Court Opinion

ID: 9427381
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:20:33.238591+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:06.700140
License: Public Domain

Me. Justice Marshall,
concurring.
Although I join the opinion of the Court, I write separately to emphasize why, in my view, the California Automobile Franchise Act is not violative of the Due Process Clause. As the Court observes, ante, at 100-103, the California statute, like its state and federal counterparts, seeks to redress the disparity in economic power between automobile manufacturers and their franchisees. By empowering the New Motor Vehicle Board to superintend the establishment or relocation of a franchise, the statute makes it more difficult for a manufacturer to force its franchisees to accept unfair conditions of trade by threatening to overload their markets with intra-brand competitors.1
*112This litigation arises because of the delay necessarily incident to the Board’s inquiry. Given the unavoidable time lag between the filing of protests and the Board’s hearing, the State had to elect whether to permit the establishment or relocation of dealerships pending the Board’s determination of their legality. To enjoin temporarily the proposed transactions would deprive new dealers and their franchisors of legitimate profits in cases where the dealership was eventually approved. On the other hand, allowing the transactions to go forward would force existing franchisees to bear the burden of illegal competition in cases where the Board ultimately disapproved the new dealership. Perhaps because the policy of redressing the economic imbalance between franchisees and manufacturers would be thwarted if existing franchisees were left unprotected until the Board made its decision, the California Legislature chose the former option.2
Assuming appellees’ interest in immediately opening or relocating a franchise implicates the Due Process Clause, I do not believe it outweighs the interest of the State in protecting existing franchisees from unfair competition and economic coercion pending completion of the Board’s inquiry. See Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U. S. 254, 262-263 (1970); Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U. S. 564, 570-571 (1972). The state legislature has decided to impose the burdens of delay on appellees rather than on existing franchisees. In view of the substantial public interest at stake and the short lapse of *113time between notice and hearing, the Due Process Clause does not dictate a contrary legislative decision.

 Although there is little legislative history on the California Act, the need for statutory constraints on manufacturers’ ability to coerce their dealers is reflected in a variety of state and federal enactments. See, e. g., statutes cited ante, at 101 n. 5; H. R. Rep. No. 2850, 84th Cong., 2d Sess., 4-5 (1956); S. Rep. No. 2073, 84th Cong., 2d Sess., 2-4 (1956); Forest Home Dodge, Inc. v. Karns, 29 Wis. 2d 78, 138 N. W. 2d 214 (1965). See generally S. Macaulay, Law and the Balance of Power: The Automobile Manufacturers and Their Dealers 139 (1966).
The dissenting opinion, post, at 121, suggests that the right of existing franchisees to protest the entry of a new competitor is of “little value,” since less than 1% of the protests were successful and two-thirds were *112abandoned in advance of any hearing. These figures, however, may indicate merely that the California statute has successfully served a deterrent function. In any event, the California Legislature could legitimately conclude that the "right to be heard does not depend upon an advance showing that one will surely prevail at the hearing.” Fuentes v. Shevin, 407 U. S. 67, 87 (1972).

 See n. 1, supra. The State may also have sought to protect aspiring franchisees from the economic loss they would incur if the Board disapproved their applications after they had commenced operations.