Crane by Crane v. Indiana High School Athletic Ass'n

• Citation: 975 F.2d 1315
• Decision Date: 28 December 1992
• Docket Number: No. 91-2227,91-2227
• Parties: 77 Ed. Law Rep. 722 D. Ryan CRANE, by David F. CRANE, his next friend, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. INDIANA HIGH SCHOOL ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (7th Circuit)

Page 1315

975 F.2d 1315

77 Ed. Law Rep. 722

D. Ryan CRANE, by David F. CRANE, his next friend, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. INDIANA HIGH SCHOOL ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 91-2227.

United States Court of Appeals Seventh Circuit.

Argued Dec. 12, 1991.

Decided Sept. 23, 1992.

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc

Denied Dec. 28, 1992.

James A. Kornblum, Lockyear & Kornblum, Evansville, Ind., Ruth E. VanDemark, Raymond E. Beckering, III (argued), Wildman, Harrold, Allen & Dixon, Chicago, Ill., Blake Chambers, Washington, Ind., for plaintiff-appellee.

Robert M. Baker (argued), Frederick D. Emhardt, Miller, Faires, Hebert, Woddell & Baker, Indianapolis, Ind., for defendant-appellant.

Before POSNER, RIPPLE, and MANION, Circuit Judges.

MANION, Circuit Judge.

The Indiana High School Athletic Association, Inc. ("IHSAA") appeals a district court order permanently enjoining it from declaring Ryan Crane ineligible to play high school athletics. The IHSAA declared Ryan ineligible pursuant to its transfer eligibility rules. Ryan sued the IHSAA alleging that the IHSAA's decision violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Indiana state law. The district court found that the IHSAA transfer eligibility rules violated Ryan's equal protection and due process rights. Although for different reasons, we affirm the decision of the district court.

I. Background

The facts in this case are not in dispute. Defendant-appellant Indiana High School Athletic Association, Inc. is a voluntary association formed in 1903 which administers a program of high school interscholastic athletics in Indiana. Membership in the IHSAA is open to any public or private, secondary school which is accredited by the Indiana Department of Education and pays the annual membership fee of $1.50. Currently, 410 schools are members of the IHSAA; approximately 80% of those members are public schools. With an annual budget of over $3 million, derived from television contracts, corporate sponsorship, gate receipts and the sale of novelty items, the IHSAA currently administers nine sports for boys and nine sports for girls. The IHSAA has promulgated rules governing when high school athletic teams can practice and play, rules governing each sport and, most important for this case, rules governing the eligibility of high school students to participate in athletics. Continuing membership in the IHSAA is contingent upon strict adherence to these and other rules and regulations promulgated by the IHSAA.

Plaintiff-appellee Ryan Crane is a high school student whose parents were divorced in 1978. The divorce decree gave Ryan's father, David F. Crane, physical custody of Ryan (and his older brother, Chad), subject to his mother's visitation rights. In 1980, custody of Ryan, then five years old, was transferred to his mother. Mr. Crane, pursuant to a court order, paid child support. Ryan lived with his mother, Linda Crane-Gaskill, in Fort Wayne, Indiana until June 1990. During the 1989/90 school year, his freshman year, Ryan attended Fort Wayne Snider High School and was a member of the junior-varsity golf team. In 1989, Ryan's mother, citing "disciplinary problems" and falling grades in school, asked Mr. Crane to take custody of Ryan. At that time, Ryan's parents decided that it would not be a good idea for Ryan to change schools in the middle of the school year. So, Ryan stayed with his mother and finished his freshman year at Snider. After completion of the school year, however, Ryan's parents decided that it was in Ryan's best interests to live with his father. Accordingly, in June 1990, Ryan moved to his father's home in Washington, Indiana. On July 19, 1990, the Circuit Court of Daviess County, Indiana entered an order terminating Mr. Crane's obligation to pay child support. ¹

When Ryan Crane moved to his father's home in Washington, Indiana, he enrolled in Washington High School ("WHS"), a member of the IHSAA, and joined the varsity golf team. As a transfer student, under the IHSAA eligibility rules, Ryan was ineligible to participate in athletics for one year unless declared eligible by the IHSAA. The IHSAA will not declare a transfer student eligible for athletics if the transfer was athletically motivated. As required by the IHSAA transfer eligibility rules, the principal of Fort Wayne Snider High School and the principal of WHS filled out an "Athletic Transfer Report" and submitted it to the IHSAA. In this report, both principals recommended that the IHSAA declare Ryan eligible for all interschool athletics, finding that there was no evidence that Ryan transferred to WHS for athletic reasons.

IHSAA Assistant Commissioner Ray Craft rejected these recommendations and declared Ryan ineligible for varsity athletics. Instead, Commissioner Craft declared Ryan eligible only for junior-varsity athletics. This "limited eligibility" was useless to Ryan, however, because he played only golf and WHS did not have a junior-varsity golf team. Thus, Commissioner Craft's decision meant that Ryan could not play golf at WHS. Accordingly, pursuant to IHSAA rules, Ryan appealed Commissioner Craft's decision to the IHSAA Executive Committee. After a short hearing, the Executive Committee summarily affirmed Commissioner Craft's decision. The IHSAA never found that Ryan's transfer to WHS was athletically motivated.

Ryan then filed suit against the IHSAA in the Circuit Court of Daviess County, Indiana, alleging that the IHSAA's decision violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Indiana state law. The IHSAA removed the action to the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana. ² The district court found that the IHSAA's application of the transfer eligibility rules violated Ryan's equal protection and due process rights, and entered a permanent injunction prohibiting the IHSAA "from declaring Ryan Crane ineligible to play high school athletics at Washington High School, Washington, Indiana, based on his move from his mother's home in Fort Wayne, Indiana to this father's home in Washington, Indiana." The IHSAA appeals. Although for reasons different from those offered by the district court, we affirm.

II. Jurisdiction

The IHSAA declared Ryan ineligible to play varsity sports for one year. Ryan has now completed the 11th grade; the one year is over; and therefore, the district court's injunction has run its course. The first question before us, then, is whether this case is moot. Under Article III of the Constitution, our jurisdiction extends only to actual cases and controversies. U.S. Const. art. III, § 2; Nebraska Press Ass'n v. Stuart, 427 U.S. 539, 546, 96 S.Ct. 2791, 2796, 49 L.Ed.2d 683 (1976). We have no power to adjudicate disputes which are moot. The test for mootness "is whether the relief sought would, if granted, make a difference to the legal interests of the parties (as distinct from their psyches, which might remain deeply engaged with the merits of the litigation)." Air Line Pilots Ass'n International v. UAL Corp., 897 F.2d 1394, 1396 (7th Cir.1990).

Generally, after an injunction has expired under its own terms, the underlying dispute is no longer "a present, live controversy." Henco, Inc. v. Brown, 904 F.2d 11, 13 (7th Cir.1990) (citation omitted). The injunction in this case has expired. However, there is still a justiciable controversy because of IHSAA Rule 17-6. ³ Rule 17-6 allows the IHSAA to impose retroactive penalties on student athletes (and their schools) who are declared ineligible by the IHSAA but are permitted to participate in interschool competition in accordance with a court restraining order or injunction. If the injunction is subsequently vacated, stayed or reversed, the IHSAA may strike individual and team records, require forfeit of victories won by the team, or require return of individual and team awards earned while the student participated. In this case, while Ryan was playing golf pursuant to the district court's injunction, Ryan placed second individually and WHS was the first-place team in the IHSAA sectional golf tournament. Ryan received an award for his second-place finish, he and his teammates received first-place team ribbons, and WHS received a sectional championship trophy. Under Rule 17-6, if we reverse the district court, the IHSAA intends to seek the return of these awards and require WHS to forfeit its sectional golf championship. The championship trophy would then be given to Washington Catholic High School. Thus, the IHSAA still has a very real, legal interest in the outcome of this appeal which satisfies the requirements of Article III. See Wiley v. National Collegiate Athletic Ass'n, 612 F.2d 473, 475-76 (10th Cir.1979), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 943, 100 S.Ct. 2168, 64 L.Ed.2d 798 (1980) (substantial controversy still existed although athlete had graduated because of a similar NCAA rule).

There is yet another reason why we have jurisdiction to decide this appeal--the "capable of repetition yet evading review" exception to mootness. Even when an injunction has expired, we still have jurisdiction "if the underlying dispute between the parties is one 'capable of repetition yet evading review.' " Nebraska Press Ass'n, 427 U.S. at 546, 96 S.Ct. at 2796. A dispute is "capable of repetition yet evading review" if: "(1) the challenged action was in its duration too short to be fully litigated prior to its cessation or expiration, and (2) there was a reasonable expectation that the same complaining party would be subject to the same action again." Weinstein v. Bradford, 423 U.S. 147, 149, 96 S.Ct. 347, 348, 46 L.Ed.2d 350 (1975). Both of these requirements are met in this case. First, the period of ineligibility and thus the district court's injunction could last only one year. One year is not enough time for the validity of the injunction to be fully litigated. The second requirement is met because Ryan is still subject to the IHSAA transfer...