Court Opinion

ID: 9425627
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:15:17.949921+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:56.136280
License: Public Domain

Mu. Justice Rehnquist,
with whom The Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Stewart, and Mr. Justice Powell join, concurring in the judgment.
I agree with the Court that the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in this case should be affirmed, since there was no injunctive order in effect at the time that respondent’s allegedly contemptuous conduct occurred. But I do not join that portion of the Court’s opinion which lays down a “rule” for all cases *446involving 28 U. S. C. § 1450,1 the statute which all parties agree is controlling in the case before us. In my view, the announcement of this “rule” is neither necessary to the decision of this case nor consistent with the provisions of the statute itself.
The Court persuasively demonstrates in its opinion that the temporary restraining order issued by the California Superior Court had expired by its own terms long before the alleged contempt occurred. And I see nothing in the language or legislative history of 28 U. S. C. § 1450, providing that “[a] 11 injunctions, orders, and other proceedings had in such action prior to its removal shall remain in full force and effect until dissolved or modified by the district court,” which would indefinitely extend the Superior Court’s restraining order beyond the time of its normal expiration under state law. Since the temporary restraining order, had the case remained in state court, concededly would have expired in early June, respondent’s actions in November and December could not have constituted a contempt of that order.
The Court also persuasively demonstrates that none of the proceedings occurring after removal of the case to the United States District Court had the effect of converting the subsisting state court temporary restraining order into a preliminary injunction of indefinite duration. Those proceedings addressed markedly different issues and certainly did not give the state court order a new, independent federal existence.
Having said this much, the Court has disposed of the case before it. The opinion then goes on, however, to devise a “rule” that
“[a]n ex parte temporary restraining order issued by *447a state court prior to removal remains in force after removal no longer than it would have remained in effect under state law, but in no event does the order remain in force longer than the time limitations imposed by Rule 65 (b), measured from the date of removal.” Ante, at 439-440. (Footnote omitted.)
But the determination that mere removal of a case to a federal district court does not extend the duration of a previously issued state court order past its original termination date makes quite unnecessary to this case any further discussion about time limitations contained in Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 65 (b). More importantly, the second clause of the “rule” devised by the Court seems quite contrary to the specific language of 28 U. S. C. § 1450.
The Court apparently bases this latter clause of the “rule" upon the observation that “respondent Union had a right to the protections of the time limitation in Rule 65 (b) once the case was removed to the District Court.” While this premise probably has a good deal to recommend it as a matter of practicality or of common sense, the language of the statute gives no hint that rules of practice governing issuance of federal injunctions in the first instance were automatically to be incorporated in applying its terms. The statute says that the state court's temporary restraining order “shall remain in full force and effect until dissolved or modified by the district court.” This Court’s “rule,” however, says that it shall not remain in full force and effect, even though not dissolved or modified by the District Court, if it would have a life beyond the time limitations imposed by Rule 65 (b).
I think it likely that the interest in limiting the duration of temporary restraining orders which is exemplified in Rule 65 (b) can be fully protected in cases removed *448to the district court by a-n application to modify or dissolve a state court restraining order which is incompatible with those terms.2 Such a procedure would be quite consistent with § 1450, which specifically contemplates dissolution or modification by the district court upon an appropriate showing, in a way that the “rule” devised by the Court in this case is not. It is unlikely that many orders issued under rules of state procedure, primarily designed, after all, to provide suitable procedures for state courts rather than to frustrate federal procedural rules in removed actions, would by their terms remain in effect for a period of time far longer than that contemplated by the comparable Federal Rule of Civil Procedure. But in the rare case where such a condition obtains, it is surely not asking too much of a litigant in a removed case to comply with § 1450 and affirmatively move for appropriate modification of the state order.
Therefore, although I cannot subscribe to the rule which the Court fashions to govern cases of this type, I concur in its conclusion that respondent’s activity in November and December 1970 did not violate any injunc-tive order which was in force at that time.3

 The relevant provision of 28 U. S. C. § 1450 reads:
“All injunctions, orders, and other proceedings had in such action prior to its removal shall remain in full force and effect until dissolved or modified by the district court.”

 Indeed, respondent's motion to dissolve the state court order because of the prohibitions contained in the Norris-LaGuardia Act, 29 U. S. C. § 104, was just such a motion. That motion was denied by the District Court, however, and respondent made no further effort to obtain a modification or dissolution of the state restraining order prior to its expiration.

 I see no occasion for the Court's rather casual speculation, contained in n. 5 of its opinion, that the respondent’s violation of the order, even were it effective at the time of its later conduct, may not have been "willful.” The Court has concluded that the order was not effective at that later time, and it can serve no useful purpose to speculate about the sufficiency of the evidence with respect to violation of a defunct order.