Court Opinion

ID: 9530152
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:57:47.775056+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:00.654128
License: Public Domain

DISSENT
GARDEBRING, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s conclusion that the one-year limitations period of the Minnesota Human Rights Act applies to claims under the Air Carrier Access Act (ACAA) and therefore, that Vaughn’s ACAA claim was properly dismissed.
First, I want to note my agreement with , the majority’s initial assertion that “the characterization of the federal claim and the method for selecting a state limitations period is ultimately a matter of federal law.” Op. at 738. The Supreme Court has specifically said that, in enacting the “borrowing provision” of federal civil rights law, “Congress surely did not intend to assign to state courts and legislatures a conclusive role in the formative function of defining and characterizing the essential elements of a federal cause of action.” Wilson v. Garcia, 471 U.S. 261, 269,105 S.Ct. 1938,1943, 85 L.Ed.2d 254 (1985). But, having acknowledged that we are bound in our present task by federal precedent, the majority then commences an unpersuasive effort to distinguish controlling federal case law.
Upon a first examination, the Supreme Court’s directive that we refer to “the most elosely-analogous” state law of limitations, where Congress has not provided one, Board of Regents v. Tomanio, 446 U.S. 478, 483-84, 100 S.Ct. 1790, 1794-95, 64 L.Ed.2d 440 (1980), lends support to the majority’s view. Indeed, the MHRA does seem, in some respects, to meet that description. But concluding the analysis with this simplistic test ignores the extensive application of this standard to federal civil rights statutes in many cases since Tomanio, beginning of course with Wilson. With one exception,1 virtually every court, both state and federal, that has considered the question of what state limitations period should be applied to federal discrimination claims has held that a state’s residual or general limitations period (for personal injury actions) is applicable. See, e.g., Southerland v. Hardaway Management Co., 41 F.3d 250 (6th Cir.1994); Baker v. Board of Regents, 991 F.2d 628 (10th Cir. 1993); Bush v. Commonwealth Edison Co., 990 F.2d 928 (7th Cir.1993); Hickey v. Irving Indep. Sch. Disk, 976 F.2d 980 (5th Cir. 1992); Morse v. University of Vermont, 973 F.2d 122 (2d Cir.1992); Raggi v. Wegmans Food Markets, Inc., 779 F.Supp. 705 *746(W.D.N.Y.1991); Henrickson v. Sammons, 268 Ga. 331, 434 S.E.2d 51 (1993).
In particular, I would rely on the recent decision of the 8th Circuit, Egerdahl v. Hibbing Community College, 72 F.3d 615 (8th Cir.1995), in which the court of appeals rejected a determination by the Minnesota district court that the MHRA limitations period should be applied to claims arising under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, 20 U.S.C. § 1681 (“Title IX”) and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000d (“Title VT”). The Egerdahl court extended the reasoning of Wilson to the Title IX and Title VI claims at issue, noting that it was unlikely that the personal injury limitations period “ever would be, fixed in a way that would discriminate against federal claims, or be inconsistent with federal law in any respect.” Egerdahl, 72 F.3d at 618 (quoting Wilson, 471 U.S. at 279,105 S.Ct. at 1949).
Given the almost uniform federal court analysis of this issue, in a wide variety of factual and legal contexts, the majority’s effort to carve out a distinction for claims arising under the ACAA is not compelling. The only difference identified by the majority between the ACAA and the other federal statutes to which the state personal injury limitations period have been applied is that the other civil rights provisions, particularly the Rehabilitation Act considered in Bush, Morse and Henrickson, are “broader,” i.e., that the ACAA claim prohibits disability discrimination by air carriers and the Rehabilitation Act reaches disability discrimination in all federally funded activities. The majority provides no explanation as to why this difference takes it outside the general rule of law articulated in Wilson and its progeny.
For these reasons, I would affirm the court of appeals in its ruling that Vaughn’s ACAA claims are not time barred.

. Wolsky v. Medical College of Hampton Roads, 1 F.3d 222 (4A Cir.1993).