Bloom v. AH Pond Co., Inc.
| Citation | 519 F. Supp. 1162 |
| Decision Date | 27 July 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. 79-3985-Civ-JWK.,79-3985-Civ-JWK. |
| Parties | William L. BLOOM, Plaintiff, v. A. H. POND CO., INC., etc., et al., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of Florida |
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Mallory R. Horne, Horne, Rhodes, Jaffry, Horne & Carrouth, Tallahassee, for plaintiff.
Hugo L. Black, Kelly, Black, Black, Wright, & Earle, P.A., Miami, Fla., for defendants.
MEMORANDUM ORDER ON JURISDICTION
Plaintiff, William L. Bloom, filed this action pursuant to the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), 29 U.S.C.A. § 621 et seq., and the Florida Human Rights Act of 1977, Fla.Stat.Ann. § 23.161 et seq.,1 alleging discrimination against him on the basis of his age. Plaintiff brought suit against his former employer, the A. H. Pond Co. (the corporate defendant), and three officers of that corporation, Roland B. Pond, Richard P. Davis and Albert W. Doolittle (the individual defendants), for terminating his employment as an outside salesman of diamond rings with the defendant corporation. Plaintiff contends that the sole reason for his termination from employment was his age, which was 61 at the time of his discharge. All of the defendants are citizens and residents of New York state, and the corporate defendant has its principal place of business in Syracuse, New York. Plaintiff is a resident and citizen of the state of Florida.
The defendants have moved to dismiss the Complaint and quash service of process upon them on the grounds of lack of jurisdiction over their persons and insufficiency of service of process. For the reasons that are fully elucidated in this opinion, the Court concludes that it has jurisdiction over the corporate defendant where adequate service was obtained in compliance with the applicable law, but that the Court has no jurisdiction over the persons of the individual defendants.
This action was originally brought in the state court and properly removed to this Court pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1441(a) since it was an action in which this Court had original jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331 (federal question) and 1332 (diversity of citizenship). Plaintiff has correctly predicated service of process over the defendants upon the applicable provisions of Florida law. Fed.R.Civ.P. 4(d)(7), 4(e).
Defendants have objected to subjecting them to the jurisdiction of this Court since they contend that plaintiff has failed to establish that they were doing business in Florida or that this cause of action arose out of any of their activities in this state. While plaintiff's choice of forum in which to litigate should be given serious consideration, constitutional and statutory requirements must first be met before a nonresident defendant may be obliged to defend in a remote forum. A plaintiff has never been given an unfettered right to litigate in the forum of his choice where that action would adversely compel a nonresident defendant with little or no contact with the forum state to defend himself at a serious disadvantage. The law imposes several safeguards to protect the nonresident under these circumstances.
Personal jurisdiction in a federal diversity action is governed by the state law standard of the state in which the federal court sits.2 Gordon v. John Deere Company, 466 F.2d 1200 (5th Cir. 1972); Woodham v. Northwestern Steel and Wire Company, 390 F.2d 27 (5th Cir. 1968); Time, Inc. v. Manning, 366 F.2d 690 (5th Cir. 1966); Stanga v. McCormack Shipping Corporation, 268 F.2d 544 (5th Cir. 1959). While constitutional considerations govern the reach of a long-arm statute, a state is not obliged to extend its jurisdiction to the full extent permitted by the Constitution, if it chooses not to do so. Perkins v. Benguet Consolidated Mining Company, 342 U.S. 437, 72 S.Ct. 413, 96 L.Ed. 485 (1952). Once a state has, however, provided for jurisdiction over nonresidents, the jurisdiction so imposed can extend no further than the statutory base provided for by the forum state. Barrett v. Browning Arms Company, 433 F.2d 141 (5th Cir. 1970). Thus, regardless of the constitutional parameters that may circumscribe a state's long-arm jurisdiction, a nonresident defendant may not be brought before a federal court in this instance unless jurisdiction is properly authorized by an appropriate long-arm statute of this state.
The test to be applied is twofold; it involves both statutory and constitutional considerations. Its application has been described as follows:
In deciding whether a state jurisdictional statute confers jurisdiction over a nonresident defendant in a federal diversity suit, two avenues of inquiry must be followed. First, it must be determined that the defendant is in fact amenable to service under the state statute; state law of the forum controls this question. citations omitted If the state statute has been complied with, then federal law must be applied to determine whether the assertion of jurisdiction over the defendant comports with due process. citations omitted
Jetco Electronics Industries v. Gardiner, 473 F.2d 1228, 1232 (5th Cir. 1973). See generally 4 Wright & Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure: Civil § 1075 (1969); 2 Moore's Federal Practice ¶ 4.41-1 (2d ed. 1980).
(1)
Plaintiff maintains that the defendants are amenable to service under the appropriate Florida statutes. The Court is referred initially to Section 607.041, Florida Statutes (1977), of the Florida General Corporation Act, captioned, "Service of process, notice or demand on a corporation," which provides in pertinent part:
Process against any corporation may be served in accordance with Chapter 48 and Chapter 49.
Turning to Chapter 48, plaintiff refers the Court to the appropriate long-arm statutes. The first one, Section 48.181(1), Florida Statutes (1979) provides:
The acceptance by any person or persons, individually, or associated together as a copartnership or any other form or type of association, who are residents of any other state or country, and all foreign corporations, and any person who is a resident of the state and who subsequently becomes a nonresident of the state or conceals his whereabouts, of the privilege extended by law to nonresidents and others to operate, conduct, engage in, or carry on a business or business venture in the state, or to have an office or agency in the state, constitutes an appointment by the persons and foreign corporations of the secretary of state of the state as their agent on whom all process in any action or proceeding against them, or any of them, arising out of any transaction or operation connected with or incidental to the business or business venture may be served. The acceptance of the privilege is signification of the agreement of the persons and foreign corporations that the process against them which is so served is of the same validity as if served personally on the persons or foreign corporations. (emphasis supplied)
In addition to Section 48.181, in 1973 the Florida legislature enacted a second long-arm statute, Section 48.193, which substantially duplicates the operative language of the older statute and provides in pertinent part:
The Florida legislature also specifically set forth the method by which service of process is obtained pursuant to these statutes:
(2)
Unlike, for example, the Oklahoma long-arm statute challenged in World-Wide Volkswagen...
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