Colorado River Abstention Flashcards
McCarran Amendment
66 Stat. 560, 43 U.S.C. § 666
-provides that “consent is hereby given to join the United States as a defendant in any suit:
(1) for the adjudication of rights to the use of water of a river system or other source, or
(2) for the administration of such rights,
where it appears that the United States is the owner of or is in the process of acquiring water rights by appropriation under State law, by purchase, by exchange, or otherwise,
and the United States is a necessary party to such suit.”
Colorado River v. US - Question
- questions presented by this case concern the effect of the McCarran Amendment upon the jurisdiction of the federal district courts under 28 U.S.C. § 1345 over suits for determination of water rights brought by the United States as trustee for certain Indian tribes and as owner of various non-Indian Government claims.
Specifically, determining:
1) whether M Am terminated jurisdiction of fed cts to adjudicate fed water rights
2) whether, if juris not terminated, dist ct’s dismissal was nevertheless appropriate
Colorado River v. US - Background
- 1976
- CO law passed in 1969 to address water claims - Water Rights Determination and Administration Act
- Under the law, state divided into 7 water divisions -> each division encompasses one or more entire drainage basins for the larger rivers in CO
- adjudication of water claims w/in each division occurs on a continuous basis
- reserved rights to water of US extend to Indian reservations and other fed lands (ex: nat parks + forests) -> in this case, reserved rights by US affect waters in division #7
Colorado River - History of Suit
- 1972 - fed gov instituted suit (against around 1,000 water users) in US dist ct, invoking court’s juris under §1345
- sought declaration of gov’s rights to waters in certain rivers and their tributaries in district 7
-> gov reserved rights on own behalf + on behalf of certain Indian tribes, as well as rights based on state law - shortly after FED suit commenced, one of suit defendants filed an app in STATE ct for div 7, seeking order directing service of process on US in order to make it a party to proceedings in division 7 for the purpose of adjudicating all the gov’s claims, both state and federal -> Jan 1973, US served pursuant to McCarren Am
- several defendants filed motions in dist ct to dismiss on grounds that the McCarren Amendment meant ct lacked juris to determine fed water rights
Colorado River v. US - Procedural Posture
- dist ct didn’t decide jurisdictional q, but June 1973 granted motion to dismiss on grouns that doctrine of abstention required deference to the proceedings in District 7
- 10th Cir reversed - held suit w/in dist ct’s juris + abstention inappropriate
Coorado River - McCarran Holding
- McCarran Am didn’t divest dist ct of juris over litigation under 1345
- effect of AM = give consent to state juris concurrent w/ fed juris over controversies involving fed water rights
- BUT language + leg history make clear fed juris doesn’t go away
- also noted that there’s no irreconcilability in the op of the two statutes b/c Am just gives concurrent juris - no irreconcilability in existence of concurrent state + fed juris
28 USC 1345
- provides that district cts shall have original jurisdiction over all civil actions brought by the federal government “Except as otherwise provided by an act of Congress”
Colorado River - Indian Water Rights
- held McCarran Am did provide consent to determine fed reserved rights held on behalf of Indians in state court - state ct DID have juris of Indian water rights
Colorado River - Abstention Holding
- the abstention doctrine is confined to three categories of cases (Pullman, Burford, Younger), none of which applies to the litigation at bar; hence the District Court’s dismissal on the basis of abstention was inappropriate
Colorado River - General Discussion of Abstention
- contains a LOT of text emphasizing abstention “is the exception, not the rule”
- “The doctrine of abstention, under which a District Court may decline to exercise or postpone the exercise of its jurisdiction, is an extraordinary and narrow exception to the duty of a District Court to adjudicate a controversy properly before it”
- “Abdication of the obligation to decide cases can be justified under this doctrine only in the exceptional circumstances where the order to the parties to repair to the state court would clearly serve an important countervailing interest”
-“virtually unflagging obligation of the federal courts to exercise the jurisdiction given to them”
Colorado River - Categories of Abstention
“confined…to three general categories”:
1) “in cases presenting a federal constitutional issue which might be mooted or presented in a different posture by a state court determination of pertinent state law” (‘Pullman’ abstention)
2) “Where there have been presented difficult questions of state law bearing on policy problems of substantial public import whose importance transcends the result in the case then at bar” (‘Burford’ abstention)
- state q doesn’t need to be determinative of state pol to invoke this, sufficient that fed review would be disruptive of state efforts to establish coherent pol
- doesn’t apply in this case b/c state law settled
3) “Absent bad faith, harassment, or a patently invalid state statute, fed jurisdiction has been invoked for the purpose of restraining state crim proceedings; state nuisance proceedings antecedent to a criminal prosecution, which are directed at obtaining the closure of places exhibiting obscene films; or collection of state taxes” (‘Younger’ abstention)
Colorado River - Ruling on Appropriateness of Dismissal
(quotes from SCOTUS syllabus)
“Several factors, however, are present in this litigation that counsel against exercise of concurrent federal jurisdiction, clearly supporting dismissal of the Government’s action and resolution of its water right claims in the state court proceedings.”
1) Most significantly, such dismissal furthers the policy of the McCarran Amendment recognizing the desirability of unified adjudication of water rights and the availability of state systems like the one in Colorado for such adjudication and management of rights to use the State’s waters. The Colorado legislation established a continuous proceeding for adjudicating water rights that antedated the Government’s suit and reached “all claims, perhaps month by month, but inclusively in the totality,”
->later refers to this as showing “clear federal policy” to avoid piecemeal adjudication of water rights + says it’s akin to the rule re suits involving property (don’t want inconsistent dispositions)
2) Other significant factors include (1) the apparent absence before dismissal of any District Court proceedings other than the filing of the complaint; (2) the extensive involvement of state water rights occasioned by this suit against 1,000 defendants; (3) the distance between the federal court and Division 7; and (4) the Government’s existing participation in proceedings in three other Divisions.
Colorado River - Lingo Re Support for Dismissal
- refers to “principles unrelated to considerations of proper constitutional adjudication and regard for federal-state relations which govern in situations involving the contemporaneous exercise of concurrent jurisdictions” -> “rest of considerations of ‘wise judicial administration, [wrt] conservation of judicial resources and comprehensive disposition of litigation’”
- “Given [the virtually unflagging obligation], and the absence of weightier considerations of constitutional adjudication and state-federal relations, the circumstances permitting the dismissal of a federal suit due to the presence of a concurrent state proceeding for reasons of wise judicial administration are considerably more limited than the circumstances appropriate for abstention. The former circumstances, though exceptional, do nevertheless exist.”
- refers to fact that first ct to attach property to suit can exercise jur to exclusion of others
Colorado River - General Relevant Factors for Dismissal Under Broader Principles
- inconvenience of the federal forum
- desirability of avoiding piecemeal litigation
- order in which jurisdiction was obtained by the concurrent forums
“No one factor is necessarily determinative; a carefully considered judgment taking into account both the obligation to exercise jurisdiction and the combination of factors counselling against that exercise is required. Only the clearest of justifications will warrant dismissal.”
Colorado River - Stewart
- dissent
- dist ct could make determinations it needed to make (whether as a matter of fed law fed reservations of water rights had occurred, and, if so, date and scope of the reservations) without having control of the river
- principal reason appears to be avoid piecemeal lit, but this dismissal won’t accomplish that
- other reasons listed by majority = insubstantial
Obedience to “virtually unflagging obligation” appropriate here for 2 reasons:
1) issues involved are those of fed law -> fed ct more likely to be familiar w/
2) some of fed claims related to water reserved for Native Americans -> fed ct more appropriate for this, states have worse history w/ Native Americans
