 681. In 1882, Congress amended its 1863 enactment to eliminate automatic federal question jurisdiction over all disputes involving national banks. See Leather Mfrs.’ Bank v. Cooper, 120 U.S. 778, 780-81, 7 S.Ct. 777, 30 L.Ed. 816 (1887). Nonetheless, the amendment provided plainly that jurisdiction over lawsuits involving national banks “shall be the same as, and not other than, the jurisdiction for suits by or against banks not organized under any law of the United States.... ” Act of July 12, 1882, ch. 290, 22 Stat. 162, 163. The Court promptly construed this *435amendment to place “national banks on the same footing as the banks of the state where they were located for all the purposes of the jurisdiction of the courts of the United States.” Leather Mfrs.’ Bank, 120 U.S. at 780, 7 S.Ct. 777; see also Petri v. Commercial Nat’l Bank of Chi., 142 U.S. 644, 649, 12 S.Ct. 325, 35 L.Ed. 1144 (1892) (observing that 1882 amendment “placed [national banks] in the same category with banks not organized under the laws of the United States”).
In 1887, Congress revised the jurisdictional statute to include the language that we must assess today. See Act of Mar. 3, 1887, ch. 373, 24 Stat. 552, 554 (providing that “all national banking associations ... shall ... be deemed citizens of the States in which they are respectively located”). The 1887 enactment also provided that, “in such cases the circuit and district courts shall not have jurisdiction other than such as they would have in cases between individual citizens of the same State.” Id. at 554-55. In assessing this statutory revision, the Court again recognized and applied the clear intent of Congress that national banks be accorded equal access to the federal courts. See Petri, 142 U.S. at 650-51, 12 S.Ct. 325 (“No reason is perceived why it should be held that congress intended that national banks should not resort to federal tribunals as other corporations and individual citizens might.”); Fin. Software Sys., Inc. v. First Union Nat’l Bank, 84 F.Supp.2d 594, 600 (E.D.Pa.1999) (recognizing that the 1887 act changed the structure of the 1882, but it “did not change the purpose”). In 1948, when the national bank jurisdictional statute was codified as the present § 1348, Congress left fully intact its provision that national banks are “citizens of the States in which they are respectively located.” See 28 U.S.C. § 1348.
As this historical review reflects, the Court has viewed § 1348 as according national banks the same access to the federal courts as that enjoyed by state banks and corporations. Significantly, Congress has never altered the pertinent statutory language, although it has repeatedly revised other aspects of the jurisdictional statute.4 In my view, Congress has thereby, in each of these enactments, manifested its intent to sanction applicable judicial and administrative interpretations of the statute. See Bragdon v. Abbott, 524 U.S. 624, 645, 118 S.Ct. 2196, 141 L.Ed.2d 540 (1998) (“When administrative and judicial interpretations have settled the meaning of an existing statutory provision, repetition of the same language in a new statute indicates ... the intent to incorporate its administrative and judicial interpretations as well.”).
C.
Three of our sister courts of appeals have faced the very issue posed to us today, and I agree with their decisions construing the term “located” in § 1348 to provide national banks the same access to the federal courts as that accorded other banks and corporations.5 Most recently, *436the Fifth Circuit, in its decision in Horton v. Bank One, N.A., agreed with this very proposition. 387 F.3d at 436, 2004 WL 2224867, at *7 (5th Cir. Oct.5, 2004) (holding that the definition of “located,” as used in § 1348, is limited to a “national bank’s principal place of business and the state listed in its organization certificate and its articles of association”). In so ruling, the court recognized that “[bjecause section 1348 does not have any language modifying or rejecting the interpretive understanding that came with its predecessors, this court should presume that Congress intended to retain and incorporate the existing interpretive backdrop.” Id. at 431, 2004 WL 2224867, at *3. Similarly, the Seventh Circuit, in its Firstar Bank, N.A. v. Faul decision of 2001, adhered to the same principle, relying on the established presumption that “Congress will use clear language if it intends to alter an established understanding about what a law means; if Congress fails to do so, courts presume that the new statute has the same effect as the older version.” 253 F.3d 982, 988 (7th Cir.2001); see also Am. Surety Co. v. Bank of Cal., 133 F.2d 160, 162 (9th Cir.1943) (explaining that, if Congress had intended to provide that national bank should be deemed citizen of states where branch offices are operated, “it would be a noteworthy departure from the general rule, and more likely than not Congress would have plainly state[d] such intent”).6 In fact, as the Horton court recognized, “[pjrior to 1992, the ‘unquestioned’ and ‘longstanding interpretation’ was that ‘located’ did not include the branches of a national bank.” 387 F.3d at 428-29, 2004 WL 2224867, at *1 (emphasis in original) (quoting Baker v. First Am. Nat’l Bank, 111 F.Supp.2d 799, 800 (W.D.La.2000)).7 The Comptroller of the Currency has also endorsed this view. See O.C.C. Interpretive Letter No. 952, 2003 WL 23221430, at *4 (O.C.C. June 2003) (“National banks are to be treated for diversity jurisdiction purposes in a manner similar to state banks.”). As the Faul court has aptly explained, for sixty years leading up to the 1948 codification of § 1348, the term “located” was construed to mean that national banks would enjoy parity with state banks and corporations, and we must presume that Congress intended for that construc*437tion to continue. See 253 F.3d at 988.8 And as the court appropriately observed, nothing “in the statute rebuts this presumption.” Id. at 988-89 (contrasting 1882 enactment, which explicitly declared that national banks no longer enjoyed federal jurisdiction based on their federal status).9 Adhering to this reasoning, Judge Higginbotham, in writing for the Horton court, similarly concluded that “we should read section 1348 as retaining its objective of jurisdictional parity for national banks vis-a-vis state banks and corporations.” 387 F.3d at 431, 2004 WL 2224867, at *3.
II.
Notwithstanding the foregoing, the panel majority has concluded that the Court’s decision in Citizens & Southern National Bank v. Bougas, 434 U.S. 35, 98 S.Ct. 88, 54 L.Ed.2d 218 (1977), is controlling here. With respect, three compelling reasons serve to undercut the majority’s reliance on Bougas. First, the Bougas Court confined its ruling to the state court venue provision of 12 U.S.C. § 94, declaring that it was not deciding an issue of venue— much less jurisdiction — in the federal courts. Second, the in pari materia canon of statutory construction does not dictate how we should construe “located” because § 94 does not address the same subject as § 1348. Third, the canon of construction that different words within the same statute should, if possible, be assigned different meanings, does not preclude “located” from meaning Wachovia’s principal place of business.
A.
First of all, in rendering its decision in Bougas, the Court was assessing the congressional use of the term “located” in another statute, and its reasoning does not bind us. The Bougas appeal involved an issue of state court venue only, and the Court, in explaining its holding, carefully recognized that venue doctrines are primarily concerned with the convenience of the parties. In so doing, the Court concluded that, in the modern age, authorizing venue as present in a place where a national bank operates a branch office would not be unduly burdensome. Bougas, 434 U.S. at 44 & n. 10, 98 S.Ct. 88. Although the Court recognized that § 1348 also contains the term “located,” id. at 36 n. 1, 98 S.Ct. 88, this singular reference was, as the Horton court aptly observed, merely pointed out by the Bougas Court “in a footnote, with no further comment....” Horton, 387 F.3d at 433, 2004 WL 2224867, at *5. Moreover, the Bougas Court’s holding was confined to § 94 only, and the Court explicitly declared that it was not addressing any issue of venue in the federal courts. 434 U.S. at 39, 98 S.Ct. 88 (referencing 12 U.S.C. § 94). In these circumstances, the Court did not implicitly reverse its longstanding precedent concerning federal court jurisdiction involving national banks.
*438B.
Second, the in pari materia canon of statutory construction does not compel us to construe “located,” as found in § 1348, in the same manner as the Court construed § 94 in Bougas. Of course, statutes in pari materia — or pertaining to the same subject matter — should be construed “as if they were one law.” Erlenbaugh v. United States, 409 U.S. 239, 243, 93 S.Ct. 477, 34 L.Ed.2d 446 (1972) (internal citation and quotation marks omitted). This canon is only applicable, however, when the statutes address the same subject. See Faul, 253 F.3d at 990; 2B Norman J. Singer, Sutherland Statutory Construction § 51.03, at 138 (6th ed.2004) (stating that “where the same subject is treated in several acts having different objects the statutes are not in pari materia”). While the doctrines of both venue and jurisdiction concern whether a national bank may initiate suit or be sued in federal court, there are significant meaningful distinctions between them. See Neirbo Co. v. Bethlehem Shipbldg. Corp., 308 U.S. 165, 168, 60 S.Ct. 153, 84 L.Ed. 167 (1939) (“This basic difference between the court’s power and the litigant’s convenience is historic in the federal courts.”).10 Put simply, venue provisions address the convenience of the parties, and they are designed to minimize the cost of obtaining a court’s judgment. Id. at 990-91. Hence, the Bougas decision was premised on its conclusion that, with respect to state court proceedings, authorizing venue to lie in any county where a national bank operates a branch office, as opposed to the county of bank’s incorporation, would not unduly inconvenience the party litigants. See Bougas, 434 U.S. at 44, 98 S.Ct. 88 (observing that “[w]hat Congress was concerned with [in § 94] was the untoward interruption of a national bank’s business that might result from compelled production of bank records for distant litigation”) (emphasis added); see also Faul, 253 F.3d at 989-90.
Diversity jurisdiction, on the other hand, does not implicate any issue of convenience to the parties. Its principal purpose is to minimize potential bias against out-of-state parties. Guar. Trust Co. v. York, 326 U.S. 99, 111, 65 S.Ct. 1464, 89 L.Ed. 2079 (1945) (“Diversity jurisdiction is founded on assurance to nonresident litigants of courts free from susceptibility to potential local bias.”); Ziady v. Curley, 396 F.2d 873, 875 (4th Cir.1968) (recognizing that “one of the principal purposes of diversity jurisdiction was to give a citizen of one state access to an unbiased court to protect him from parochialism if he was forced into litigation in another state in which he was a stranger and of which his opponent was a citizen”). As Chief Judge Flaum explained in Faul, “while venue provisions minimize the cost of obtaining a court’s judgment without regard to what that judgment might be, diversity jurisdiction seeks to ensure a correct decision, in the sense of being rendered on the merits of the parties’ case rather than because of prejudice against a foreigner.” 253 F.3d at 991. The Faul court thus properly concluded that “the affirmative reasons offered for the [Bou-gas \ court’s holding have no applicability to questions of jurisdiction [,]” because “reductions in the cost of litigating do not justify separating national banks from all other corporations so as to deny them federal diversity jurisdiction....” Id. at 989-90.
*439Indeed, the rationale underlying the concept of diversity jurisdiction led -Congress to limit the states where a corporation may be deemed to possess citizenship, providing that a corporation is “a citizen of any State by which it has been incorporated and of the State where it has its principal place of business.... ” 28 U.S.C. § 1332(c)(1). And, as the Court has long recognized, national banks and corporations should be treated on the same basis for jurisdictional purposes. See Mercantile Nat’l Bank at Dallas v. Langdeau, 371 U.S. 555, 566, 83 S.Ct. 520, 9 L.Ed.2d 523 (1963); Petri, 142 U.S. at 650-51, 12 S.Ct. 325; Leather Mfrs.’ Bank, 120 U.S. at 780, 7 S.Ct. 777.
C.
Finally, though different terms used in the same statute should be assigned different meanings whenever possible, this principle of construction does not dictate our resolution of this jurisdictional dispute. Section 1348 utilizes two terms — “established” and “located” — to refer to the presence of a bank. As a result, the majority reads the term “established” to refer to a bank’s charter location, and it reads “located” to refer to a bank’s physical presence in general, concluding that “if Congress wishes to specify principal place of business and thereby exclude branch locations, it can easily do so.” Ante at 421 (emphasis in original). In the 1880s, when these terms first appeared in the national bank jurisdictional statute, such banks were not authorized to engage in branch banking. Consequently, as the Horton court recognized, the terms “ ‘established’ and ‘located’ would have been functionally equivalent for jurisdictional purposes” because a national bank was both “established” and “located” in the place specified in its certificate of organization. 387 F.3d at 434, 2004 WL 2224867, at *6. After branch banking was legalized in 1927 and expanded in 1933, Congress amended the jurisdictional statute several times, leaving the location language intact. Although different ways of being “located” were possible when Congress codified the statute in 1948, I see no basis for concluding that Congress intended for § 1348 to reflect some new reality,11 nor has any other court supported such an approach.12
In my view, it is more compelling to conclude that Congress, in 1948, intended to ratify the Supreme Court’s earlier rulings, and thus to construe “located” to include only a national bank’s principal place of business. See Bragdon, 524 U.S. at 645, 118 S.Ct. 2196. Indeed, as the Faul court observed, “the canon that different words in the same statute should be given different meanings can be complied with by considering ‘established’ as referring only to the place specified in the bank’s charter, while giving ‘located’ a meaning that includes a bank’s principal place of business.” 253 F.3d at 992.
III.
Pursuant to the foregoing, diversity jurisdiction is present here, and our creation of a circuit split on this issue is unwarranted. Because the majority has unjustifiably circumscribed federal court jurisdiction of *440disputes involving national banks, I respectfully dissent.

. See Horton v. Bank One, N.A., 387 F.3d 426 (5th Cir.2004); Firstar Bank, N.A. v. Faul, 253 F.3d 982 (7th Cir.2001); Am. Surety Co. v. Bank of Cal., 133 F.2d 160 (9th Cir.1943).

. Previous versions of these sources, and other sources as well, affirm the proposition that "locate” refers to a particular or specific position. See Black's Law Dictionary 1089 (4th ed.1968) (defining "location” as "[s]ite or place”); 8 The Oxford English Dictionary 1081 (reprint 2004) (2d ed.1989) (defining "locate” as "[t]o fix or establish in a place”). Only one definition emphasizes "located” as being related to physical presence. See Black’s Law Dictionary 940 (6th ed.1990) (defining "located” as "[h]aving physical presence or existence in a place").

. The Court's Bougas decision only addressed the meaning of 12 U.S.C. § 94, which then provided that actions against national banks may be brought in any district court "within the district in which such association may be established, or in any State, county, or municipal court in the county or city in which said [national bank] is located having jurisdiction in similar cases.” Bougas, 434 U.S. at 35-36, 98 S.Ct. 88 (quoting 12 U.S.C. § 94).

. For example, in adopting the Judicial Code of 1911, Congress altered the structure of the jurisdictional provision of the 1887 act, while retaining in hs&c verba its language regarding citizenship. Horton, 387 F.3d at 431, 2004 WL 2224867, at *3. This structural revision was obviously designed "to make the purpose of the reenacted statute clearer....” Herrmann v. Edwards, 238 U.S. 107, 117, 35 S.Ct. 839, 59 L.Ed. 1224 (1915).

. The Second Circuit has recently indicated that, pursuant to § 1348, a national bank should be deemed "a citizen of every state in which it has offices.” World Trade Ctr. Props., L.L.C. v. Hartford Fire Ins. Co., 345 F.3d 154, 161 (2d Cir.2003). Needless to say, I am unpersuaded by this dicta. As I read it, the decision upon which that panel relied — United Republic Ins. Co. in Receivership v. Chase Manhattan Bank, 315 F.3d 168, 169 (2d Cir.*4362003) (per curiam) — did not hold that "located” includes a national bank's branch offices; it simply remanded for an assessment of citizenship. Indeed, the only court in the Second Circuit to directly address the issue viewed the language of World Trade Center Properties as "dicta” and as not controlling. See RDC Funding Corp. v. Wachovia Bank, N.A., No. 3:03CV1360, 2004 WL 717111, at *2 n. 6 (D.Conn. March 31, 2004). That court agreed with my take on this question. See id. at *6.

. In American Surety Co., the court was called upon to construe the term "located” as found in 28 U.S.C. § 41, the predecessor of § 1348.

. The district courts to have confronted this issue since the Seventh Circuit's decision in Faul have all agreed with that court’s holding, including a court in this circuit. Compare MBIA Ins. Corp. v. Royal Indem. Co., 294 F.Supp.2d 606 (D.Del.2003), Pitts v. First Union Nat’l Bank, 217 F.Supp.2d 629 (D.Md.2002), Bank One, N.A. v. Euro-Alamo Invs., Inc., 211 F.Supp.2d 808 (N.D.Tex.2002), Baker v. First Am. Nat’l Bank, 111 F.Supp.2d 799 (W.D.La.2000), and Fin. Software Sys., Inc. v. First Union Nat’l Bank, 84 F.Supp.2d 594 (E.D.Pa.1999) (holding that national bank is citizen of state of its principal place of business and not citizen of any other state where it has branch), with Ferraiolo Constr., Inc. v. Keybank, N.A., 978 F.Supp. 23 (D.Me.1997), Norwest Bank Minn., N.A. v. Patton, 924 F.Supp. 114 (D.Colo.1996), Bank of N.Y. v. Bank of Am., 861 F.Supp. 225 (S.D.N.Y.1994), and Conn. Nat’l Bank v. Iacono, 785 F.Supp. 30 (D.R.I.1992) (agreeing that national bank has citizenship in every state where it has branch)..

. Because a corporation is a citizen of both the state in which it is incorporated and the state in which it maintains its principal place of business, a national bank, to be treated similarly, should be a citizen of the state of its principal place of business and the state named in its organizational certificate. Horton, 387 F.3d at 436, 2004 WL 2224867, at *7; Faul, 253 F.3d at 994.

. The only district court in this circuit to have faced the question of how the term "located” in § 1348 should be construed followed the Faul court's "reasoning and analysis.” See Pitts v. First Union Nat'l Bank, 217 F.Supp.2d 629, 631 (D.Md.2002). In so doing, Judge Nickerson recognized that " located' should be construed to maintain jurisdictional equality between national banks and state banks or. other corporations.” Id. (quoting Faul, 253 F.3d at 993-94) (internal quotation marks omitted).

. As the Horton and Faul courts have emphasized, § 94 was enacted in 1864 as part of the National Banking Act, while § 1348 was adopted in 1948 as part of the Judiciaiy and Judicial Procedure Act. See Horton, 387 F.3d at 433, 2004 WL 2224867, at *5; Faul, 253 F.3d at 990.

. For support for its position, the majority asserts that in 1948 Congress-was aware that branch banking was-possible, "having effected the change itself.''. Ante at 421. However, there is no indication that Congress intended the advent of branch banking to change the definition of "located” and to deviate from its 'settled precedent of according national banks access to the federal court.

. The district courts that have construed the term "located” in § 1348 to include branch offices, see supra note 6, relied principally on the Bougas construction of 12 U.S.C. § 94.