Fox v. Baltimore City Pd.

• Decision Date: 28 October 1999
• Docket Number: CA-91-2784-WMN,No. 98-2618,98-2618
• Citation: 201 F.3d 526
• Parties: (4th Cir. 2000) EDWARD F. FOX; THOMAS L. GRIMES; JAMES HORNER; EDWARD KOLUCH; JOSEPH KUNDRAT; VINCENT C. MOULTER; GARY RAUB; CHARLES RUMMEL; HERBERT HEWLETT; BARRY WOOD; WILLIAM HELMICK, Plaintiffs-Appellants, and LAWRENCE AMES; THOMAS BULL; TERRY CAUDELL; JOSEPH CONWAY; FREDERICK J. DILLON; RONALD EKLUND; RONALD KENNEDY; JAMES KIRKPATRICK; GEORGE LEICHLING; MARK LINDSAY; JOHN F. X. O'BRIEN; JOSEPH WASHINGTON PETERS; DAVID PHIPPS; FREDRIK ROUSSEY; FRANCIS SCHMITZ; RICHARD WAYBRIGHT; JOHN WISSMAN, Plaintiffs, v. THE BALTIMORE CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT; COMMISSIONER, BALTIMORE CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT, Defendant-Appellees, and EDWARD WOODS, Commissioner, Baltimore City Police Department, Defendant. (). . Argued:
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

Page 526

201 F.3d 526 (4th Cir. 2000)

EDWARD F. FOX; THOMAS L. GRIMES; JAMES HORNER; EDWARD KOLUCH; JOSEPH KUNDRAT; VINCENT C. MOULTER; GARY RAUB; CHARLES RUMMEL; HERBERT HEWLETT; BARRY WOOD; WILLIAM HELMICK, Plaintiffs-Appellants, and LAWRENCE AMES; THOMAS BULL; TERRY CAUDELL; JOSEPH CONWAY; FREDERICK J. DILLON; RONALD EKLUND; RONALD KENNEDY; JAMES KIRKPATRICK; GEORGE LEICHLING; MARK LINDSAY; JOHN F. X.

O'BRIEN; JOSEPH WASHINGTON PETERS; DAVID PHIPPS; FREDRIK ROUSSEY; FRANCIS SCHMITZ; RICHARD WAYBRIGHT; JOHN WISSMAN, Plaintiffs, v. THE BALTIMORE CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT; COMMISSIONER, BALTIMORE CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT, Defendant-Appellees, and EDWARD WOODS, Commissioner, Baltimore City Police Department, Defendant.

No. 98-2618 (CA-91-2784-WMN).

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS, FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT.

Argued: October 28, 1999.

Decided: January 13, 2000.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, at Baltimore.

William M. Nickerson, District Judge.

[Copyrighted Material Omitted] COUNSEL ARGUED: Michael Lawrence Marshall, SCHLACHMAN, BELSKY & WEINER, P.A., Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellants. William Rowe Phelan, Jr., OFFICE OF THE CITY SOLICITOR, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Otho M. Thompson, City Solicitor, Kathryn E. Kovacs, BALTIMORE CITY LAW DEPARTMENT, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellees.

Before MURNAGHAN, MOTZ, and KING, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by published opinion. Judge Motz wrote the opinion, in which Judge Murnaghan and Judge King joined.

OPINION

DIANA GRIBBON MOTZ, Circuit Judge:

For some years, the Baltimore City Police Department and its officers have disputed the legality of the Department's policy limiting enlistment in the Armed Forces reserves and National Guard. This case involves twenty-eight officers who claim that they were denied access to the reserves in violation of the Veterans' Re-employment Rights Act. The district court held that the 1986 amendments to the Act, establishing protections for those who wish to join the reserves, do not apply retroactively. Finding that for this reason eleven of the twenty-eight officers could not prevail, the district court granted the Department summary judgment as to the claims of those officers and certified that judgment as final pursuant to Rule 54(b). Because the district court did not abuse its discretion in certifying its judgment for immediate appeal, and because it properly interpreted the Act, we affirm.

I.

The Baltimore City Police Department's policy of restricting access to the Armed Forces reserves and National Guard has spawned three separate federal lawsuits. In 1979, a group of officers sued the Department for its refusal to permit them to enlist, alleging a denial of their equal protection rights. The settlement of that case, Kundrat v. Pomerleau, Civ. No. T-79-2198 (D. Md. 1981), permitted two of the officers whose claims are here on appeal--Officers Kundrat and Helmick--to join the reserves. The settlement also prompted the Department to establish a policy under which a maximum of 100 Department employees were permitted to be members of the reserves at any given time. After the Department reached its 100-person limit, it placed other officers who asked to join the reserves on a waiting list.

In the second lawsuit, this court addressed whether the 100-person cap itself violated the Veterans' Re-employment Rights Act, 38 U.S.C. § 2021 (1988) (VRRA), amended by 38 U.S.C. § 4301 (1994). See Kolkhorst v. Tilghman, 897 F.2d 1282 (4th Cir. 1990), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 1029 (1992). That statute, as amended in 1986, prohibits a state or political subdivision from denying hiring, promotion or other "advantage of employment" to any individual because of that person's service in a "Reserve component of the Armed Services." 38 U.S.C. § 2021(b)(3), amended by 38 U.S.C.§ 4301(b)(3) (1994).¹ We held that the Department's 100-person policy "conflict[ed] directly with the language and purpose of [the statute]," and thus invalidated the cap. Kolkhorst, 897 F.2d at 1285.

In the wake of our holding in Kolkhorst, twenty-eight officers brought the instant action, seeking lost pay and retirement benefits under VRRA for the Department's refusal to permit them to enlist in the reserves. This third lawsuit, filed in September 1991, has already been the lengthiest of the three actions, and the district court order we review here would only resolve the claims of eleven of the twenty eight plaintiffs.

Those eleven officers all requested, formally or informally, to join the reserves prior to 1986. Their claims rest on retroactive application of the 1986 amendments to VRRA, which extended the Act's protections to those seeking to join the reserves. See Pub. L. No. 99-576, 100 Stat. 3248 (1986). The district court held that the 1986 amendments do not apply retroactively. It then referred the case to a magistrate judge to determine, in light of this holding, which of the twenty-eight officers could state a claim for recovery.

The magistrate judge recommended that summary judgment be granted to the Department on the claims of Officers Fox, Grimes, and Moulter. These officers had never formally asked to be placed on the Department's waiting list before or after 1986. They nevertheless contended they were entitled to recover because the Department assertedly discouraged them from making a formal request, and because, in any event, such a request would have been futile.

The district court adopted the recommendation of the magistrate judge rejecting these arguments and granted summary judgment to the Department on the three officers' claims. The court also granted summary judgment to the Department with respect to eight other officers who failed to pursue their claims further after the district court's initial ruling on retroactivity: Officers Helmick, Hewlett, Horner, Koluch, Kundrat, Raub, Rummel, and Wood.

Finding "no just reason for delay in the entry of judgment," the district court, pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 54(b), certified its order as final as to these eleven officers, and therefore suitable for immediate appeal.

II.

Initially, we must determine whether, as the Department maintains, the district court's entry of final judgment under Rule 54(b) was unwarranted.

We lack jurisdiction to review a district court's order unless that order constitutes a "final" judgment. See 28 U.S.C. § 1291 (1994). This limit on appellate jurisdiction guards against the waste of judicial resources and the unnecessary resolution of issues later rendered moot, reflecting what has been described as an "historic federal policy against piecemeal appeals." Curtiss-Wright Corp. v. General Elec. Co., 446 U.S. 1, 9 (1980) (quoting Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. Mackey, 351 U.S. 427, 483 (1956)). Ordinarily, a district court order is not "final" until it has resolved all claims as to all parties. See Braswell Shipyards, Inc. v. Beazer East, Inc., 2 F.3d 1331, 1335 (4th Cir. 1993).

Rule 54(b), however, provides a vehicle by which a district court can certify for immediate appeal a judgment that disposes of fewer than all of the claims or resolves the controversy as to fewer than all of the parties. Pursuant to that rule, "the court may direct the entry of a final judgment as to one or more but fewer than all of the claims or parties only upon express determination that there is no just reason for delay and upon an express direction for the entry of judgment." Fed. R. Civ. P. 54(b). In the case at hand, the district court expressly directed entry of judgment and expressly determined that there was no just reason for delay. The court failed, however, to state the rationale for its certification. The Department maintains that because of this omission, and because "hearing this appeal is not in the interest of sound judicial administration," Brief of Appellees at 15, we should dismiss the appeal.

We can only reverse a district court's Rule 54(b) certification if we determine that the district court has abused its discretion. See CurtissWright, 446 U.S. at 8. Moreover, we defer to the district court's initial determination that a judgment is final and no just reason exists for delay. We must necessarily accord the district court less deference, however, when, as here, the court offers no rationale for its decision to certify. See Braswell, 2 F.3d at 1336. Nonetheless, the district judge remains better-situated than an appellate court to consider the impact of certification on the parties and on the further resolution of the case.

The Supreme Court has described in some detail our role and that of the district court in the context of Rule 54(b) certifications. See Curtiss-Wright, 446 U.S. at 9. The Court likened the district court to a "dispatcher," to whose "sound judicial discretion" is left the determination regarding the appropriateness of immediate appeal. Id. The appellate court's role on review, the Court explained, has "two aspects":

The court of appeals must, of course, scrutinize the district court's evaluation of such factors as the interrelationship of claims so as to prevent piecemeal appeals in cases which should be reviewed as single units. But once such juridical concerns have been met, the discretionary judgment of the district court should be given substantial deference, for that court is "the one most likely to be familiar with the case and with any justifiable reasons for delay.

Id. at 10 (quoting Sears, 351 U.S. at 437).

In determining whether to certify a judgment as final and suitable for immediate appeal, a district court must take into account two broad sets of considerations--the parties' interest in swift resolution of their disputes, and the "juridical concerns" of preserving judicial resources and guarding against the unnecessary resolution of issues. See id. Certification should be avoided when further trial court proceedings might force an appellate court to revisit the issues relevant to the...