Davis v. U.S.

• Decision Date: 16 August 2007
• Docket Number: No. 06-4514.,06-4514.
• Citation: 499 F.3d 590
• Parties: John J. DAVIS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America; United States of America, Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration; Svetlana A. Davis, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

499 F.3d 590

John J. DAVIS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America; United States of America, Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration; Svetlana A. Davis, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 06-4514.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued: July 27, 2007.

Decided and Filed: August 16, 2007.

ARGUED: Jeffrey P. Nunnari, Toledo, Ohio, for Appellant. Guillermo J. Rojas, Assistant United States Attorney, Toledo, Ohio, Alan R. Kirshner, Toledo, Ohio, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Jeffrey P. Nunnari, Toledo, Ohio, for Appellant. Guillermo J. Rojas, Assistant United States Attorney, Toledo, Ohio, Alan R. Kirshner, Toledo, Ohio, for Appellees.

Before: GILMAN and GRIFFIN, Circuit Judges; ACKERMAN, District Judge.^*

OPINION

RONALD LEE GILMAN, Circuit Judge.

The district court dismissed John J. Davis's complaint due to the lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Davis had sought a declaratory judgment to determine the amount of financial support that he owes to his wife, from whom he is legally separated, under an Affidavit of Support that the government required him to file on her behalf when she immigrated to the United States from Ukraine. This suit came after a state court in Ohio enforced the Affidavit by obligating Davis to pay his wife monthly support. But Davis contends that his cause of action stems from an enforceable contract between himself and the government that arises under federal law, despite the prior state-court ruling. He thus argues that he has properly established subject matter jurisdiction. For the reasons set forth below, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.

I. BACKGROUND

In January of 2000, Davis executed an Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) I-864 Affidavit of Support on behalf of Svetlana A. Davis and her two teenaged sons. Svetlana at that time was a Ukrainian citizen whom Davis had recently married. The Affidavit of Support acknowledges Davis's obligation to maintain his income at no less than 125 percent of the federal poverty level for a four-member household in order to support his wife and his stepsons. Svetlana and her sons then joined Davis in the United States. The marriage, however, was not a happy one.

Davis filed for divorce in 2001, and Svetlana counterfiled for a legal separation. The Court of Common Pleas in Wood County, Ohio granted Svetlana's petition for a legal separation and awarded her $830 in monthly spousal support for a period of eight years, but declined to specifically enforce the Affidavit of Support. She appealed to the Ohio Court of Appeals. The Ohio appellate court remanded the matter back to the trial court with instructions to enforce the Affidavit of Support. On remand, the trial court ordered Davis to support Svetlana in the amount of $900 per month for a period of ten years. The court did not explain how it arrived at this amount.

Davis then filed suit against the United States, the U.S. Bureau of Citizen and Immigration Services (the BCIS, which was formerly the INS), and Svetlana in federal district court, seeking a "declar[ation of] the rights, duties, and responsibilities of the parties to, and third party beneficiaries of, the INS I-864 Affidavit of Support." Specifically, he requested a clarification of "the level of support required by the INS I-864 Affidavit of Support." Davis asserted that the Ohio trial court's support order erroneously reflected a "conclusion that each sponsored immigrant is entitled to support at an amount equivalent to 125% of the federal poverty guidelines for a household size of one (1)." (Emphasis added). In contrast, Davis contends that the Affidavit of Support "only requires that each sponsored immigrant be maintained at a level equal to a pro rata share of 125% of the federal poverty guidelines for a household size of four (4)," because that was the household size used to determine his "eligibility to sponsor [Svetlana] and her children in accordance with the terms of the INS I-864 Affidavit of Support."

Davis's complaint sought clarification of what he described as the Affidavit's "ambiguous" and "less than clear" language "as to what [his] obligations are" to Svetlana and to each of her two sons. He also requested clarification of whether the support obligation was fixed or would change as the federal poverty guidelines are updated. Finally, Davis contended that "[a]llowing each sponsored immigrant on the INS I-864 Affidavit of Support to enforce the affidavit against Plaintiff based on individual household unit sizes of one (1) would result in Plaintiff becoming a public charge."

The BCIS moved to dismiss the complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction pursuant to Rule 12(b)(1) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, claiming that Davis had failed to assert a valid federal cause of action. In addition, the BCIS argued in its reply brief to the district court that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine applied because Davis's complaint was a "thinly veiled attempt to seek appellate review of the state court's final judgment."

The district court granted the BCIS's motion, dismissing Davis's complaint for the lack of subject matter jurisdiction and concluding that Davis lacked standing to sue the BCIS. There was no citation to or discussion of the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. The court stated, however, that because the Affidavit of Support had been the subject of a state-court ruling, Davis "cannot bring an action in district court to question the state court determination of the meaning of the affidavit of support." One month later, the court issued a summary order stating that Davis's complaint as to "Suzanne [sic] Davis . . . is dismissed, with prejudice, on the basis of this Court's [previous] order . . . dismissing the case as to the United States of America."

Davis asserts on appeal that his complaint sought a declaration "of the meaning of the Affidavit [of Support] vis-á-vis his obligation to support his wife," and that "it also sought to displace any action which the Government or his wife's [two] sons may bring under their independent right to enforce the Affidavit." He then concedes that "the better practice would have been to name [his] wife's two sons as defendants in the declaratory judgment complaint," but contends that "their omission from the complaint is actually of no moment, as the Government still retains the right to bring an action against Davis to enforce the Affidavit in the circumstance that either or both sons receive public assistance."

II. ANALYSIS

A. Subject matter jurisdiction

We review de novo a district court's judgment dismissing a complaint for the lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Sutton v. St. Jude Med. S.C., Inc., 419 F.3d 568, 570 (6th Cir.2005). The factual findings that a district court makes in deciding the motion to dismiss will be accepted unless the findings are clearly erroneous. Id. Where a defendant moves to dismiss a complaint for the lack of subject matter jurisdiction, "the plaintiff has the burden of proving jurisdiction in order to survive the motion." Moir v. Greater Cleveland Reg'l Transit Auth., 895 F.2d 266, 269 (6th Cir.1990). In the present case, the district court dismissed Davis's complaint because neither of the statutes on which he based his claims grant him a cause of action.

A district court has subject matter jurisdiction over any civil action "arising under the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States." 28 U.S.C. § 1331. "A claim arises under federal law when the plaintiff's statement of his own cause of action shows that it is based upon federal laws or the federal Constitution." Cobb v. Contract Transp., Inc., 452 F.3d 543, 548 (6th Cir.2006) (brackets and quotation marks omitted). Davis asserts that his claims arise under the Declaratory Judgment Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2201, and under the provision of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) governing Affidavits of Support, 8 U.S.C. § 1183a(e)(1). Neither statute, however, supports this assertion.

The Declaratory Judgment Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2201, provides that "[i]n a case of actual controversy within its jurisdiction . . ., any court of the United States . . . may declare the rights and other legal relations of any interested party seeking such declaration, whether or not further relief is or could be sought." But § 2201 does not create an independent cause of action. Skelly Oil Co. v. Phillips Petroleum Co., 339 U.S. 667, 671, 70 S.Ct. 876, 94 L.Ed. 1194 (1950) (holding that "Congress enlarged the range of remedies available in the federal courts [under the Act] but did not extend their jurisdiction"). A federal court accordingly "must have jurisdiction already under some other federal statute" before a plaintiff can "invok[e] the Act." Toledo v. Jackson, 485 F.3d 836, 839 (6th Cir.2007) (quotation marks omitted).

The other statute on which Davis relies is IIRIRA. Specifically, he contends that the provision governing Affidavits of Support confers an implied cause of action on an immigrant's sponsoring citizen, such as himself. His reasoning is based upon an unconvincing syllogism. First, he argues that the Affidavit of Support is a contract between himself and the government. See 8 U.S.C. § 1183a(a)(1) ("No affidavit of support may be accepted . . . unless such affidavit is executed by a sponsor of the alien as a contract . . . ."). He next contends that this contract "arises under" and is governed by federal law. Finally, because he seeks to have the courts "interpret" this contract "arising under federal law," he asserts that he has established subject matter jurisdiction over his request for a "declaration of [the Affidavit of Support's] meaning."

Section 1183a, however, clearly states that "[a]n action to enforce an affidavit of...