LABORERS’ INTERNATIONAL UNION OF NORTH AMERICA, LOCAL 860, on behalf of itself and its members v. TEREASE Z. NEFF; HON. THOMAS F. O‘MALLEY; CUYAHOGA COUNTY, OHIO COMMON PLEAS COURT, JUVENILE DIVISION
No. 21-3653
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
March 23, 2022
RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION Pursuant to Sixth Circuit I.O.P. 32.1(b) File Name: 22a0052p.06
Argued: March 10, 2022
Decided and Filed: March 23, 2022
Before: SUTTON, Chief Judge; GIBBONS and GRIFFIN, Circuit Judges.
COUNSEL
ARGUED: Austin T. Opalich, MANGANO LAW OFFICES CO., L.P.A., Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellant. Max V. Rieker, WALTER | HAVERFIELD LLP, Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Austin T. Opalich, Joseph J. Guarino III, Ryan K. Hymore, MANGANO LAW OFFICES CO., L.P.A., Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellant. Max V. Rieker, R. Todd Hunt, Alejandro V. Cortes, WALTER | HAVERFIELD LLP, Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellees.
SUTTON, C.J., delivered the opinion of the court in which GIBBONS and GRIFFIN, JJ., joined. SUTTON, C.J. (pp. 13–15), also delivered a separate concurring opinion.
SUTTON, Chief Judge. When contract negotiations broke down between an Ohio juvenile court and the union that represents the court‘s employees, the union took the court to federal court. Because the juvenile court is an arm of the State, the district court correctly held that sovereign immunity bars most of the union‘s claims. And because the union‘s remaining contentions fail to state a claim for relief, we affirm across the board.
I.
Ohio‘s third branch of government is divided into three courts: the Ohio Supreme Court, the intermediate courts of appeals, and the courts of common pleas.
Cuyahoga County has a Juvenile Court with six judges.
In 2012, the employees of the Juvenile Court certified labor union Local 860 as their exclusive collective bargaining representative. The union represents 136 employees who work in a range of positions, including as legal services clerks, as probation officers, and as custodial and food service workers in juvenile detention facilities. It does not represent judges.
In 2019, the relationship soured. Attempts to negotiate a new agreement stalled. Consensus continued to elude them in 2020. On December 1, 2020, the union alleges, the Juvenile Court “unilaterally proclaimed” the contracts invalid. R.1 at 7. That day, the Juvenile Court filed a lawsuit in state court asking it to declare the agreements void or expired. The union counterclaimed for breach of contract. In the days that followed, the union alleges, relations continued to spiral, as the Juvenile Court treated the union‘s members as nonunion employees, announced a plan to stop deducting union dues from paychecks, imposed new work schedules, and eliminated grievance procedures.
The union sued the Juvenile Court in federal court. In addition to naming the court, it filed the lawsuit against Judge Thomas O‘Malley, the court‘s administrative judge, and Terease Neff, the court administrator, in their personal and official capacities. As relevant here, the union claimed the Juvenile Court and the administrators violated the Contracts Clause and the Takings Clause of the U.S. Constitution by breaching the collective bargaining agreements.
The Juvenile Court moved to dismiss, and the district court granted the motion. It reasoned that sovereign immunity bars the union‘s claims against the Juvenile Court because it is an arm of the State of Ohio. It reasoned that
“When the States entered the federal system, they did so with their sovereignty intact.” PennEast Pipeline Co. v. New Jersey, 141 S. Ct. 2244, 2258 (2021) (quotation omitted). One feature of sovereignty is immunity from suit. Id. Whether reflected in the words of the Tenth or Eleventh Amendments or background principles to the Convention, sovereign immunity protects States and the Federal Government from litigation except in “limited circumstances.” Id. That remains true for the States whether the case is filed in state or federal court, whether the plaintiff is a citizen of the defendant State or not, and whether the lawsuit‘s target is the State or an official acting on its behalf. Ernst v. Rising, 427 F.3d 351, 358 (6th Cir. 2005) (en banc).
Broadly though these principles sweep, exceptions exist. Waiver by a State is one. Port Auth. Trans-Hudson Corp. v. Feeney, 495 U.S. 299, 304 (1990). Authorized abrogation by Congress is another. Tennessee v. Lane, 541 U.S. 509, 517 (2004). A lawsuit by the federal government is a third. West Virginia v. United States, 479 U.S. 305, 311 (1987). On top of these and other exceptions, immunity applies only to lawsuits against the State or “an arm of the State,” not to those against political subdivisions like counties. Mt. Healthy City Sch. Dist. Bd. of Educ. v. Doyle, 429 U.S. 274, 280 (1977).
Familiar considerations shape the application of the arm-of-the-State inquiry to the Juvenile Court. Among them are: (1) the State of Ohio‘s “potential liability” for a judgment against the Juvenile Court; (2) the way in which state law describes the Juvenile Court and “the degree of state control and veto power over the [Court‘s] actions“; (3) the extent to which state officials control membership on the Juvenile Court; and (4) the extent to which the Juvenile Court‘s “functions fall within the traditional purview of state or local government.” Ernst, 427 F.3d at 359. While the first factor—the potential impact on the state treasury of any judgment—is undoubtedly important, it does not control the inquiry. Id. at 364; see also Pucci v. Nineteenth Dist. Ct., 628 F.3d 752, 761–62 (6th Cir. 2010). Sovereign immunity after all guards against money-damages and injunction actions. Ernst, 427 F.3d at 364–65. It not only protects a State‘s treasury, but it also “pervasively ... emphasizes the integrity retained by each State in our federal system,” a consideration that applies to money-damages and injunction actions. Hess v. Port Auth. Trans-Hudson Corp., 513 U.S. 30, 39 (1994).
Second, the State treats the common pleas courts and their subdivisions as segments of state government. The Ohio Constitution creates a “unified state judicial system,” Pucci, 628 F.3d at 762, providing that the “judicial power of the state is vested in a supreme court, courts of appeals, [and] courts of common pleas and divisions thereof,”
The State also exercises considerable control over the courts. The “fundamental law of Ohio imparts supervisory authority over all courts of that state, and the authority to promulgate rules for all courts of that state, to the Ohio Supreme Court.” Mumford, 105 F.3d at 268. The State Constitution also “dictates standards controlling the election, residency, tenure, compensation, and eligibility of every Ohio common pleas judge.” Id. State statutes play a role too. See
Third, the State exercises substantial influence over Juvenile Court membership. This factor favored “granting sovereign immunity” to the state trial courts of Michigan given that state officials controlled the removal of judges and the governor filled any vacancies. Pucci, 628 F.3d at 763. That was true even though Michigan voters elected the judges and the City in which each trial court was located oversaw its staff‘s employment. Id. The Ohio courts of common pleas and juvenile courts warrant the same treatment. The Ohio governor fills any vacancy.
Fourth, state courts quintessentially fall within the “traditional purview of state government.” Pucci, 628 F.3d at 764. The state judiciary is “one of three essential branches of state government.” Ernst, 427 F.3d at 361. The Federal Constitution “recognizes and preserves the autonomy and independence of the states ... in their judicial departments.” Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64, 78–79 (1938) (quotation omitted); see S.J. v. Hamilton County, 374 F.3d 416, 421 (6th Cir. 2004); Pucci, 628 F.3d at 764. The state courts serve as the State‘s “adjudicative voice.” S.J., 374 F.3d at 421 (quotation omitted); Pucci, 628 F.3d at 764. Their functions not only overlap with the “traditional purview of state government,” but they also fall “exclusively” within it. Pucci, 628 F.3d at 764. If any entity qualifies as an arm of the State, a state court does.
Valuable as multi-factor tests may be in the abstract, they rarely beat case decisions in the concrete. In case after case, we have held and said that the courts in a State‘s third branch of government count as arms of the State. See Pucci, 628 F.3d at 764; Ernst, 427 F.3d at 365; S.J., 374 F.3d at 421–24; Mumford, 105 F.3d at 260–70; Popovich v. Cuyahoga Cnty. Ct. of Common Pleas, 276 F.3d 808, 810 (6th Cir. 2002) (en banc); Wellman v. Sup. Ct. of Ohio, No. 18-3260, 2018 WL 9651499, at *2 (6th Cir. Nov. 13, 2018); Smiles v. Royster, No. 18-1440, 2018 WL 4998196, at *2 (6th Cir. Oct. 1, 2018); Vaughn v. Common Pleas Ct. of Montgomery Cnty., No. 16-4282, 2017 WL 5514436, at *1 (6th Cir. May 4, 2017); Ward v. City of Norwalk, 640 F. App‘x 462, 465 (6th Cir. 2016); Smith v. Leis, 407 F. App‘x 918, 932 (6th Cir. 2011); Dolan v.
Other circuits, indeed all circuits addressing the question to our knowledge, have come to similar conclusions. See, e.g., Brown v. Newberger, 291 F.3d 89, 92 (1st Cir. 2002); Gollomp v. Spitzer, 568 F.3d 355, 367–68 (2d Cir. 2009); Benn v. First Jud. Dist. of Pa., 426 F.3d 233, 240-41 (3d Cir. 2005); Wash. Legal Found. v. Tex. Equal Access to Just. Found., 94 F.3d 996, 1005 (5th Cir. 1996); Kelly v. Mun. Cts. of Marion Cnty., 97 F.3d 902, 907–08 (7th Cir. 1996); Clark v. Clark, 984 F.2d 272, 273 (8th Cir. 1993); Simmons v. Sacramento Cnty. Superior Ct., 318 F.3d 1156, 1161 (9th Cir. 2003); Collins v. Daniels, 916 F.3d 1302, 1316 (10th Cir. 2019); Simmons v. Conger, 86 F.3d 1080, 1085 (11th Cir. 1996); see also 13 Charles Alan Wright et al., Federal Practice & Procedure § 3524.2 (3d ed. 2008) (“As a general matter, state courts are considered arms of the state.“).
The union resists this conclusion and this authority, claiming that the Juvenile Court is a county entity, not a state entity. It emphasizes that Cuyahoga County, not the State of Ohio, would pay any judgment in this case, invoking our observation that “the state-treasury inquiry will generally be the most important” factor in the inquiry. Ernst, 427 F.3d at 364. But this case shows why the who-pays-the-judgment inquiry is “not the sole criterion,” a point we clarified in our en banc decision in Ernst. Id. (quotation omitted). That the state court system is one of the three branches of state government offers a compelling reason for treating it as the State in federal-court litigation. That explains why we treat the Michigan trial courts as the State and why the source of payment of any judgment does not change things. Pucci, 628 F.3d at 764. “[I]n the context of a court system that . . . is mandated by the state constitution to be uniform and to be supervised by one supreme court,” we explained, it would be a “particular affront” to the State to subject the court to suit. Id. (quotation omitted). We strongly suggested the same
This question and answer defeat the union‘s reliance on Alkire v. Irving, 330 F.3d 802 (6th Cir. 2003). In that case, we questioned whether Mumford was correctly decided because it omitted any discussion of who would pay a judgment against the Lorain County Domestic Relations Court—perhaps because the point was not argued. Id. at 812–13. But as just shown, Mumford‘s holding—that the Lorain County Domestic Relations Court is an arm of the State—remains good law. Ernst and Pucci at a minimum confirm as much.
The union separately pushes back on the idea that the State exercises control over the Juvenile Court, pointing out that the County has some control as well. The County, it notes, pays for court accommodations, facilities, and equipment and exercises some discretion in appropriating funds and setting employee compensation. But this funding occurs only because a state statute says that the County “shall” provide “suitable” resources.
The union falls back on a distinct argument—that, even if the Juvenile Court counts as the State for some purposes, it does not count as the State for employment purposes. Court staff, it points out, are county employees, suggesting that sovereign immunity should not apply when the Juvenile Court makes employment decisions with respect to those individuals. But this dividing and conquering does not work. For one, court staff still answer to the administrative juvenile judge. The “authority to hire personnel” for the Juvenile Court “is delegated by state
For another, the administrative juvenile judge does not answer to the county board of commissioners. Voters select juvenile judges.
For still another reason, this kind of functional argument does not work with a state court. A federal court‘s interference with a state court‘s employees, at the instance of a private entity, is no less an affront to the integrity of the court than a claim against the court itself. See Pucci, 628 F.3d at 764. It might be a different case if the governmental entity shared qualities of a protected court entity and an unprotected county entity. See S.J., 374 F.3d at 420–22 (permitting claims against a juvenile detention facility). In that setting, it might make sense to consider the function being exercised. But here it does not. This coequal branch of state government is the State, no less than the legislature or the governor—pulling all of its employees within its authority for immunity purposes.
III.
Our conclusion that the Juvenile Court is an arm of the State resolves many of the union‘s claims. The union cannot sue the court itself or recover damages from the administrators in their
Contracts Clause. States may not “pass any ... Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts.”
The union asks us to “reconsider” Kaminski. Appellant‘s Br. at 21. But a prior published opinion binds our panel “unless an inconsistent decision of the United States Supreme Court requires modification” of our opinion, the en banc court overrules it, or it conflicts with an even earlier case. Darrah v. City of Oak Park, 255 F.3d 301, 309–10 (6th Cir. 2001) (quotation omitted). The union does not identify a Supreme Court case since Kaminski. While it points to a pre-Kaminski decision in which we affirmed an injunction against enforcement of a Michigan law on Contracts Clause grounds, nowhere in that opinion did we suggest we were allowing the plaintiffs to proceed under
Takings Clause—Injunction. The Juvenile Court‘s status as an arm of the State would not prevent us from enjoining the administrators from future violations of the Takings Clause. Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 159–60 (1908). Still, to obtain an injunction, the union must establish not only that the challenged conduct qualifies as a taking, but that it also has no “adequate remedy at law.” Knick v. Township of Scott, 139 S. Ct. 2162, 2176 (2019). In other words, it must show that no acceptable “provision for obtaining just compensation exists.” Id.
The union pushes back, arguing that this last analysis conflicts with Knick. After Knick, it claims, it need not plead that it exhausted state-law procedures before bringing a takings claim, and the district court erred in thinking so. But it is the union that has its wires crossed. Knick authorized property owners to seek damages in federal court without first resorting to state law remedies. 139 S. Ct. at 2172–73. But in the next breath, the Court noted that so “long as an adequate provision for obtaining just compensation exists, there is no basis to enjoin the government‘s action effecting a taking.” Id. at 2176. The availability of a legal remedy does not on its own bar the damages claims. But it does preclude an injunction.
Takings Clause—Damages. That leaves the union‘s individual-capacity damages claims under the Takings Clause. Qualified immunity protects the administrators from these claims “insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known.” Gean v. Hattaway, 330 F.3d 758, 767 (6th Cir. 2003) (quotation omitted). They can invoke that protection unless “any reasonable public official” in their shoes would have understood that their “conduct violated the right.” Id.
But we have not found a case, as an initial matter, in which a government official merely breached a contract and a cognizable Takings Clause claim arose from the breach. To the contrary, our cases suggest that where a party claims that a governmental entity breached rights
But even if state officials breaching a contract somehow violate the Takings Clause, no precedent clearly establishes the point. Officials of “reasonable competence could disagree” on whether a breach occurred here. Humphrey v. Mabry, 482 F.3d 840, 847 (6th Cir. 2007) (quotation omitted). The administrators could have reasonably concluded that the agreements no longer applied. The contracts specified that they would “remain in full force and effect until December 31, 2019,” R.1-1 at 37; R.1-2 at 43, nearly a year before the alleged breach on December 1, 2020.
In response, the union points to the agreements’ preambles, which state that the court agrees to “abide by the terms of this Agreement until such time as a successor agreement is negotiated between the parties, the Union disclaims interest, or the employees elect to decertify the Union as their exclusive bargaining representative.” R.1-1 at 5; R.1-2 at 5. But in the face of the tension between those terms and the agreements’ explicit expiration dates, it was not unreasonable for the administrators to conclude that the more specific duration term controlled.
We affirm.
SUTTON, Chief Judge, concurring.
There are two schools of thought. Under one of them, the Supreme Court limited
More recently, a second school of thought has taken hold. Ever “since the 1960s,
Under this “broad construction” of the statute, “compelled” by its sweeping reference to “any rights” in “the Constitution and laws” of the United States, the statute has been applied to all manner of constitutional rights, including structural guarantees such as the dormant Commerce Clause. Dennis v. Higgins, 498 U.S. 439, 440, 443 (1991). After the U.S. Supreme Court determined that
Our court has one foot in the past and one foot in the present with respect to today‘s question. In Kaminski v. Coulter, 865 F.3d 339, 347 (6th Cir. 2017), we addressed whether