Court Opinion

ID: 9486163
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 11:39:41.413655+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:51:33.515733
License: Public Domain

CUDAHY, Circuit Judge,
with whom CUMMINGS and ILANA DIAMOND ROVNER, Circuit Judges, join, dissenting.
The plurality opinion flatly rejects the previously unarguable truth that “a deal is a deal” or, more elegantly, pacta sunt servan-da. The plurality’s assertion that Chicago in 1984 did not settle any aspect of the merits of this dispute is simply and transparently wrong. Pl.Op. at 6. Any number of sophistical efforts to distinguish municipalities from corporations and to invoke the shibboleths of democracy and federalism do not change the basic fact that a contract has been repudiated with the blessing of this court. The City’s promises in 1984 are apparently no longer binding in 1994. The City’s promise in 1984 was merely to pay some of its debts promptly. I am unable to see this as a significant assault on federalism or democracy.
The plurality seems to have backwards what was settled in 1984. It says the merits were not settled — only the relief. But by its plain terms the consent decree purported to settle the merits both of the equal protection and of the due process claims. The Consent Decree states unambiguously that the “parties intend this Consent Decree to fully and finally resolve the budgetary and equitable aspect of the Plaintiffs class complaint, reserving only plaintiffs claim for damages and claims for attorney’s fees.” Consent Decree at 8. The Consent Decree later indicates that it is “a final and total settlement of all claims [that the plaintiffs] now have or may have in the future, arising either directly or indirectly out of [the Illinois Code], as well as under the United States and Illinois Constitutions, except for claims for damages and attorneys fees.” Id. at 10. The merits were therefore settled, while the relief was left to further litigation, ultimately resulting in Evans II. The plurality seems to be saying that the merits were not settled because Judge Grady pressed the parties to reach a settlement. Somehow, the one proposition does not follow from the other. In any event, I do not understand the City to be complaining that its arm was twisted.
At the time the settlement was reached in 1984, the City had litigated the equal protection claim and lost. The due process claim, on the other hand, was set aside by this court (although our dicta certainly indicated that the claim was colorable). Hence, if anything was settled under the 1984 decree, it was certainly the due process claim.
With its explication of the transitory quality of settlements with municipalities (e.g. a Harold Washington deal certainly could not bind Richard Daley), Pl.Op. at 7-13, the plurality has put in grave doubt the value of these devices for dispute resolution. In fact, the plurality opinion effectively deprives state and local governments of the ability to enter into enforceable consent decrees. If *484courts refused to enforce contractual agreements, “people would be reluctant to enter into contracts and the process of economic exchange would be retarded.” Anthony T. Kronman & Richard A. Posner, The Economics of Contract Law 4 (1979). Where courts are unavailable to enforce promises, those who seek to make binding promises are forced to seek some other, and typically more costly, means of enforcement. See John Um-beck, A Theory of Contract Choice and the California Gold Rush, 20 J.L. & Econ. 421 (1978).
Here, there is an obvious candidate to replace a regime of contract law. A district court, recognizing that consent decrees are of doubtful and declining enforceability, would likely issue a permanent injunction, rather than have the city negotiate a (meaningless) consent decree.
The plurality correctly points out that cities may form contracts to build a new road or repay a loan, but insists that governments cannot contract away their power to enact legislation. Pl.Op. at 8. The Consent Decree falls into the latter category, the plurality contends, because it interferes with Chicago’s ability to adopt a budget. This assertion simply proves too much, for even a city’s agreement to build a road interferes with the city’s budgetary process, since a subsequent administration is surely required to honor the bonds that its predecessor sold to finance the construction. Moreover, the agreement we are concerned with here involves an application of constitutional law — something we should think not open to tinkering even by a democratic process. If, as the plurality contends, the word of an elected official is less worthy of trust than almost anyone else’s, governmental bodies will simply have to be coerced into compliance instead of invited to make voluntary agreements. It is difficult to understand how this result furthers the ends of federalism.
The plurality is insistent that there is no federal interest in maintenance of the consent decree to the extent that it is based on due process. While the Supreme Court has yet to vacate a consent decree on the grounds that there is an insufficient federal interest, it has suggested that the Constitution implicitly imposes such a limitation on the equitable powers of the federal courts. See Rizzo v. Goode, 423 U.S. 362, 96 S.Ct. 598, 46 L.Ed.2d 561 (1976); Allan Effron, Note, Federalism and Federal Consent Decrees Against State Governmental Entities, 88 Colum.L.Rev. 1796 (1988). See also League of United Latin American Citizens v. Clements, 999 F.2d 831, 898, 900 (5th Cir.1993) (Politz, J. dissenting & King, J. dissenting) (consent decree settling parties’ dispute should be enforced).
In any event, in the case before us there certainly is a federal interest of the highest importance. That interest is, of course, in the enforcement of the Constitution. The facts here, as recited by the plurality, involve tort judgment creditors who had enough political clout to “jump the queue” and receive payment first. This practice alone may violate three or four constitutional provisions. In addition, the original due process claim recognized by the district court in 1981 and affirmed in dicta by this court, Evans v. City of Chicago, 689 F.2d 1286, 1296-99 (7th Cir.1982) (“Evans I”), is at least colorable. There is thus a clear federal interest in enforcing the decree. In enforcing the Constitution, federal courts are not meddling in parochial matters lying outside their sphere of responsibility. Nor are they encroaching on the prerogatives of the state. They are instead serving the preeminent function for which they were established. See generally Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 178, 2 L.Ed. 60 (1803) (ensuring the supremacy of the Constitution is “of the very essence of judicial duty”).
The due process claim here as analyzed in our 1982 decision Evans I, 689 F.2d at 1296-98, rested in part on a purported property interest in unpaid tort judgments created by an Illinois statute. Apparently the financial practices of the City violated state law as well as, arguably, the Constitution. It is therefore difficult for me to see how the consent decree has offended federalism and democracy. So far as I am aware, no effort has been made to amend the state statutes which, we are told, intruded so onerously on the City’s independence.
*485Finally, I am astonished by the plurality’s suggestion that we have announced a “rule of law” for the future guidance of district courts. Pl.Op. at 17. Here, of course, we are violating the basic principle of strong deference to the district court in its construction of its own consent decrees. It does not seem to me that we are announcing a rule of law. It is more like a rule of anarchy. The solemn promises of governments bind only for the day. They are not to be taken seriously with the turnover of city fathers (not to mention the advent of new faces on the federal courts).
I therefore respectfully dissent.