U.S. v. City of Jackson, Miss.
| Decision Date | 25 September 1975 |
| Docket Number | AFL-CIO,Nos. 74-2660,74-2867,s. 74-2660 |
| Citation | 519 F.2d 1147 |
| Parties | 13 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 1137, 10 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 10,405 UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. The CITY OF JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI, et al., etc., Defendants-Appellees, Lushes Walker and Local Union 1888, etc., Movants-Appellants. LOCAL UNION 1888 OF the AMERICAN FEDERATION OF STATE, COUNTY AND MUNICIPAL EMPLOYEES,, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The CITY OF JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI, et al., Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
Danny E. Cupit, Dixon L. Pyles, Jackson, Miss., for Lucas Walker and Local Union 1888.
Robert E. Hauberg, U. S. Atty., L. A. Smith, III, Asst. U. S. Atty., Jackson, Miss., David L. Rose, Michael A. Middleton, Attys., U. S. Dept. of Justice, Washington, D. C., for the U. S.
John E. Stone, City Atty., City of Jackson, Thomas H. Watkins, Lawrence J. Franck, Rhesa H. Barksdale, Jackson, Miss., for City of Jackson.
Appeals from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi.
Before GIBSON, * THORNBERRY and AINSWORTH, Circuit Judges.
In these consolidated appeals, a union local whose members are black employees of the City of Jackson, Mississippi, and several of the union's individual members raise procedural questions arising out of actions by them and by the United States to remedy alleged racial discrimination in employment by the city. Although the appellants and the government have shared this general aim, their efforts have been neither closely coordinated nor aimed at identical remedial objectives and, in No. 74-2660, appellants claim that the government's settlement of its suit with the city will so impair their efforts to obtain the relief due their class that they should be allowed to intervene in the suit. In No. 74-2867, appellants seek in another action against the city to imply from the trial court's failure to rule on their motion for a preliminary injunction a denial of the motion, and ask that we reverse the denial. We dismiss both appeals.
In 1971, appellants filed a class action against the City of Jackson attacking its employment practices under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (1970). By the summer of 1973, Jackson found its policies under fire not only in this action, but in an additional action by appellants under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act 1 and in two other private actions 2 as well. During the summer, the Justice Department also entered the picture by initiating an investigation into Jackson's employment practices to determine whether a "pattern or practice" 3 of discrimination existed.
By December, the Justice Department had satisfied itself that the city had engaged in illegal practices and invited both the private plaintiffs and the city to enter settlement discussions. Several months of negotiations bore fruit; on Friday, March 21, 1974, the United States filed suit against the City of Jackson and on the following Monday a consent decree was approved by the court. The decree provided for wide-ranging injunctive relief 4 and for back pay to incumbent and former black employees in the amount of $50 per person per year of seniority up to a maximum of $1,000 per person.
Had all parties been fully satisfied by the decree, 5 these appeals would not be before us. But although generally content with the injunctive relief, appellants deemed the back pay provision seriously inadequate and sought to intervene in the government action in order to block the decree on the day of its approval. The trial court's denial of that motion is appealed in No. 74-2660.
Neither did the course of its original class action please appellants. After extensive discovery, they moved for partial summary judgment or, in the alternative, a preliminary injunction against the city. Because the court deemed in camera inspection 6 of civil service tests necessary for determination of the issue, it reserved ruling on the motion until it could rule on the tests' validity. Although the tests were submitted to the court on July 9, 1973, no ruling had been made by June 25, 1974, the date the appeal in No. 74-2867 was initiated.
Although the trial court in the government action denied both intervention as of right and permissive intervention, appellants assert only the former ruling as error on appeal. The text, then, is Rule 24(a)(2) 7 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which allows intervention of right
when the applicant claims an interest relating to the property or transaction which is the subject matter of the action and he is so situated that the disposition of the action may as a practical matter impair or impede his ability to protect that interest, unless the applicant's interest is adequately represented by existing parties.
Since all parties agree that appellants have the requisite interest for intervention and because the question of adequacy of representation requires an answer only if we find that denial of intervention "may as a practical matter impair or impede" plaintiffs in protecting their interests, the inquiry quickly focuses on that requirement.
The present language of Rule 24, a product of the 1966 Amendments to the Federal Rules, was intended to overcome what was felt to be an overly restrictive attitude toward intervention on the part of the courts. In place of the judicially developed requirement that there be a potential res judicata or collateral estoppel effect on the movant, the amendments sought to substitute a more flexible, non-technical standard of "practical impairment" and to synchronize Rule 24 with the standards for joinder in Rule 19 and the class action provisions of Rule 23. See generally Advisory Committee Note to Rule 24, 39 F.R.D. 69, 109-11 (1966); Atlantis Development Corp. v. United States, 379 F.2d 818 (5 Cir. 1967).
As is often the case, gains in flexibility as a result of the new Rule have been offset to some extent by judicial uncertainity and inconsistency; the issue of "practical impairment" is necessarily one of degree and cannot be solved by reference to Rules 19 or 23. It requires instead a consideration of the competing interests of the plaintiff and defendant in conducting and concluding their lawsuit without undue complication and of the public in the speedy and economical resolution of legal controversies. Nevertheless, the courts have generally responded as the Advisory Committee hoped, allowing intervention in some cases because of the potential effects of stare decisis, e. g., Atlantis Development Corp. v. United States, supra ; Nuesse v. Camp, 128 U.S.App.D.C. 172, 385 F.2d 694 (1967), of prospective inability to obtain in personam jurisdiction over a party to the action in which intervention is sought, Diaz v. Southern Drilling Corp., 427 F.2d 1118 (5 Cir.), cert. denied sub nom. Trefina, A. G. v. United States, 400 U.S. 878, 91 S.Ct. 118, 27 L.Ed.2d 115 (1970), or of the absence of an alternative forum, United States v. Reserve Mining Co., 56 F.R.D. 408 (D.Minn.1972). But unless the present Rule 24 is to fall prey to the rigidity which resulted in the amendment of its pre-1966 counterpart, we cannot regard any of these circumstances as an automatic occasion for intervention. Our decision can only be made with reference to the facts and procedural posture of this case. See United States v. Allegheny-Ludlum Industries, Inc., 517 F.2d 826, at 841 (5 Cir. 1975).
The consent decree approved by the court in this action provides comprehensive injunctive relief, with which appellants have no major objections, and back pay according to a formula based on seniority. By its terms, no present or former city employee is required to accept the proffered back pay; if he deems the award insufficient, he remains free to refuse it and bring suit to establish his entitlement to a greater amount. Only if the employee signs a rather extensive and specific waiver and accepts back pay under the consent decree is he barred from further litigation of its adequacy.
The argument chiefly relied on by appellants is that the consent decree's back pay provisions will be given stare decisis effect by courts adjudicating later claims of employees who do not accept back pay under the decree. Thus, even though non-waiving employees will remain free to pursue their individual claims, Rodriguez v. East Texas Motor Freight, 505 F.2d 40, 65 (5 Cir. 1974); Williamson v. Bethlehem Steel Corp., 468 F.2d 1201 (2 Cir. 1972), cert. denied, 411 U.S. 931, 93 S.Ct. 1893, 36 L.Ed.2d 390 (1973), it is contended that the provisions of the consent decree will be given such judicial deference as to practically impair the vindication of those claims. This argument gives insufficient consideration, we believe, both to the significant differences between a consent decree and a litigated judgment on the merits and to the good sense of the federal trial bench.
A consent decree is in many respects a contract between the parties thereto. See United States v. ITT Continental Baking Co., 420 U.S. 223, 236-37, 95 S.Ct. 926, 934-35 & n. 10, 43 L.Ed.2d 148 (1975); Craft v. Burrow, 228 Miss. 664, 89 So.2d 722 (Miss.1956). Although the court must approve a consent decree, in so doing it does not inquire into the precise legal rights of the respective parties, Florida Trailer & Equipment Co. v. Deal, 284 F.2d 567, 571 (5 Cir. 1960), but only assures itself that there has been valid consent by the concerned parties and that the terms of the decree are not unlawful, unreasonable, or inequitable. United States v. Allegheny-Ludlum Industries, Inc., supra at 849; Young v. Katz, 447 F.2d 431 (5 Cir. 1971); 30A C.J.S. § 678 Equity. This is not, of course, to imply that the consent decree is a legal entity of somehow lower stature. It is a highly useful tool for government agencies, since it maximizes the effectiveness of limited law enforcement resources; 8 by reaching agreement with private p...
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