ORTIZ ET AL. v. FIBREBOARD CORP. ET AL.
No. 97-1704
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Argued December 8, 1998—Decided June 23, 1999
527 U.S. 815
Laurence H. Tribe argued the cause for petitioners. With him on the briefs were Brian Koukoutchos, Jonathan S. Massey, Frederick M. Baron, Brent M. Rosenthal, and Steve Baughman.
Elihu Inselbuch argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief for respondents Ahearn et al. were Peter Van N. Lockwood, Joseph B. Cox, Jr., Joseph F. Rice, Steven Kazan, and Harry F. Wartnick. Herbert M. Wachtell, Paul J. Bschorr, Richard B. Sypher, Kelly C. Wooster, Stephen M. Snyder, William R. Irwin, Rodney L. Eshelman, Donald T. Ramsey, Stuart Philip Ross, Sean M. Hanifan, Merril J. Hirsh, and Michael E. Jones filed a brief for respondents Continental Casualty Co. et al.*
*Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed for the Association of Trial Lawyers of America by Jeffrey Robert White and Mark S. Mandell; for Trial Lawyers for Public Justice, P. C., by Arthur H. Bryant and Anne Bloom; and for Legal Ethics, Civil Procedure, and Constitutional Law Scholars by Roger C. Cramton, Kenneth J. Chesebro, and Barbara J. Olshansky.
Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for Asbestos Victims of America by Daniel U. Smith; for Exxon Corporation by Charles W. Bender, John F. Daum, and Charles C. Lifland; and for the National Association of Securities and Commercial Law Attorneys by Kevin P. Roddy and Arthur R. Miller.
This case turns on the conditions for certifying a mandatory settlement class on a limited fund theory under
I
Like Amchem Products, Inc. v. Windsor, 521 U.S. 591 (1997), this case is a class action prompted by the elephantine mass of asbestos cases, and our discussion in Amchem will suffice to show how this litigation defies customary judicial administration and calls for national legislation.1 In 1967, one of the first actions for personal asbestos injury was filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District
Respondent Fibreboard Corporation was a defendant in the 1967 action. Although it was primarily a timber company, from the 1920‘s through 1971 the company manufactured a variety of products containing asbestos, mainly for high-temperature industrial applications. As the tide of asbestos litigation rose, Fibreboard found itself litigating on two fronts. On one, plaintiffs were filing a stream of personal injury claims against it, swelling throughout the 1980‘s and 1990‘s to thousands of new claims for compensatory damages each year. Id., at 265a; App. 1040a. On the second front, Fibreboard was battling for funds to pay its tort claimants. From May 1957 through March 1959, respondent Continental Casualty Company had provided Fibreboard with a comprehensive general liability policy with limits of $1 million per occurrence, $500,000 per claim, and no aggregate limit. Fibreboard also claimed that respondent Pacific Indemnity Company had insured it from 1956 to 1957 under a similar policy. App. to Pet. for Cert. 267a-268a. Beginning in 1979, Fibreboard was locked in coverage litigation with Continental and Pacific in a California state trial court, which in 1990 held Continental and Pacific responsible for indemnification as to any claim by a claimant exposed to Fibreboard asbestos products prior to their policies’ respective
With asbestos case filings continuing unabated, and its secure insurance assets almost depleted, Fibreboard in 1988 began a practice of “structured settlement,” paying plaintiffs 40 percent of the settlement figure up front with the balance contingent upon a successful resolution of the coverage dispute.2 By 1991, however, the pace of filings forced Fibreboard to start settling cases entirely with the assignments of its rights against Continental, with no initial payment. To reflect the risk that Continental might prevail in the coverage dispute, these assignment agreements generally carried a figure about twice the nominal amount of earlier settlements. Continental challenged Fibreboard‘s right to make unilateral assignments, but in 1992 a California state court ruled for Fibreboard in that dispute.3
Meanwhile, in the aftermath of a 1990 Federal Judicial Center conference on the asbestos litigation crisis, Fibreboard approached a group of leading asbestos plaintiffs’ lawyers, offering to discuss a “global settlement” of its asbestos
In February 1993, after Continental had lost on both issues at the trial level, and thus faced the possibility of practically unbounded liability, it too joined the global settlement negotiations. Because Continental conditioned its part in any settlement on a guarantee of “total peace,” ensuring no unknown future liabilities, talks focused on the feasibility of a mandatory class action, one binding all potential plaintiffs and giving none of them any choice to opt out of the certified class. Negotiations continued throughout the spring and summer of 1993, but the difficulty of settling both actually pending and potential future claims simultaneously led to an agreement in early August to segregate and settle an inventory of some 45,000 pending claims, being substantially all those filed by one of the plaintiffs’ firms negotiating the global settlement. The settlement amounts per claim were higher than average, with one-half due on closing and the remainder contingent upon either a global settlement or Fibreboard‘s success in the coverage litigation. This agreement provided the model for settling inventory claims of other firms.
With the insurance companies’ appeal of the consolidated coverage case set to be heard on August 27, the negotiating parties faced a motivating deadline, and about midnight before the argument, in a coffee shop in Tyler, Texas, the negotiators finally agreed upon $1.535 billion as the key term of a “Global Settlement Agreement.” $1.525 billion of this sum would come from Continental and Pacific, in the proportion established by the California trial court in the coverage case,
On September 9, 1993, as agreed, a group of named plaintiffs filed an action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, seeking certification for settlement purposes of a mandatory class comprising three groups: all persons with personal injury claims against Fibreboard for asbestos exposure who had not yet brought suit or settled their claims before the previous August 27; those who had dismissed such a claim but retained the right to bring a future action against Fibreboard; and “past, present and future spouses, parents, children, and other relatives” of class mem-
As finally negotiated, the Global Settlement Agreement provided that in exchange for full releases from class members, Fibreboard, Continental, and Pacific would establish a trust to process and pay class members’ asbestos personal injury and death claims. Claimants seeking compensation would be required to try to settle with the trust. If initial settlement attempts failed, claimants would have to proceed to mediation, arbitration, and a mandatory settlement conference. Only after exhausting that process could claimants go to court against the trust, subject to a limit of $500,000 per claim, with punitive damages and prejudgment interest barred. Claims resolved without litigation would be discharged over three years, while judgments would be paid out over a 5- to 10-year period. The Global Settlement Agreement also contained spendthrift provisions to conserve the trust, and provided for paying more serious claims first in the event of a shortfall in any given year. Id., at 973.
After an extensive campaign to give notice of the pending settlement to potential class members, the District Court allowed groups of objectors, including petitioners here, to intervene. After an 8-day fairness hearing, the District Court certified the class and approved the settlement as “fair, adequate, and reasonable” under
On appeal, the Fifth Circuit affirmed both as to class certification and adequacy of settlement. In re Asbestos Litiga-
Shortly thereafter, this Court decided Amchem and proceeded to vacate the Fifth Circuit‘s judgment and remand for further consideration in light of that decision. 521 U. S. 1114 (1997). On remand, the Fifth Circuit again affirmed, in a brief per curiam opinion, distinguishing Amchem on the grounds that the instant action proceeded under
We granted certiorari, 524 U.S. 936 (1998), and now reverse.
II
The nub of this case is the certification of the class under
Petitioners also argue that the Fifth Circuit on remand disregarded Amchem in passing on the
III
A
Although representative suits have been recognized in various forms since the earliest days of English law, see generally S. Yeazell, From Medieval Group Litigation to the Modern Class Action (1987); see also Marcin, Searching for the Origin of the Class Action, 23 Cath. U. L. Rev. 515, 517-524 (1973), class actions as we recognize them today developed as an exception to the formal rigidity of the necessary parties rule in equity, see Hazard, Gedid, & Sowle, An Historical Analysis of the Binding Effect of Class Suits, 146 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1849, 1859-1860 (1998) (hereinafter Hazard, Gedid, & Sowle), as well as from the bill of peace, an equitable device for combining multiple suits, see Z. Chafee, Some Problems of Equity 161-167, 200-203 (1950). The necessary parties rule in equity mandated that “all persons materially interested, either as plaintiffs or defendants in the subject matter of the bill ought to be made parties to the suit, however numerous they may be.” West v. Randall, 29 F. Cas. 718, 721 (No. 17,424) (CC RI) (1820) (Story, J.). But because that rule would at times unfairly deny recovery to the party before the court, equity developed exceptions, among them one to cover situations “where the parties are very numerous, and the court perceives, that it will be almost impossible to bring them all before the court; or where the question is of general interest, and a few may sue for the benefit of the whole; or where the parties form a part of a voluntary associ-
Among the traditional varieties of representative suit encompassed by
Equity, of course, recognized the same necessity to bind absent claimants to a limited fund when no formal imposition of a constructive trust was entailed. In Guffanti v. National Surety Co., 196 N. Y. 452, 458, 90 N. E. 174, 176 (1909), for example, the defendant received money to supply steamship tickets and had posted a $15,000 bond as required by state law. He converted to personal use funds collected from more than 150 ticket purchasers, was then adjudged bankrupt, and absconded. One of the defrauded ticket purchasers sued the surety in equity on behalf of himself and all others like him. Over the defendant‘s objection, the New York Court of Appeals sustained the equitable class suit, citing among other considerations the fact that all recovery had to come from a “limited fund out of which the aggregate recoveries must be sought” that was inadequate to pay all claims, and subject to pro rata distribution. Id., at 458, 90 N. E., at 176. See Hazard, Gedid, & Sowle 1915 (“[Guffanti]
Ross v. Crary, 1 Paige Ch. 416, 417-418 (N. Y. Ch. 1829), presents the concept of the limited fund class action in another incarnation. “[D]ivers suits for general legacies,” id., at 417, were brought by various legatees against the executor of a decedent‘s estate. The Ross court stated that where “there is an allegation of a deficiency of the fund, so that an account of the estate is necessary,” the court will “direc[t] an account in one cause only” and “stay the proceeding[s] in the others, leaving all the parties interested in the fund, to come in under the decree.” Id., at 417-418. Thus, in equity, legatee and creditor bills against the assets of a decedent‘s estate had to be brought on behalf of all similarly situated claimants where it was clear from the pleadings that the available portion of the estate could not satisfy the aggregate claims against it.17
B
The cases forming this pedigree of the limited fund class action as understood by the drafters of
The first and most distinctive characteristic is that the totals of the aggregated liquidated claims and the fund available for satisfying them, set definitely at their maximums, demonstrate the inadequacy of the fund to pay all the claims. The concept driving this type of suit was insufficiency, which alone justified the limit on an early feast to avoid a later famine. See, e. g., Guffanti, supra, at 457, 90 N. E., at 176 (“The total amount of the claims exceeds the penalty of the bond .... A just and equitable payment from the bond would be a distribution pro rata upon the amount of the several embezzlements. Unless in a case like this the amount
Second, the whole of the inadequate fund was to be devoted to the overwhelming claims. See, e. g., Dickinson, 197 F. 2d, at 979-980 (rejecting a challenge by holder of funds to the court‘s disposition of the entire fund); see also United States v. Butterworth-Judson Corp., 269 U. S. 504, 513 (1926) (“Here, the fund being less than the debts, the creditors are entitled to have all of it distributed among them according to their rights and priorities“). It went without saying that the defendant or estate or constructive trustee with the inadequate assets had no opportunity to benefit himself or claimants of lower priority by holding back on the amount distributed to the class. The limited fund cases thus ensured that the class as a whole was given the best deal; they did not give a defendant a better deal than seriatim litigation would have produced.
Third, the claimants identified by a common theory of recovery were treated equitably among themselves. The cases assume that the class will comprise everyone who might state a claim on a single or repeated set of facts, invoking a common theory of recovery, to be satisfied from the limited fund as the source of payment. Each of the people represented in Ross, for example, had comparable entitlement as a legatee under the testator‘s will. Those subject to representation in Dickinson had a common source of claims in the solicitation of funds by parties whose subsequent defalcation left them without their investment, while in Guffanti the individuals represented had each entrusted
In sum, mandatory class treatment through representative actions on a limited fund theory was justified with reference to a “fund” with a definitely ascertained limit, all of which would be distributed to satisfy all those with liquidated claims based on a common theory of liability, by an equitable, pro rata distribution.
C
The Advisory Committee, and presumably the Congress in approving subdivision (b)(1)(B), must have assumed that an action with these characteristics would satisfy the limited
It is true, of course, that the text of
To begin with, the Advisory Committee looked cautiously at the potential for creativity under
Consistent with its backward look under
The Rules Enabling Act underscores the need for caution. As we said in Amchem, no reading of the Rule can ignore the Act‘s mandate that “rules of procedure ‘shall not abridge, enlarge or modify any substantive right,‘” Amchem, 521 U. S., at 613 (quoting
Finally, if we needed further counsel against adventurous application of
Second, and no less important, mandatory class actions aggregating damages claims implicate the due process “principle of general application in Anglo-American jurisprudence that one is not bound by a judgment in personam in a litigation in which he is not designated as a party or to which he has not been made a party by service of process,” Hansberry v. Lee, 311 U. S. 32, 40 (1940), it being “our ‘deep-rooted historic tradition that everyone should have his own day in court,‘” Martin v. Wilks, 490 U. S. 755, 762 (1989) (quoting 18 C. Wright, A. Miller, & E. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure § 4449, p. 417 (1981)); see Richards v. Jefferson County, 517 U. S. 793, 798-799 (1996). Although “[w]e have recognized an exception to the general rule when, in certain limited circumstances, a person, although not a party, has his interests adequately represented by someone with the same interests who is a party,” or “where a special remedial scheme exists expressly foreclosing successive litigation by nonlitigants, as for example in bankruptcy or probate,” Martin, supra, at 762, n. 2 (citations omitted), the burden of justification rests on the exception.
The inherent tension between representative suits and the day-in-court ideal is only magnified if applied to damages claims gathered in a mandatory class. Unlike
In related circumstances, we raised the flag on this issue of due process more than a decade ago in Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Shutts, 472 U. S. 797 (1985). Shutts was a state class action for small sums of interest on royalty payments suspended on the authority of a federal regulation. Id., at 800. After certification of the class, the named plaintiffs notified each member by first-class mail of the right to opt out of the lawsuit. Out of a class of 33,000, some 3,400 exercised that right, and another 1,500 were excluded because their notices could not be delivered. Id., at 801. After losing at trial, the defendant, Phillips Petroleum, argued that the state court had no jurisdiction over claims of out-of-state plaintiffs without their affirmative consent. We said no and held that out-of-state plaintiffs could not invoke the same due process limits on personal jurisdiction that out-of-state defendants had under International Shoe Co. v. Washington, 326 U. S.
IV
The record on which the District Court rested its certification of the class for the purpose of the global settlement did not support the essential premises of mandatory limited fund actions. It failed to demonstrate that the fund was limited except by the agreement of the parties, and it showed exclusions from the class and allocations of assets at odds with the concept of limited fund treatment and the structural protections of
A
The defect of certification going to the most characteristic feature of a limited fund action was the uncritical adoption by both the District Court and the Court of Appeals of figures25 agreed upon by the parties in defining the limits of the fund and demonstrating its inadequacy.26 When a dis-
We have already alluded to the difficulties facing limited fund treatment of huge numbers of actions for unliquidated damages arising from mass torts, the first such hurdle being a computation of the total claims. It is simply not a matter of adding up the liquidated amounts, as in the models of limited fund actions. Although we might assume, arguendo, that prior judicial experience with asbestos claims would allow a court to make a sufficiently reliable determination of the probable total, the District Court here apparently thought otherwise, concluding that “there is no way to predict Fibreboard‘s future asbestos liability with any certainty.” 162 F. R. D., at 528. Nothing turns on this conclusion, however, since there was no adequate demonstration of the second element required for limited fund treatment, the upper limit of the fund itself, without which no showing of insufficiency is possible.
The “fund” in this case comprised both the general assets of Fibreboard and the insurance assets provided by the two policies, see 90 F. 3d, at 982 (describing the fund as Fibreboard‘s entire equity and $2 billion in insurance assets under the Trilateral Settlement Agreement). As to Fibreboard‘s assets exclusive of the contested insurance, the District Court and the Fifth Circuit concluded that Fibreboard had a then-current sale value of $235 million that could be devoted to the limited fund. While that estimate may have been conservative,28 at least the District Court heard evi-
The insurance assets would obviously be “limited” in the traditional sense if the total of demonstrable claims would render the insurers insolvent, or if the policies provided aggregate limits falling short of that total; calculation might be difficult, but the way to demonstrate the limit would be clear. Neither possibility is presented in this case, however. Instead, any limit of the insurance asset here had to be a product of potentially unlimited policy coverage discounted by the risk that Fibreboard would ultimately lose the coverage dispute litigation. This sense of limit as a value discounted by risk is of course a step removed from the historical model, but even on the assumption that it would suffice for limited fund treatment, there was no adequate finding of fact to support its application here. Instead of undertaking an independent evaluation of potential insurance funds, the District Court (and, later, the Court of Appeals), simply accepted the $2 billion Trilateral Settlement Agreement figure as representing the maximum amount the insurance companies could be required to pay tort victims, concluding that “[w]here insurance coverage is disputed, it is appropriate to value the insurance asset at a settlement value.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 492a.29
ties, less transaction costs. App. to Pet. for Cert. 377a, 492a. In 1997, however, Fibreboard was acquired for about $515 million, plus $85 million of assumed debt. See In re Asbestos Litigation, 134 F. 3d 668, 674 (CA5 1998) (Smith, J., dissenting); see also Coffee, Class Wars: The Dilemma of the Mass Tort Class Action, 95 Colum. L. Rev. 1343, 1402 (1995) (noting the surge in Fibreboard‘s stock price following the settlement below).
Settlement value is not always acceptable, however. One may take a settlement amount as good evidence of the maximum available if one can assume that parties of equal knowledge and negotiating skill agreed upon the figure through arms-length bargaining, unhindered by any considerations tugging against the interests of the parties ostensibly represented in the negotiation. But no such assumption may be indulged in this case, or probably in any class action settlement with the potential for gigantic fees.30 In this case, certainly, any assumption that plaintiffs’ counsel could be of a mind to do their simple best in bargaining for the benefit of the settlement class is patently at odds with the fact that at least some of the same lawyers representing plaintiffs and the class had also negotiated the separate settlement of 45,000 pending claims, 90 F. 3d, at 969-970, 971, the full payment of which was contingent on a successful Global Settlement Agreement or the successful resolution of the insurance coverage dispute (either by litigation or by agreement, as eventually occurred in the Trilateral Settlement Agreement), id., at 971, n. 3; App. 119a-120a. Class counsel thus had great incentive to reach any agreement in the global settlement negotiations that they thought might survive a
We do not, of course, know exactly what an independent valuation of the limit of the insurance assets would have shown. It might have revealed that even on the assumption that Fibreboard‘s coverage claim was sound, there would be insufficient assets to pay claims, considered with reference to their probable timing; if Fibreboard‘s own assets would not have been enough to pay the insurance shortfall plus any claims in excess of policy limits, the projected insolvency of the insurers and Fibreboard would have indicated a truly limited fund. (Nothing in the record, however, suggests that this would have been a supportable finding.) Or an independent valuation might have revealed assets of insufficient value to pay all projected claims if the assets were discounted by the prospects that the insurers would win the coverage cases. Or the court‘s independent valuation might have shown, discount or no discount, the probability of enough assets to pay all projected claims, precluding certification of any mandatory class on a limited fund rationale. Throughout this litigation the courts have accepted the assumption that the third possibility was out of the question, and they may have been right. But objecting and unidentified class members alike are entitled to have the issue settled by specific evidentiary findings independent of the agreement of defendants and conflicted class counsel.
The explanation of need for independent determination of the fund has necessarily anticipated our application of the requirement of equity among members of the class. There are two issues, the inclusiveness of the class and the fairness of distributions to those within it. On each, this certification for settlement fell short.
The definition of the class excludes myriad claimants with causes of action, or foreseeable causes of action, arising from exposure to Fibreboard asbestos. While the class includes those with present claims never filed, present claims withdrawn without prejudice, and future claimants, it fails to include those who had previously settled with Fibreboard while retaining the right to sue again “upon development of an asbestos related malignancy,” plaintiffs with claims pending against Fibreboard at the time of the initial announcement of the Global Settlement Agreement, and the plaintiffs in the “inventory” claims settled as a supposedly necessary step in reaching the global settlement, see 90 F. 3d, at 971. The number of those outside the class who settled with a reservation of rights may be uncertain, but there is no such uncertainty about the significance of the settlement‘s exclusion of the 45,000 inventory plaintiffs and the plaintiffs in the unsettled present cases, estimated by the Guardian Ad Litem at more than 53,000 as of August 27, 1993, see App. in No. 95-40635 (CA5), 6 Record, Tab 55, p. 72 (Report of the Guardian Ad Litem). It is a fair question how far a natural class may be depleted by prior dispositions of claims and still qualify as a mandatory limited fund class, but there can be no question that such a mandatory settlement class will not qualify when in the very negotiations aimed at a class settlement, class counsel agree to exclude what could turn out to be as much as a third of the claimants that negotiators thought might eventually be involved, a substantial number of whom class counsel represent, see App. to Pet. for Cert.
Might such class exclusions be forgiven if it were shown that the class members with present claims and the outsiders ended up with comparable benefits? The question is academic here. On the record before us, we cannot speculate on how the unsettled claims would fare if the global settlement were approved, or under the trilateral settlement. As for the settled inventory claims, their plaintiffs appeared to have obtained better terms than the class members. They received an immediate payment of 50 percent of a settlement higher than the historical average, and would get the remainder if the global settlement were sustained (or the coverage litigation resolved, as it turned out to be by the Trilateral Settlement Agreement); the class members, by contrast, would be assured of a 3-year payout for claims settled, whereas the unsettled faced a prospect of mediation followed by arbitration as prior conditions of instituting suit, which would even then be subject to a recovery limit, a slower payout, and the limitations of the trust‘s spendthrift protection. See supra, at 827. Finally, as discussed below, even ostensible parity between settling nonclass plaintiffs and class members would be insufficient to overcome the failure to provide the structural protection of independent representation as for subclasses with conflicting interests.
On the second element of equity within the class, the fairness of the distribution of the fund among class members, the settlement certification is likewise deficient. Fair treatment in the older cases was characteristically assured by straightforward pro rata distribution of the limited fund. See supra, at 841. While equity in such a simple sense is unattainable in a settlement covering present claims not specifically proven and claims not even due to arise, if at all, until some future time, at the least such a settlement must
First, it is obvious after Amchem that a class divided between holders of present and future claims (some of the latter involving no physical injury and attributable to claimants not yet born) requires division into homogeneous subclasses under
Second, the class included those exposed to Fibreboard‘s asbestos products both before and after 1959. The date is significant, for that year saw the expiration of Fibreboard‘s insurance policy with Continental, the one that provided the bulk of the insurance funds for the settlement. Pre-1959 claimants accordingly had more valuable claims than post-1959 claimants, see 90 F. 3d, at 1012-1013 (Smith, J., dissenting), the consequence being a second instance of disparate interests within the certified class. While at some point there must be an end to reclassification with separate counsel, these two instances of conflict are well within the requirement of structural protection recognized in Amchem.
It is no answer to say, as the Fifth Circuit said on remand, that these conflicts may be ignored because the settlement makes no disparate allocation of resources as between the conflicting classes. See 134 F. 3d, at 669-670. The settlement decides that the claims of the immediately injured deserve no provisions more favorable than the more speculative claims of those projected to have future injuries, and that liability subject to indemnification is no different from liability with no indemnification. The very decision to treat them all the same is itself an allocation decision with results almost certainly different from the results that those with immediate injuries or claims of indemnified liability would have chosen.
Nor does it answer the settlement‘s failures to provide structural protections in the service of equity to argue that the certified class members’ common interest in securing contested insurance funds for the payment of claims was so weighty as to diminish the deficiencies beneath recognition here. See Brief for Respondent Class Representatives Ahearn et al. 31 (discussing this issue in the context of the
C
A third contested feature of this settlement certification that departs markedly from the limited fund antecedents is the ultimate provision for a fund smaller than the assets understood by the Court of Appeals to be available for payment of the mandatory class members’ claims; most notably, Fibreboard was allowed to retain virtually its entire net worth. Given our treatment of the two preceding deficiencies of the certification, there is of course no need to decide whether this feature of the agreement would alone be fatal to the Global Settlement Agreement. To ignore it entirely, however, would be so misleading that we have decided simply to identify the issue it raises, without purporting to resolve it at this time.
Fibreboard listed its supposed entire net worth as a component of the total (and allegedly inadequate) assets available for claimants, but subsequently retained all but $500,000
The District Court in this case seems to have had a further point in mind, however. One great advantage of class action treatment of mass tort cases is the opportunity to save the enormous transaction costs of piecemeal litigation, an advantage to which the settlement‘s proponents have referred in this case.35 Although the District Court made no specific
V
Our decision rests on a different basis from the ground of JUSTICE BREYER‘s dissent, just as there was a difference in approach between majority and dissenters in Amchem. The nub of our position is that we are bound to follow
Apart from its effect on the requirements of subdivision (a) as explained and held binding in Amchem, the dissent would move the standards for mandatory actions in the direction of opt-out class requirements by according weight to this “unusual limited fund[‘s] ... witching hour,” post, at 877, in exercising discretion over class certification. It is on this belief (that we should sustain the allowances made by the District Court in consideration of the exigencies of this settlement proceeding) that the dissent addresses each of the criteria for limited fund treatment (demonstrably insufficient fund, intraclass equity, and dedication of the entire fund, see post, at 873-883).
As to the calculation of the fund, the dissent believes an independent valuation by the District Court may be dispensed with here in favor of the figure agreed upon by the settling parties. The dissent discounts the conflicts on the part of class counsel who negotiated the Global Settlement Agreement by arguing that the “relevant” settlement negotiation, and hence the relevant benchmark for judging the actual value of the insurance amount, was the negotiation between Fibreboard and the insurers that produced the Trilateral Settlement Agreement. See post, at 876. This argument, however, minimizes two facts: (1) that Fibreboard and the insurers made this separate, backup agreement only at the insistence of class counsel as a condition for reaching the Global Settlement Agreement; (2) even more important, that “[t]he Insurers were adamant that they would not agree
With respect to the requirement of intraclass equity, the dissent argues that conflicts both within this certified class and between the class as certified and those excluded from it may be mitigated because separate counsel were simply not to be had in the short time that a settlement agreement was possible before the argument (or likely decision) in the coverage case. But this is to say that when the clock is about to strike midnight, a court considering class certification may lower the structural requirements of
Finally, the dissent would excuse Fibreboard‘s retention of virtually all its net worth, and the loss to members of the certified class of some 13 percent of the fund putatively available to them, on the ground that the settlement made more money available than any other effort would likely have done. But even if we could be certain that this evaluation were true, this is to reargue Amchem: the settlement‘s fair
We believe that if an allowance for exigency can make a substantial difference in the level of
VI
In sum, the applicability of
The judgment of the Court of Appeals, accordingly, is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
CHIEF JUSTICE REHNQUIST, with whom JUSTICE SCALIA and JUSTICE KENNEDY join, concurring.
JUSTICE BREYER‘s dissenting opinion highlights in graphic detail the massive impact of asbestos-related claims on the federal courts. Post, at 866-867. Were I devising a system for handling these claims on a clean slate, I would agree entirely with that dissent, which in turn approves the near-heroic efforts of the District Court in this case to make the best of a bad situation. Under the present regime, transactional costs will surely consume more and more of a relatively static amount of money to pay these claims.
But we are not free to devise an ideal system for adjudicating these claims. Unless and until the
JUSTICE BREYER, with whom JUSTICE STEVENS joins, dissenting.
This case involves a settlement of an estimated 186,000 potential future asbestos claims against a single company, Fibreboard, for approximately $1.535 billion. The District Court, in approving the settlement, made 446 factual findings, on the basis of which it concluded that the settlement was equitable, that the potential claimants had been well represented, and that the distinctions drawn among different categories of claimants were reasonable. Ahearn v. Fibreboard Corp., 162 F. R. D. 505 (ED Tex. 1995); App. to Pet. for
I
A
Four special background circumstances underlie this settlement and help to explain the reasonableness and consequent lawfulness of the relevant District Court determinations. First, as the majority points out, the settlement comprises part of an “elephantine mass of asbestos cases,” which “defies customary judicial administration.” Ante, at 821. An estimated 13-to-21 million workers have been exposed to asbestos. See Report of the Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Committee on Asbestos Litigation 6-7 (Mar. 1991) (hereinafter Report). Eight years ago the Judicial Conference spoke of the mass of related cases having “reached critical dimensions,” threatening “a disaster of major proportions.” Id., at 2. In the Eastern District of Texas, for example, one out of every three civil cases filed in 1990 was an asbestos case. See id., at 8. In the past decade nearly 80,000 new federal asbestos cases have been filed; more than 10,000 new federal asbestos cases were filed last year. See U. S. District Courts Civil Cases Commenced by Nature of Suit, Administrative Office of the Courts Statistics (Dec. 31, 1994-1998) (Table C2-A) (hereinafter AO Statistics).
The Judicial Conference found that asbestos cases on average take almost twice as long as other lawsuits to resolve. See Report 10-11. Judge Parker, the experienced trial judge who approved this settlement, noted in one 3,000-member asbestos class action over which he presided that 448 of the original class members had died while the litigation was pending. Cimino v. Raymark Industries, Inc., 751 F. Supp. 649, 651 (ED Tex. 1990). And yet, Judge Parker
Second, an individual asbestos case is a tort case, of a kind that courts, not legislatures, ordinarily will resolve. It is the number of these cases, not their nature, that creates the special judicial problem. The judiciary cannot treat the problem as entirely one of legislative failure, as if it were caused, say, by a poorly drafted statute. Thus, when “calls for national legislation” go unanswered, ante, at 821, judges can and should search aggressively for ways, within the framework of existing law, to avoid delay and expense so great as to bring about a massive denial of justice.
Third, in that search the district courts may take advantage of experience that appellate courts do not have. Judge Parker, for example, has written of “a disparity of appreciation for the magnitude of the problem,” growing out of the difference between the trial courts’ “daily involvement with asbestos litigation” and the appellate courts’ “limited” exposure to such litigation in infrequent appeals. Cimino, 751 F. Supp., at 651.
Fourth, the alternative to class-action settlement is not a fair opportunity for each potential plaintiff to have his or her
For these reasons, I cannot easily find a legal answer to the problems this case raises by referring, as does the majority, to “our ‘deep-rooted historic tradition that everyone should have his own day in court.‘” Ante, at 846 (citation omitted). Instead, in these circumstances, I believe our Court should allow a district court full authority to exercise every bit of discretionary power that the law provides. See generally Califano v. Yamasaki, 442 U. S. 682, 703 (1979) (“[M]ost issues arising under
B
The case before us involves a class of individuals (and their families) exposed to asbestos manufactured by Fibreboard
But, as of 1993, one potentially short-lived additional asset promised potential claimants a greater recovery. That asset consisted of two insurance policies, one issued by Continental Casualty, the other by Pacific Indemnity. If the policies were valid (i. e., if they covered most of the relevant claims), they were worth several billion dollars; but if they were invalid, this asset was worth nothing. At that time, a separate case brought by Fibreboard against the insurance companies in California state court seemed likely to resolve the value of the policies in the near future. That separate litigation had a settlement value for the insurance companies. At the time the parties were negotiating, prior to the California court‘s decision, the insurance policies were worth, as the majority puts it, the value of “unlimited policy coverage” (i. e., perhaps the insurance companies’ entire net worth) “discounted by the risk that Fibreboard would ultimately lose the coverage dispute litigation.” Ante, at 851.
The insurance companies offered to settle with both Fibreboard and those persons with claims against Fibreboard (who might have tried to sue the insurance companies directly). The settlement negotiations came to a head in August 1993, just as a California state appeals court was poised to decide the validity of the insurance policies. This fact meant speed was important, for the California court could well decide that the policies were worth nothing. It also meant that it was important to certify a non-opt-out class of Fibreboard plain
After eight days of hearings, the District Court found that the insurance policies plus Fibreboard‘s net worth amounted to a “limited fund,” valued at $1.77 billion (the amount the insurance companies were willing to contribute to the settlement plus Fibreboard‘s value). See App. to Pet. for Cert. 492a. The court entered detailed factual findings. See generally 162 F. R. D., at 518-519. It certified a “non-opt-out” class. And the court approved the parties’ Global Settlement Agreement. The Global Settlement Agreement allows those exposed to asbestos (and their families) to assert their Fibreboard claims against a fund that it creates. It does not limit recoveries for particular types of claims, but allows for individual determinations of damages based on all historically relevant individual factors and circumstances. See 90 F. 3d, at 976. It contains spendthrift provisions designed to limit the total payouts for any particular year, and a requirement that the claimants with the most serious injuries be paid first in any year in which there is a shortfall. It also permits an individual who wishes to retain his right to bring an ordinary action in court to opt out of the arrangement (albeit after mediation and nonbinding arbitration), but sets a ceiling of $500,000 upon the recovery obtained by any person who does so. See generally 162 F. R. D., at 518-519.
The question here is whether the court‘s certification of the class under
II
The District Court certified a class consisting primarily of individuals (and their families) who had been exposed to Fibreboard‘s asbestos but who had not yet made claims. See ante, at 825-827, and n. 5. It did so under the authority of
“the prosecution of separate actions by or against individual members of the class would create a risk of... adjudications with respect to individual members of the class which would as a practical matter be dispositive of the interests of the other members not parties to the adjudications or substantially impair or impede their ability to protect their interests.”
The majority thinks this class could not be certified under
The case falls within the Rule‘s language as long as there was a significant “risk” that the total assets available to satisfy the claims of the class members would fall well below the likely total value of those claims, for in such circumstances the money would go to those claimants who brought their actions first, thereby ““substantially impair[ing]” the ““ability” of later claimants “to protect their interests.” And the District Court found there was indeed such a “risk.” 162 F. R. D., at 526.
Conceptually speaking, that “risk” was no different from the risk inherent in a classic pre-Rules “limited fund” case. Suppose a broker agrees to invest the funds of 10 individuals who each give the broker $100. The broker misuses the money, and the customers sue. (1) Suppose their claims total $1,000, but the broker‘s total assets amount to $100.
The first two cases are classic limited fund cases. See ante, at 834-836 (citing, e. g., Dickinson v. Burnham, 197 F. 2d 973 (CA2 1952), cert. denied, 344 U. S. 875 (1952), an investors’ suit for the return of misused funds); ante, at 837 (citing, e. g., Morrison v. Warren, 174 Misc. 233, 234, 20 N. Y. S. 2d 26, 27 (Sup. Ct. N. Y. Cty. 1940), a suit to distribute insurance proceeds to third party beneficiaries). The third case simply combines the first two, and that third case is the case before us.
Of course the value of the insurance policies in our case is not as precise as the $100 in my example, nor was it certain at the time of settlement. But that uncertainty makes no difference. It was certain that the insurance policies’ value was limited. And that limitation was created by the likelihood of an independent judicial determination of the meaning of words in the policy, in respect to which the merits or value of the underlying tort claims against Fibreboard were beside the point.
Nor does it matter that the value of the insurance policies in our case might have fluctuated over time. Long before the
Neither does it matter that the insurance policies might be worth much more money if the California court decided the coverage dispute in Fibreboard‘s favor. A trust worth, say, $1 million (faced with $2 million in claims) is a limited fund, despite the possibility that a company whose stock it
I need not pursue the conceptual matter further, however, for the majority apparently concedes the conceptual point that a fund‘s limit may equal its “value discounted by risk.” Ante, at 851. But the majority sets forth three additional conditions that it says are “sufficient... to justify binding absent members of a class under
Condition One: That “the totals of the aggregated liquidated claims and the fund available for satisfying them, set definitely at their maximums, demonstrate the inadequacy of the fund to pay all the claims.” Ibid.; Part IV-A, ante.
Condition Two: That “the claimants identified by a common theory of recovery were treated equitably among themselves.” Ante, at 839; Part IV-B, ante.
Condition Three: That “the whole of the inadequate fund was to be devoted to the overwhelming claims.” Ante, at 839; Part IV-C, ante.
I shall discuss each condition in turn.
A
In my view, the first condition is substantially satisfied. No one doubts that the “totals of the aggregated” claims well exceed the value of the assets in the “fund available for satisfying them,” at least if the fund totaled about what the District Court said it did, namely, $1.77 billion at most. The District Court said that the limited fund equaled in value “the sum of the value of Fibreboard plus the value of its insurance coverage,” or $235 million plus $1.535 billion. App. to Pet. for Cert. 492a. The Court of Appeals upheld
The District Court found that the insurance policies were not worth substantially more than $1.535 billion in part because there was a “significant risk” that the insurance policies would soon turn out to be worth nothing at all. 162 F. R. D., at 526. The court wrote that “Fibreboard might lose” its coverage, i. e., that it might lose “on one or more issues in the [California] Coverage Case, or that Fibreboard might lose its insurance coverage as a result of its assignment settlement program.” Ibid.
Two California insurance law experts, a Yale professor and a former state court of appeals judge, testified that there was a good chance that Fibreboard would lose all or a significant part of its insurance coverage once the California appellate courts decided the matter. 90 F. 3d, at 974. And that conclusion is not surprising. The Continental policy (for which Fibreboard had paid $10,000 per year) carried limits of $500,000 “per-person” and $1 million “per-occurrence,” had been in effect only between May 1957 and March 1959, and arguably denied Fibreboard the right to settle tort cases as it had been doing. See App. to Pet. for Cert. 267a. The Pacific policy was said (no one could find a copy) to carry a $500,000 per-claim limit, and had been in effect only for one year, from 1956 to 1957. See ibid. To win significantly in respect to either of the two policies, Fibreboard had to show that the policies fully covered a person exposed to asbestos long before the policy year (say, in 1948) even if the disease did not appear until much later (say, in 2002). It also had to explain away the $1 million per occurrence limit in the Continental policy, despite policy language defining “one occurrence” as “[a]ll... exposure to substantially the same general conditions existing at or emanating from each premises location.” Brief for Respondents Continental Casualty et al. 5. And Fibreboard had to show that its tort-suit settlement practice was consistent with the policy.
The District Court arrived at the present value of the policies ($1.535 billion) by looking to a different settlement, the settlement arrived at in the insurance coverage case itself as a result of bargaining between Fibreboard and the insurance companies. See id., at 492a. That settlement, embodied in the Trilateral Agreement, created a backup fund by taking from the insurance companies $1.535 billion (plus other money used to satisfy claims not here at issue) and simply setting it aside to use for the payment of claims brought against Fibreboard in the ordinary course by members of this class (in the event that the federal courts ultimately failed to approve the Global Settlement Agreement).
The Fifth Circuit approved this method of determining the value of the insurance policies. See 90 F. 3d, at 982 (discussing value of Trilateral Agreement plus value of Fibreboard). And the majority itself sees nothing wrong with that method in principle. The majority concedes that one
“may take a settlement amount as good evidence of the maximum available if one can assume that parties of equal knowledge and negotiating skill agreed upon the figure through arms-length bargaining, unhindered by any considerations tugging against the interests of the parties ostensibly represented in the negotiation.” Ante, at 852.
The majority rejects the District Court‘s valuation for a different reason. It says that the settlement negotiation
The District Court and Court of Appeals, however, did accept the relevant “arms-length” assumption, with good reason. The relevant bargaining (i. e., the bargaining that led to the Trilateral Agreement that set the policies’ value) was not between the plaintiffs’ class counsel and the insurance companies; it was between Fibreboard and the insurance companies. And there is no reason to believe that that bargaining, engaged in to settle the California coverage dispute, was not “arms length.” That bargaining did not lead to a settlement that would release Fibreboard from potential tort liability. Rather, it led to a potential backup settlement that did not release Fibreboard from anything. It created a fund of insurance money, which, once exhausted, would have left Fibreboard totally exposed to tort claims. Consequently, Fibreboard had every incentive to squeeze as much money as possible out of the insurance companies, thereby creating as large a fund as possible in order to diminish the likelihood that it would eventually have to rely upon its own net worth to satisfy future asbestos plaintiffs.
Nor are petitioners correct when they argue that the insurance companies’ participation in setting the value of the insurance policies created a fund that is limited “only in the sense that . . . every settlement is limited.” Brief for Petitioners 28. As the District Court found, the fund was limited by the value of the insurance policies (along with Fibreboard‘s own limited net worth), and that limitation arose out of the independent likelihood that the California courts
“mandatory class certification is appropriate in the typical case where a class action is settled with a defendant‘s own funds, or with insurance funds that are not the subject of genuine and vigorous dispute.” 162 F. R. D., at 527.
The court added that, in the ordinary case: “If the settlement failed[,] . . . the defendant would retain the settlement funds (or the insurance coverage), and there might not be the ‘impair[ment]’ to class members’ ‘ability to protect their interests’ required for mandatory class certification.” Ibid. In this case, however, if settlement failed, coverage “[might] well disappear . . . with the result that Class members could not then secure their due through litigation.” Ibid.
I recognize that one could reasonably argue about whether the total value of the insurance policies (plus the value of Fibreboard) is $1.535 billion, $1.77 billion, $2.2 billion, or some other roughly similar number. But that kind of argument, in this case, is like arguing about whether a trust fund, facing $30,000 in claims, is worth $15,000 or $20,000 (e. g., do we count Aunt Agatha‘s share as part of the fund?), or whether a ship, subject to claims that, by any count, exceed its value, is worth a little more or a little less (e. g., does the coal in the hold count as fuel, which is part of the ship‘s value, or as cargo, which is not?). A perfect valuation, requiring lengthy study by independent experts, is not feasible in the context of such an unusual limited fund, one that comes accompanied with its own witching hour. Within weeks after the parties’ settlement agreement, the insurance policies might well have disappeared, leaving most potential plaintiffs with little more than empty claims. The ship was about to sink, the trust fund to evaporate; time was important. Under these circumstances, I would accept the valuation
B
I similarly believe that the second condition is satisfied. The “claimants . . . were treated equitably among themselves.” Ante, at 839. The District Court found equitable treatment, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. But a majority of this Court now finds significant inequities arising out of class counsel‘s “egregious” conflict of interest, the settlement‘s substantive terms, and the District Court‘s failure to create subclasses. See ante, at 854-859. But nothing I can find in the Court‘s opinion, nor in the objectors’ briefs, convinces me that the District Court‘s findings on these matters were clearly erroneous, or that the Court of Appeals went seriously astray in affirming them.
The District Court made 76 separate findings of fact, for example, in respect to potential conflicts of interest. App. to Pet. for Cert. 392a-430a. Of course, class counsel consisted of individual attorneys who represented other asbestos claimants, including many other Fibreboard claimants outside the certified class. Since Fibreboard had been settling cases contingent upon resolution of the insurance dispute for several years, any attorney who had been involved in previous litigation against Fibreboard was likely to suffer from a similar “conflict.” So whom should the District Court have appointed to negotiate a settlement that had to be reached soon, if ever? Should it have appointed attorneys unfamiliar with Fibreboard and the history of its asbestos litigation? Where was the District Court to find those competent, knowledgeable, conflict-free attorneys? The District Court said they did not exist. Finding of Fact ¶ 372 says there is “no credible evidence of the existence of other ‘conflict-free’ counsel who were qualified to negotiate” a settlement within the necessary time. Id., at 428a. Finding of Fact ¶ 317 adds that the District Court viewed it as
The majority emphasizes the fact that, by settling the claims of a class that consisted, for the most part, of persons who had not yet asserted claims against Fibreboard, counsel assured the availability of funds to pay other clients who had already asserted those claims. Ante, at 852-853. The decision to split the latter “inventory” claims from the former “class” claims, however, reflected the suggestion, not of class counsel, but of a judge, Circuit Judge Patrick Higginbotham, who had become involved in efforts to produce a timely settlement. Judge Higginbotham thought that negotiations had broken down because the combined class was “too complex.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 316a-317a; see also id., at 397a. He thought “inventory” claim settlements could be used as benchmarks to determine future class claim values, id., at 316a-317a, and that is just what happened. Although the majority is concerned that “inventory” plaintiffs “appeared to have obtained better terms than the class members,” ante, at 855, Finding of Fact ¶ 329 says that class counsel
“used the higher-than-average [inventory plaintiff settlement values] . . . to achieve a global settlement for future claimants at similarly high values, effectively arguing they could not possibly accept less for a class of future claimants than they had just negotiated for their present clients.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 407a.
In addition, more than 150 findings of fact, made after an 8-day hearing, support the District Court‘s finding that overall the settlement is “fair, adequate, and reasonable.” See id., at 500a-501a. And, of course, Finding of Fact ¶ 318 says that appointing other attorneys—i. e., those who had no in-
The Fifth Circuit found that “[t]he record amply supports” these District Court findings. 90 F. 3d, at 978. Does the majority mean to set them aside? If not, does it mean to set forth a rigid principle of law, such as the principle that asbestos lawyers with clients outside a class, who will potentially benefit from a class settlement, can never represent a class in settlement negotiations? And does that principle apply no matter how unusual the circumstances, or no matter how necessary that representation might be? Why should there be such a rule of law? If there is not an absolute rule, however, I do not see how this Court can hold that the case before us is not that unusual situation.
Consider next the claim that “equity” required more subclasses. Ante, at 855-857. To determine the “right” number of subclasses, a district court must weigh the advantages and disadvantages of bringing more lawyers into the case. The majority concedes as much when it says “at some point there must be an end to reclassification with separate counsel.” Ante, at 857. The District Court said that if there had “been as many separate attorneys” as the objectors wanted, “there is a significant possibility that a global settlement would not have been reached before the Coverage Case was resolved by the California Court of Appeal.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 428a. Finding of Fact ¶ 346 lists the shared common interests among subclasses that argue for single representation, including “avoiding the potentially disastrous results of a loss . . . in the Coverage Case,” “maximizing the total settlement contribution,” “reducing transaction costs and delays,” “minimizing . . . attorney‘s fees,” and “adopting” equitable claims payment “procedures.” Id., at 415a. Surely the District Court was within its discretion to conclude that “the point” to which the majority alludes was reached in this case.
C
The majority‘s third condition raises a more difficult question. It says that the ”whole of the inadequate fund” must be “devoted to the overwhelming claims.” Ante, at 839 (emphasis added). Fibreboard‘s own assets, in theory, were available to pay tort claims, yet they were not included in the global settlement fund. Is that fact fatal?
I find the answer to this question in the majority‘s own explanation. It says that the third condition helps to guarantee that those who held the
“inadequate assets had no opportunity to benefit [themselves] or claimants of lower priority by holding back on the amount distributed to the class. The limited fund cases thus ensured that the class as a whole was given the best deal; they did not give a defendant a better deal than seriatim litigation would have produced.” Ibid.
“The reform of
Rule 23 was intended to shake the law of class actions free of abstract categories . . . and to rebuild the law on functional lines responsive to those recurrent life patterns which call for mass litigation through representative parties. . . . And whereas the old Rule had paid virtually no attention to the practical administration of class actions, the revised Rule dwelt long on this matter—not, to be sure, by prescribing detailed procedures, but by confirming the courts’ broad powers and inviting judicial initiative.” A Prefatory Note, 10 B. C. Ind. & Com. L. Rev. 497 (1969).
The majority itself recognizes the possibility of providing incentives to enter into settlements that reduce costs by granting a “credit” for cost savings by relaxing the whole-of-the-assets requirement, at least where most of the savings would go to the claimants. Ante, at 861.
There is no doubt in this case that the settlement made far more money available to satisfy asbestos claims than was likely to occur in its absence. And the District Court found that administering the fund would involve transaction costs of only 15%. App. to Pet. for Cert. 362a. A comparison of that 15% figure with the 61% transaction costs figure applicable to asbestos cases in general suggests hundreds of mil-
Because I believe that all three of the majority‘s conditions are satisfied, and because I see no fatal conceptual difficulty, I would uphold the determination, made by the District Court and affirmed by the Court of Appeals, that the insurance policies (along with Fibreboard‘s net value) amount to a classic limited fund within the scope of
III
Petitioners raise additional issues, which the majority does not reach. I believe that respondents would likely prevail were the Court to reach those issues. That is why I dissent. But, as the Court does not reach those issues, I need not decide the questions definitively.
In some instances, my belief that respondents would likely prevail reflects my reluctance to second-guess a court of appeals that has affirmed a district court‘s fact- and circumstance-specific findings. See supra, at 868; cf. Amchem Products, Inc. v. Windsor, 521 U. S. 591, 629-630 (1997) (BREYER, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). That reluctance applies to those of petitioners’ further claims that, in effect, attack the District Court‘s conclusions related to: (1) the finding under
In other instances, my belief reflects my conclusion that class certification here rests upon the presence of what is close to a traditional limited fund. And I doubt that petitioners’ additional arguments that certification violates, for example, the Rules Enabling Act, the Bankruptcy Act, the Seventh Amendment, and the Due Process Clause are aimed at, or would prevail against, a traditional limited fund (e. g., “trust assets, a bank account, insurance proceeds, company assets in a liquidation sale, proceeds of a ship sale in a maritime accident suit,” ante, at 834 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted)). Cf. In re Asbestos Litigation, 90 F. 3d, at 986 (noting that Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Shutts, 472 U.S. 797 (1985), involved a class certified under the equivalent of
Notes
“[This] is a tale of danger known in the 1930s, exposure inflicted upon millions of Americans in the 1940s and 1950s, injuries that began to take their toll in the 1960s, and a flood of lawsuits beginning in the 1970s. On the basis of past and current filing data, and because of a latency period that may last as long as 40 years for some asbestos related diseases, a continuing stream of claims can be expected. The final toll of asbestos related injuries is unknown. Predictions have been made of 200,000 asbestos disease deaths before the year 2000 and as many as 265,000 by the year 2015.
“The most objectionable aspects of asbestos litigation can be briefly summarized: dockets in both federal and state courts continue to grow; long delays are routine; trials are too long; the same issues are litigated over and over; transaction costs exceed the victims’ recovery by nearly two to one; exhaustion of assets threatens and distorts the process; and future claimants may lose altogether.” Amchem Products, Inc. v. Windsor, 521 U. S., at 598 (quoting Report of The Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Committee on Asbestos Litigation 2-3 (Mar. 1991) (hereinafter Report)). We noted in Amchem that the Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Committee on Asbestos Litigation in 1991 had called for “federal legislation creating a national asbestos dispute-resolution scheme.” 521 U. S., at 528 (citing Report 3, 27-35). To date Congress has not responded.
The final judgment regarding class certification in the District Court defined the class as follows:
“(a) All persons (or their legal representatives) who prior to August 27, 1993 were exposed, directly or indirectly (including but not limited to exposure through the exposure of a spouse, household member or any other person), to asbestos or to asbestos-containing products for which Fibreboard may bear legal liability and who have not, before August 27, 1993, (i) filed a lawsuit for any asbestos related personal injury, or damage, or death arising from such exposure in any court against Fibreboard or persons or entities for whose actions or omissions Fibreboard bears legal liability; or (ii) settled a claim for any asbestos-related personal injury, or damage, or death arising from such exposure with Fibreboard or with persons or entities for whose actions or omissions Fibreboard bears legal liability;
“(b) All persons (or their legal representatives) exposed to asbestos or to asbestos-containing products, directly or indirectly (including but not limited to exposure through the exposure of a spouse, household member or any other person), who dismissed an action prior to August 27, 1993 without prejudice against Fibreboard, and who retain the right to sue Fibreboard upon development of a nonmalignant disease process or a malignancy; provided, however, that the Settlement Class does not include persons who filed and, for cash payment or some other negotiated value, dismissed claims against Fibreboard, and whose only retained right is to sue Fibreboard upon development of an asbestos-related malignancy; and
“(c) All past, present and future spouses, parents, children and other relatives (or their legal representatives) of the class members described in paragraphs (a) and (b) above, except for any such person who has, before August 27, 1993, (i) filed a lawsuit for the asbestos-related personal injury, or damage, or death of a class member described in paragraph (a) or (b) above in any court against Fibreboard (or against entities for whose actions or omissions Fibreboard bears legal liability), or (ii) settled a claim for the asbestos-related personal injury, or damage, or death of a class member described in (a) or (b) above with Fibreboard (or with entities for whose actions or omissions Fibreboard bears legal liability).” App. to Pet. for Cert. 534a-535a.