Court Opinion

ID: 9461126
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:06:36.967615+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:54.367756
License: Public Domain

STEVENS, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
Askew v. Hargrave, 401 U.S. 476, 91 S.Ct. 856, 28 L.Ed.2d 196, demonstrates that abstention may be appropriate to give a state court an opportunity to determine a state law claim which, if sustained, will obviate the need to adjudicate a federal constitutional question. Defendants argue that similar reasoning justifies abstention in this case. In Askew, however, two factors favored abstention which are not present here.
In Askew, the plaintiffs attacked the constitutionality of a new Florida statutory method of financing public education. Because a statewide statute was under attack, a three-judge district court had been convened. In this case, the potential state-federal conflict is much less serious because the dispute merely involves one individual teacher, one local school board, and a set of facts which is relatively unique. Moreover, unlike the situation before us, the substantial character of the state law attack on the Florida legislation was indicated by the pendency of litigation in the Florida courts. The colloquy between the Court and counsel at the oral argument of Askew apparently persuaded the Court that the pendency of that litigation made abstention appropriate. See 401 U.S. at 478, 91 S.Ct. at 857. In contrast, the oral argument of this ease revealed that there is no litigation pending in the Indiana courts which will be of benefit to this plaintiff, and neither counsel gave us any indication that there was a substantial likelihood that plaintiff would obtain adequate relief from an Indiana court.
The per curiam opinion in Askew seems to place critical emphasis on the question whether “the same claim” might be asserted in both the federal court and the state court. I find this emphasis somewhat puzzling because, contrary to the thrust of Askew, I would suppose that a greater identity between the two claims would increase, rather than decrease, the justification for abstention.1 Be that as it may, my *841agreement with the conclusion that abstention was improper in this case is not dependent on the premise that plaintiff’s federal complaint asserts the “same claim” that might be asserted in a state court.
Plaintiff has attempted to assert two quite different federal claims: (1) that she was dismissed for an impermissible reason, namely, in retribution for exercising her First Amendment right to criticize the school administration; and (2) that her dismissal was simply arbitrary. As I understand defendants’ position, it is the latter theory which is comparable to a possible state claim which they want her to file and litigate to a conclusion before proceeding in federal court. But, as a matter of federal law, that theory is insufficient. Jef-fries v. Turkey Run Consolidated School District, 492 F.2d 1, 3-4 (7th Cir. 1974).. I do not understand defendants to argue that plaintiff’s First Amendment claim has any exact counterpart in Indiana law.
In my judgment, abstention is improper regardless of whether there is a lack of identity between the potential state claim and the federal claim. As Judge Swygert correctly emphasizes, this case does not involve an attack on any state statute or regulatory program.2 This is a local controversy raising a disputed issue of fact and also the legal question of whether plaintiff’s version of the facts entitles her to federal relief. The merits of the federal claim are not dependent in any way upon the resolution of any uncertain questions of state law.3 In this situation, the mere possibility that a state tribunal might grant this individual plaintiff relief which would make it unnecessary for her to pursue her federal remedy is not a sufficient reason for abstention. I believe that is the essential teaching of Monroe v. Pape and McNeese.4

. In McNeese v. Board of Education, 373 U.S. 668, 83 S.Ct. 1433, 10 L.Ed.2d 622, after reviewing the purposes of § 1983 as described in Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167, 171-183, 81 S.Ct. 473, 5 L.Ed.2d 402, the Court said:
“We would defeat those purposes if we held that assertion of a federal claim in a federal court must await an attemjjt to vindicate the same claim in a state court.” 373 U.S. at 672, 83 S.Ct. at 1436.
It would seem even more inconsistent with the purposes of § 1983 to hold that the assertion of the federal claim must await an attempt to vindicate some other claim in a state court.
Indeed, in Gibson v. Berryhill, 411 U.S. 564, 580, 93 S.Ct. 1689, 1699, 36 L.Ed.2d 488, the Court relied on the difference between the state and federal claims as a reason for not requiring abstention. The Court there stated:
“Arguably, the District Court should have awaited the outcome of the Lee Optical Co. appeal, a decision which might have obviated the need for an injunction in this case.18 But the Board was pressing its charges against appellees without *841awaiting that outcome and, in any event, it appears that at least some of the charges pending against appellees might have survived a reversal of the state trial court’s judgment by the Alabama Supreme Court. Under these circumstances, it was not an abuse of discretion for the District Court to proceed as it did.” (Emphasis added.)
In its footnote 18, the Court cited Askew.

. It is worth noting that the statewide application of the order of the Texas Railway Commission under attack in Railroad Commission v. Pullman, 312 U.S. 496, 61 S.Ct. 643, 85 L.Ed. 971, the Alaska fishing laws and regulations involved in Reetz v. Bozanich, 397 U.S. 82, 90 S.Ct. 788, 25 L.Ed.2d 68, and the Millage Rollback Law challenged in Askew, made it appropriate to convene a three-judge district court in each of those cases. In contrast, it is of interest that in Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167, 81 S.Ct. 473, 5 L.Ed.2d 492, and McNeese v. Board of Education, 373 U.S. 668, 83 S.Ct. 1433, 10 L.Ed.2d 622 (as in this case), the state action under attack had only a local impact.

. In Pullman, state law claims were raised in the federal litigation and it would have been necessary for the tliree-judge court to decide the state issues before reaching the federal questions. Abstention was therefore essential to avoid tlie risk that the state questions would be decided incorrectly. In Mc-Neese, the Court emphasized the fact that tiie federal right was not “in any way entangled in a skein of state law that must be untangled before the federal case can proceed.” 373 U.S. at 674, 83 S.Ct. at 1437. In that case, as in this, it was “immaterial whether respondents’ conduct is legal or illegal as a matter of state law.” Ibid. And in Reetz, the Court differentiated those cases “where the questions of state law are enmeshed with federal questions.” 397 U.S. at 85, 90 S.Ct. at 789, quoting from City of Meridian v. Southern Bell Tel. & Tel. Co., 358 U.S. 639, 640-641, 79 S.Ct. 455, 3 L.Ed.2d 562.

. Orr v. Thorpe, 427 F.2d 1129 (5th Cir.1970), presented a stronger case for abstention than does this case since the availability of an adequate state remedy was apparently assumed, and the controversy between the Teachers Association and the School Board involved a broader policy question than merely the discharge of one teacher. Nevertheless, Judge Wisdom, speaking for the Court, summarily dismissed defendants’ abstention argument, stating simply: “The plaintiffs have stated a federal cause of action and do not seek to interpret or attack Florida statutes.” 427 F.2d at 1131.