Struck v. Cook County Public Guardian
| Decision Date | 26 November 2007 |
| Docket Number | No. 07-2420.,07-2420. |
| Citation | 508 F.3d 858 |
| Parties | James T. STRUCK, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. COOK COUNTY PUBLIC GUARDIAN, Defendant-Appellee. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit |
James T. Struck, Chicago, IL, pro se.
Before POSNER, WOOD, and SYKES, Circuit Judges.
The plaintiff appeals from the dismissal of his suit, which the district court held was outside its jurisdiction. The complaint alleged that an Illinois state court had appointed a guardian for the plaintiff's mother because she was incompetent to manage her own affairs, and that the plaintiff had asked the court to revoke the guardianship because the guardian was abusing his mother, refusing to let him visit her, and denying him access to her records, mail, and assets. Turned down by the state court, he brought this suit in federal district court against the Cook County Public Guardian, the public official who had designated the guardian of the plaintiff's mother. The suit charges violations of both the plaintiff's and his mother's federal constitutional rights.
The plaintiff is not his mother's guardian and therefore is not authorized to sue on her behalf; and to the extent that he is seeking appellate review in a federal district court (or in this court) of the decision by the Illinois state court, his suit is barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine. But his complaint, though none too clear (he does not have a lawyer), appears also to be claiming misconduct by the guardian that continued after the judgment in the plaintiff's unsuccessful state court suit.
And the plaintiff does have a claim on his own behalf—that the guardian is preventing him from seeing his mother and by doing so is depriving him of liberty protected by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, liberty that he argues includes the right of an adult child to associate with his parent. Whether the argument has merit has split the circuits, as explained in Robertson v. Hecksel, 420 F.3d 1254, 1258-60 (11th Cir.2005), but remains an open question in this circuit. Jones v. Brennan, 465 F.3d 304, 308 (7th Cir.2006); Russ v. Watts, 414 F.3d 783, 790 (7th Cir.2005). We need not try to answer it in this case. For the preliminary question is whether the suit is barred by the doctrine that excepts from federal jurisdiction certain probate and domestic-relations cases, such as will contests, custody battles, and suits for divorce; and we think it is barred.
The exception is usually described as two exceptions, one for probate and one for domestic relations. But the two exceptions are materially identical. The fact that they are two rather than one reflects nothing more profound than the legal profession's delight in multiplying entities.
In Jones v. Brennan, supra, 465 F.3d at 306-07, we pointed out that the exception originally was thought compelled by the phrase "judicial Power of the United States," in Article III of the Constitution. The federal judiciary was modeled on the three British royal courts at Westminster, and in Britain in the eighteenth century most domestic-relations and probate matters were consigned to other courts. But the modern understanding is that the exception, except insofar as it bars the federal courts from entertaining nonadversary proceedings, such as the uncontested appointment of a guardian or the uncontested probate of a will, which are not cases or controversies within the meaning of Article III, is based on a pragmatic interpretation of the statutes that give the federal courts jurisdiction over cases at law and in equity (the current term, covering both, is "civil actions," e.g., 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331, 1332). Such terms need not be interpreted to embrace all domestic-relations and probate matters, even if they are real cases. Typical adversary proceedings involving domestic relations or probate, such as child-custody proceedings and proceedings to resolve disputes over the administration of a decedent's estate (or as in this case and in Jones the estate of a living person who is incompetent to manage his affairs), are, like the nonadversary...
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