Court Opinion

ID: 9797054
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 04:12:08.564815+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:52:29.841268
License: Public Domain

MINZNER, Justice (specially concurring). {40} I concur in the majority opinion but write separately in order to emphasize the importance I place on the analysis in Cockrell v. Board of Regents of New Mexico State University, 2002-NMSC-009, 132 N.M. 156, 45 P.3d 876, in reversing the Court of Appeals. Further, I believe the opinion of the Court of Appeals, as did the opinion in Cockrell, recognized an important anomaly within the body of case law we apply. I am persuaded that we adopted an approach in Cockrell we should continue to pursue. {41} In Cockrell, we discussed the effect of several opinions by the United States Supreme Court on issues of federalism. We concluded that these opinions have determined that each State enjoys a form of constitutional sovereign immunity, and this unique constitutional immunity precludes Congress from providing for enforcement against a state absent its consent. Id. ¶ 8. As we noted in Cockrell, however, the United States Supreme Court also indicated that a statute Congress may not make enforceable against a State, absent its consent, nevertheless can continue to be “binding on the States pursuant to the Supremacy Clause of Article VI of the Constitution.” Id. ¶¶ 5, 27. {42} We specifically said in Cockrell, [W]e do not believe that it is within this Court’s province to decide whether the State should subject itself to liability for a federal claim filed in state court. Under the principle of separation of powers embodied in Article III, Section 1 of the New Mexico Constitution, we believe this is a matter for the Legislature. Unlike the decision “to do away with common law principles,” [Hicks v. State, 88 N.M. 588, 590, 544 P.2d 1153, 1155 (1975) ], which is within this Court’s power, the decision to waive this State’s constitutional sovereign immunity would represent an alteration of the constitutional balance of power between the Federal Government and the State of New Mexico that was struck by the Supreme Court in Alden [v. Maine, 527 U.S. 706, 119 S.Ct. 2240, 144 L.Ed.2d 636 (1999) ]. Id. ¶ 13. {43} Our opinion in this case might appear inconsistent with this portion of Cockrell. In applying Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714 (1908) to the facts of this case, reversing both the trial court and the Court of Appeals, and recognizing a private enforcement claim, we may appear to be in effect exercising the Legislature’s prerogative to determine when or under what circumstances New Mexico will permit itself to be sued in its own courts on a federal claim, notwithstanding the constitutional sovereign immunity the United States Supreme Court has so carefully and recently articulated. After all, we noted in the above passage that the United States Supreme Court had struck a balance of power between the Federal Government and the State of New Mexico, a balance that preserved the Legislature’s power to waive the State’s immunity and under the principle of separation of powers that is part of the New Mexico Constitution limited our own. {44} Cockrell itself seems to me to hold the answer to any apparent inconsistency. The constitutional sovereign immunity that the United States Supreme Court has articulated so recently is limited. We made this point in Cockrell several times. We said, for example: “[I]n the limited context of a private action for money damages authorized by a federal statute, ‘the States do retain a constitutional immunity from suit in their own courts.’” 2002-NMSC-009, ¶ 11, 132 N.M. 156, 45 P.3d 876 (first emphasis added) (quoting Alden, 527 U.S. at 745, 119 S.Ct. 2240). We also said: “This State, by virtue of its sovereign role in the Union, is constitutionally immune from private suits for damages under a federal statute.” Id. ¶ 15 (emphasis added). Finally, we said: “We hold that the State has not waived its constitutional sovereign immunity from private suits for damages based on a violation of federal law.” Id. ¶ 29 (emphasis added). {45} Consequently, we have indicated our understanding that the Legislature’s power to waive New Mexico’s constitutional sovereign immunity is the power to decide whether to expose the State to liability for money damages for violations of federal law. Whether the doctrine of Ex parte Young applies is a decision that the Court explicitly and appropriately reserved for itself. In Cockrell, we stated: Despite the existence of the State’s constitutional sovereign immunity, state employees who do not receive the benefits to which they are entitled under the FLSA are not without recourse.... [Constitutional sovereign immunity “does not bar certain actions against state officers for injunctive or declaratory relief.” 2002-NMSC-009, ¶28,132 N.M. 156, 45 P.3d 876 (quoting Alden, 527 U.S. at 757,119 S.Ct. 2240). {46} It does seem to me that in applying Ex parte Young to the facts of this case, we are extending an historic doctrine beyond its historic limits. See generally 1 Laurence H. Tribe, American Constitutional Law § 3-27, at 555-56 (3d ed.2000). In the past, the doctrine of Ex parte Young has permitted suits in federal courts against individual state officers on the basis that when acting illegally, those officers should be viewed as stripped of the immunity they otherwise would enjoy as representatives of a sovereign state. Id. In this case, the Board acted, from its perspective, legally. The Board members certainly acted consistently with and in reliance on a state statute. In this case, we in effect declare action taken pursuant to a state statute illegal, if it conflicts with a federal statute. As the majority opinion points out, we are not alone in recognizing that Ex parte Young can apply to an action taken in state courts. Id. ¶25. The most difficult question for me has been whether we ought to equate the Board’s action with the conduct to which the Ex parte Young doctrine historically has applied, but I also have found it difficult to determine whether the claim asserted in this case is in fact a claim for prospective, injunctive relief within the scope of the doctrine. See Gill v. Pub. Employees Ret. Bd., 2003-NMCA-038, ¶ 10, 133 N.M. 345, 62 P.3d 1227. {47} The Court of Appeals seems to me to make a valid point in suggesting the historical anomaly of relying on Ex parte Young to preserve the supremacy of federal law in a state court when some of the language in the federal cases suggests Congress lacked the power to make the law supreme or, put another way, that a state’s constitutional sovereign immunity is an equally important principle of constitutional law, which inherently limits the reach of federal law. See e.g. Kimel v. Fla. Bd. of Regents, 528 U.S. 62, 120 S.Ct. 631, 145 L.Ed.2d 522 (2000). In Kimel the Court held “that the [Age Discrimination in Employment Act] is not a valid exercise'of Congress’ power under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment” and that therefore the “purported abrogation of the States’ sovereign immunity is accordingly invalid.” Id. at 91, 120 S.Ct. 631. If, by that language, the United States Supreme Court meant to say that Congress had the power to enact legislation that is binding on the States but not the power to make it enforceable, Congress’ power must be limited, even if supreme. We noted this anomaly in Cockrell. There we said that “[w]e recognize[d] the incongruity of the State’s obligation to pay overtime wages ... without a concomítant method of enforcement for employees.” Cockrell, 2002-NMSC-009, ¶ 27, 132 N.M. 156, 45 P.3d 876. {48} The Court of Appeals opinion elegantly refers to the tension within the case law in a single sentence: “If the purpose of Ex parte Young doctrine is to ensure the Constitution’s supremacy, then a congressional act that is constitutionally outside of Congress’s power to enact as against the states should not be permitted to be enforced against the states in any way, either in state or federal court.” Gill, 2003-NMCA-038, ¶ 12, 133 N.M. 345, 62 P.3d 1227 (emphasis added). I understand the Court of Appeals to be observing, correctly, that Ex parte Young began as a protection of the supremacy of the United States Constitution. If the Constitution limited Congressional power to make federal legislation applicable to the states, then it should be the case (not necessarily is the case) that the Ex parte Young doctrine, a constitutional concept, would not be available to facilitate what Congress otherwise did not have the power under the Constitution to accomplish. {49} Again, I think Cockrell addresses and helps resolve what would otherwise be an unbearable tension. Because the constitutional sovereign immunity the United States Supreme Court has so recently articulated is limited to an immunity from money damages, and does not preclude suits for injunctive relief, Congress’ power in enacting remedial legislation is not as limited as the language in Kimel suggests. Because State constitutional sovereign immunity is limited, Congress’ power to enact remedial legislation can be understood to include' the power to make that legislation enforceable in actions to which a State is not immune. For this reason, we ought not foreclose the suit before us on the basis of constitutional sovereign immunity. Having recognized the federal cases as articulating a limited constitutional sovereign immunity, we are able to recognize the viability of the present claim. The federal statute on which this claim rests continues to have validity in state court, to the extent the State is not immune as a matter of federal constitutional law. The complaint stating the claim should not have been dismissed, because we should equate the Board’s conduct with the conduct to which Ex parte Young historically applied. {50} Nevertheless, the balance to which we referred in Cockrell is a balance not only between Federal and State power but also between legislative and judicial power. If we are careful in applying Ex parte Young, we can respect the Legislature’s exclusive power to waive the State’s constitutional sovereign immunity without surrendering our own power to recognize the development of the Ex parte Young doctrine in an appropriate way. For the reasons stated in the majority opinion, I believe we are extending the Ex parte Young doctrine consistent with United States Supreme Court precedent, although injunctive relief can be every bit as onerous a burden on the state and its treasury as the potential exposure of the state to monetary damages. See Pamela S. Karlan, The Irony of Immunity: The Eleventh Amendment, Irreparable Injury, and Section 1983, 53 Stan. L.Rev. 1311, 1314 (2001) (arguing that “injunctive relief may turn out to be far broader and more intrusive than the damages that would have been available after the fact, both because it may involve more invasive judicial supervision of state entities and because some of the defenses that would be available in after-the-fact-litigation, most notably qualified immunity, are unavailable in cases seeking prospective relief’). What has helped me distinguish this case from Cockrell is the existence of a separate fund against which the claim has been made, making it possible to characterize the relief sought as prospective, injunctive relief, “that would only have an ancillary effect on the state treasury.” Majority Op. ¶¶ 33, 34. In Cockrell, on the other hand, the plaintiff sought money damages for breach of a state statute, which I assume would not have had an ancillary effect on the state treasury. 2002-NMSC-009, ¶ 1, 132 N.M. 156, 45 P.3d 876. The distinctions we are making may seem thin, but the analysis that results from those distinctions is consistent with Cockrell and seems to permit us to reconcile conflicting language and ideas within the federal cases. On that basis, and on the basis of the analysis contained in the majority opinion, I concur.