Court Opinion

ID: 9947801
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-05 18:01:30.142279+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:28:35.305597
License: Public Domain

FOR PUBLICATION

  UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
       FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

PERIDOT TREE, INC.; KENNETH                  No. 22-16783
GAY,
                                               D.C. No.
                 Plaintiffs-Appellants,     2:22-cv-00289-
                                               KJM-DB
 v.

CITY OF SACRAMENTO; DAVINA                     OPINION
SMITH,

                 Defendants-Appellees,

and

SACRAMENTO OFFICE OF
CANNABIS MANAGEMENT,

                 Defendant.

         Appeal from the United States District Court
             for the Eastern District of California
      Kimberly J. Mueller, Chief District Judge, Presiding

          Argued and Submitted November 15, 2023
                  San Francisco, California

                     Filed March 4, 2024
2             PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

     Before: Sidney R. Thomas and Salvador Mendoza, Jr.,
     Circuit Judges, and Solomon Oliver, Jr., * District Judge.

                   Opinion by Judge Mendoza

                          SUMMARY **

                     Civil Rights/Abstention

    In an action challenging the City of Sacramento’s
requirement that individuals applying for permits to operate
storefront marijuana dispensaries within city limits be
Sacramento residents, the panel reversed the district court’s
decision to abstain from exercising jurisdiction over
plaintiff’s dormant Commerce Clause claim and remanded
for further proceedings.
    The district court—concerned by the conflict between
state and federal law regulating marijuana use and
distribution and that it might have to apply constitutional
protections to federally unlawful conduct—abstained from
exercising jurisdiction over plaintiff’s dormant Commerce
Clause claim, stayed the case, and directed plaintiff to seek
relief in California state court.

*
 The Honorable Solomon Oliver, Jr., United States Senior District Judge
for the Northern District of Ohio, sitting by designation.
**
  This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has
been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO        3

    Abstention is generally permitted only in exceptional
circumstances when denying a federal forum would clearly
serve an important countervailing interest.
    The panel held that abstention was not warranted under
Railroad Commission of Texas v. Pullman Co., 312 U.S. 496
(1941), which permits abstention when the resolution of a
federal question might be obviated if the state courts were
given the opportunity to interpret ambiguous state law.
Given the clarity of Sacramento’s residency requirement,
precedent interpreting similar requirements, and the lack of
state law issues that might narrow or moot the federal
constitutional claim, plaintiff’s suit does not meet the
requirements of Pullman abstention.
    The panel held that abstention was not warranted under
Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 319 U.S. 315 (1943). California has
not chosen to concentrate suits challenging administrative
action in a particular court and plaintiff’s claim did not
resemble one asserting that a state agency had misapplied its
lawful authority or failed to take into consideration or
properly weigh relevant state-law factors. Instead, this case
presents pronounced federal interests, implicating the
substantial federal concern of whether the dormant
Commerce Clause applies to conduct lawful under state law
and unlawful under federal law.
    The panel held that abstention was improper under
Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. City of Thibodaux, 360 U.S.
25 (1959), because this lawsuit does not present a dispute
between intra-governmental agencies or states, the city’s
residency requirement is straightforward, and no party has
articulated a pressing sovereignty concern endangered by the
dormant Commerce Clause analysis.
4          PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

    The panel held that abstention was not warranted under
Colorado River Water Conservation District v. United
States, 424 U.S. 800 (1976), because there is no concurrent
state-court proceeding.
    Finally, the panel declined Sacramento’s invitation to
invoke general comity principles to affirm the district court’s
decision. Plaintiff’s suit exclusively presents a question of
federal law. The district court’s abstention and its
expectation that plaintiff try its luck in state court did little
to promote efficiency, comity, or federalism, and effectively
imposed an exhaustion requirement on plaintiff.

                         COUNSEL

Jeffrey M. Jensen (argued), Jeffrey M. Jensen PC, Beverly
Hills, California; Christian E. Kernkamp, Kernkamp Law
APC, Los Angeles, California; for Plaintiffs-Appellants.
Lee H. Roistacher (argued), Dean Gazzo Roistacher LLP,
Solana Beach, California; Grace L. Pak, Deputy City
Attorney; Matthew R. Day, Senior Deputy City Attorney;
Susan A. Wood, City Attorney; Sacramento City Attorney’s
Office, Sacramento, California; for Defendants-Appellants.
Arthur J. Wylene, General Counsel, Rural County
Representatives of California, Sacramento, California;
Jennifer B. Henning, Litigation Counsel, California State
Association of Counties, Sacramento, California; for Amici
Curiae California State Association of Counties and League
of California Cities.
Patrick J. Hagan, Kabir Chopra, and Taylor C. Wagniere,
Deputy City Attorneys; Hydee F. Soto, City Attorney; Los
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO         5

Angeles City Attorney’s Office, Los Angeles, California; for
Amici Curiae City of Los Angeles.

                         OPINION

MENDOZA, Circuit Judge:

    Peridot Tree, Inc. and its majority shareholder, Kenneth
Gay (together, “Peridot Tree”), filed suit against the City of
Sacramento and Davina Smith (collectively, “Sacramento”)
over the city’s requirement that individuals applying for
permits to operate storefront marijuana dispensaries within
city limits be Sacramento residents. Peridot Tree argues that
Sacramento’s residency requirement violates the federal
Constitution’s dormant Commerce Clause because it
impermissibly discriminates between residents and non-
residents, unduly restricting interstate commerce. The
district court—concerned by the obvious conflict between
state and federal law regulating marijuana use and
distribution; and that it might have to apply constitutional
protections to federally unlawful conduct—abstained from
exercising jurisdiction over Peridot Tree’s constitutional
claim. To justify its abstention, the district court noted the
deep conflicts between state and federal marijuana law;
invoked an amalgam of the Supreme Court’s abstention
decisions in Pullman, Burford, Thibodaux, and Colorado
River and their progeny; conceded that this case did not “fit
neatly” among them; and stayed the suit. In our view, the
district court rightly determined that this case does not meet
the requirements for abstention under any abstention
doctrine established by the Supreme Court. But it erred by
6          PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

choosing to abstain anyway. So we reverse its decision and
remand for further proceedings.
        I. Factual and Procedural Background
                             A.
     In 2016, California voters legalized recreational
marijuana use by adults through a constitutional ballot
initiative, commonly called “Proposition 64” or the “Adult
Use of Marijuana Act.” Control, Regulate and Tax Adult
Marijuana Act, 2016 Cal. Legis. Serv. A-92 (West). In the
wake of Proposition 64, a new industry blossomed, and
many California counties and cities—including its capital,
Sacramento—passed ordinances and resolutions to regulate
the production, sale, and purchase of recreational marijuana.
Some of these ordinances sought to prevent state-level
legalization from harming local communities, and they
implemented policies to avoid marijuana revenue funding
gang activity or marijuana use contributing to impaired
driving. See, e.g., San Jose, Cal., 6 Bus. Licenses & Regs.
ch. 6.88.010 (2019). Others sought to transition existing
medical-marijuana       infrastructure   into    recreational
businesses. See, e.g., Oakland, Cal. Code § 5.80.110 (2018)
(“Any permit issued . . . may be utilized for medical or
adult-use purposes.”). And some aimed to expand equitable
access to the marijuana industry by providing unique
opportunities and programming to those negatively affected
by marijuana’s past criminalization. See Coachella, Cal.,
Res. 2019-15 (Mar. 27, 2019); see also Humboldt County,
Cal., Ordinance 2623 (Mar. 19, 2019).
   One such program is at issue here: Sacramento’s 2018
“Cannabis Opportunity Reinvestment and Equity,” or
“CORE,” Program. See Sacramento, Cal., Res. 2018-0323
(Aug. 9, 2018). Designed to “address the negative impacts
             PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO                     7

of disproportionate enforcement of cannabis related
regulation,” the CORE Program seeks to reduce “barriers of
entry” to the marijuana industry for those “negatively
impacted” by past marijuana prosecution and
criminalization. Id. It offers business and development
resources to eligible CORE Program participants, including
coaching, criminal-record expungement, business-needs and
loan-readiness assessments, and courses in regulatory
compliance. Id. And it provides unique economic
opportunities to qualifying participants in the city’s
burgeoning recreational- and medical-marijuana industry.
Sacramento, Cal., Res. 2020-0338 (Oct. 13, 2020).
   To be a CORE Program participant, an individual must
meet one of two “classifications”: 1

         Classification 1. A current or former
         resident of the City of Sacramento who
         previously resided or currently resides in a
         low-income household and was either [sic]:
         a) arrested or convicted for a cannabis related
         crime in Sacramento between the years 1980
         and 2011; or is b) an immediate family
         member of an individual described in
         subsection a of Classification 1 or
         Classification 2.
         Classification 2. A current or former
         resident of the City of Sacramento who has
         lived in a low-income household for at least

1
 Different classifications govern a business’s ability to participate in the
CORE Program, but those classifications are irrelevant to Peridot Tree’s
suit.
8          PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

       five (5) years, between the years of 1980 and
       2011 in [listed zip codes].

Both CORE Program classifications 1 and 2 facially require
participants to be current or former Sacramento residents.
    After adopting and implementing its CORE Program,
Sacramento’s City Council set aside ten “storefront cannabis
dispensary permits,” and invited classification 1 and 2
participants, and only those participants, to apply for them.
See Sacramento, Cal., Res. 2020-0338 (Oct. 13, 2020). By
city ordinance, such a permit is needed to operate a
storefront cannabis dispensary within city limits, and
Sacramento caps the number of active permits at forty. See
Sacramento, Cal., Code § 5.150.350. At the time it opened
the permitting application to classification 1 and 2 CORE
Program participants, thirty of those licenses had already
been issued. Thus, Sacramento restricted access to the
remaining ten permits exclusively to qualifying CORE
Program participants.
    Peridot Tree and its majority shareholder, Mr. Gay,
applied for one of those ten storefront cannabis dispensary
permits. Despite being a member of a low-income
household and having been convicted of a marijuana crime
between 1980 and 2011, Mr. Gay is not and has never been
a resident of Sacramento; he is a citizen of Michigan. He is
also not a CORE Program participant. When Sacramento
announced the winners of the permit-application process,
Peridot Tree and Mr. Gay were not among them. Instead, all
ten permits allegedly went to businesses “affiliated with
individuals who have resided in Sacramento,” and were
classification 1 or 2 CORE Program participants.
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO          9

   So Peridot Tree sued Sacramento in federal court under
42 U.S.C. § 1983 and the Federal Declaratory Judgment Act,
28 U.S.C. § 2201, for violating the dormant Commerce
Clause. Among other things, Peridot Tree notes that
Sacramento’s CORE Program and permitting scheme allow
only “current or former resident[s] of the City of
Sacramento” to apply for storefront cannabis dispensary
permits. According to Peridot Tree, this requirement
unconstitutionally discriminates between resident and
nonresident applicants, unduly burdening interstate
commerce. Peridot Tree seeks injunctive, declaratory, and
monetary relief.
                              B.
    Peridot Tree’s suit against Sacramento under the
dormant Commerce Clause does not grow in a vacuum.
Instead, its roots lie at the intersection of conflicting state
and federal policies related to marijuana legalization,
possession, production, and sale. For its part, California has
long been at the vanguard of marijuana legalization in the
United States.       In 1996, California voters approved
Proposition 215 and passed the “Compassionate Use Act,”
codified at Section 11362.5 of the California Health and
Safety Code, which legalized marijuana for certain medical
purposes. In response, cities like Sacramento issued medical
marijuana storefront dispensary permits.             Likewise,
California’s Proposition 64 and its ensuing regulations built
on these early efforts, developing a “comprehensive”
regulatory system to “control and regulate the cultivation,
distribution, transport, storage, manufacturing, processing,
and sale of nonmedical marijuana.” Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code
§ 26000(b) (2016). California also amended various health
and safety, labor, water, revenue and tax, and food
agricultural codes to accommodate its new marijuana
10         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

industry. See, e.g., Cal. Health & Safety Code § 11362.1
(2016); Cal. Water Code § 13276(a) (2016); Cal. Food &
Agric. Code § 81010(b) (2016).           Despite creating a
Department of Cannabis Control, California does not appear
to have created a dedicated administrative agency or judicial
tribunal to adjudicate marijuana-related disputes. Other
states, many in California’s wake, have also legalized
recreational and medical marijuana possession, use, and
distribution in different contexts. See Gonzales v. Raich, 545
U.S. 1, 5 & n.1 (2005); see also Lisa N. Sacco, Cong. Rsch.
Serv., IN11204, The Schedule I Status of Marijuana 1 (2022)
(“[M]ost states and territories have deviated from across-the-
board prohibition of marijuana, and now have laws and
policies allowing for some cultivation, sale, distribution, and
possession of marijuana.”).
    By contrast, the federal government has given mixed
signals on the issue of recreational and medical marijuana
use. In 1970, Congress passed the Controlled Substances
Act (“CSA”), which, among other things, made it unlawful
to “manufacture, distribute, or dispense” controlled
substances. 21 U.S.C. § 841(a). One of those controlled
substances is marijuana, which Congress categorized as a
“Schedule I” drug, making its possession, manufacture, and
use a criminal offense. See 21 U.S.C. § 812(c); Raich, 545
U.S. at 14. Under the CSA, virtually any transaction
involving marijuana is unlawful, and violations of the CSA
come with stiff federal penalties, including hefty fines and
lengthy terms of imprisonment. See 21 U.S.C. §§ 811–12,
841(a)(1), 844(a); Raich, 545 U.S. at 14. The Drug
Enforcement Administration (“DEA”), which enforces
federal controlled substances laws and regulations, has long
resisted efforts to reschedule marijuana because, according
to the DEA, marijuana “has a high potential for abuse, has
             PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO               11

no currently accepted medical use, and lacks an accepted
level of safety for use under medical supervision.” Lisa N.
Sacco, Cong. Rsch. Serv., IN11204, The Schedule I Status
of Marijuana 2 (2022). 2 The CSA remains good law.
    Both the legislative and executive branches of the federal
government, however, appear disquieted by the CSA’s
marijuana-based prohibitions. For its part, since December
2014, Congress has, through “congressional appropriations
riders,” “prohibited the use of any [Department of Justice]
funds that prevent states with medical marijuana programs
(including California) from implementing their state medical
marijuana laws.” United States v. Kleinman, 880 F.3d 1020,
1027 (9th Cir. 2017); Joanna R. Lampe, Cong. Rsch. Serv.,
LSB10694, Funding Limits on Federal Prosecutions of
State-Legal Medical Marijuana 1 (2022). The Department
of Justice, at the urging of various United States deputy
attorneys general over the past decade and a half, has
(1) generally “decline[d] to enforce” federal marijuana
prohibitions in states that have legalized the drug, Feinberg
v. C.I.R., 808 F.3d 813, 814 (10th Cir. 2015); (2) advised
local prosecutors not to devote resources to prosecute
individuals for acts that comply with state drug laws, see
United States v. Canori, 737 F.3d 181, 183–84 (2d Cir.
2013); and (3) noted that marijuana-enforcement priorities
should focus on keeping marijuana revenue from making its

2
  Although the DEA has historically been reluctant to loosen federal
restrictions on marijuana, on August 29, 2023, the Department of Health
and Human Services (“DHS”) issued a 252-page report to the DEA,
recommending that marijuana “be controlled in Schedule III of the CSA”
instead of Schedule I. See Letter from Doctor Rachel L. Levine,
Assistant Sec’y for Health, to The Honorable Anne Milgram, Adm’r,
Drug Enf’t Agency (Aug. 29, 2023). As of the date of this opinion, the
DEA has yet to formally respond to this recommendation.
12         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

way to criminal enterprises, Memorandum from James M.
Cole, Deputy Att’y Gen., U.S. Dep’t of Justice to All U.S.
Att’ys (Feb. 14, 2014). The Department of Justice has also
issued guidance to states that have enacted laws authorizing
cannabis-related conduct, counseling them to “implement
strong and effective regulatory and enforcement systems that
will address the threat those state laws could pose to public
safety, public health, and other law enforcement interests.”
Memorandum from James M. Cole, Deputy Att’y Gen., U.S.
Dep’t of Justice to All U.S. Att’ys (Aug. 29, 2013). And
President Biden has pardoned U.S. citizens and lawful
permanent residents who “committed the offense of simple
possession of marijuana in violation of the Controlled
Substances Act.” Proclamation No. 10467, 87 Fed. Reg.
61,441 (Oct. 6, 2022); see also Pres. Joseph R. Biden,
Statement from President Biden on Marijuana Reform (Oct.
6, 2022) (“[N]o one should be in jail just for using or
possessing marijuana.”).
                               C.
    Put simply, the legal landscape governing recreational
marijuana is in flux and hardly straightforward, and Peridot
Tree’s dormant Commerce Clause suit against Sacramento
arguably arises in the gray area between competing state and
federal laws. The district court—rightfully concerned (1) by
the apparent conflict between federal and state marijuana
laws; (2) by the chance that it might need to apply
constitutional protections to federally unlawful conduct; or
(3) that it may invalidate California’s new regulatory regime
for recreational marijuana—sua sponte asked the parties to
consider the propriety of abstention. In the order that
followed, the district court noted that “[t]his case does not fit
neatly within any single abstention doctrine the Supreme
Court has recognized.” Nonetheless, it invoked the policies
            PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO             13

and justifications underpinning many federal abstention
doctrines—including those grounded in the Supreme
Court’s decisions in Railroad Commission of Texas v.
Pullman Co., 312 U.S. 496 (1941) (“Pullman” abstention),
Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 319 U.S. 315 (1943) (“Burford”
abstention), Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. City of
Thibodaux, 360 U.S. 25 (1959) (“Thibodaux” abstention),
and Colorado River Water Conservation District v. United
States, 424 U.S. 800 (1976) (“Colorado River” abstention)—
before abstaining anyway, staying the case, and directing
Peridot Tree to seek relief in California state court. Peridot
Tree’s appeal timely followed.
                   II. Standard of Review
     We have jurisdiction over the district court’s decision
under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. When reviewing a district court’s
decision to abstain, we tailor our standard of review to the
abstention doctrine invoked. In “most abstention cases,” we
apply a “modified abuse of discretion standard,” where we
first determine, de novo, “whether the requirements of
abstention are satisfied.” Courthouse News Serv. v. Planet,
750 F.3d 776, 782–83, 789 (9th Cir. 2014). If those
requirements are not met, the district court has “little or no
discretion” to abstain. Id. at 782 (quoting Almodovar v.
Reiner, 832 F.2d 1138, 1140 (9th Cir. 1987)). But if they
are met, then we review the decision to abstain for abuse of
discretion. Id. Relevant here, we have applied the modified
standard of review to abstention decisions under Pullman,
Burford, and Colorado River. 3 We have yet to squarely

3
 See Gearing v. City of Half Moon Bay, 54 F.4th 1144, 1147 (9th Cir.
2022) (considering Pullman); United States v. Morros, 268 F.3d 695,
703–05 (9th Cir. 2001) (considering Burford); Am. Int’l Underwriters
14           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

decide what standard of review to apply to district court
decisions invoking Thibodaux abstention. 4 Given, however,
that “[c]ourts and commentators alike are split on whether
Thibodaux is a separate abstention doctrine, as opposed to a
special form of Burford abstention,” we apply our modified
standard of review to Thibodaux abstention, too. See
Hawthorne Savings F.S.B. v. Reliance Ins. Co. of Ill., 421
F.3d 835, 846 n.9, 848–49 (9th Cir. 2005) (citing Thibodaux
and applying the modified abuse of discretion standard to
Burford abstention); City of Tucson v. U.S. W. Commc’ns,
Inc., 284 F.3d 1128, 1133–34 (9th Cir. 2002) (reciting our
modified standard, before addressing whether Thibodaux
abstention, which the district court did not address, might
“support the district court’s decision to abstain”). 5 In

(Philippines), Inc. v. Cont’l Ins. Co., 843 F.2d 1253, 1256 (9th Cir. 1988)
(considering Colorado River).
4
  It appears that we have had few opportunities to address Thibodaux
abstention, much less to consider what standard of review to apply to a
district court’s decision to abstain under its auspices. See, e.g.,
Hawthorne Savings F.S.B. v. Reliance Ins. Co. of Ill., 421 F.3d 835, 846
n.9 (9th Cir. 2005); Kern-Tulare Water Dist. v. City of Bakersfield, 828
F.2d 514, 517 (9th Cir. 1987) (addressing Burford abstention and citing
Thibodaux in support); Midkiff v. Tom, 702 F.2d 788, 800 n.3 (9th Cir.
1983) (Poole, J., concurring) (“[Thibodaux] is generally classified as
within Burford abstention.”), judgment rev’d by Hawaii Hous. Auth. v.
Midkiff, 467 U.S. 229 (1984).
5
  In cases that precede the development of our modified standard of
review, we imply, albeit in dicta, that Burford abstention and, by
implication, Thibodaux abstention may be subject to an abuse of
discretion standard. See, e.g., In re Eastport Assocs., 935 F.2d 1071,
1079 n.7 (9th Cir. 1991) (addressing whether the district court “should
have abstained under [Burford and Thibodaux],” and concluding that
“[t]hese doctrines raise no further grounds for finding an abuse of
discretion” given the district court’s decision not to abstain under a
             PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO                  15

addition, we have discretion to determine whether any of
these abstention doctrines ought to apply, regardless of
whether they were specifically invoked or raised by the
parties. See, e.g., Slidewaters LLC v. Washington State
Dep’t of Lab. & Indus., 4 F.4th 747, 761 (9th Cir. 2021).
                          III. Discussion
    “Abstention from the exercise of federal jurisdiction is
the exception, not the rule.” Colorado River, 424 U.S. at
813. Both this court and the Supreme Court have long
affirmed that “[d]istrict courts have an obligation and a duty
to decide cases properly before them.” Tucson, 284 F.3d at
1132; see also Deakins v. Monaghan, 484 U.S. 193, 203
(1988) (describing federal courts’ obligation to adjudicate
matters within their jurisdiction as “virtually unflagging”
(quoting Colorado River, 424 U.S. at 817)). Abstention is
generally permitted only in “exceptional circumstances,”
when “denying a federal forum would clearly serve an
important countervailing interest.” Quackenbush v. Allstate
Ins. Co., 517 U.S. 706, 716 (1992) (citations omitted).
Abstention remains, however, “an extraordinary and narrow
exception to the duty of a [d]istrict [c]ourt to adjudicate a

broader state law); Turf. Paradise, Inc. v. Arizona Downs, 670 F.2d 813,
819–20 (9th Cir. 1982) (reviewing all abstention decisions “only for an
abuse of discretion,” and citing Thibodaux in support of its finding that
Burford abstention was “inapplicable”); Sederquist v. City of Tiburon,
590 F.2d 278, 281 n.5 (9th Cir. 1978) (“The language of Thibodaux does,
however, reinforce the wisdom of interfering with the abstention
determination by the district judge only when there is an abuse of
discretion.”). But these cases, despite mentioning Thibodaux and
cursorily considering its implications, fail to apply Thibodaux abstention
directly, do not address what to do when the requirements for abstention
are not met, do not prescribe a standard of review for Thibodaux
abstention cases, and appear obviated by our later decisions addressing
the appropriate standard of review for Burford abstention.
16         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

controversy properly before it.” Colorado River, 424 U.S.
at 813 (quoting Cnty. of Allegheny v. Frank Mashuda Co.,
360 U.S. 185, 188 (1959)); see also Quackenbush, 510 U.S.
at 728 (characterizing Burford abstention, and summarizing
established abstention doctrines).
    The parties do not dispute that the district court has
jurisdiction over Peridot Tree’s lawsuit. On appeal, Peridot
Tree argues that its claims under the dormant Commerce
Clause do not present the type of “exceptional
circumstances” warranting abstention. Not only are the
established federal abstention doctrines cited by the district
court an imperfect fit, but none of them apply, and Peridot
Tree urges us not to craft a new abstention doctrine to fit this
case. For its part, Sacramento maintains that the federal
abstention doctrines are an imperfect fit because so many
apply, and it contends that Pullman abstention and principles
of comity justify the district court’s decision. After
considering the propriety of Pullman, Burford, Thibodaux,
and Colorado River abstention, as well as abstention on
generalized “comity” grounds, we agree with Peridot Tree.
                              A.
1. Pullman abstention
    Pullman does not support the district court’s abstention.
Under the Pullman abstention doctrine, “federal courts have
the power to refrain from hearing cases” when “the
resolution of a federal constitutional question might be
obviated if the state courts were given the opportunity to
interpret ambiguous state law.” Quackenbush, 517 U.S. at
716–17. Like its brethren, “Pullman abstention is an
extraordinary and narrow exception to the duty of a district
court to adjudicate a controversy.” Wolfson v. Brammer, 616
F.3d 1045, 1066 (9th Cir. 2010) (alterations and quotation
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO          17

marks omitted).         We consider Pullman abstention
appropriate if: “(1) there are sensitive issues of social policy
‘upon which the federal courts ought not to enter unless no
alternative to its adjudication is open,’ (2) constitutional
adjudication could be avoided by a state ruling, and
(3) resolution of the state law issue is uncertain.” Id.
(citation omitted). At bottom, Pullman counsels that when
“a federal court can avoid a constitutional determination by
allowing a state court to construe state law, the federal court
should abstain.” Am. Int’l Underwriters, 843 F.2d at 1257.
Peridot Tree’s dispute satisfies Pullman abstention’s first
requirement, but it fails to meet its second and third
requirements.
                               i.
     Peridot Tree’s suit touches on sensitive issues of social
policy. This court has not had the opportunity to address the
sensitivity of city-sponsored, business-development
strategies designed to lessen the effects of a state’s past
criminalization of drug-related conduct. But we have held
that “land use planning is a sensitive area of social policy,”
C-Y Development Co. v. City of Redlands, 703 F.2d 375, 377
(9th Cir. 1983), and this case might touch on some aspects
of land use. After all, the city apportions permits to those
who wish to open storefront dispensaries within city limits
(although such apportionment is hardly akin to the zoning-
style considerations that we traditionally call “land use”). It
is also “well settled that the State has broad police powers in
regulating the administration of drugs by the health
professions.” Whalen v. Roe, 429 U.S. 589, 603 n.30 (1977).
California has, of course, recognized the use of marijuana as
a medical treatment under certain conditions (although the
ordinance at issue is not one that regulates the administration
of marijuana by health professionals). See Cal. Health &
18         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

Safety Code § 11362.5. And while Sacramento’s ordinances
are not criminal—an area traditionally considered an
important state interest, see Juidice v. Vail, 430 U.S. 327,
335 (1977)—they are designed to alleviate the burdens
imposed by previous criminal laws outlawing marijuana.
Here, the city’s interest in remedying the consequences of
past marijuana criminalization, coupled with the state’s
interest in regulating its new, recreational marijuana
industry, is broad and of sensitive state concern, so this first
Pullman requirement is met.
                              ii.
    But it is unclear how Peridot Tree’s dormant Commerce
Clause claim could be avoided by a state-court ruling
clarifying Sacramento’s residency requirement for storefront
marijuana dispensaries. Generally, “[t]he assumption [that]
justifies abstention is that a federal court’s erroneous
determination of a state law issue may result in premature or
unnecessary constitutional adjudication, and unwarranted
interference with state programs and statutes.” Pue v. Sillas,
632 F.2d 74, 79 (9th Cir. 1980). In Zwickler v. Koota, the
Supreme Court reasoned that Pullman abstention is
inappropriate when “state court construction cannot narrow
[the state statute’s] allegedly indiscriminate cast and render
unnecessary a decision of [a plaintiff]’s constitutional
challenge.” Id. at 250. By contrast, in C-Y Development, we
affirmed a district court’s decision to abstain because the
plaintiffs, applicants denied building permits, improperly
asked the federal court to resolve a mixture of state law and
federal constitutional challenges to the city’s permitting
system. 703 F.2d at 376, 378. In that case, resolution “of
the[] state law questions could dispose of most of C-Y’s
federal constitutional claims,” and abstention would thus
“substantially narrow[] and refine[]” any remaining
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO           19

“constitutional issues.” Id. at 378–80. We similarly
endorsed Pullman abstention in Columbia Basin Apartment
Ass’n v. City of Pasco. 268 F.3d 791, 806 (9th Cir. 2001).
That case turned on whether certain city ordinances
permitted the issuance of administrative warrants, which
involved “novel and uncertain questions of state law in light
of the substantial differences between the Fourth
Amendment and Art. 1, § 7 [of the state Constitution].” Id.
at 806.
     On balance, Peridot Tree’s suit hews far more closely to
the facts of Zwickler than C-Y Development or Columbia
Basin Apartment. As in Zwickler, the district court stayed
Peridot Tree’s suit not so that a state court could clarify state
law, but so that a “well-equipped” state court could “answer
th[e] question” of “how to apply the [d]ormant Commerce
Clause.” As the Court in Zwickler emphasized, however,
“abstention cannot be ordered simply to give state courts the
first opportunity to vindicate the federal claim.” 389 U.S. at
251. Ultimately, “the ‘recognition of the role of state courts
as the final expositors of state law implies no disregard for
the primacy of the federal judiciary in deciding questions of
federal law.’” Id. at 251–52 (quoting England v. Louisiana
State Bd. of Med. Exam’rs, 375 U.S. 411, 415–16 (1964)).
Here, the district court construed the straightforward
language in Sacramento’s ordinance, easily determining that
both CORE Program classifications “require applicants to be
current or former Sacramento residents.” And Sacramento
concedes that “[n]o party argued, and the district court never
found the residency requirement ambiguous.” Thus, the
district court improperly abstained.
   In defense of the district court’s decision to abstain,
Sacramento relies on Pullman abstention because, given the
chance, a state court might hold that its residency
20         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

requirement is unconstitutional under California’s
Constitution. This argument is somewhat surprising, given
Sacramento’s purported interest in preserving its
regulations. At any rate, it only underscores the impropriety
of abstention. “[W]here there is ‘no apparent saving
construction’ on the face of the state law, abstention is
unwarranted.” Potrero Hills Landfill, Inc. v. Cnty. of
Solano, 657 F.3d 876, 889 (9th Cir. 2011) (quoting Bd. of
Airport Comm’rs of L.A. v. Jews for Jesus, Inc., 482 U.S.
569, 575 (1987)). Sacramento does not argue that its
ordinance can be “saved,” i.e., that a state-court
determination would result in a constitutional construction
of its ordinance. It also does not claim that Peridot Tree’s
dormant Commerce Clause claim might be “moot[ed],” in
whole or in part, by a state-court ruling. C-Y Development,
703 F.2d at 379. Instead, Sacramento suggests that its
ordinance might be unconstitutional under both California
and federal law. This renders Sacramento’s proposed
justification for abstention far afield from that recognized in
C-Y Development, where a state-court determination would
obviate most of the federal claims by adopting an
interpretation of the ordinance that complies with the federal
Constitution. Id. at 379–80. Nor does Sacramento’s
preferred flavor of abstention resemble the abstention we
blessed in Columbia Basin Apartment, where the
constitutionality of the city’s ordinance would be measured
against “qualitatively different” standards under the state
constitution and the federal Constitution. 268 F.3d at 803
(quoting City of Seattle v. McCready, 868 P.2d 134, 137
(Wash. 1994)).
    Indeed, California’s Constitution appears to afford either
co-extensive or lesser protections for interstate commerce
than the federal Constitution. Compare Ostrager v. State Bd.
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO          21

of Control, 99 Cal. App. 3d 1, 7 (1979) (applying rational-
basis review to California constitutional claims based on the
propriety of residency requirements in a state statute
concerned with crime-victim benefits), with Tennessee Wine
& Spirits Retailers Ass’n v. Thomas, 588 U.S. --, 139 S. Ct.
2449, 2461 (2019) (holding that residency requirements
must be “narrowly tailored to ‘advanc[e] a legitimate local
purpose’”) (alteration in original), and City of Phila. v. New
Jersey, 437 U.S. 617, 624 (1978) (“[W]here simple
economic protectionism is effected by state legislation, a
virtually per se rule of invalidity has been erected.”). Both
this court and the Supreme Court have long reasoned that
abstention is unwarranted in such circumstances. See
Hawaii Hous. Auth. v. Midkiff, 467 U.S. 229, 237 n.4 (1984)
(“[A]bstention is not required for interpretation of parallel
state constitutional provisions.”); Pue, 632 F.2d at 80 (noting
“the distinction . . . between state constitutional provisions
[that] are integrally related to the challenged state statutory
scheme and those [that] simply mirror the federal
[C]onstitution”); cf. Columbia Basin, 268 F.3d at 806
(“Because the Pasco Ordinance implicates a state
constitutional provision that differs significantly from the
Fourth Amendment, Pullman abstention is particularly
appropriate.”).
                              iii.
    Were this not enough, Sacramento’s residency
requirement for CORE Program participants, and its
resulting effect on access to storefront dispensary permits,
does not meet Pullman’s high bar for state law uncertainty.
“An issue of state law is ‘uncertain’ if ‘a federal court cannot
predict with any confidence how the state’s highest court
would decide an issue of state law.’” Courtney v. Goltz, 736
F.3d 1152, 1163 (9th Cir. 2013) (quoting Pearl Inv. Co. v.
22         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

City and Cnty. of S.F., 774 F.2d 1460, 1465 (9th Cir. 1985)).
In Slidewaters, for example, we declined to apply Pullman
abstention because the case did “not present a close question
of state law.” 4 F.4th at 761. Likewise, in Hawaii Housing
Authority, the Supreme Court found abstention unwarranted
because “the naked question, uncomplicated by [ambiguous
language], is whether the Act on its face is unconstitutional.”
467 U.S. at 237 (quoting Wisconsin v. Constantineau, 400
U.S. 433, 439 (1971)) (alteration in original). Here, the
district court did not hold—and Sacramento does not
argue—that Sacramento’s residency requirement is
particularly ambiguous. As noted above, all parties agree
that the residency requirement means exactly what it says.
    Sacramento argues that Peridot Tree “purposefully
evaded” state-law uncertainty by filing a federal claim, and
it repeats that it is uncertain “whether the residency
requirement violates provisions of the California
Constitution or some other California law.” But Sacramento
cites no case (nor have we found one) that requires a plaintiff
to fabricate a state-law claim—constitutional or otherwise—
to drum up uncertainty in an otherwise unambiguous statute.
Doing so conflicts with our determination that “[f]ederal
courts are not required to send a case to the state court if
doing so would simply ‘impose expense and long delay upon
the litigants without hope of its bearing fruit.’” Potrero Hills
Landfill, 657 F.3d at 889 (quoting Zwickler, 389 U.S. at
251). Given the clarity of the city’s residency requirement,
precedent interpreting similar requirements, and the lack of
state law issues that might narrow or moot the federal
constitutional claim, Peridot Tree’s suit does not meet the
requirements of Pullman abstention.
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO         23

2. Burford abstention
    Burford abstention “is concerned with protecting
complex state administrative processes from undue federal
interference.” New Orleans Pub. Serv., Inc. v. Council of
New Orleans (NOPSI), 491 U.S. 350, 362 (1989). In
Burford, the Supreme Court approved abstention from a
Fourteenth Amendment challenge to the “reasonableness” of
the Texas Railroad Commission’s grant of an oil drilling
permit. 319 U.S. at 332. Noting that Texas had both
endowed the Commission “with principal responsibility for
fact finding and for policy making” and, “[t]o prevent the
confusion of multiple review,” placed the authority to review
Commission orders in a single set of state courts, the Burford
court reasoned that abstention was merited to avoid
disrupting the uniform review of Commission orders. Id. at
326–27. In a later decision considering Burford, the Court
clarified that “[w]here timely and adequate state court
review is available,” district courts sitting in equity should
abstain from “interfer[ing] with the proceedings or orders of
state administrative agencies” under two conditions: “(1)
when there are ‘difficult questions of state law bearing on
policy problems of substantial public import whose
importance transcends the result in the case then at bar’; or
(2) where the ‘exercise of federal review . . . would be
disruptive of state efforts to establish a coherent policy with
respect to a matter of substantial public concern.’” NOPSI,
491 U.S. at 361 (quoting Colorado River, 424 U.S. at 814).
    Synthesizing this guidance, “[w]e have required certain
factors to exist before a district court can abstain under
Burford.” S. Cal. Edison Co. v. Lynch, 307 F.3d 794, 806
24         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

(9th Cir. 2002). Burford abstention “is only appropriate”
when:

       (1) [] the state has concentrated suits
       involving the local issue in a particular court;
       (2) the federal issues are not easily separable
       from complicated state law issues with which
       the state courts may have special
       competence; and (3) [] federal review might
       disrupt state efforts to establish a coherent
       policy.

Poulos v. Caesars World, Inc., 379 F.3d 654, 671 (9th Cir.
2004) (quoting Tucker v. First Md. Sav. & Loan, Inc., 942
F.2d 1401, 1405 (9th Cir. 1991)); see also Blumenkron v.
Multnomah Cnty., 91 F.4th 1303, 1312 (2024) (same).
    Here, abstention under Burford is unwarranted. From
the start, it is unclear whether Sacramento’s permitting
process for storefront marijuana dispensaries qualifies as a
“complex state administrative process[]” under Burford. See
NOPSI, 491 U.S. at 362; Tucson, 284 F.3d at 1133 (“[W]e
find no designation by Arizona’s Constitution or statutes of
any particular state court to review grants or denials of
franchises within Arizona.”). But even assuming so,
California has “not chosen to concentrate suits challenging
the administrative action in a particular court,” and thus, “the
threshold requirements for the exercise of Burford
abstention . . . have not been satisfied.” S. Cal. Edison, 307
F.3d at 806. Unlike in Burford, where “Texas had created a
centralized system of judicial review of commission orders,
which ‘permit[ted] the state courts, like the Railroad
Commission itself, to acquire a specialized knowledge’ of
the regulations and industry,” NOPSI, 491 U.S. at 360
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO         25

(discussing and quoting Burford, 319 U.S. at 327) (alteration
in original), neither Sacramento nor California has
designated a judicial body to handle recreational-marijuana
permitting disputes.       And Sacramento did not seek
abstention in the first place, which might have reflected its
interest in state-court review. Instead, the district court sua
sponte ordered the parties to address abstention. Cf. S. Cal.
Edison, 307 F.3d at 806 (“If the State voluntarily chooses to
submit to a federal forum, principles of comity do not
demand that the federal court force the case back into the
State’s own system.” (quoting Ohio Bureau of Emp. Servs.
v. Hodory, 431 U.S. 471, 480 (1977))). Thus, because there
is no specialized forum for review of Sacramento’s
permitting decisions, we cannot conclude that “the
availability of an alternative, federal forum” would frustrate
any state or local purpose, which counsels against abstention
under Burford. See Quackenbush, 517 U.S. at 725;
Kirkbride v. Cont’l Cas. Co., 933 F.2d 729, 734 (9th Cir.
1991) (“The fact that California has not established a
specialized court system to resolve disputes . . . convinces us
that application of the Burford doctrine to this case is
unwarranted.”).
    Further, Peridot Tree’s suit “does not involve a state-law
claim, nor even an assertion that the federal claims are ‘in
any way entangled in a skein of state-law that must be
untangled before the federal case can proceed.’” NOPSI,
491 U.S. at 361 (quoting McNeese v. Bd. of Educ. for Cmty.
Unit Sch. Dist. 187, Cahokia, 373 U.S. 668, 674 (1963)). As
discussed above, Sacramento’s CORE Program, and its
storefront-marijuana-dispensary permitting process, involve
state interests. But those interests have little bearing on the
issue here: whether a city’s straightforward residency
requirement conditioning the sale of federally unlawful
26         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

products violates the dormant Commerce Clause. Indeed,
Peridot Tree’s claim does not resemble one asserting that “a
state agency has misapplied its lawful authority or has failed
to take into consideration or properly weigh relevant state-
law factors,” which might warrant abstention. See id. at 362.
Instead, this case presents “pronounced” federal interests,
implicating the “substantial federal concern” of whether the
dormant Commerce Clause applies to conduct lawful under
state law and unlawful under federal law. See Quackenbush,
517 U.S. at 728. So we hold that abstention was improper
under Burford.
3. Thibodaux abstention
    Despite invoking Thibodaux abstention, the district court
did not make an explicit case for its application. Nor does
Sacramento, although amici California State Association of
Counties and League of California Cities maintain that this
“rarest of birds” is appropriate here. As with Burford and
Pullman abstention, this case will not quietly roost with
Thibodaux’s fowl.
    The Supreme Court has “increasingly recognized the
wisdom of staying actions in the federal courts pending
determination by a state court of decisive issues of state
law.” Thibodaux, 360 U.S. at 27 (citing Pullman, 312 U.S.
at 499). When the issue “touche[s] upon the relationship of
City to State” or “involve[s] the scope of a previously
uninterpreted state statute which, if applicable, [is] of
questionable constitutionality,” district courts should “stay
their proceedings pending the submission of the state law
question to state determination.” Id. at 28. Thibodaux
“simply holds that actions in the federal courts are properly
stayed in any case ‘pending determination by a state court of
decisive issues of state law’ where the controlling statute is
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO         27

of highly doubtful meaning.” Mach-Tronics, Inc. v. Zirpoli,
316 F.2d 820, 826 (9th Cir. 1963) (quoting Thibodaux, 360
U.S. at 27); see id. at 827 (declining to abstain because “the
state law is clear and readily ascertain[able]”). We have thus
characterized Thibodaux as requiring abstention “where
state law apportioning power between the city and the state
was uncertain, and any decision by the federal district court
would affect state sovereignty.” Tucson, 284 F.3d at 1134.
    As discussed above, Peridot Tree’s case does not present
complex issues of state law that are of questionable state
constitutionality. And Thibodaux was a unique case. There,
the plaintiff asked the district court to wade into an eminent-
domain dispute, in which a previously uninterpreted
Louisiana statute appeared to grant considerable power to a
Louisiana city, contrary to the Louisiana Attorney General’s
protests otherwise. Thibodaux, 360 U.S. at 30. The
Supreme Court thus reasoned that it was proper to ask a
Louisiana state court to weigh in on this dispute between city
and state, given that an “[i]nformed local court[] may find
meaning not discernible to the outsider.” Id. That is not the
situation here. Peridot Tree’s lawsuit presents no dispute
between intra-governmental agencies or states, the city’s
residency requirement is straightforward, and no party has
articulated a pressing sovereignty concern endangered by the
dormant Commerce Clause analysis. See Tucson, 284 F.3d
at 1134–35. Indeed, there is no underlying state law dispute
at all—much less one that touches on a critical “sovereign
prerogative.” Thibodaux, 360 U.S. at 28. So Thibodaux
abstention’s requirements are also unmet.
4. Colorado River abstention
    Colorado River does not provide a basis for abstention,
either. Colorado River abstention accords “deference to
28           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

state court proceedings,” Travelers Indem. Co. v. Montana,
914 F.2d 1364, 1367 (9th Cir. 1990), and it permits federal
court abstention in the face of “concurrent federal and state
proceedings,” so long as certain pragmatic and doctrinal
factors warrant such abstention, Seneca Ins. Co., Inc. v.
Strange Land, Inc., 862 F.3d 835, 841–42 (9th Cir. 2017)
(emphasis added); see also Colorado River, 424 U.S. at 814.
Here, there is no concurrent state-court proceeding.
Accordingly, Colorado River does not apply, and abstention
cannot properly be invoked on this basis, either. 6
                          *         *        *
    In sum, this case does not meet the requirements of any
“abstention doctrine being invoked” and thus “[t]he district
court has no discretion to abstain.” Fireman’s Fund Ins. Co.
v. City of Lodi, Cal., 302 F.3d 928, 939 (9th Cir. 2002); see
also C-Y Development, 703 F.2d at 377 (“[T]here is little or
no discretion to abstain in a case [that] does not meet
traditional abstention requirements.”); Porter v. Jones, 319
F.3d 483, 487 (9th Cir. 2003) (same).
                                   B.
    We also decline Sacramento’s invitation to invoke
general “comity” principles to affirm the district court’s
decision. At the outset, “[i]t is not clear to what extent
comity remains an independent basis for abstention,
available even when none of the settled comity-based
abstention doctrines such as Burford and Colorado River
apply.” Hawthorne Sav. F.S.B., 421 F.3d at 852; see also

6
 Abstention under Wilton v. Seven Falls Co., 515 U.S. 277, 282 (1995)
and Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 43–44 (1971), two Supreme Court
decisions that the district court also invoked, fails because there are no
concurrent state-court proceedings.
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO         29

Proctor v. Vishay Intertechnology Inc., 584 F.3d 1208, 1230
(9th Cir. 2009) (expressing skepticism for “comity”
abstention because “federal courts are nearly always obliged
to exercise their jurisdiction absent some recognized basis
for not doing so”). The Supreme Court has invoked
“comity” and the “comity doctrine” sparingly, endorsing
abstention over certain suits challenging “the
constitutionality of state taxation of commercial activity”
because it reflects “‘a proper respect for state functions.’”
Levin v. Commerce Energy, Inc., 560 U.S. 413, 421 (2010)
(quoting Fair Assessment in Real Est. Ass’n, Inc. v. McNary,
454 U.S. 100, 112 (1981)); see also Matthews v. Rodgers,
284 U.S. 521, 525 (1932) (reasoning that the comity doctrine
reflects the “proper reluctance” of federal courts “to
interfere” with states’ “fiscal operations,” and the
concomitant desire to show “scrupulous regard for the
rightful independence of state governments”).
    That abstention doctrine, however, appears almost
entirely cabined to suits that interfere with “the validity of
state tax systems in federal courts,” and only when the
plaintiff has state-court “remedies [that] are plain, adequate,
and complete,[] and may ultimately seek review of the state
decisions in [the Supreme] Court.” Fair Assessment, 454
U.S. at 116; see also Direct Mktg. Ass’n v. Brohl, 575 U.S 1,
15 (2015) (characterizing the “comity doctrine” as one
counseling federal courts to avoid interfering “with the fiscal
operations of the state governments” (quoting Levin, 560
U.S. at 422)); Hibbs v. Winn, 542 U.S. 88, 107 n.9 (2004)
(“[T]his Court has relied upon ‘principles of comity’ [] to
preclude original federal-court jurisdiction only when
plaintiffs have sought district-court aid in order to arrest or
30           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

countermand state tax collection.” (citation omitted)). 7 For
the most part, our comity-based abstention precedent is
similarly circumspect. See Fredrickson v. Starbucks Corp.,
840 F.3d 1119, 1124 (9th Cir. 2016) (“In cases involving
state taxes, the comity doctrine establishes an even ‘[m]ore
embracive’ prudential rule that federal courts should refrain
from hearing ‘claims for relief that risk disrupting state tax
administration.’” (quoting Levin, 560 U.S. at 417) (alteration
in original)). Two outliers, however, require our attention.
In Noel v. Hall, we noted in passing that “a federal court may
stay its proceedings based on comity even when none of the
abstention doctrines requires that it do so.” 341 F.3d 1148,
1160 (9th Cir. 2003). Likewise, in City & County of San
Francisco v. Assessment Appeals Board for San Francisco,
No. 1, we noted that “principles of comity” may warrant
abstention to permit the “state government” to “carry[] out
its governmental functions.” 122 F.3d 1274, 1277 (9th Cir.
1997) (citing Freehold Cogeneration Assocs., L.P. v. Bd. of
Regul. Comm’rs, 44 F.3d 1178, 1187 n.6 (3d Cir. 1995)).
    Despite invoking broad principles of comity drawn from
the Supreme Court’s and other circuits’ decisions following
Younger and Pullman, neither Noel nor Assessment Appeals
Board compels comity-based abstention in every suit that
touches on an area of state interest. In Noel, we merely
considered whether abstention would accommodate or

7
  Our sister circuits agree. See City of Fishers v. DIRECTV, 5 F.4th 750,
753–55 (7th Cir. 2021) (summarizing comity-based abstention under
Levin for disputes challenging state taxation); Dorce v. City of New York,
2 F.4th 82, 96 (2d Cir. 2021) (“Federal courts generally abstain from
cases that challenge state taxation schemes.” (citation omitted));
Seminole Tribe of Fla. v. Stranburg, 799 F.3d 1324, 1344 (11th Cir.
2015) (characterizing Levin as focusing “more on the comity doctrine in
the context of federal challenges to state tax statutes”).
           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO       31

facilitate “parallel state court litigation” and state-
administrative proceedings involving the same parties. See
Noel, 341 F.3d at 1154, 1160. This follows rather
unremarkably from the principles laid out in Colorado River.
And Assessment Appeals Board presaged Levin, grappling
with comity-based abstention in the context of challenges to
state fiscal policy falling under 12 U.S.C. § 632 and the Tax
Injunction Act. 122 F.3d at 1276, 1277–78. Moreover, in
rejecting abstention, the court in Assessment Appeals Board
noted that “comity yields” when “important federal interests
are at stake.” Id. at 1277–78 (quoting United States v.
Gillock, 445 U.S. 360, 373 (1980)).
    These comity considerations are not present here. To
start, no party argues that (1) Sacramento’s regulations
concerning storefront marijuana-dispensary permits fall
within the domain of state fiscal operations and core
functions, like those akin to taxation; or (2) abstention is
warranted to accommodate a concurrent, state-court
proceeding. The district court abstained so that California’s
local experiment with legal marijuana might endure, free
from interference by federal courts or the shifting landscape
of federal marijuana laws. And it abstained not in favor of
an ongoing state-court action, but so that Peridot Tree might
go to state court and manufacture a state-law claim. Levin,
Noel, and Assessment Appeals Board do not counsel us to
bless abstention based solely on a state’s vested interest in
local, economic activity—even when that activity might be
undermined by the application of federal law to federally
unlawful commercial conduct. Indeed, as Assessment
Appeals Board notes, our courts have not shied away from
deciding constitutional concerns raised by local regulations,
particularly when those concerns are squarely within the
federal courts’ jurisdiction. See 122 F.3d at 1278 (holding
32         PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

that the district “lacked discretion to remand the case back
to state court on the basis of comity” because the respondent
had “an unfettered right under [federal law] to defend in
federal court”); see also Deakins, 484 U.S. at 203 (“[F]ederal
courts have a ‘virtually unflagging obligation’ to exercise
their jurisdiction.” (citation omitted)); cf. Town of Lockport
v. Citizens for Cmty. Action at the Local Level, Inc., 430 U.S.
259, 264 n.8 (1977) (“[P]rinciples of comity and federalism
do not require that a federal court abandon jurisdiction it has
properly acquired simply because a similar suit is later filed
in a state court.”). Accordingly, while a court need not
cosplay as Procrustes when deciding whether to abstain, see
Pennzoil Co. v. Texaco, Inc., 481 U.S. 1, 11 n.9 (1987), we
decline to invent “some new, free-floating, comity-based
abstention doctrine for cases of this ilk,” Hawthorne Sav.,
421 F.3d at 852. See also Vasquez v. Rackauckas, 734 F.3d
1025, 1039 (9th Cir. 2013) (affirming the district court’s
decision not to abstain under Younger, as well as its decision
“declining to abstain from granting relief under general
principles of comity and federalism”).
    Sacramento’s reliance on out-of-circuit precedent—
which the city argues blesses comity-based abstention—
does not persuade us otherwise. In each case cited, the court
considered abstention because, like our decision in Noel, the
underlying suit involved “parallel state and federal actions.”
See Bacardi Int’l Ltd. v. V. Suarez & Co., Inc., 719 F.3d 1,
14 (1st Cir. 2013) (affirming a stay for “more than simple
parallel litigation,” but because the state proceeding
involved the same issues and parties, the state proceeding
was filed first, and already well underway); J.B. v. Woodard,
997 F.3d 714, 721 (7th Cir. 2021) (“[The] complaint leaves
us with the clear and unmistakable impression that [the
plaintiff] seeks a favorable federal court judgment so that he
             PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO               33

can use that judgment to influence ongoing state court
decision making.”); Cruz v. Melecio, 204 F.3d 14, 23 (1st
Cir. 2000) (counseling abstention “until the proceedings
presently pending before the Puerto Rico Supreme Court
have run their course”). 8 That is not the case here.
    Indeed, the district court’s abstention and its expectation
that Peridot Tree try its luck in state court does little to
promote efficiency, comity, or federalism. Instead, the
district court effectively imposed an exhaustion requirement
on Peridot Tree, requiring it to first identify and litigate
potential state-law claims before raising its federal
constitutional concerns.       We addressed a somewhat
analogous situation in Gearing v. City of Half Moon Bay. 54
F.4th 1144, 1147–50 (9th Cir. 2022). There, the plaintiffs
sought to develop housing on their properties, only to have
their development plan rejected by the city. Id. at 1146–47.
The city then sought to acquire the plaintiffs’ properties by
offering to buy them, which the plaintiffs in turn rejected.
Id. at 1147. So both parties went to court. Id. The plaintiffs
sued in federal court, pursuing a regulatory-taking theory
under 42 U.S.C. § 1983; the city initiated an eminent-domain
action in state court; and the city asked the federal court to
abstain under Pullman from considering the plaintiffs’
regulatory-taking action. Id. at 1147. In response, the
plaintiffs argued that Pullman abstention effectively and
improperly required them to exhaust state-court remedies,
“forc[ing] them to litigate their regulatory[-]taking claim as
part of the state-court eminent[-]domain action before they

8
  To be clear: we do not intend for our decision today to foreclose the
possibility of abstention based on broader principles of comity,
federalism, or equity. We merely find that, here, the district court’s
abstention under those principles was improper.
34           PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

c[ould] seek federal judicial review,” which necessarily and
unfairly subsumed their federal claims. Id. at 1149. We
disagreed. In affirming the district court’s abstention, we
reasoned in part that: (1) the state-court eminent-domain and
federal-court regulatory-taking actions sought distinct
remedies; (2) resolution of the eminent-domain action might
narrow a later, regulatory-taking action, but it would not
preclude it; and (3) the plaintiffs had insulated their federal
claim from dismissal on preclusion grounds by making an
England reservation in state court. Gearing, 54 F.4th at
1149–51 (citing England, 375 U.S. at 421). So abstention
did not impose an unwarranted exhaustion requirement.
    Not so here. Unlike in Gearing, there is no ongoing
state-court proceeding to adjudicate independent state-law
claims with independent state-law remedies, which might
obviate or narrow Peridot Tree’s federal claim. Peridot
Tree’s suit exclusively presents a question of federal law.
Thus, abstention here, as Sacramento concedes, results in
Peridot Tree (1) manufacturing a state-law claim;
(2) protecting its dormant Commerce Clause claim with an
England reservation; and (3) upon the completion of its
state-court proceedings, returning to federal court with its
original complaint in hand, re-alleging its same dormant
Commerce Clause claim. 9 In Gearing, abstention protected
the district court from deciding “sensitive federal
constitutional questions when state law issues” might narrow
them. 54 F.4th at 1147 (quoting San Remo Hotel v. City &
Cnty. of S.F., 145 F.3d 1095, 1104 (9th Cir. 1998)).
Abstention here “accomplish[es] nothing except to require

9
 Of course, the district court also permitted Peridot Tree to remain
without a remedy, waiting until that court could “award relief consistent
with federal law.”
            PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO               35

still another lawsuit, with added delay and expense for all
parties.” Cnty. of Allegheny, 360 U.S. at 196 (declining to
permit abstention). We see no reason to require that exercise
in futility.
                                 C.
    We understand the district court’s hesitation to resolve
whether the Constitution’s dormant Commerce Clause
prohibits Sacramento’s alleged conduct, which may require
venturing into the murky forests of state and federal
recreational-marijuana law. Nor do we doubt that Peridot
Tree’s lawsuit presents “difficult” and significant questions.
But as the Court wisely noted in 1821, “[q]uestions may
occur which we would gladly avoid; but we cannot avoid
them. All we can do is, to exercise our best judgment, and
conscientiously to perform our duty.” Cohens v. Virginia,
19 U.S. 264, 404 (1821). Thankfully, the path is not entirely
dark. The First Circuit, for example, recently affirmed that
a Maine law—which required “officers or directors of a
[medical-marijuana] dispensary” to be “residents” of
Maine—violated the dormant Commerce Clause. Ne.
Patients Grp. v. United Cannabis Patients & Caregivers of
Me., 45 F.4th 542, 544 (1st Cir. 2022). And many district
courts, including those within our circuit, have grappled with
similar issues. 10 We trust the district court will do the same.

10
  Compare Brinkmeyer v. Washington State Liquor & Cannabis Bd.,
2023 WL 1798173, at *11 (W.D. Wash. Feb. 7, 2023) (“The dormant
Commerce Clause does not apply to federally illegal markets, including
Washington’s cannabis market and, thus, it does not apply to
Washington’s residency requirements.”) and Peridot Tree WA Inc. v.
Washington State Liquor & Cannabis Ctrl. Bd., 2024 WL 69733, at *9
(W.D. Wash. Jan. 5, 2024) (“Peridot cannot use the dormant Commerce
Clause to demand a constitutional right to participate in an illegal
36            PERIDOT TREE, INC. V. CITY OF SACRAMENTO

After all, it “cannot, as the legislature may, avoid a measure”
merely “because it approaches the confines of the
[C]onstitution.” Cohens, 19 U.S. at 404.
     REVERSED and REMANDED.

interstate market.”), with Finch v. Treto, 606 F. Supp. 3d 811, 834 (N.D.
Ill. 2022), aff’d in part, denied in part on other grounds, 82 F.4th 572
(7th Cir. 2023) (concluding that plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the
merits of their dormant Commerce Clause claim alleging that Illinois
“discriminat[es] against nonresidents in awarding conditional dispensary
licenses”). We recite these decisions not to provide merits-based
guidance to the district court, but merely to affirm that federal courts can,
and do, resolve similar claims without abstaining in favor of state-court
adjudication.