Brown v. Sec'y of State

• Decision Date: 31 January 2012
• Docket Number: No. 11–14554.,11–14554.
• Citation: 668 F.3d 1271,23 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. C 719
• Parties: Corrine BROWN, Mario Diaz–Balart, Plaintiffs–Appellants,Florida House of Representatives, Intervenor Plaintiff–Appellant, v. SECRETARY OF STATE OF the State of FLORIDA, Defendant–Appellee,ACLU of Florida, Leon W. Russell, et al., Intervenor Defendants–Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

23 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. C 719

668 F.3d 1271

Corrine BROWN, Mario Diaz–Balart, Plaintiffs–Appellants,Florida House of Representatives, Intervenor Plaintiff–Appellant,

v.SECRETARY OF STATE OF the State of FLORIDA, Defendant–Appellee,ACLU of Florida, Leon W. Russell, et al., Intervenor Defendants–Appellees.

No. 11–14554.

United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

Jan. 31, 2012.

Stephen Michael Cody, Cody Law Office, Palmetto Bay, FL, Miguel De Grandy, Stephen Cody, PA, Coral Gables, FL, George Nicholas Meros, Jr., Gray Robinson, Tallahassee, FL, Gregory G. Garre, Latham & Watkins, LLP, Washington, DC, for Plaintiffs–Appellants.

Karen C. Dyer, Elan M. Nehleber, Boies, Schiller & Flexner, LLP, Orlando, FL, Joseph W. Hatchett, Akerman Senterfitt, LLP, Tallahassee, FL, for Claimant–Appellee.

Daniel Nordby, Ashley E. Davis, Florida Department of State, Tallahassee, FL, Laughlin McDonald, ACLU Foundation, Inc., Atlanta, GA, Randall C. Marshall, ACLU Foundation of Florida, Inc., Stephen F. Rosenthal, Podhurst Orseck, PA, Miami, FL, for Defendants–Appellees State of Florida, Kurt S. Browning, Florida Senate, Governor of the State of Florida, ACLU of Florida, Janet Cruz, Arthenia L. Joyner, Luis R. Garcia, Perry E. Thurston.Jessica Ring Amunson, Michael B. DeSanctis, Paul March Smith, Jenner & Block, LLP, Joseph Gerald Hebert, Campaign Legal Center, Washington, DC, for Defendants–Appellees Leon W. Russell, Patricia T. Spencer, Carolyn H. Collins, Edwin Enciso, Stephen Easdale, Florida State Conference of NAACP Branches, Democracia Ahora.Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

Before DUBINA, Chief Judge, and MARCUS and FAY, Circuit Judges.

MARCUS, Circuit Judge:

At issue today is whether a state constitutional provision establishing standards for congressional redistricting that was approved by the people by initiative is contrary to the Elections Clause of the United States Constitution. Article I, Section 4 of the United States Constitution provides that the “Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof.” Appellants Corrine Brown and Mario Diaz–Balart, members of the United States House of Representatives, along with the Florida House of Representatives, appeal from a district court order granting final summary judgment to the appellees, the Florida Secretary of State and various intervening parties. The appellants claim that Amendment Six is unconstitutional because it was enacted by citizen initiative rather than by the state's legislature in the ordinary “legislative process.” Moreover, they say that Amendment Six—even if properly enacted pursuant to Florida's legislative process—imposes substantive requirements that far exceed the state legislature's Elections Clause power.

We are unpersuaded. In the first place, the Florida voters' act of lawmaking according to the state's expressly enumerated lawmaking process is fully consistent with the commands of the federal Constitution's Elections Clause, and consonant with the understanding given to the Elections Clause by the Supreme Court in two cases that all parties agree are controlling— Ohio ex rel. Davis v. Hildebrant, 241 U.S. 565, 36 S.Ct. 708, 60 L.Ed. 1172 (1916), and Smiley v. Holm, 285 U.S. 355, 52 S.Ct. 397, 76 L.Ed. 795 (1932). As for the second claim, we also have little difficulty in concluding that the factors enumerated in Amendment Six have been for many years commonly considered by legislative bodies in congressional redistricting and long accepted by the courts as being lawful and consistent with the powers delegated to the state legislatures by the United States Constitution. Accordingly, we affirm the order of summary judgment entered by the district court.

I.

According to the Florida Constitution, the people of Florida may use an initiative process to amend any part of their constitution. Fla. Const. art. XI, § 3 (“The power to propose the revision or amendment of any portion or portions of this constitution by initiative is reserved to the people ....”). Once the backers of an initiative petition obtain sufficient signatures in support, the proposed amendment appears on the general election ballot. See id. §§ 3, 5(b). A proposed amendment passes if it is approved by at least sixty percent of those voting on the measure. Id. § 5(e).

In an initiative petition approved by the Florida Secretary of State on September 28, 2007, FairDistrictsFlorida.org proposed a constitutional amendment to Article III of the state constitution that would set some standards for the legislature to use in the congressional redistricting process. The initiative petition obtained sufficient signatures, and the proposal was placed on the November 2, 2010, general election ballot as Amendment Six. Amendment Six passed, garnering the approval of over sixty-two percent of those voting.¹

Amendment Six was codified as Article III, Section 20 of the Florida Constitution. Article III of the Florida Constitution addresses the nature and power of the state legislature. See Fla. Const. art. III. The newly added Section 20 reads this way:

SECTION 20. Standards for establishing congressional district boundaries.—In establishing congressional district boundaries:

(a) No apportionment plan or individual district shall be drawn with the intent to favor or disfavor a political party or an incumbent; and districts shall not be drawn with the intent or result of denying or abridging the equal opportunity of racial or language minorities to participate in the political process or to diminish their ability to elect representatives of their choice; and districts shall consist of contiguous territory.

(b) Unless compliance with the standards in this subsection conflicts with the standards in subsection (a) or with federal law, districts shall be as nearly equal in population as is practicable; districts shall be compact; and districts shall, where feasible, utilize existing political and geographical boundaries.

(c) The order in which the standards within subsections (a) and (b) of this section are set forth shall not be read to establish any priority of one standard over the other within that subsection.

Fla. Const. art. III, § 20.²

On November 3, 2010, Plaintiff–Appellants Corrine Brown and Mario Diaz–Balart, members of the United States House of Representatives from Florida, challenged the constitutionality of Amendment Six in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. They sought a declaratory judgment that Amendment Six was invalid under the Elections Clause of the U.S. Constitution, as well as injunctive relief prohibiting its enforcement. The plaintiffs later amended their complaint and voluntarily dismissed a defendant, leaving Kurt Browning, in his official capacity as Florida's Secretary of State, as the sole defendant. The district court allowed the Florida House of Representatives to intervene as a party plaintiff and several individuals and organizations to intervene as defendants.³

All of the parties moved for summary judgment, and, by order dated September 9, 2011, the district court granted final summary judgment in favor of the defendant and defendant-intervenors.

The district court looked to the history of the Elections Clause and to Supreme Court precedent in construing the meaning of Article I, Section 4 and its application to Amendment Six. The court squarely rejected the claim that Amendment Six violates the Elections Clause because it was enacted outside the legislative process. The district court explained that controlling Supreme Court case law established that a state constitutional amendment validly enacted pursuant to state law may restrict the legislature's exercise of its Elections Clause power. The court also rejected the argument that Amendment Six amounted to an unconstitutional substantive limitation on the state legislature's power to regulate elections. Finally, the district court determined that Amendment Six did not implicate Supreme Court precedent invalidating regulations that “favor or disfavor ... candidates” or “dictate electoral outcomes,” see U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, 514 U.S. 779, 833–34, 115 S.Ct. 1842, 131 L.Ed.2d 881 (1995), because the conditions imposed by Amendment Six favor no one.

The plaintiffs and plaintiff-intervenor timely appealed to this Court. In view of the shortness of time before the national elections this fall, we expedited oral argument and our review.

II.

We review a district court's grant or denial of summary judgment de novo . Holloman v. Mail–Well Corp., 443 F.3d 832, 836 (11th Cir.2006). “Summary judgment is appropriate when the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, presents no genuine issue of material fact and compels judgment as a matter of law in favor of the moving party.” Id. at 836–37; accord Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(a); Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322–23, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986). In this case, both sides agree that there are no material facts in dispute.

It is abundantly clear from the text of the Constitution that the states have no inherent authority to regulate congressional elections. Rather, because federal offices are the creature of and “arise from the Constitution itself,” any state authority to regulate election to federal offices “had to be delegated to, rather than reserved by, the States.” Cook v. Gralike, 531 U.S. 510, 522, 121 S.Ct. 1029, 149 L.Ed.2d 44 (2001) (alteration omitted) (quoting U.S. Term Limits, 514 U.S. at 804–05, 115 S.Ct. 1842). The Supreme Court has recognized that “States may regulate the incidents of [congressional] elections ... only within the exclusive delegation of power under the Elections Clause.” Id. at 523, 115 S.Ct. 1842. Clause 1 of Article I, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution, commonly known as the Elections Clause, specifically...