Wagner v. Taylor
| Decision Date | 24 December 1987 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-2252,83-2252 |
| Citation | 836 F.2d 578 |
| Parties | 45 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 1199, 45 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 37,631, 266 U.S.App.D.C. 414, 9 Fed.R.Serv.3d 1055 Charles E. WAGNER, For Himself and Others Similarly Situated, Appellant, v. Reese H. TAYLOR, Jr., Chairman, Interstate Commerce Commission. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit |
Charles E. Wagner, pro se.
Patricia J. Kenney, Asst. U.S. Atty., with whom Joseph E. diGenova, U.S. Atty., Royce C. Lamberth and R. Craig Lawrence, Asst. U.S. Attys. and Craig M. Keats, Atty., Interstate Commerce Commission, were on the brief, for appellees.
Before ROBINSON and STARR, Circuit Judges, and BRYANT, * Senior District Judge.
Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge ROBINSON.
On this appeal--his second 1--Wagner complains of the District Court's denial of his motion seeking a preliminary injunction restraining his employer, the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC), from alleged discrimination against its black professional, administrative, and technical employees graded GS-9 and above. 2 This disposition was predicated upon a simultaneous ruling, which Wagner also challenges, rejecting his motion for certification of those employees as a class on whose behalf permanent injunctive relief of that type could be sought. 3 For the reasons articulated herein, we affirm.
Since the proceedings in the District Court will be examined in detail as further discussion warrants, an overview suffices here. Wagner is a black ICC employee in the senior executive service. 4 Originally hired by ICC as a senior trial attorney in 1978, he left after approximately eighteen months to work elsewhere, but was rehired by ICC in August, 1980, as Deputy Director for Enforcement in the agency's Office of Compliance and Consumer Assistance. 5
Wagner has encountered a number of problems at ICC which he attributes to racial discrimination. During the course of this litigation, he has alleged that when he was first hired he was not allowed to select certain subordinates; 6 that later he was not permitted to exert the powers of his office to discipline a white employee; 7 that he was investigated on an anonymous informant's false charge of bribery; 8 that he was not promoted when he might otherwise have been; 9 that he has been unfairly rated; 10 and that his supervisory authority has been undermined. 11 Wagner has also charged more broadly that he has suffered from a general pattern and practice of racial discrimination at ICC. 12
These claims--individual to Wagner--have not been developed before the District Court. 13 His initial pleading in the case, denominated a "class action complaint," 14 cited instances of alleged discrimination against Wagner, 15 but its averments were primarily of ICC's treatment of its black employees as a group, 16 and it requested declaratory and injunctive relief on behalf of the class rather than for Wagner alone. 17 Wagner moved for class certification shortly after his suit was brought. 18
Wagner's complaint and his motion for class certification alleged widespread discrimination against black workers at ICC--in hiring, promotion, and other terms and conditions of employment--in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. 19 Wagner asked for certification of a plaintiff class composed of all black professional, technical and administrative employees in positions graded GS-9 and above, and all black applicants for those positions. 20 After completion of discovery, Wagner supplemented his class-certification motion with a citation of discrimination complaints filed in ICC's equal employment office and with statistics on black representation in the upper echelons of the agency. 21
While the District Court was considering the request for class certification, ICC discharged Thomas Wilson, a black GS-12 contract specialist within the class that Wagner hoped to represent. 22 Wagner then moved for a preliminary injunction 23 charging that he was fired because of his complaints to ICC of racial discrimination. 24 Wagner sought an order reinstating Wilson, enjoining ICC from reprisals against Wagner and other potential class members, and affording relief insuring an environment free from reprisal. 25 ICC opposed the motion, asserting that Wagner had no standing to represent Wilson, 26 and that in any event Wilson had not been discharged improperly. 27
The District Court issued two separate orders. One denied Wagner's motion for certification and ordered that the action proceed solely on Wagner's individual claims. 28 Accompanying this order was a memorandum explaining the basis for the court's action. 29 The second order rejected the motion for preliminary injunction on the ground that Wagner, in consequence of the first order, had no standing to seek relief on behalf of the class. 30
Wagner has appealed from both orders. 31 ICC argues that we have no jurisdiction to consider the issue on class certification, 32 and urges affirmance of the ruling on the sought-after injunction. 33
We must, at the outset, determine whether we have power to consider the District Court's disposition of Wagner's motion for class certification. We hold that we do, for review of the court's refusal of the preliminary injunction--a review we clearly are authorized to conduct--requires us to first ascertain whether Wagner's suit can proceed as a class action rather than simply on an individual basis.
Federal appellate jurisdiction vis-a-vis district courts extends primarily to "final decisions" of those courts. 34 But Congress has ordained exceptions to this proposition, premised on the need of litigants "to effectually challenge interlocutory orders of serious, perhaps irreparable, consequence." 35 Since the statutory exception relevant here--Section 1292(a)(1)--specifically confers jurisdiction upon the courts of appeals to review interlocutory orders refusing injunctions, 36 our authority to examine the District Court's rejection of Wagner's motion for preliminary injunctive relief cannot be doubted. 37
What remains in dispute, then, is whether we may also consider the court's denial of class certification. 38 The Supreme Court has made clear that an order withholding class certification, standing alone, is not appealable. 39 The Court, however, expressly left open the question whether a concomitant withholding of both class certification and preliminary injunctive relief provides a foundation for an immediate appeal, 40 and the issue has not heretofore been precisely resolved in this circuit. We are faced with the need to do so now, and in evaluating the relevant caselaw, we are mindful of the Court's admonition that Section 1292(a) must be "approach[ed] ... somewhat gingerly lest a floodgate be opened that brings into the exception many pretrial orders." 41
We cautioned, however, that decision of other aspects of the case must be restricted to those "closely related" to the subject of the interlocutory appeal authorized. 46
Other circuits have echoed the view that the reviewing court may address issues that are "inextricably intertwined" 47 or "substantially interdependent" 48 with an appealable interlocutory order. 49 Some of the circuits have held specifically that a denial of class certification may be investigated on an appeal from action taken on a motion for a preliminary injunction; 50 and that, we think, is as it should be. Indeed, when the availability of provisional relief is as tightly interwoven into the fabric of class certification as it is in the case at bar, a narrower construction of Section 1292(a)(1) would impinge upon the congressionally conferred right to an interlocutory appeal from the refusal of an injunction. 51
We believe, then, that we have both the power and the duty to review the District Court's class-certification order as well as its order on the motion for a preliminary injunction. That court expressly rejected the motion solely "in light of" its contemporaneous denial of class certification. 52 Without review of the determination on class certification, effective review of the order on the injunction request would be seriously impaired. We have, then, a matter--class certification--"inextricably bound up with the remedial decision" 53--the ruling on preliminary injunctive relief--which is properly before us under Section 1292(a)(1). We turn accordingly to an examination of the District Court's action on Wagner's motion for class certification.
A. General Considerations
Without a doubt, the District Court is "uniquely well situated" to make rulings on the propriety of class certification. 54 Nonetheless, it remains our responsibility to review those rulings carefully and to rectify any erroneous...
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...Wood Prods. , 979 S.W.2d 84 (Tex. App.—Beaumont 1998, pet. granted), aff’d , 18 S.W.3d 202 (Tex. 2000), §30:11.B.1 Wagner v. Taylor , 836 F.2d 578, 595 (D.C. Cir. 1987), §37:3.D.1.b.(5) Wagner v. Texas A&M Univ. , 939 F. Supp. 1297 (S.D. Tex. 1996), §34:2 Walch v. Intecom, Inc. , No. CA 3-9......
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