Court Opinion

ID: 9478690
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 06:55:10.764837+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:46:33.777508
License: Public Domain

RIPPLE, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the judgment.
The majority opinion is a careful effort to apply faithfully the Supreme Court’s holding in Foremost Insurance Co. v. Richardson, 457 U.S. 668, 102 S.Ct. 2654, 73 L.Ed.2d 300 (1982). In my view, the court reaches the correct result. The fire that caused the damage here occurred in a pleasure boat tied to a dock within the well-delineated confines of a marina dedicated exclusively to the wharfage of pleasure boats. It presented no harm to maritime commerce.
I write separately because the test adopted by the court, while producing the correct result in this case, will place inappropriate restrictions on admiralty jurisdiction in other instances. In my view, Foremost does not compel restricting admiralty jurisdiction in noncommercial activities to matters directly involving the navigation of a vessel. In Foremost, the Supreme Court had to deal with an incident arising out of an alleged noncompliance with the “Rules of the Road.” However, I do not read the Supreme Court’s opinion as necessarily precluding jurisdiction based on other hazards traditionally associated with maritime activities, including fire, when that hazard threatens maritime commerce.
Hopefully, before long, the Supreme Court will revisit this quagmire and resolve the current ambiguity generated by the courts of appeals in the wake of Foremost.
ORDER
On consideration of the Petition for Rehearing with Suggestion for Rehearing En Banc filed by counsel for the plaintiff-appellant in the above-named cause and the response thereto by appellee, no judge in active service has requested a vote thereon and all of the judges on the original panel have voted to deny a rehearing. Accordingly,
IT IS ORDERED that the aforesaid petition for rehearing be, and the same is hereby, DENIED.
RIPPLE, Circuit Judge, concurring. I join in the denial of the petition for rehearing. The matters raised in that petition were examined by the panel during its consideration of the merits, and I do not believe that further examination by the panel would be fruitful.
I have also decided not to call for a vote on the suggestion for rehearing en banc. This circuit sees little in the way of admiralty litigation and here the result, if not the articulated rule of decision, is correct. Before this court revisits the area again, there is every probability that the Supreme Court will have an opportunity to supply further guidance with respect to its decision in Foremost Insurance Co. v. Richardson, 457 U.S. 668, 102 S.Ct. 2654, 73 L.Ed.2d 300 (1982).