Jones v. Coleman

• Citation: 848 F.3d 744
• Decision Date: 15 February 2017
• Docket Number: No. 16-5908,16-5908
• Parties: Amber JONES; Deanna Lack, Plaintiffs–Appellants, v. Kent COLEMAN ; Henry Fincher ; Patricia Heim ; Tom Lawless ; Norma Lester; Tom Morton, in their official capacities as members of the Tennessee Registry of Election Finance, Defendants–Appellees.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (6th Circuit)

848 F.3d 744

Amber JONES; Deanna Lack, Plaintiffs–Appellants,

v.Kent COLEMAN ; Henry Fincher ; Patricia Heim ; Tom Lawless ; Norma Lester; Tom Morton, in their official capacities as members of the Tennessee Registry of Election Finance, Defendants–Appellees.

No. 16-5908

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued: February 1, 2017

Decided and Filed: February 15, 2017

ARGUED: Michael J. Wall, BRANSTETTER, STRANCH & JENNINGS, PLLC, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellants. Erin F. Merrick, OFFICE OF THE TENNESSEE ATTORNEY GENERAL, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Michael J. Wall, James G. Stranch, III, Anthony A. Orlandi, BRANSTETTER, STRANCH & JENNINGS, PLLC, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellants. Janet M. Kleinfelter, Lyndsay F. Sanders, OFFICE OF THE TENNESSEE ATTORNEY GENERAL, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellees.

Before: BATCHELDER, SUTTON, and KETHLEDGE, Circuit Judges.

OPINION

ALICE M. BATCHELDER, Circuit Judge.

This case calls upon us to decide whether the district court properly abstained from exercising its jurisdiction in a case alleging that Tennessee's Campaign Financial Disclosure Act, Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 2–10–101 et seq. , unconstitutionally burdens the rights of free speech and association. We find that the district court's abstention was improper in this case, especially in light of the alleged chilling effects of the Act. Accordingly, we reverse and remand for further proceedings.

I. BACKGROUND

Appellants Amber Jones and Deanna Lack are parents of school-age children in White County, Tennessee. In the fall of 2015, Jones and Lack, together with several other parents, formed an unincorporated group called the Association for Accurate Standards in Education ("AASE"). AASE opposed another group of parents' advocating for removal of a social studies textbook that includes discussion of Islam from the public schools in White County. Approximately eight persons, all part-time volunteers, comprise AASE. It does not have a separate bank account, and it does not keep regular records of money collected or spent. There are no formal membership requirements, and there are no regular in-person meetings. Jones serves as the president of the group, and Lack serves as the secretary; there is no treasurer. Approximately five or six people have donated to AASE since its formation, but no individual donation has exceeded $200; indeed total donations to AASE have yet to reach $500.

Several seats on the White County Board of Education were up for election in August 2016, and the parents comprising AASE wanted the group to support and oppose candidates for at least two seats on the Board of Education. Appellants believed their message would be amplified if it were delivered through AASE. At the time, Appellants did not want AASE to make direct campaign contributions to candidates, but they intended for AASE to spend less than $250 on independent expenditures, including yard signs, stickers, and brochures.

In October 2015, Appellants met with members of Williamson Strong, an unincorporated group of parents that disseminates information and facilitates discussion about school board candidates and election issues in nearby Williamson County, Tennessee. It was then that Appellants learned that the Tennessee Registry of Election Finance ("the Registry") had fined Williamson Strong $5,000 for failing to certify a treasurer or file financial disclosure statements. "In finding that [Williamson Strong] is a political campaign committee^{[1 ]}subject to these requirements, the Registry relied on Tenn. Code Ann. § 2–10–102(12)(A), which defines a political campaign committee as, among other things,: ‘A combination of two (2) or more individuals ... to support or oppose any candidate for public office or measure....’ " Williamson Strong v. Tenn. Bureau of Ethics and Campaign Fin. , No. 3:15–cv–0739, 2015 WL 5794561, at *1 (M.D. Tenn. Oct. 2, 2015) (staying the case because of an ongoing state administrative hearing). Appellants viewed AASE as a group comparable to Williamson Strong and became concerned that the Registry could also fine AASE for engaging in the aforementioned political activities without first registering as a political campaign committee and complying with applicable rules and regulations.²

Appellants sued the officials of the Registry—Appellees Kent Coleman, Henry Fincher, Patricia Heim, Tom Lawless, Norma Lester, and Tom Morton—in their official capacities under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming that the Act violates their First Amendment rights of free speech and association and their Fourteenth Amendment rights of equal protection and due process. Appellants sought both declaratory and injunctive relief. After full briefing and oral argument, the district court stayed the case pending the outcome of the state administrative proceedings in the Williamson Strong case,³ and opining as well that the Act's application represented an unclear question of state law that, once interpreted by state courts, could eliminate the potential First and Fourteenth Amendment violations. Appellants filed a motion to alter the judgment, which the district court denied. Appellants timely appealed both orders, arguing that the district court's decision to abstain was error and that the district court should have granted their motion for a preliminary injunction.

II. DISCUSSION

A. Standard of Review

We have appellate jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 to consider the district court's order because orders of abstention are considered final judgments. Moses H. Cone Mem'l Hosp. v. Mercury Constr. Corp. , 460 U.S. 1, 9, 103 S.Ct. 927, 74 L.Ed.2d 765 (1983) ; Idlewild Liquor Corp. v. Epstein , 370 U.S. 713, 82 S.Ct. 1294, 8 L.Ed.2d 794 (1962). We review de novo a district court's decision to abstain from exercising jurisdiction that has otherwise been properly invoked. Rouse v. DaimlerChrysler Corp. , 300 F.3d 711, 715 (6th Cir. 2002).

B. Standing

The Registry argues that Appellants lack standing to bring either an as-applied or a facial (i.e. , "overbreadth") challenge, and that the district court therefore did not have jurisdiction to hear the case. We disagree. First, Appellants can bring this claim on behalf of AASE. The Supreme Court has held that in "overbreadth" challenges, "[l]itigants ... are permitted to challenge a statute not because their own rights of free expression are violated, but because of a judicial prediction or assumption that the statute's very existence may cause others not before the court to refrain from constitutionally protected speech or expression." Sec'y of State of Md. v. Joseph H. Munson Co. , 467 U.S. 947, 956–57, 104 S.Ct. 2839, 81 L.Ed.2d 786 (1984) (quoting Broadrick v. Oklahoma , 413 U.S. 601, 612, 93 S.Ct. 2908, 37 L.Ed.2d 830 (1973) ); Speet v. Schuette , 726 F.3d 867, 872–74 (6th Cir. 2013). Second, regarding as-applied challenges, the Supreme Court has repeatedly held that individuals or groups need not wait to be prosecuted for the exercise of First Amendment rights before they can bring a lawsuit, provided there is a "claim of specific present objective harm or a threat of specific future harm." Laird v. Tatum , 408 U.S. 1, 13–14, 92 S.Ct. 2318, 33 L.Ed.2d 154 (1972) ; see also Virginia v. Am. Booksellers Ass'n , 484 U.S. 383, 392–93, 108 S.Ct. 636, 98 L.Ed.2d 782 (1988) ; Platt v. Bd. of Comm'rs on Grievances & Discipline of the Ohio Supreme Court , 769 F.3d 447, 451–52 (6th Cir. 2014). Here, Appellants have done more than merely allege a potential chilling effect of the law. They have not only refrained from making independent political expenditures through AASE, but they have also raised the specter of fines and registration requirements, citing the ongoing Williamson Strong case, in which the Registry stipulated that Williamson Strong is an unincorporated association for the purpose of the Tennessee Financial Disclosure Act.

Based on the allegations in the Complaint and the aforementioned stipulation in Williamson Strong , we are satisfied that Appellants meet both the constitutional requirements for standing, see Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife , 504 U.S. 555, 560–61, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992), and the somewhat relaxed prudential standing requirements for First Amendment challenges. See Am. Booksellers , 484 U.S. at 392, 108 S.Ct. 636 ; Prime Media, Inc. v. City of Brentwood , 485 F.3d 343, 350 (6th Cir. 2007).

C. Pullman Abstention

"The doctrine of abstention, under which a [d]istrict [c]ourt may decline to exercise or postpone the exercise of its jurisdiction, is an extraordinary and narrow exception to the duty of a [d]istrict [c]ourt to adjudicate a controversy properly before it." Cty. of Allegheny v. Frank Mashuda Co. , 360 U.S. 185, 188, 79 S.Ct. 1060, 3 L.Ed.2d 1163 (1959) ; see also Colo. River Water Conservation Dist. v. United States , 424 U.S. 800, 817, 96 S.Ct. 1236, 47 L.Ed.2d 483 (1976) (describing the "virtually unflagging obligation of the federal courts to exercise the jurisdiction given them"). One exception to this general rule is based on the avoidance of "needless friction with state policies," and "a premature constitutional adjudication." R.R. Comm'n of Tex. v. Pullman Co. , 312 U.S. 496, 500, 61 S.Ct. 643, 85 L.Ed. 971 (1941). Pullman abstention, as this exception has come to be called, does not "involve the abdication of federal jurisdiction, but only the postponement of its exercise," Harrison v. NAACP , 360 U.S. 167, 177, 79 S.Ct. 1025, 3 L.Ed.2d 1152 (1959), which differentiates it from other forms of federal judicial abstention. E.g., Younger v. Harris , 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L.Ed.2d 669 (1971).

In Pullman , the Supreme Court "held that federal courts should abstain from decision when difficult and unsettled questions of state law must be resolved before a substantial federal constitutional question can be decided." Haw. Hous. Auth. v. Midkiff , 467 U.S. 229, 236, 104 S.Ct. 2321, 81 L.Ed.2d 186 (1984). Thus the primary scenario for a...