Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Ass'n of U.S., Inc. v. O'Neill

• Decision Date: 31 March 1987
• Docket Number: No. 12985,12985
• Citation: 523 A.2d 486,203 Conn. 63
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: MOTOR VEHICLE MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION OF the UNITED STATES, INC. et al. v. William A. O'NEILL, et al.

Page 486

523 A.2d 486

203 Conn. 63

MOTOR VEHICLE MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION OF the UNITED STATES, INC. et al. v. William A. O'NEILL, et al.

No. 12985.

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Argued Feb. 10, 1987.

Decided March 31, 1987.

Mark R. Kravitz, with whom were Michael K. Brown, New Haven, and, on brief, William H. Crabtree, Detroit, Mich., Jane Lightfoot Wilson and Charles H. Lockwood II, Arlington, Va., for plaintiffs.

Robert M. Langer, Asst. Atty. Gen., with whom were Garry Desjardins, Asst. Atty. Gen., and, on brief, Joseph I. Lieberman, Atty. Gen., and Janet A. Spaulding and William M. Rubenstein, Asst. Attys. Gen., for defendants.

John J. Woodcock III, South Windsor, pro se, as intervening defendant.

Before PETERS, C.J., and SHEA, SANTANIELLO, JACOBSON and FRANCIS X. HENNESSY, JJ.

PETERS, Chief Justice.

This case comes to us, by way of reservation, as a multifaceted challenge to the constitutional and statutory validity of legislation colloquially known as Lemon Law II that establishes arbitration panels for the settlement of disputes between consumers and manufacturers of new motor vehicles. The plaintiffs, Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Association of the United States, Inc. and a number of individual motor vehicle manufacturers and importers, ¹ brought an action in six counts ² seeking declaratory and injunctive relief from Public Acts 1984, No. 84-338, codified as General Statutes §§ 42-181 through 42-184, both in its initial form and as amended in 1985. The complaint named as defendants the governor, William A. O'Neill, and other governmental officials and agencies charged with enforcing the act. ³ State Representative John J. Woodcock III, a legislative sponsor of Lemon Law II, was permitted to intervene as a party defendant. At the joint request of all the parties, the trial court, Satter, J., granted a motion for reservation upon stipulated facts to have this court resolve nine questions of law about the validity of the statutes in question. ⁴ Because we conclude that the questions were improvidently reserved, we remand the case for trial.

All of the plaintiff manufacturers and importers extend express written warranties to the retail purchasers of their cars. Although these warranties vary in scope and in duration, they all conform to the same general pattern. For new vehicles, and/or selected components, the warrantors promise to pay for repair or replacement of defective factory materials or workmanship during a stipulated warranty period. The warranty period ranges from a minimum of twelve months or 12,000 miles (whichever occurs first) to a maximum of five years or 50,000 miles. The warranty may also contain a provision for a deductible.

Informal dispute resolution mechanisms to resolve consumer complaints about consumer products received federal encouragement in 1975, when Congress enacted the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act. Pub.L. No. 93-637, title I, 15 U.S.C. § 2301 et seq., and especially § 2310(a). The federal trade commission has adopted standards for the operation of informal dispute settlement mechanisms. 16 C.F.R. § 703 et seq. In response, the plaintiffs Chrysler Corporation and Ford Motor Company have established their own informal dispute settlement mechanisms for the settlement of disputes with consumers regarding applicable warranties, among other matters. In addition, the Council of Better Business Bureaus, Inc., administers an "Auto Line" dispute settlement mechanism which fourteen other manufacturers offer to consumers.

In 1982, the Connecticut legislature enacted Public Acts 1982, No. 82-287 (Lemon Law I). That act is codified as General Statutes § 42-179. ⁵ For consumer buyers of new motor vehicles, the act provides supplemental remedies of repair, replacement and refund to facilitate the enforcement of express warranties made by the manufacturers of such vehicles. These supplemental remedies come into play whenever a manufacturer or authorized dealer, after a reasonable number of repair attempts, is unable substantially to conform a new vehicle to the terms of the express warranty. The validity of Lemon Law I is not an issue in the present litigation.

In 1984, the legislature enacted Public Acts 1984, No. 84-338 (Lemon Law II), now codified as General Statutes §§ 42-181 through 42-184. The purpose of Lemon Law II is to provide, for consumer purchasers of new motor vehicles, an alternative to civil litigation. The key provision is § 42-181, ⁶ which authorizes the department of consumer protection to establish "an independent arbitration procedure for the settlement of disputes between consumers and manufacturers of motor vehicles which do not conform to all applicable warranties under the terms of section 42-179." Whether to invoke arbitration under the act is a decision for the consumer: only the consumer may initiate arbitration proceedings, and the consumer may decide whether to accept the decision of the arbitration panel. General Statutes § 42-181(b), (c). Once a consumer has brought a grievance to the statutory arbitration panel, the manufacturer must cooperate, in good faith, with all aspects of the arbitration procedure. General Statutes §§ 42-181(b), (c); 42-184. The department of consumer protection has promulgated the necessary regulations, effective December 18, 1984, to create the automobile dispute settlement panels mandated by Lemon Law II. Regs.Conn.State Agencies § 42-1-181 et seq.

The legislature amended both Lemon Law I and Lemon Law II in 1985, when it enacted Public Acts 1985, No. 85-331, codified as General Statutes § 42-179a and as amendments to §§ 42-179, 42-181, 42-182 and 42-185. The amendments, in addition to making a number of procedural changes, empowered the attorney general to certify a manufacturer's informal dispute settlement mechanism as complying with 16 C.F.R. § 703 et seq., thus avoiding the state's arbitration panels under Lemon Law II. To date, no manufacturer has obtained such certification. A report of the attorney general that has been made an exhibit criticizes existing private programs for, inter alia, their "exclusion of consequential damages" from the arbitration process.

The state has begun to implement and enforce Lemon Law II according to its terms. Arbitration panels have heard and resolved numerous consumer complaints pursuant to the applicable statutory and regulatory provisions. Examination of the available documentation concerning the decisions of the arbitration panels, contained in exhibit M, indicates that these arbitration proceedings appear to have been conducted and concluded, in large part, without their participants having raised any of the questions of constitutional validity and statutory conflict that the present plaintiffs are pursuing in this case.

With respect to each of the fourteen exhibits that accompany the stipulation, ⁷ each party has reserved the right to challenge the relevancy of its contents to the issues raised by the reservation. The plaintiffs, furthermore, "expressly do not stipulate to the truth or accuracy of any of the information or statements contained in Exhibits A through N." In effect, therefore, the stipulation furnishes us with no binding particulars about the nature of the consumer disputes whose arbitrability these plaintiffs resist, or about the arbitral remedies previously sought or awarded.

The stipulation as a whole, therefore, is simply a request for advice about the facial validity of Lemon Law II. The reserved questions raise a number of serious issues about the validity of Lemon Law II under the federal and state constitutions, as well as a possible statutory conflict between Lemon Law II and the Uniform Administrative Procedure Act. General Statutes § 4-166 et seq.

The propriety of a reservation which seeks an adjudication of constitutional questions in a factual vacuum is always doubtful. Only recently, this court reviewed at length the discretionary prudential concerns which generally counsel against such an undertaking. State v. Zach, 198 Conn. 168, 176-78, 502 A.2d 896 (1985), and cases there cited; see also J. Nowak, R. Rotunda & J. Young, Constitutional Law (2d Ed.1983) pp. 72-74; L. Tribe, American Constitutional Law (1978) § 3-13. A party mounting a constitutional challenge to the validity of a statute must provide an adequate factual record in order to meet its burden of demonstrating the statute's adverse impact on some protected interest of its own, in its own particular case, and not merely under some hypothetical set of facts as yet unproven. Whether a case comes to us by way of reservation or after a final judgment, the rule is the same. We do not give advisory opinions, nor do we sit as roving commissions assigned to pass judgment on the validity of legislative enactments. "Determination of the scope and constitutionality of legislation in advance of its immediate adverse effect in the context of a concrete case involves too remote and abstract an inquiry for the proper exercise of the judicial function." International Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's Union, Local 37 v. Boyd, 347 U.S. 222, 224, 74 S.Ct. 447, 448, 98 L.Ed. 650 (1954). In the absence of weighty countervailing circumstances, facial invalidation of a statute is improvident. Brockett v. Spokane Arcades, Inc., 472 U.S. 491, 501-502, 105 S.Ct. 2794, 2800-2801, 86 L.Ed.2d 394 (1985).

Without an adequate factual record, the issues concerning the constitutional validity of Lemon Law II are not ripe for review. The problem we face is illustrated by the parties' conflicting positions about the first issue that has been reserved to us: does Lemon Law II violate the portion of article first, § 19, of the Connecticut constitution, as amended, which provides that "the right of trial by jury shall remain inviolate"?

The basic principles that govern the scope of article first, § 19, are well established. The right to a jury trial is measured by a historical test. "[A]s to c...