Lead Opinion
Pursuant to Correction Law § 24, New York courts lack jurisdiction under state or federal law to entertain civil actions seeking money damages against correction officers. The issue in this case is whether section 24 violates the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution because state courts cannot adjudicate federal 42 USC § 1983 causes of action alleging violations of civil rights. We hold that the statute is not unconstitutional.
I
Plaintiff Keith Haywood was sentenced as a second violent felony offender to a 15-to-30-year term of imprisonment after being convicted in 1990 of escape in the first degree and eight counts of robbery in the first degree.
In the aftermath of these disciplinary findings, plaintiff commenced two unrelated, pro se civil actions in state Supreme Court premised on 42 USC § 1983 against employees of the state Department of Correctional Services (DOCS).
Plaintiff’s second lawsuit was filed against defendant Pat Smith, a DOCS hearing officer, two correction officers and two of their superior officers. According to plaintiff, he had been grabbed from behind without justification by one of the correction officers and sustained a “minor injury to his left pinkie finger.” He claimed that the correction officer involved in the incident had conspired with his superiors to fabricate the facts set forth in his June 2003 misbehavior report. Plaintiff further alleged that the urinalysis test conducted in June 2003 had been tampered with by DOCS employees. The complaint, relying on 42 USC § 1983, accused defendants of conspiring to violate plaintiffs federal civil rights by assaulting him without cause, creating a false misbehavior report, tampering with his urinalysis test and denying him a fair and impartial hearing.3
The defendants in both actions, represented by the Office of the Attorney General pursuant to Public Officers Law § 17, moved to dismiss the complaints on the ground that plaintiffs claims—both state and federal—were barred by Correction Law § 24. This statute provides, in pertinent part:
“1. No civil action shall be brought in any court of the state, except by the attorney general on behalf of the state, against any officer or employee of the department [of correctional services], in his personal capacity, for damages arising out of any act done or the failure to perform any act within the scope of the employment and in the discharge of the duties by such officer or employee.
“2. Any claim for damages arising out of any actdone or the failure to perform any act within the scope of the employment and in the discharge of the duties of any officer or employee of the department shall be brought and maintained in the court of claims as a claim against the state.”
Supreme Court dismissed both complaints on this statutory basis, citing Woodward v State of New York (
II
Plaintiff contends that when Congress enacted 42 USC § 1983, it imposed a national policy that was intended to allow persons who are injured by others acting under color of law to seek judicial redress. He claims that by prohibiting section 1983 actions for money damages, Correction Law § 24 impermissibly discriminates against the federal cause of action contrary to the purpose of the Supremacy Clause.
The Supremacy Clause declares that the
“Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding” (US Const art VI [2]).
In the event of a conflict between federal and state law, the Supremacy Clause preempts operation of state law because when Congress adopts an act it speaks “ ‘for all the people and all the States, and thereby established] a policy for all. That policy is
The alleged conflict between federal and state law in this case arises from the fact that, although a claim based on 42 USC § 1983 for monetary damages against government officials in their personal capacity can generally be asserted in a New York court (see generally Will v Michigan Dept. of State Police,
Upon closer scrutiny, however, the Supremacy Clause imposes no constitutional impediment to the operation of Correction Law § 24. The Supremacy Clause gives states the power to deny enforcement of a federal right if they have a “ ‘valid excuse’ ” for doing so (Howlett,
Thus, the policy underlying the Supremacy Clause is to maintain an equilibrium between state and federal causes of action: if a state court opens its doors to a state cause of action, it must also allow related federal claims to be heard; but if the state does not hear a particular state claim, it may also decline to consider related federal causes of action in its state courts (see generally Missouri ex rel. Southern R. Co. v Mayfield,
Applying these precepts, we cannot say that Correction Law § 24 violates the Supremacy Clause. The statute, by emphasiz
Nor does the fact that a plaintiff can sue the state directly in the Court of Claims alter our analysis. Ordinarily, a state cannot be sued under 42 USC § 1983 because states are not considered to be “persons” within the purview of the federal statute (see Will v Michigan Dept. of State Police,
In our view, New York does not discriminate against section 1983 claims by allowing state, but not federal, actions involving DOCS employees to be adjudicated in the Court of Claims since it was Congress that decided to exempt the states as responsible parties from the purview of the federal statute. Furthermore, federal law acknowledges that states can be sued by individuals only in state courts unless sovereign immunity is waived or abrogated (see US Const Amend 11; Seminole Tribe of Fla. v Florida,
Notes
. See People v Haywood,
. Plaintiff has also filed other pro se complaints during his term of confinement (see e.g. Kollar v Conagra Foods Retail Prods. Co., No. 07 CV 0130,
. This federal statute provides that
“[e]very person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress . . . .”
. The complaint also asserted a second cause of action based on an alleged violation of plaintiffs state constitutional rights.
. Plaintiff’s alternative claim, that the statute merely indemnifies correction officers, was not raised in Supreme Court and is therefore unpreserved.
. Section 24 operates without regard to the identity of the plaintiff, such as when a correction officer seeks to sue his superior officers for civil rights violations (see Woodward v State of New York,
. Cases such as Howlett and Felder, relied upon by plaintiff and the dissent, are distinguishable from this case. In Howlett, for example, the state provided an immunity defense to the section 1983 action that did not apply to related state law claims and that would not have been available if the action had been commenced in federal court (see
. New York’s waiver of sovereign immunity is conditioned on submission to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Court of Claims (see NY Const, art VI, § 9; Court of Claims Act § 8).
Dissenting Opinion
The question before this Court is whether Correction Law § 24 violates the Supremacy Clause insofar as it bars litigants from bringing 42 USC § 1983 claims for money damages in state court against DOCS employees for actions committed within the scope of their employment. As interpreted by the majority, section 24 frustrates the purpose of, and is inconsistent with, section 1983. Specifically, section 24 (1) burdens the litigation of section 1983 actions by preventing state courts from adjudicating claims for money damages—even where such courts have jurisdiction over the parties and the type of claim brought—while, at the same time, allowing the court to adjudicate state law actions involving the same conduct by DOCS employees; and (2) immunizes a select group of state employees from section 1983 damages claims where other state employees are not similarly immunized. The majority and the State argue, however, that state courts can decline to exercise their concurrent jurisdiction over section 1983 money damages claims against DOCS employees because Correction Law § 24 affords New York State a “valid excuse” (i.e., a neutral rule of judicial administration limiting subject matter jurisdiction) for doing so. Contrary to the majority’s conclusion, section 24 cannot withstand a challenge under the Supremacy Clause. Accordingly, I dissent and would reverse the orders of the Appellate Division, reinstate plaintiffs claims and remand both actions to Supreme Court for further proceedings.
I.
Correction Law § 24 (entitled “Civil actions against [DOCS] personnel”) states:
“1. No civil action shall be brought in any court of the state, except by the attorney general on behalf of the state, against any officer or employee of the department, in his personal capacity, for damages arising out of any act done or the failure to perform any act within the scope of the employment and in the discharge of the duties by such officer or employee.
“2. Any [such] claim for damages arising out of any act done or the failure to perform any act within the scope of the employment and in the discharge ofthe duties of any officer or employee of the department shall be brought and maintained in the court of claims as a claim against the state” (emphasis added).
We have stated that the purpose of section 24 is to ensure that DOCS employees, when acting within the scope of employment, freely perform their dangerous duties of maintaining safety and security within correctional facilities without fear of being subjected to voluminous, vexatious and, in many cases, merit-less suits brought by prisoners and being held personally liable should a prisoner prevail (see Arteaga v State of New York,
The majority opinion provides a detailed description of plaintiffs present claims, and several previous ones (see majority op at 484-485), apparently to suggest that the claims are frivolous, which they may well be. I recognize that the problem of baseless lawsuits by prisoners against corrections officers is a serious one; Congress, however, enacted section 1983 to deal with an even more serious problem—i.e., violations of citizens’ rights by those acting under the color of state law.
Section 1983 is the current version of section 1 of the Civil Rights Act of 1871, one of the post-Civil War Reconstruction-Era civil rights statutes Congress enacted.
“Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territoiy or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress” (emphasis added).
Thus, section 1983 permits an individual deprived of his or her federal civil rights by person(s) acting under color of state law (i.e., government officials) to bring a civil suit against the state actor(s), in their personal capacity, for compensatory relief. Moreover, the Supreme Court stated that section 1983 was meant to create
“a species of liability in favor of persons deprived of their federal civil rights by those wielding state authority. . . . ‘[T]he central objective of the Reconstruction-Era civil rights statutes ... is to ensure that individuals whose federal constitutional or statutory rights are abridged may recover damages or secure injunctive relief.’ Thus, [section] 1983 provides ‘a uniquely federal remedy against incursions . . . upon rights secured by the Constitution and laws of the Nation,’ and is to be accorded ‘a sweep as broad as its language. ’
“Any assessment of the applicability of a state law to federal civil rights litigation, therefore, must be made in light of the purpose and nature of the federal right. This is so whether the question ofstate-law applicability arises in [section] 1983 litigation brought in state courts, which possess concurrent jurisdiction over such actions, or in federal-court litigation” (Felder v Casey, 487 US 131 , 139 [1988] [emphasis added and citations omitted]).
Bottom line, Congress decided that the threat of abuse of citizens by those acting under color of state law was real enough to justify creating the section 1983 cause of action—even though many section 1983 cases lack merit. Accordingly, the State of New York is not free to decide that DOCS employees must be immune from such suits. In any event, the issue here is not whether plaintiff has a right to bring these claims—he clearly does—but whether state courts, as well as federal courts, must bear the burden of adjudicating them. In my view, state courts cannot selectively escape this responsibility. However, over the years, New York State courts have (see Steven H. Steinglass, an Introduction to State Court Section 1983 Litigation, in Sword and Shield, A Practical Approach to Section 1983 Litigation, at 153 [ABA 3d ed 2006] [stating that “(t)he most flagrant example of a state court system selectively excluding (section) 1983 cases is the refusal of the New York courts to entertain (section) 1983 actions against state correctional officials”]).
Although the State of New York generally has the freedom to fix the rules of subject matter jurisdiction its courts must follow, it does not have the authority to enact a statute that violates or is inconsistent with federal law—for example, a statute immunizing “an official from liability for injuries compensable under federal law” (Howlett v Rose,
II.
Under the Supremacy Clause (US Const art VI [2]), federal law is “the supreme Law of the Land.” The Supreme Court explained:
“[flederal law is enforceable in state courts not because Congress has determined that federal courtswould otherwise be burdened or that state courts might provide a more convenient forum—although both might well be true—but because the Constitution and laws passed pursuant to it are as much laws in the States as laws passed by the state legislature. The Supremacy Clause makes those laws the supreme Law of the Land, and charges state courts with a coordinate responsibility to enforce that law according to their regular modes of procedure. The laws of the United States are laws in the several States, and just as much binding on the citizens and courts thereof as the State laws are. . . . The two together form one system of jurisprudence, which constitutes the law of the land for the State; and the courts of the two jurisdictions are not foreign to each other, nor to be treated by each other as such, but as courts of the same country, having jurisdiction partly different and partly concurrent” (Howlett, 496 US at 367 [citations and internal quotation marks omitted]).
Federal and state courts, therefore, have concurrent jurisdiction over federal actions and state courts have a duty to enforce federal law to the same extent as federal courts except where a valid excuse to the exercise of such jurisdiction exists. Discussing this “valid excuse” exception, the Supreme Court articulated three corollaries:
“1. A state court may not deny a federal right, when the parties and controversy are properly before it, in the absence of valid excuse. . . . The existence of the jurisdiction creates an implication of duty to exercise it. . . .
“2. An excuse that is inconsistent with or violates federal law is not a valid excuse ....
“3. When a state court refuses jurisdiction because of a neutral state rule regarding the administration of the courts, we must act with utmost caution before deciding that it is obligated to entertain the claim. . . . The requirement that a state court of competent jurisdiction treat federal law as the law of the land does not necessarily include within it a requirement that the State create a court competent to hear [a] case in which the federal claim is presented. The general rule ... is that federal law takes the state courts as it finds them. . . . The States thus have great latitude to establish the structure and jurisdiction of their own courts. . . . In addition, States may apply their own neutral procedural rules to federal claims, unless those rules are [preempted] by federal law” (id. at 369-372 [citations and internal quotation marks omitted]).
Accordingly, a state may enact legislation limiting its subject matter jurisdiction over claims otherwise within its purview as long as the legislation is supported by a valid excuse. If a state applies a neutral rule of judicial administration, the state has a valid excuse for refusing to provide a court of competent jurisdiction to hear such claims. For the reasons set forth below, Correction Law § 24 is not a valid excuse.
First, the Supreme Court has not deemed the type of “jurisdictional” rule at bar—the effect of which is that Section 1983 damages claims against one group of state employees are barred while identical claims against other state employees are allowed—to be a valid excuse. There have only been three cases in which the Supreme Court has held that a valid excuse exists for a state court’s refusal to entertain a federal claim. These cases involved neutral rules of judicial administration—all markedly different from section 24—where the state court dismissed the federal claim: (1) on forum non conveniens grounds;
Second, the majority’s view that section 24 does not discriminate against section 1983 damages claims is based, in my view, on an unduly narrow reading of United States Supreme Court precedent. In Martinez, the Supreme Court held that a California statute immunizing government conduct was not controlling in section 1983 litigation, even where such litigation took place in state court, because the application of the State’s immunity law would thwart the remedial purpose of section 1983 (
At issue in Felder was a Wisconsin notice-of-claim statute, which effectively shortened the statute of limitations for those seeking to assert federal civil rights claims. The Supreme Court held that the Wisconsin statute was preempted to the extent that it applied to section 1983 claims because the statute conflicted in both purpose and effect with the remedial objectives of section 1983, and its application to a section 1983 claim brought in state court could yield a different outcome than if it were brought in federal court (
Moreover, in Howlett, the Supreme Court considered whether a Florida statute in which the State waived sovereign immunity from state tort actions—but not from section 1983 claims— against state defendants was a jurisdictional limitation on the power of the Florida state courts. The Court held that the statute violated the Supremacy Clause because the state courts entertained similar state claims not subject to the sovereign immunity defense; as such, section 1983 claims could not be precluded (see Howlett,
In light of the foregoing, the majority’s nondiscrimination and “equality requirement” arguments are unavailing. I ac
Further, as noted by the majority, the State Legislature determined that the State, and not DOCS employees, should be liable for the wrongful conduct committed within the scope of employment (see Correction Law § 24 [2]). This policy judgment logically flows from the above-mentioned purpose of section 24. However, under the Supremacy Clause, “[t]he relative importance to the State of its own law is not material when there is a conflict with a valid federal law, for any state law, however clearly within a State’s acknowledged power, which interferes with or is contrary to federal law, must yield” (Felder,
Third, in resolving the issue at bar, the broad goals and objectives of section 1983, and for that matter its progenitor (the Civil Rights Act of 1871), must be taken into account. Specifically, this Court should determine whether
“the application of the [state statute] to § 1983 actions brought in state courts [is] consistent with the goals of the federal civil rights laws, or [whether] the enforcement of [the state statute] instead stand[s] as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full purposes and objectives of Congress” (id. [internal quotation marks omitted]).
Here, Correction Law § 24, which by its plain terms immunizes DOCS employees from liability for certain conduct ac
Additionally, a state may not extend its sovereign immunity and pass legislation immunizing “an official from liability for injuries compensable under federal law” (Howlett,
In conclusion, I stress two points which make clear why the Appellate Division order should be reversed. First, if you strip away the veneer of the majority’s arguments, section 24—a statute which, on its face, precludes anyone, including other DOCS employees and prisoners, from bringing damages claims against DOCS personnel—is not a neutral jurisdictional barrier to a particular type of claim. In reality, section 24 functions as an immunity statute that allows state courts to selectively exclude prisoner suits for damages against DOCS personnel. Second, contrary to the majority’s view, section 24 simply does not fall under the category of what could be a “valid excuse” (i.e., section 24 does not reflect the concerns of power over the litigants and competence over subject matter). Here, the state supreme court has jurisdiction over the parties and, based on the State’s willingness to allow the adjudication of all section 1983 claims against other state employees, competence over the type of claim at bar. Further, plaintiffs claims arose within the State’s territorial jurisdiction. Based on the foregoing, Correction Law § 24 does not afford a valid excuse to selectively exclude section 1983 damages suits against DOCS personnel and is, therefore, constitutionally infirm under the Supremacy Clause.
Chief Judge Kaye and Judges Ciparick and Read concur with Judge Graffeo; Judge Jones dissents and votes to reverse in a separate opinion in which Judges Smith and Pigott concur.
Orders affirmed, without costs.
. The purpose of the Civil Rights Act of 1871 was to address the lawlessness in the southern states after the Civil War (see Cong Globe, 42nd Cong, 1st Sess, at 236 [1871]) and to enforce the provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment (see Monroe v Pape,
“The [Act] grew out of a message sent to Congress by President Grant on March 23, 1871, reading:
“ ‘A condition of affairs now exists in some States of the Union rendering life and property insecure and the carrying of the mails and the collection of the revenue dangerous. The proof that such a condition of affairs exists in some localities is now before the Senate. That the power to correct these evils is beyond the control of State authorities I do not doubt; that the power of the Executive of the United States, acting within the limits of existing laws, is sufficient for present emergencies is not clear. Therefore, I urgently recommend such legislation as in the judgment of Congress shall effectually secure life, liberty, and property, and the enforcement of law in all parts of the United States. . .
“[The legislation, which was enacted on April 20, 1871, had three main aims.]
“First, it might. . . override certain kinds of state laws. . . . “Second, it provided a remedy where state law was inadequate. . . .
“The third aim was to provide a federal remedy where the state remedy, though adequate in theory, was not available in practice. . . .
“The debates are replete with references to the lawless conditions existing in the South in 1871. ... It was not the unavailability of state remedies but the failure of certain States to enforce the laws with an equal hand that furnished the powerful momentum behind this ‘force bill.’ . . .
“[T]he remedy created was . . . against those who representing a State in some capacity were unable or unwilling to enforce a state law” (Monroe,365 US at 172-176 [footnotes omitted]).
. See Missouri ex rel. Southern R. Co. v Mayfield,
. See Douglas v New York, N. H. & H. R. Co.,
. See Herb v Pitcairn,
. See Baker v Coughlin,
. Under section 24, a litigant can bring section 1983 actions for declaratory and injunctive relief in state court. However, if the litigant is to have a full recovery, as contemplated by section 1983, he or she must seek money damages in federal court. Thus, to obtain a full recovery, a litigant has to split claims and bring two separate actions in two separate jurisdictions. This places an onerous burden on litigants. (See also Woodward v State of New York,
. By this requirement, section 24 has redefined and limited the section 1983 cause of action, i.e., it eliminates a plaintiffs federal right to sue a DOCS employee, in his or her personal capacity, for damages in state court.
. See Howlett,