Miller v. Anckaitis

• Decision Date: 07 December 1970
• Docket Number: No. 18379.,18379.
• Citation: 436 F.2d 115
• Parties: Charles F. MILLER v. Victor W. ANCKAITIS, Secretary of Transportation of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and Frank McCormick, Supervisor Financial Responsibility Division Bureau of Traffic Safety of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

436 F.2d 115 (1970)

Charles F. MILLER v. Victor W. ANCKAITIS, Secretary of Transportation of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and Frank McCormick, Supervisor Financial Responsibility Division Bureau of Traffic Safety of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Appellants.

No. 18379.

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Argued April 20, 1970.

Reargued October 13, 1970.

Decided December 7, 1970.

Robert Baer Cohen, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Philadelphia, Pa., William C. Sennett, Atty. Gen., Harrisburg, Pa., for appellants.

David H. Kubert, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellee.

Before GANEY, VAN DUSEN and GIBBONS, Circuit Judges.

Before HASTIE, Chief Judge, and GANEY, FREEDMAN, SEITZ, VAN DUSEN, ALDISERT, ADAMS and GIBBONS, Circuit Judges.

Argued April 20, 1970

Before GANEY, VAN DUSEN and GIBBONS, Circuit Judges.

Reargued Oct. 13, 1970

Before HASTIE, Chief Judge, and GANEY, FREEDMAN, SEITZ, VAN DUSEN, ALDISERT, ADAMS and GIBBONS, Circuit Judges.

OPINION OF THE COURT

GIBBONS, Circuit Judge.

In May of 1962 a judgment was entered in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against plaintiff Miller, based on his vicarious liability for the negligent driving of his truck by a sub-agent, whom his truck driver had permitted to drive. The accident took place in Maryland, and the judgment was in favor of a Maryland plaintiff. Because that judgment remained unsatisfied for sixty days, Pennsylvania suspended Miller's motor vehicle operator's license and his owner's registration. On June 10, 1963, he received a discharge in bankruptcy from the vicarious tort liability. On June 19, 1963, he requested the Secretary of Revenue of the Commonwealth to revoke the suspensions. The secretary declined. Miller then commenced this suit to enjoin the enforcement, as to him, of the Pennsylvania statute which provides for suspension of operator's license and owner's registration of persons against whom a motor vehicle accident judgment remains unsatisfied. He contends that the last paragraph of § 1414 of the Pennsylvania Motor Vehicle Safety Responsibility Provisions, Pa.Stat.Ann. Tit. 75, § 1414 (1960), is unconstitutional. That section provides:

A discharge in bankruptcy following the rendering of any such judgment shall not relieve the judgment debtor from any of the requirements of this article.

It must be read in conjunction with § 1413 of the same statute which makes consent of the judgment creditor a necessary condition to restoration of license privileges. His suit presents the issue whether under the supremacy clause or the due process or equal protection clauses a state can impose, as a pre-condition to the right to own or to drive a motor vehicle, the satisfaction of a private debt, resulting from remote vicarious tort liability, that has been discharged in bankruptcy.

Miller, and the district judge to whom the case was assigned, requested a three-judge court. 28 U.S.C. §§ 2281, 2284. In December, 1964, Chief Judge Biggs declined to convene such a court on the ground that the complaint failed to allege a substantial federal question. Miller v. Smith, 236 F.Supp. 927 (E.D. Pa.1965). In October, 1965, the Supreme Court denied Miller's motion for leave to file a petition for a writ of mandamus challenging Judge Biggs' ruling. The case then proceeded to hearing before a single district judge, who on October 2, 1969 ordered that the Commonwealth authorities revoke their suspension of Miller's operator's license and owner's registration. This appeal followed.

When Mr. Miller undertook his quest for the right to use a car to earn a living, it was clear that only a three-judge court could enjoin enforcement of an unconstitutional statute on supremacy grounds. Kesler v. Department of Public Safety, 369 U.S. 153, 82 S.Ct. 807, 7 L.Ed.2d 641 (1962). Justice Warren dissented from that rule. Kesler v. Department of Public Safety, supra at 175, 82 S.Ct. 807. His view is now the law. A single district judge can issue or refuse to issue an injunction on supremacy grounds. Swift & Co. v. Wickham, 382 U.S. 111, 86 S.Ct. 258, 15 L.Ed.2d 194 (1965). The District Court reached its decision on Fourteenth Amendment grounds. Those grounds would still require a three-judge court and a direct appeal to the Supreme Court. But where, as here, the same facts, which are not in dispute, can support a decision on supremacy grounds we have jurisdiction to affirm.

The Commonwealth contends that Chief Judge Biggs' opinion in Miller v. Smith, supra has already decided the supremacy issue unfavorably to Miller. But whatever is the role of a Chief Judge of a circuit in considering whether or not to convene a three-judge court, it is clear that he could not make any decision on the merits on any issue. His opinion that the supremacy contention was frivolous because of the decision in Kesler v. Department of Public Safety, supra, that of a judge acting in the performance of a limited judicial function, is not controlling.

If Kesler v. Department of Public Safety, supra, and Reitz v. Mealey, 314 U.S. 33, 62 S.Ct. 24, 86 L.Ed. 21 (1941), relied upon in Kesler, were directly in point, we would be obligated to apply them to this case, whatever doubts we might have about their soundness. However, in the present distinguishable situation, we will not extend their holdings and thereby without sound reason further erode the healing remedy afforded by § 17 of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U. S.C. § 35 (Supp. V, 1970).

Both Reitz and Kesler involved drivers of motor vehicles. In Reitz, the Supreme Court upheld the validity of § 94-b of the Vehicle and Traffic Law of New York, as applied to a negligent driver. That statute imposed a three-year suspension on a driver who has had an accident in respect of which a judgment convicted him of negligence unless he furnished proof of ability to satisfy the judgment. Justice Roberts for the Court wrote:

If the statute went no further, we are clear that it would constitute a valid exercise of the State\'s police power not inconsistent with § 17 of the Bankruptcy Act. The penalty which § 94-b imposes for injury due to careless driving is not for the protection of the creditor merely, but to enforce a public policy that irresponsible drivers shall not, with impunity, be allowed to injure their fellows. The scheme of the legislation would be frustrated if the reckless driver were permitted to escape its provisions by the simple expedient of voluntary bankruptcy, and, accordingly, the legislature declared that a discharge in bankruptcy should not interfere with the operation of the statute. Such legislation is not in derogation of the Bankruptcy Act. Rather it is an enforcement of permissible state policy touching highway safety. Reitz v. Mealey, supra at 37, 62 S.Ct. at 27.

The Court expressly abstained from considering the further question whether an amendment to that statute, which put it in the power of the creditor to end the suspension by later exacting payment, was in conflict with § 17 of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U.S.C. § 35 (Supp. V, 1970). Justice Douglas dissented, saying:

Under the New York scheme a creditor whose claim has been discharged still holds a club over his debtor\'s head. The state has given him a remedy which survives bankruptcy. If the bankrupt refuses to pay his discharged debt, the creditor will see to it that his driver\'s license is suspended. If, however, the bankrupt will pay up, the creditor will refrain.

The practical pressures of this collection device are apparent. Where retention of the operator\'s license is essential to livelihood, as here alleged, the bankrupt is at the creditor\'s mercy.

Bankruptcy is not then the sanctuary for hapless debtors which Congress intended. The bankrupt, instead of receiving by virtue of his discharge "a new opportunity in life and a clear field for future effort, unhampered by the pressure and discouragement of preexisting debt" (Local Loan Co. v. Hunt, 292 U.S. 234, 244, 54 S.Ct. 695, 699, 78 L.Ed. 1230, 93 A.L.R. 195) finds himself still entangled with a former creditor.

In practical effect the bankrupt may be in as bad, or even worse, a position than if the state had made it possible for a creditor to attach his future wages. Such a device would clearly contravene the Bankruptcy Act. Local Loan Co. v. Hunt, supra. The present one likewise runs afoul of the Act. Reitz v. Mealey, supra, at 41-42, 62 S.Ct. at 29.

Justice Douglas is quite obviously correct that the result of the New York statute (as well as the Pennsylvania statute before us and all the other motor vehicle financial responsibility statutes) is to put in the hands of a judgment creditor a club to enforce payment of reparations for a tort claim.

Kesler brought before the Supreme Court the question reserved in Reitz. In the opinion of the Court, Justice Frankfurter made an exhaustive study of the legislative history of motor vehicle responsibility laws. He did not discuss, however, the legislative history of § 17 of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U.S.C. § 35 (Supp. V, 1970) though that history would have afforded a helpful guide to the decision of a supremacy question. Justice Frankfurter explained Reitz v. Mealey, supra, as the upholding of the "police power" of a state "exerted for the protection of life and limb." Kesler v. Department of Public Safety, supra, 369 U.S. at 172, 82 S.Ct. at 819. That is, indeed, what Justice Roberts said. It was once argued (and is occasionally still) that a statute making automobile liability insurance compulsory has an adverse impact on safe driving by relieving tortfeasors of the consequences of their negligence. But any driver knows that neither type of statute bears any meaningful relationship to his driving habits or the protection of life and limb. Both are devices adopted to spread the risk of the statistically predictable and inevitable number of injuries resulting from motor vehicle operation.

Even accepting the fiction that, as...