Court Opinion

ID: 9636733
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 14:41:06.144553+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:12:45.913861
License: Public Domain

IIEALY, Circuit Judge
(concurring)..
While I am not in disagreement with the conclusions of the majority, I, think the only appropriate action for this court to take is to affirm the judgment of dismissal on the ground that the appellants are in no position to maintain the suit.
The bill is one to enjoin public officers from enforcing the criminal laws. I believe it should not be entertained unless the jurisdiction of the court is plain and the complainants have established a clear right to equitable consideration. In re Sawyer, 124 U.S. 200, 8 S.Ct. 482, 31 L.Ed. 402; Truax v. Raich, 239 U.S. 33, 36 S.Ct. 7, 60 L.Ed. 131, L.R.A.1916D, 545, Ann.Cas.1917B, 283.
Appellants are private recreational clubs, organized solely for the benefit of their members and guests. Three of them are corporations, one an unincorporated association. The attention of the court has not been called to any provision of the state law, and I believe there is none, by which a corporation or an unincorporated association may obtain a license to take wild birds. Only natural persons are so 'licensed. Without a license, hunting or the taking of game is unlawful in California and is punishable as a criminal offense. Fish and Game Code, § 420, St. Cal. 1933, p. 436.
■ The matter in controversy in this suit is the right to take migratory birds by means of baiting. Appellants have undertaken to champion that right. It is a right which they do not possess and which it would be unlawful for them to exercise, even in the absence of the act of Congress and the regulation prohibiting such taking. I do not believe that under these circumstances they have any standing in equity, regardless of damage which they may suffer through the enforcement of the act. Compare Alabama Power Co. v. Ickes, 302 U.S. 464, 58 S.Ct. 300, 82 L.Ed. -.
It is without point to say that, except for the regulation, the appellants would be free to distribute grain on their lands or to put out feed which will attract wild ducks. The regulation does not prohibit that. It prohibits taking ducks with the aid of baiting; and the appellants neither do that, nor are they entitled to do it under state law.
Nor is the fact that they may become involved as accessories in the threatened criminal prosecution of their members sufficient to confer equitable jurisdiction. The depreciation in property values which it is claimed will result is not a direct damage, but is purely consequential or collateral. I am unable to see that it affords a measure of the value of the thing in controversy as contemplated by section 24(1) of the Judicial Code, as amended, 28 U.S.C.A. § 41(1), even though appellants were otherwise qualified. See Healy v. Ratta, 292 U.S. 263, at page 268, 54 S.Ct. 700, 702, 78 L.Ed. 1248. A merchant who "invests in a stock of automatic shotguns would suffer a similar depreciation in the *632value of his merchandise in the face of a statute prohibiting the shooting of birds with guns of that type. But I apprehend that nobody would contend that his threatened loss would entitle him to sue in equity to enjoin the enforcement of the allegedly invalid act; or that a depreciation of $3,000 or more in the value of his merchandise would furnish a measure of the value of the thing in controversy sufficient to confer federal jurisdiction.
It is a familiar principle that one who attacks the constitutionality of a statute is not the champion of any rights except his own. Henneford v. Silas Mason Co., 300 U.S. 577, 57 S.Ct. 524, 81 L.Ed. 814. And it is well settled that, “while an unconstitutional act is no law, attacks upon the validity of laws can only be entertained when made by those whose rights are directly affected.” Buchanan v. Warley, 245 U.S. 60, 38 S.Ct. 16, 17, 62 L.Ed. 149, L.R.A.1918C, 210, Ann.Cas.1918A, 1201.
Since, independent of the statute, it would be unlawful for the appellants to do what the statute prohibits, and since the act bears upon their property rights only in a collateral way, their suit was properly dismissed.
Whether appellants have such standing as representatives of their members as would enable them to maintain the action, I think we need not stop to inquire. There is no showing that their members will suffer any monetary damage from the enforcement of the regulation, or, if so, how much the damage would be. KVOS, Inc., v. Associated Press, 299 U.S. 269-279, 57 S.Ct. 197-201, 81 L.Ed. 183.