Los Angeles Unified School Dist. v. Los Angeles Branch NAACP, 81-5772
| Decision Date | 16 November 1983 |
| Docket Number | No. 81-5772,81-5772 |
| Citation | 714 F.2d 935 |
| Parties | 13 Ed. Law Rep. 34 LOS ANGELES UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT, et al., Defendants-Appellants, v. LOS ANGELES BRANCH NAACP, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit |
G. William Shea, Peter W. James, McCutchen, Black, Verleger & Shea, Los Angeles, Cal., for plaintiffs-appellees.
Thomas I. Atkins, Gen. Counsel, Brooklyn Heights, N.Y., for defendants-appellants.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California.
Before CHAMBERS, SNEED and SKOPIL, Circuit Judges.
In 1963, the California Supreme Court held in a unanimous decision that school boards are under an obligation to remedy racial segregation in the public schools, regardless of the cause of such segregation. Jackson v. Pasadena City School District, 59 Cal.2d 876, 881, 382 P.2d 878, 881-82, 31 Cal.Rptr. 606, 609-10 (1963).
Soon thereafter, Crawford was filed as a class action on behalf of black school children in the Los Angeles Unified School District, 3 seeking desegregation of the District's schools. After the failure of the District to formulate a satisfactory voluntary plan for desegregation, Crawford came to trial in 1968 in the Superior Court of Los Angeles County before Judge Alfred Gitelson. The parties agreed to limit the scope of the court's inquiry into the District's activities to the period from May 1, 1963 to the beginning of trial. After considering an enormous body of evidence and holding a lengthy trial, Judge Gitelson rendered judgment for the plaintiff class on May 12, 1970. Judge Gitelson found that a number of the schools in the District were segregated, and concluded that the Board of Education had segregated its students de jure as the result of policies, practices, and omissions on the part of the Board. 4
The Board of Education appealed to the California Supreme Court, which affirmed the judgment of the Superior Court, but only on the basis of the Board's failure to remedy racial segregation in the public schools, as was required under the California State Constitution by Jackson. Crawford v. Board of Education, 17 Cal.3d 280, 285, 551 P.2d 28, 30, 130 Cal.Rptr. 724, 726 (1976) (Crawford I ). It did not rest its decision on the Superior Court's finding of de jure segregation, although it stated that such finding was supported by the record. Id.
On remand to the Superior Court, Judge Paul Egly held extensive hearings on the appropriate remedy, and ordered mandatory busing to begin in September 1978. 5 However, on November 6, 1979, the California voters enacted Proposition 1, which restricted the power of the state courts to order busing and pupil assignment as remedies for school segregation to that exercised by the federal courts under the Fourteenth Amendment. The effect of Proposition 1, therefore, was to overrule the part of Jackson and the cases following it which permitted court-ordered busing and pupil assignment as remedies for school segregation even in the absence of de jure segregation.
The Crawford defendants then petitioned to the Superior Court to end mandatory school busing in Los Angeles. The court denied the request, holding that Proposition 1 did not apply to Los Angeles, since Judge Gitelson's 1970 decision had found de jure segregation, a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment for which busing is an appropriate remedy.
In December 1980, the California Court of Appeal reversed, and vacated the order refusing to terminate the mandatory busing plan. Crawford v. Board of Education, 113 Cal.App.3d 633, 170 Cal.Rptr. 495 (1980) (Crawford II ). The court, in the light of subsequent United States Supreme Court opinions and its construction of Judge Gitelson's 1970 decision, held that the Crawford plaintiffs had not established the existence of de jure segregation in the District, as is On July 2, 1981, the Board submitted a desegregation plan to the Superior Court, Judge Robert Lopez now presiding. 7 Judge Lopez accepted the plan, with modifications, on September 10, 1981. 8 The court held that the desegregation plan remedied present conditions in the District, and that the plan protected the rights of all students and met constitutional standards. Order Re Final Approval of School Board Desegregation Plan and Discharge of Writ of Mandate at 7 (Superior Court of Los Angeles County No. C822854) (September 10, 1981 Order). 9 The court stated that the "underlying issues [in Crawford] have been resolved," id. at 8, and, on November 25, 1981, awarded costs and attorneys' fees, and terminated jurisdiction. 10
needed under the Fourteenth Amendment for busing to be used as a court-ordered remedy. Id. at 638-46, 170 Cal.Rptr. at 499-504. 6 Noting that the District was still obligated under California law, as explicated in Jackson and Crawford I, even after Proposition 1 to remedy racial segregation in the public schools--as long as mandatory busing or pupil assignment is not included in any desegregation plan--the court issued a remittitur to the Superior Court to formulate a desegregation plan consistent with the requirements of Proposition 1. Id. at 636-37 n. 1, 651, 170 Cal.Rptr. at 497-98 n. 1, 507; see also Crawford v. Board of Education, 458 U.S. 527, 535, 102 S.Ct. 3211, 3217 & n. 12, 73 L.Ed.2d 948 (1982)
Meanwhile, on April 15, 1981, the NAACP filed the present case in the District Court for the Central District of California as a class action on behalf of black children eligible to attend the Los Angeles schools. The plaintiffs alleged unconstitutional segregation in the Los Angeles Unified School District from its establishment until the present, and sought a temporary restraining order to enjoin the termination of mandatory busing in the District. The district court granted the temporary restraining order on April 17, 1981, 513 F.Supp. 717, but we vacated the order the following day. 650 F.2d 1004 (9th Cir.1981). On remand, the district court refused to grant the NAACP's motion for a preliminary injunction.
The District then moved for summary judgment on the ground that the doctrines of res judicata and collateral estoppel preclude this suit. 11 The district court denied
the motion on July 16, 1981, but certified an interlocutory appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b).
The District asserts that the NAACP is precluded under the doctrines of res judicata and collateral estoppel from litigating its contention that the Los Angeles schools were segregated de jure, since that claim was adjudicated in Crawford. The district court under the circumstance it confronted refused to apply res judicata or collateral estoppel. We reverse.
As the Supreme Court explained in Allen v. McCurry, 449 U.S. 90, 94, 101 S.Ct. 411, 414-15, 66 L.Ed.2d 308 (1980):
The federal courts have traditionally adhered to the related doctrines of res judicata and collateral estoppel. Under res judicata, a final judgment on the merits of an action precludes the parties or their privies from relitigating issues that were or could have been raised in that action. Cromwell v. County of Sac, 94 U.S. 351, 352 . Under collateral estoppel, once a court has decided an issue of fact or law necessary to its judgment, that decision may preclude relitigation of the issue in a suit on a different cause of action involving a party to the first case. Montana v. United States, 440 U.S. 147, 153 [99 S.Ct. 970, 973, 59 L.Ed.2d 210] .... As this Court and other courts have often recognized, res judicata and collateral estoppel relieve parties of the cost and vexation of multiple lawsuits, conserve judicial resources, and, by preventing inconsistent decisions, encourage reliance on adjudication.
In applying the requirements for res judicata and collateral estoppel, we are obligated by 28 U.S.C. § 1738 "to give the same preclusive effect to state court judgments that those judgments would be given in the courts of the State from which the judgments emerged." Kremer v. Chemical Construction Corp., 456 U.S. 461, 466, 102 S.Ct. 1883, 1889, 72 L.Ed.2d 262 (1982). We therefore must turn to the rules for preclusion followed by the courts of California. See Miofsky v. Superior Court, 703 F.2d 332, 336 (9th Cir.1983).
Under California law, the application of res judicata is dependent on the conclusion that: (1) there was a final judgment on the merits in the earlier proceeding; (2) the claims were part of a cause of action that was litigated and decided, or that might have been litigated, in the earlier proceeding; and (3) the parties against whom the principle is invoked were parties or in privity with a party to the prior adjudication. See Dillard v. McKnight, 34 Cal.2d 209, 214, 209 P.2d 387, 391 (1949); Mattson v. Costa Mesa, 106 Cal.App.3d 441, 446, 164 Cal.Rptr. 913, 916 (1980); see also Sea-Land Services Inc. v. Gaudet, 414 U.S. 573, 579, 94 S.Ct. 806, 812, 39 L.Ed.2d 9 (1974). We examine each of these requirements below.
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