Browder v. Gayle
| Citation | 142 F. Supp. 707 |
| Decision Date | 05 June 1956 |
| Docket Number | No. 1147.,1147. |
| Parties | Aurelia S. BROWDER, and Susie McDonald, and Claudette Colvin, by Q. P. Colvin, next friend, and Mary Louise Smith, by Frank Smith, next friend, and others similarly situated, Plaintiffs, v. W. A. GAYLE, Clyde Sellers and Frank Parks, individually and as members of the Board of Commissioners of the City of Montgomery, Alabama, and Goodwyn J. Ruppenthal, individually and as Chief of Police of the City of Montgomery, Alabama, and The Montgomery City Lines, Inc., a Corporation, and James F. Blake, and Robert Cleere, and C. C. (Jack) Owen, Jimmy Hitchcock, and Sibyl Pool, as members of the Alabama Public Service Commission, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Middle District of Alabama |
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Charles D. Langford, Fred D. Gray, Montgomery, Ala., and Robert L. Carter, New York City, for plaintiffs.
Walter J. Knabe, Drayton N. Hamilton, and Herman H. Hamilton, Jr., Montgomery, Ala., for defendants Gayle, Sellers, Parks, and Ruppenthal.
Robert Thrun, New York City, for defendants Blake, Cleere, and Montgomery City Lines.
John Patterson, William N. McQueen, Gordon Madison, William F. Black, Montgomery, Ala., for defendants Owen, Hitchcock and Pool.
Before RIVES, Circuit Judge, and LYNNE and JOHNSON, District Judges.
The purpose of this action is to test the constitutionality of both the statutes of the State of Alabama1 and the ordinances of the City of Montgomery2 which require the segregation of the white and colored races on the motor buses of the Montgomery City Lines, Inc., a common carrier of passengers in said City and its police jurisdiction.
The plaintiffs are four Negro citizens who bring this action for themselves and on behalf of all other Negroes similarly situated.3 The defendants are the members of the Board of Commissioners and the Chief of Police of the City of Montgomery, the members of the Alabama Public Service Commission, The Montgomery City Lines, Inc., and two of its employee drivers.
Each of the four named plaintiffs has either been required by a bus driver or by the police to comply with said segregation laws or has been arrested and fined for her refusal so to do. The plaintiffs, along with most other Negro citizens of the City of Montgomery, have since December 5, 1955, and up to the present time, refrained from making use of the transportation facilities provided by Montgomery City Lines, Inc. Plaintiffs and other Negroes desire and intend to resume the use of said buses if and when they can do so on a non-segregated basis without fear of arrest.
The members of the Board of Commissioners and the Chief of Police of the City of Montgomery in their answers to the complaint admit "that they seek to enforce the statutes of the State of Alabama and the ordinances of the City of Montgomery, Alabama", and further aver that "segregation of privately owned buses within cities within the State of Alabama is in accordance with the laws of the State of Alabama and the City of Montgomery."
The members of the Alabama Public Service Commission deny that they, in their official capacities as such members have any jurisdiction over, or have issued any orders relating to the separation of the races on buses operated wholly within the City of Montgomery and its police jurisdiction. On information and belief they allege that the members of the Board of Commissioners and the Chief of Police of said City "have sought to enforce by legal means constitutional and valid statutes and ordinances providing for separate but equal seating arrangements on buses operated in the City of Montgomery, Alabama, and its police jurisdiction".
The Montgomery City Lines, Inc., admits that it has operated, and pursuant to orders of a State Court, continues to operate "its buses as required by the Statutes and Ordinances set out in the Complaint requiring it to provide equal but separate accommodations for the white and colored races". Without dispute the evidence is to the effect that, other than being separate, such accommodations are equal.
The defendants, Blake and Cleere, admit they are employees of the Montgomery City Lines and drivers of its buses, that as such they have acted pursuant to orders of said Company which "has operated its buses on the basis of racial segregation as required by said statutes and ordinances". They deny that as drivers of said buses they are exercising the powers of police officers in the enforcement of said statutes and ordinances.
The complaint prays for the convening of a three-judge district court as provided by Title 28 of the United States Code, § 2284; for a declaratory judgment as to whether the enforcement of said statutes and ordinances abridges the privileges and immunities of plaintiffs as citizens of the United States, or deprives them of liberty without due process of law, or denies to them the equal protection of the laws, as secured by the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States,4 and the rights and privileges secured to them by Title 42, United States Code, §§ 1981 and 1983.5 The complaint further prays that the defendants be both temporarily and permanently enjoined from enforcing the statutes and ordinances claimed to be unconstitutional and in conflict with said Federal statutes.
Federal jurisdiction is invoked under Title 28, United States Code, §§ 1331 and 1343(3),6 and under Title 42, United States Code, §§ 1981 and 1983, footnote 5, supra. We think that the validity of both the State statutes and the City ordinances is in question, but if only the City ordinances are involved, Federal jurisdiction would still exist because the Constitution and statutes of Alabama authorize the adoption of City ordinances "not inconsistent with the laws of the state,"7 and because the constitutional phrase "equal protection of the laws" refers to City ordinances adopted under State authority as well as to State statutes.8
A three judge district court is required for the granting of "An interlocutory or permanent injunction restraining the enforcement, operation or execution of any State statute by restraining the action of any officer of such State". 28 U.S.C.A. § 2281. According to the complaint and the answers, the separation of the races on the buses is required both by State statutes and by City ordinances. Admittedly, therefore, State statutes are involved. The defendants claim, however, that the statutes and ordinances are being enforced by municipal officers only, and not by "any officer of such State". 28 U.S. C.A. § 2281, supra.
If the members of the Alabama Public Service Commission are proper parties defendant, a matter to be hereinafter discussed, then it must be conceded that the objection to the jurisdiction of the three judge district court fails. Irrespective of the answer to that question, however, we think that the three judge district court has jurisdiction.
The State statutes, footnote 1, supra, vest in the defendant bus drivers the authority to enforce, and, notwithstanding their insistence to the contrary, we think that when so engaged the bus drivers clearly are officers of the State.
The City Commissioners have important duties to perform in connection with the enforcement, operation, and execution of State statutes. Under Alabama law, a municipal corporation "is essentially a public agency, a local unit of government, invested with a portion of the sovereign power of the state, for the benefit of its inhabitants." Cooper v. Town of Valley Head, 212 Ala. 125, 101 So. 874, 875. The defendant Chief of Police has authority to make arrests for violations of State statutes, 1940 Code of Alabama, Title 15, § 152. The City Recorder in criminal cases has the power of an ex-officio justice of the peace. 1940 Code of Alabama, Title 37, § 585. All of the City officials admit in their answers that they are enforcing the State statutes. An official, though localized by his geographic activities and the mode of his selection, is performing a State function when he enforces a statute which "embodies a policy of state-wide concern".9
Very clearly, the three judge district court has jurisdiction.10
The defendants, relying on Alabama Public Service Commission v. Southern Railway Co., 341 U.S. 341, 71 S.Ct. 762, 95 L.Ed. 1002, insist that even if the Federal court has jurisdiction, it should, in its discretion as a court of equity, and for reasons of comity, decline to exercise such jurisdiction until the State courts have ruled on the construction and validity of the statutes and ordinances. The short answer is that doctrine has no application where the plaintiffs complain that they are being deprived of constitutional civil rights, for the protection of which the Federal courts have a responsibility as heavy as that which rests on the State courts.11
Without repeating the averments of the complaint we hold that they are clearly sufficient to constitute this a class action on behalf of the four individual plaintiffs and of all other Negro citizens similarly situated. See Rule 23(a), F.R. C.P.
It was probably not necessary for the plaintiffs to sue the members of the Board of Commissioners and the Chief of Police, not only as such but also individually, when no relief is sought against them by way of damages. If, however, the plaintiffs' contentions are sustained, these defendants are acting not only in their capacities as municipal officers, but also as officers of the State; and, further, are possibly transcending the scope of their office in any capacity when they compel obedience to statutes and ordinances attacked as unconstitutional. Moreover, in issuing and enforcing an injunction, a court of equity acts in personam. If, as we trust will be true, no relief becomes necessary against any of them in their individual capacities, their joinder as...
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