Cayuga Indian Nation of New York v. Pataki
| Decision Date | 23 December 1999 |
| Docket Number | No. 80-CV-960.,No. 80-CV-930.,80-CV-930.,80-CV-960. |
| Citation | 79 F.Supp.2d 78 |
| Parties | The CAYUGA INDIAN NATION OF NEW YORK, et al., Plaintiffs, and The Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma, Plaintiff-Intervenor, v. George E. PATAKI, et al., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of New York |
Mariscal Weeks McIntryre, & Friedlander, Phoenix, AZ, Glenn M. Feldman, of counsel, for plaintiff-intervenors.
Rubin Baum Levin Constant & Friedman, New York City, Martin R. Gold, Raymond J. Heslin, of counsel, for plaintiffs Cayuga Indian Nation of New York.
Eliot Spitzer, Attorney General of the State of New York, Albany, NY, David B. Roberts, of counsel, for State defendants.
Huber Lawrence & Abell, New York City, Theodore F. Duver, of counsel, for defendant New York State Electric & Gas Corporation.
Goodwin Procter & Hoar, Boston, MA, Anthony M. Feeherry, of counsel, for Miller Brewing and defendant Class.
Harris Beach & Wilcox, Rochester, NY, William L. Dorr, Brian Laudadio, of counsel, for defendant Counties.
Hank Meshorer, U.S. Department of Justice, Environment & Natural Division, Washington, DC, for United States Special Litigation Section.
On December 20, 1999, the court heard oral argument with respect to a number of motions in limine made by the plaintiffs, the Cayuga Indian Nation of New York ("the Nation") and the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma ("the Tribe"),1 the plaintiff-intervenor, the United States of America ("the U.S."), and the State of New York ("the State"), one of the defendants in this action. After slightly more than four hours of oral argument, the court strongly hinted at how it would rule on some but not all of these motions. The court further indicated that a written decision would be forthcoming shortly addressing all of these motions. Following constitutes the same.
The court will first address the simplest of the present motions (and hence, the only one to which there is no opposition) — the Tribal plaintiffs' separate motion to amend their respective complaints and for partial summary judgment against the State on the issue of liability. This motion is purely a procedural house-keeping matter. The bottom-line is that neither the Nation nor the Tribe named the State itself as a defendant in their original complaints, although various State agencies, departments and individuals, in their official capacities as State officers, were so named.2 Among others, however, "Mario M. Cuomo [then governor] and the State of New York" did file an answer. Based upon the foregoing, the Tribal plaintiffs are seeking to add the State itself as a defendant pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(b), which allows "amendments to conform to the evidence" to be raised "at any time, even after judgment."
Additionally, the Tribal plaintiffs are seeking partial summary judgment because in 1991, when the court granted them such relief, it expressly did so "as to all defendants except the State of New York[,]" inviting the State to make a motion on Eleventh Amendment grounds. Cayuga Indian Nation of New York v. Cuomo, 771 F.Supp. 19, 24 and n. 9 (N.D.N.Y.1991) ("Cayuga VII") (emphasis added). Despite the fact that at last all of the liability issues in this case have been resolved, no liability judgment was ever entered against the State. Therefore, the Tribal plaintiffs are seeking the same in accordance with Fed.R.Civ.P. 56.
The State does not oppose either of these motions. See State of New York Defendants' Memorandum of Law in Opposition to Plaintiffs' Motions in Limine ("St.Opp.Memo.") at 44. The State does, however, assert one caveat, which it reiterated during oral argument: It "preserve[s] and incorporate[s] by reference all prior defenses and other arguments raised in opposition to plaintiffs' motions for partial summary judgment including the Eleventh Amendment." Id. With that understanding, and because granting these motions will serve the laudable purpose of ensuring that there is no ambiguity here, as least with respect to the status of the State as a defendant and its liability, the court grants the same.
Turning next to the Tribal plaintiffs' motions in limine, they strenuously argue that the court should "exclud[e] all evidence and testimony concerning `additional consideration'" which they may have received from the State.3 Pl. Notice of in Limine Motion at 1. In a similar vein, the Tribal plaintiffs are seeking a "determin[ation] that the State ... may not be credited with any payment made to the[m] with respect to the land which is the subject of th[is] case and [that the State] be excluded at trial from making any mention of ... such payments." Id. at 2 (emphasis added). Evidently this dispute over the admissibility of "additional consideration" evidence has arisen primarily because of the Tribal plaintiffs' interpretation of the proposed testimony of John D. Dorchester, Jr., the State's real estate appraisal "expert." As the Tribal plaintiffs' view his testimony and report, Dorchester will end up concluding that they actually owe the State money, anywhere from $65-$95 million to as much as $795 million. See Plaintiffs' Joint Memorandum of Law in Support of Motion in Limine ("Pl.Supp. Memo.") at 11-12. The Tribal plaintiffs also find troubling Dorchester's supposed "credit[ing] [of] the State with the yearly annuity payments which the State agreed to pay [them,] regardless of whether such sums were actually paid[.]" Id. at 11 (emphasis added).
In their notice of motion, the only basis which the Tribal plaintiffs offer for excluding "additional consideration" evidence is the law of the case doctrine. In their memorandum of law, however, and again during oral argument, the Tribal plaintiffs focused more heavily upon the argument that because the 1795 and 1807 transactions were "illegal," and indeed, because the 1793 Nonintercourse Act made it a misdemeanor to negotiate for the purchase of land with Indians without a federal presence, the State should not be allowed to benefit from this asserted "criminal" conduct by seeking a set-off for these additional payments. The court will address these arguments seriatim.
The Tribal plaintiffs argue that the law of the case doctrine bars proof of "additional consideration" paid by the State because "this Court has ... ruled, [that] the receipt, amount or sufficiency of additional consideration for conveyances invalid under the Nonintercourse Act is completely immaterial with respect to the claim for damages for violation of the Act." Pl.Supp.Memo. at 9 (emphasis added). The State bluntly responds that this argument has "no basis in fact or in law." St.Opp.Memo. at 38. The court agrees. As will be seen, in making this broad assertion, the Tribal plaintiffs' are taking great liberties with prior rulings in this case.
To be sure, the consideration issue has previously arisen in this litigation. In making their law of the case argument, the Cayugas point to two separate passages in two different decisions of this court,4 arguing that therein "this court has ruled that any additional consideration the Cayugas may have received is irrelevant for purposes of a violation of the Nonintercourse Act, and that such evidence is `completely immaterial[.]'" Pl.Supp.Memo. at 8 (emphasis added) and 9. Of course, as will be seen, this prior ruling does not impact the issue of consideration in the context of damages, an issue which was most decidedly not before the court in those earlier decisions.
There simply is no basis for barring evidence of additional consideration based upon the law of the case doctrine. First of all, as this court has recognized on several prior occasions, including most recently in Cayuga X, 1999 WL 509422, at *9, "the law of the case doctrine is not a commandment etched in stone." (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). It is, "at best, a discretionary doctrine, which does not constitute a limitation on the court's power, but merely expresses a general reluctance, absent good cause, to reopen rulings that the parties have relied upon.'" Id. (quoting LNC Investments, Inc. v. First Fidelity Bank, N.A., 173 F.3d 454, 467 n. 12 (2d Cir.1999)). Therefore, assuming for the moment that the passages upon which the Tribal plaintiffs rely to establish the law of the case did in fact hold as they suggest, that is, that consideration is irrelevant and immaterial to the issue of damages, given the discretionary nature of the law of the case doctrine, that doctrine does not necessarily bar this court from reconsidering that alleged determination.
There is, however, even a more significant reason why the Tribal plaintiffs' law of the case doctrine argument is misplaced. That is, as previously alluded to, the fact that while this court has held that consideration is "irrelevant," it did so in the context of an issue which is completely different than the damage issues which are presently before the court. In Cayuga III, this court held that any additional consideration which the Cayugas may have received over the years "has no bearing on the issue of whether there was compliance with the [Nonintercourse] Act." Cayuga III, 667 F.Supp. at 946 (emphasis added). Furthermore, at that same time, relatively early in this litigation, the court recognized the possibility that if they prevailed on liability, the Tribal plaintiffs receipt of "additional consideration may become pertinent to the issue of damages." Id. at 946 n. 7.
The validity of the treaties under the Nonintercourse Act is a completely separate and distinct issue from the amount of damages to which the Tribal plaintiffs may now be entitled. Likewise, also in the context of an issue wholly apart from damages, in Cayuga VII, this court did observe that the Tribal plaintiffs' efforts to secure additional...
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