Estados Unidos Mexicanos v. Decoster

• Decision Date: 06 September 2000
• Docket Number: No. 99-2170,99-2170
• Citation: 229 F.3d 332
• Parties: (1st Cir. 2000) ESTADOS UNIDOS MEXICANOS, PLAINTIFF, APPELLANT, LUIS RAMIREZ, ET AL., PLAINTIFFS, v. AUSTIN J. DECOSTER, D/B/A/ DECOSTER EGG FARM, D/B/A/ AUSTIN J. DECOSTER CO.; QUALITY EGG OF NEW ENGLAND, LLC; MAINE AG, LLC, DEFENDANTS, APPELLEES, MAINE CONTRACT FARMING, LLC, ET AL., DEFENDANTS. Heard
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

Page 332

229 F.3d 332 (1st Cir. 2000)

ESTADOS UNIDOS MEXICANOS, PLAINTIFF, APPELLANT, LUIS RAMIREZ, ET AL., PLAINTIFFS, v. AUSTIN J. DECOSTER, D/B/A/ DECOSTER EGG FARM, D/B/A/ AUSTIN J. DECOSTER CO.; QUALITY EGG OF NEW ENGLAND, LLC; MAINE AG, LLC, DEFENDANTS, APPELLEES, MAINE CONTRACT FARMING, LLC, ET AL., DEFENDANTS.

No. 99-2170

United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit

Heard September 6, 2000

Decided October 11, 2000

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF MAINE. Hon. D. Brock Hornby, U.S. District Judge.

Karen Frink Wolf, with whom Harold J. Friedman, Sally A. Morris, and Friedman Babcock & Gaythwaite were on brief, for appellant Estados Unidos Mexicanos.

Rita H. Logan, with whom Timothy J. O'Brien, William C. Knowles, and Verrill & Dana Llp were on brief, for appellee Austin J. DeCoster, d/b/a/ DeCoster Egg Farm, d/b/a/ Austin J. DeCoster Co.

Thomas H. Somers, with whom Michael E. Cassidy and Hoff, Curtis, Pacht, Cassidy & Frame, P.C. were on brief, for appellees Quality Egg of New England, Llc and Maine Ag, LLC.

Herman Schwartz and Bruce Goldstein on brief for amicus curiae Farmworker Justice Fund, Inc.

Michael E. Malamut on brief for amicus curiae New England Legal Foundation.

Before Boudin, Circuit Judge, Bownes, Senior Circuit Judge, and Lynch, Circuit Judge.

Lynch, Circuit Judge.

Claims of deplorable working and living conditions for migrant workers at DeCoster Egg Farms, a large Maine employer, were made in a civil rights action filed in May of 1998. The thrust of the complaint was that workers of Mexican descent, be they American or Mexican citizens, were treated harshly because of their Mexican background, and that white, non-Mexican workers fared better. The primary cause of action asserted violations of the workers' civil rights under 42 U.S.C. § 1981. The complaint also asserted other claims, including claims of unsafe and unsanitary housing under the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act, 29 U.S.C. § 1801 et seq. The complaint was filed by fourteen individuals, who proposed to represent a class of "all former and current migrant farm workers of Mexican race and descent" employed by Austin J. DeCoster and DeCoster Egg Farm.¹

The other plaintiff was the Government of Mexico, the Estados Unidos Mexicanos, which said it was appearing in its parens patriae capacity to protect its citizens and its own quasi-sovereign interests. It is unusual for a foreign nation to claim standing under the parens patriae doctrine; more common is the appearance of other nations in suits to protect their own distinct interests or as amicus curiae in actions that may affect them. See, e.g., National Foreign Trade Council v. Natsios, 181 F.3d 38 (1st Cir. 1999), aff'd sub nom. Crosby v. National Foreign Trade Council, 120 S. Ct. 2288 (2000); United States v. Nippon Paper Indus. Co., 109 F.3d 1 (1st Cir. 1997), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 1044 (1998). Neither the Supreme Court nor this court has addressed the question of whether the parens patriae doctrine may be so employed by a foreign nation. The district court dismissed Mexico as a plaintiff for lack of standing. See Estados Unidos Mexicanos v. DeCoster, 59 F. Supp. 2d 120, 123-25 (D. Me. 1999). At Mexico's request, final judgment was entered as to this issue while the underlying action of the fourteen individual plaintiffs proceeded.² We review the determination of lack of standing de novo, see, e.g., Serpa Corp. v. McWane, Inc., 199 F.3d 6, 9 (1st Cir. 1999), and affirm the dismissal of Mexico as a party to this action.

The Doctrine of Parens Patriae

"Parens patriae means literally 'parent of the country.'" Alfred L. Snapp & Son, Inc. v. Puerto Rico, 458 U.S. 592, 600 (1982). The doctrine has developed as to States of the United States. It creates an exception to normal rules of standing applied to private citizens in recognition of the special role that a State plays in pursuing its quasi-sovereign interests in "the well-being of its populace." Id. at 602; see also Georgia v. Tennessee Copper Co., 206 U.S. 230, 237 (1907) (a State "has an interest independent of and behind the titles of its citizens, in all the earth and air within its domain").³ It is a judicially created exception that has been narrowly construed. The most complete explanation of the parens patriae doctrine in its modern incarnation,⁴ as applied to the States of this country, appears in the Supreme Court's opinion in Snapp:

In order to maintain [a parens patriae] action, the State must articulate an interest apart from the interests of particular private parties, i.e., the State must be more than a nominal party. The State must express a quasi-sovereign interest. Although the articulation of such interests is a matter for case-by-case development -- neither an exhaustive formal definition nor a definitive list of qualifying interests can be presented in the abstract -- certain characteristics of such interests are so far evident. These characteristics fall into two general categories. First, a State has a quasi-sovereign interest in the health and well-being -- both physical and economic -- of its residents in general. Second, a State has a quasi-sovereign interest in not being discriminatorily denied its rightful status within the federal system.

458 U.S. at 607. Mexico stakes its claim in our case on this first type of quasi-sovereign interest, i.e., its interest in the general health and well-being of workers of Mexican descent employed by defendants. We do not reach the issue of whether there is a quasi-sovereign interest here, but simply assume that Mexico has interests apart from those of the individual plaintiffs and is more than a nominal party.

The question here presented is whether a foreign nation which asserts only quasi-sovereign interests and not its own proprietary or sovereign interests should be afforded standing as parens patriae. We consider this to be a question of prudential standing, and not an Article III question. See, e.g., Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 471 (1982). Our answer is that parens patriae standing should not be recognized in a foreign nation unless there is a clear indication of intent to grant such standing expressed by the Supreme Court or by the two coordinate branches of government. See, e.g., Trafficante v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., 409 U.S. 205, 209 (1972) (finding statute clearly granted standing to private plaintiffs asserting housing discrimination claim).

Supreme Court Doctrine

The Supreme Court has never recognized parens patriae standing in a foreign nation where only quasi-sovereign interests are at stake. The justifications offered to support parens patriae standing in the individual States of the Union are not applicable here. Further, several doctrines of judicial restraint counsel against recognition of such standing.

Standing of foreign nations to bring suit in the federal courts has been recognized in cases in which the foreign nation has suffered a direct injury. "There is no question but that foreign States may sue private parties in the federal courts." Principality of Monaco v. Mississippi, 292 U.S. 313, 323 n.2 (1934). That standing has been conditioned on the requirement that the foreign nation satisfy the usual standing requirements imposed on individuals or domestic corporations. The Supreme Court "has long recognized the rule that a foreign nation is generally entitled to prosecute any civil claim in the courts of the United States upon the same basis as a domestic corporation or individual might do." Pfizer, Inc. v. Government of India, 434 U.S. 308, 318-19 (1978). For example, foreign nations may bring treble damages antitrust claims under the Clayton Act to address their direct injuries. Id. at 319.⁵

There is no argument made here that Mexico could meet normal standing requirements applied to individuals or domestic corporations. Indeed, there is some danger that Mexico "advances abstract questions of wide public significance essentially amounting to generalized grievances more appropriately addressed to the representative branches." Benjamin v. Aroostock Med. Ctr., Inc., 57 F.3d 101, 104 (1st Cir. 1995).

Mexico's argument is based on the Supreme Court's recognition of standing in the States of the Union under the parens patriae doctrine. By analogy, Mexico says, it should be treated in like manner. Such an analogy is not implausible; indeed, in granting parens patriae standing to the States, the Supreme Court has analogized the States to foreign nations. See Missouri v. Illinois, 180 U.S. 208, 241 (1901). But the analogy is incomplete, and so the elegant symmetry of Mexico's argument fails.

The primary justification for recognizing parens patriae standing in the States, repeated throughout a century's Supreme Court caselaw, derives from important principles underlying our federal system. First, the States have surrendered certain aspects of their sovereignty to the federal government and, in return, are given recourse to solve their problems with other States. In Missouri v. Illinois, supra, the Court recognized parens patriae standing in the State of Missouri to sue the State of Illinois for sending sewage into the Mississippi River that poisoned its drinking water, endangered the health of its residents, and impaired the commercial value of its towns and cities. See Missouri, 180 U.S. at 241. The Court noted:

If Missouri were an independent and sovereign State all must admit that she could seek a remedy by negotiation, and, that failing, by force. Diplomatic powers and the right to make war having been surrendered to the general government, it was to be expected that upon the latter would be devolved the duty of providing a remedy....

Id. at 241; see generally Ann Woolhandler & Michael G. Collins, State Standing, 81 Va. L. Rev. 387, 446-47 (1995) (around the turn of...