Lead Opinion
BERTELSMAN, D.J., dеlivered the opinion of the court. SUTTON, J. (pp. 373-74) delivered a separate concurring opinion, in which ROGERS, J., joined.
OPINION
Plaintiff-Appellant Frank J. Lawrence, Jr. (“Lawrence”) appeals from the district court’s judgment dismissing his claims filed pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against officials of the State Bar of Michigan in connection with their denial of his application for a license to practice law. For the following reasons, we AFFIRM.
I. BACKGROUND
Frank J. Lawrence, Jr. graduated from an accredited Michigan law school and рassed the Michigan bar exam in 2001. He first applied for a license to practice law in Michigan the same year. For reasons not relevant here, that application was ultimately withdrawn.
Between 2001 and 2004, a contentious relationship developed between Lawrence, the State Bar of Michigan (“SBM”), and the Michigan Board of Law Examiners (“BLE”). In 2003, Lawrence filed a federal lawsuit against the BLE, the SBM, certain of its officials and employees, and justices of the Michigan Supremе Court. See Lawrence v. Chabot,
In 2003, Lawrence also began operating a registered website called “StateBar-Watch” on which he actively criticized the SBM and BLE for alleged dishonеsty within the Michigan attorney licensing system. Joint Appendix (“J.A.”) at 17 (Compl. at ¶ 21).
On August 18, 2004, Lawrence reapplied for admission to the Michigan bar. On August 15, 2005, Lawrence was interviewed by three members of a SBM District Character and Fitness Committee: David H. Baum (“Baum”), Randy A. Musbach (“Musbach”), and Sonal Hope Mithani (“Mithani”). During this interview, Lawrence stated that he had little respect for the Michigan state court system, and he expressed the view that the federal courts are the “guardians of the constitution” and that the Michigan state сourt system fails adequately to protect individuals’ constitutional rights. J.A. at 19 (Compl.¶ 24).
Following this interview, the District Committee forwarded to the SBM a Report and Recommendation stating: “The Committee does not believe that the applicant, Frank J. Lawrence, Jr., has shown by clear and convincing evidence that he currently possesses the requisite good character and fitness to be recommended
Following the issuance of this Report and Recommendation, Lawrence made several communications to the employers of the members of the District Committee. He telephoned the University of Michigan Law School, where Baum was the Assistant Dean of Student Affairs. Lawrence told Baum’s assistant that he wanted to address the student bar association to let them know how poorly he thought he had been treated. Lawrence also sent a letter to a board member of the legal services organization for which Mithani was a director. In the letter, Lawrence stated how poorly he had been treated and how Mithani had manipulated Lawrence’s stated views about the stаte court system.
The District Committee recommendation was sent directly to the BLE, which voted to accept the recommendation. Lawrence then requested a hearing.
A hearing was held before the BLE on April 20, 2006. Lawrence was questioned about his communications with Baum’s and Mithani’s employers, but he denied that they were inappropriate. J.A. 37-57. On June 14, 2006, the BLE issued a written opinion denying Lawrence’s application for admission to practice law. Id. Lawrence did not seek reviеw of this decision in the Michigan Supreme Court.
On September 6, 2006, Lawrence filed a complaint in the United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, naming as defendants John T. Berry, executive director of the SBM, in his official capacity; Louis A. Smith, President of the BLE, in his official capacity; and Baum, Musbach, and Mithani, all in their individual capacities. Lawrence alleged that the BLE’s denial of his bar application violated his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. He sought declaratory and injunctive relief requiring defendants to issue him a license to practice law. Second, and in the alternative, Lawrence sought prospective relief to prohibit defendants from using his protected First Amendment activities as the basis for denying his future applications for a Michigan law license. Finally, the third count sought damages from Baum, Musbach, and Mithani for their alleged retaliation against Lawrence for the exercise of his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights.
Lawrence also filed a motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction requesting the same relief sought in the first two counts of the complaint.
Defendants filed motions to dismiss. In an opinion dated December 14, 2006, the district court granted those motions and denied Lawrence’s motions for preliminary injunctive relief. J.A. 63. The district court held that Lawrence’s attack upon the BLE decision denying his bar application was squarely barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. Alternatively, the court held that Lawrence’s challenge to the cоnstitutionality of the bar admission process had been rejected by this court in Lawrence’s prior appeal.
As to Lawrence’s second claim, the district court held that a “decision granting prospective relief would necessarily imply that the hearing panel’s decision was improper and forbidden by the constitution” and thus was equally barred by Feldman. J.A. 67-68. Further, the court held that, due to the discretion involved in such fu
Finally, the district court held that Lawrence’s claims for damages against the individual District Committee members were barred because those defendants were entitled to absolute quasi-judicial immunity or, alternatively, qualified immunity. Id.
Lawrence timely appealed.
II. ANALYSIS
A. The Rooker-Feldman Doctrine: Counts I and II
This court reviews de novo the district court’s ruling that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine precluded subject matter jurisdiction. McCormick v. Braverman,
The Rooker-Feldman doctrine is based on two United States Supreme Court decisions interpreting 28 U.S.C. § 1257(a). See District of Columbia Court of Appeals v. Feldman,
In Exxon, the Supreme Court recently summarized the Rooker-Feldman doctrine:
The Rooker-Feldman doctrine, we hold today, is confined to cases of the kind from which the doctrine acquired its name: cases brought by state-court losers complaining of injuries caused by stаte-court judgments rendered before the district court proceedings commenced and inviting district court review and rejection of those judgments.
Id. at 284,
In the wake of Exxon, this circuit has “distinguished between plaintiffs who bring an impermissible attack on a state court judgment—situations in which Rooker-Feldman applies—and plaintiffs who assert independent claims before the district court—situations in which Rooker-Feldman does not apply.” Pittman v. Cuyahoga County Dep’t of Children and Family Serv.,
In McCormick, we explained that the pertinent inquiry after Exxon is whether the “source of the injury” upon which plaintiff bases his federal claim is the state court judgment:
The inquiry then is the source of the injury the plaintiff alleges in the federal complaint. If the source of the injury is the state court decision, then the Rooker-Feldman doctrine would prevent the district court from asserting jurisdiction. If there is some other source of injury, such as a third party’s actions, then the plaintiff asserts an independent claim.
To the extent that Defendants argue that these claims, even though they do not assert injury from the state court judgments, are “inextricably intertwined” with those judgments so as to*369 within the reach of Rooker-Feldman, that argument must fail. We first nоte that it was this exact language that was the source of the pre-Exxon Mobil woes as to the application of Rooker-Feldman. In addition, the Supreme Court used the phrase “inextricably intertwined” in Feldman to describe a claim where the plaintiff asserted an injury from the state court judgment itself.... In Exxon, the Supreme Court implicitly repudiated the circuits’ post-Feldman use of the phrase “inextricably intertwined” to extend Rooker-Feld-manto situations [where] the source of the injury was not the state court judgment. In short, the phrase “inextricably intertwined” only describes the conclusion that a claim asserts an injury whose source is the state court judgment, a claim that is thus barred by Rooker-Feldman.
McCormick,
Applying this distinction, we concluded in McCormick that plaintiffs claims that cеrtain defendants committed fraud and misrepresentation in the course of state probate proceedings did not allege an injury caused by the state court judgment and thus were not barred by Rooker-Feldman. Id. at 392. In contrast, however, plaintiffs claim that the probate court’s order of receivership violated her constitutional rights because it effected an unlawful seizure was barred because “the count alleges that the state court order itself was illegal and harmed Plaintiff.” Id. at 395.
We have applied this “source of the injury” analysis in other recent cases where Rooker-Feldman was raised as a bar to the district court’s jurisdiction. See Pittman,
Count I
It is clear that that defendants violated his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights by denying his most recent application for admission to practice law in Michigan is a direct attack on a state court judgment and thus barred by Rooker-Feldman. Lawrence explicitly seeks a declaration that defendants’ decision “impermissibly impinges upon protected federal rights and that Plaintiff is entitled to a license to practice law.” J.A. 28 (Compl.¶ 56). As the Supreme Court held in Feldman, the federal courts are without jurisdiction to entertain such a claim. District of Columbia Court of Appeals v. Feldman,
Likewise, this circuit has held that similar federal challenges to the denial of bar applications are barred by Rooker-Feldman. See Raymond v. Moyer,
Lawrence’s second claim—in which he seeks prospective injunctive relief barring defendants from denying his future bar applications on allegedly unlawful First Amendment grounds-—presents a more difficult question. The first issue raised with respect to this claim is the question of ripeness.
In Lawrence’s first appeal to this court, Lawrence v. Chabot,
Now, Lawrence has been denied admission to the bar on grounds which, he asserts, run afoul of the First Amendment. Lawrence has indicated a clear intent to reapply and, as the record reflects, has persisted in the same expressive activity that allegedly resulted in the first denial. Defendants, likewise, have clearly indicated that they consider such activity to render Lawrence of unfit character for admission.
It would, thus, seem that: (1) it is likely that Lawrence will again be denied admission if he engages in the same allegedly protected activity, and that he has a “credible fear of enforcement;” (2) the factual record is perhaps developed as sufficiently as it can be for purposes of a pre-enforcement challenge, and it is certainly developed now in a way that it was not at the time of the Lawrence v. Chabot decision; and (3) Lawrence is exposed to hardship in that the alleged violation of his First Amendment rights is causing him to be unable to practice in his chosen profession. See generally Norton v. Ashcroft,
No doubt there are contingencies that may mean that the anticipated harm will not come to pass. Given that the denial of the license to practice law is an ad hoc decision by a body (the BLE) whose composition no doubt changes over time, it could be that a future application will be granted notwithstanding Lawrence’s expressive activity.
Nonetheless, weighing these considerations and applying the relaxed standard of ripeness under First Amendment jurisprudence, Lawrence’s second claim for relief is ripe for consideration.
Unfortunately for Lawrence, while ripe, this second claim is also barred by Rooker-Feldman. At first blush, this may seem not to be the case given that no future aрplication-—and thus no denial— has occurred.
However, examined for its substance rather than its form, Lawrence’s second claim for relief is premised on the same alleged injury as his first cause of action, i.e., defendants’ denial of his bar application on the basis of his allegedly protected First Amendment activities. Lawrence’s complaint makes this explicit: “Therefore, Plaintiff relies upon the allegations in this Complaint relating to how Plaintiffs bar application was processed, to support this Count for prospective relief.” J.A. 29 (Compl.¶ 58).
In other words, the district court could not have concluded that Lawrence was entitled to the prospective relief he seeks—that is, an order enjoining defendants from doing what they did before— without first finding that defendant’s previous decision was unconstitutional. Put another way, while the redress Lawrence seeks in his second cause of action is forward-looking, the claim is nonetheless
In Loriz v. Connaughton,
After an unsuccessful appeal to the Ohio Court of Appeals, the plaintiffs filed suit in federal court against various state officials and others alleging, among other things, that the approval and operation of the shooting range constituted a taking of their property in violation of the Fifth Amendment. The district court dismissed the action, in part, due to lack of jurisdiction based on Rooker-Feldman, finding that the action essentially sought federal district court review over the decisions of the Ohio courts upholding the zoning permits. Id. at 474.
On appeal, this court affirmed, not only as to plaintiffs’ claim for damages, but also as to their rеquest for a permanent injunction barring the zoning officials from permitting such shooting range operations in the future:
Clearly, all of the Lorizes’ claims were inextricably intertwined with the state court decisions. In order for the district court to grant the requested declaratory or injunctive relief, or to award damages, the district court would be forced to review the decisions of the Ohio Division of Wildlife, the BZA, the Ohio Court of Common Pleas, and the Ohio appellate court. Moreover, the relief the Lorizes seek—a declaration that the state courts reached an improper result based on a faulty application of the law—is not a general challenge to the constitutionality of the state law, but rather a specific grievance over specific decisions. These claims are exactly the type the Rooker-Feldman doctrine intended to bar in the lower federal courts.
Id. at 475 (emphasis added).
Other circuits have applied similar reasoning to conclude that claims seeking injunctive relief are barred by Rooker-Feldman if they necessarily require the federal court to determine that a state court judgment was erroneously entered. See Mann v. Boatright,
Thus, because the prospective relief sought by Lawrence can be predicted only on a determination that the priоr decision denying him bar admission was improper, his second claim is likewise barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine.
B. Count III
In Count III of his complaint, Lawrence seeks damages from individual defendants Baum, Musbach, and Mithani for their alleged retaliation against him by issuing an unfavorable character and fitness recommendation based on his expressed views of the Michigan court system. The district court dismissed this claim for failure to state a cause of action pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6).
We review de novo the district court’s dismissal for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6). In re Ferro Corp. Derivative Litig.,
We conclude that the district court properly found that these three defendants, as members of the State Bar of Michigan’s Character and Fitness Committee—and thus agents of the Board of Law Examiners and the Michigan Supreme Court—are entitled to absolute immunity for their actions in investigating Lawrence’s character and fitness to practice law and in making recommendations about the same. See Thomas v. Michigan State Bd. of Law Examiners, No. 94-1346,
The (D.Vi.of the above cases makes clear that, in conducting the character and fitness examination which is integral to the prоcess of determining whether an applicant is fit to practice law, these individual defendants, acting under the authority of the Michigan Supreme Court, were per
For this reason, our dicta in Dubuc v. Michigan Bd. of Law Examiners,
III. CONCLUSION
For these reasons, we hold that the district court correctly dismissed Lawrence’s claims. We AFFIRM.
Notes
. The concurrence that follows constitutes the majority opinion on this issue of ripenеss.
Concurrence Opinion
concurring.
I wholeheartedly concur in Judge Bertelsman’s opinion with respect to his resolution of Lawrence’s first and third claims. I write separately to explain my preference for resolving Lawrence’s second claim, which seeks to enjoin the Board from denying a second Bar application that Lawrence has yet to file. As to that claim, we ought to affirm the dismissal of the claim on ripeness, not Rooker-Feldman, grounds because (1) it is not “fit[ ] ... for judicial decision” and (2) “the hardship to the parties of withholding court consideration” is minimal. Abbott Labs. v. Gardner,
Is the claim fit for judicial review? No, for several reasons. At this juncture, we do not know whether Lawrence will file another Bar application. If he does file a second application, we do not know what he will say in completing the application, how he will respond to questioning in the character and fitness hearing and whether the Board will grant or deny him admission. And if the Board opts to deny the second application, we do not know why it will do so. See Toilet Goods Ass’n v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 158, 163,
Nor has Lawrence shown that he will suffer hardship if he must wait until he files, and the Board rejects, a second application before he seeks to vindicate his First Amendment rights. In the interim, the State has not put his feet tо the fire— forcing him to take immediate action or else face the risk of civil or criminal penalties. See Abbott Labs.,
The ripeness doctrine, it is true, “is somewhat relaxed in the First Amendment context,” Norton v. Ashcroft,