Williams v. U.S. Postal Service

• Decision Date: 03 May 1989
• Docket Number: No. 88-1641,88-1641
• Citation: 873 F.2d 1069
• Parties: 49 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 1220, 50 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 38,994 Shirley WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES POSTAL SERVICE and John K. Wuertz * , Head of the United States Postal Service, Indianapolis, Indiana, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 1069

873 F.2d 1069

49 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. 1220,

50 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 38,994

Shirley WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES POSTAL SERVICE and John K. Wuertz

^*

, Head of the United States Postal

Service, Indianapolis, Indiana,

Defendants-Appellees.

No. 88-1641.

United States Court of Appeals,

Seventh Circuit.

Argued Feb. 28, 1989.

Decided May 3, 1989.

John O. Moss, Moss & Walton, Indianapolis, Ind., for plaintiff-appellant.

Stephen E. Alpern, Jesse L. Butler, Asst. Gen. Counsel, Joan C. Goodrich, Senior Atty., U.S. Postal Service, Office of Labor Law, Washington, D.C., Deborah J. Daniels, U.S. Atty., Indianapolis, Ind., Carolyn N. Small, Asst. U.S. Atty., Farmington Hills, Ind., for defendants-appellees.

Before POSNER, RIPPLE, and MANION, Circuit Judges.

MANION, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff-appellant Shirley Williams brought this employment discrimination action based on Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1973 Rehabilitation Act. The district court granted the defendants' motion to dismiss, holding that Williams failed to name the only proper defendant in the action--the Postmaster General of the United States. The district court also denied Williams' motion to amend her complaint to add the Postmaster General as a defendant. Williams appeals these decisions.

I. FACTS

Williams was discharged from her employment by the United States Postal Service on September 28, 1982. Believing she had been unlawfully discharged based on her race and sex in violation of 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e, et seq., and on the basis of a physical handicap (muscle spasms and back problems) in violation of 29 U.S.C. Sec. 791, she pursued her administrative remedies before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which issued a final decision denying her complaint. Williams received that decision on October 24, 1985, along with notification of her right to sue in federal district court within 30 days. On November 22, 1985, Williams filed this suit under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e and 29 U.S.C. Sec. 791, naming as defendants the United States Postal Service (USPS), and John K. Wuertz, head of the Indianapolis division of the USPS. Her complaint did not name Albert Casey, the Postmaster General. The defendants she did name were served with process on November 27, 1985. Other people were later served as follows: the USPS General Counsel in Washington D.C. on December 9, 1985, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Indiana on February 20, 1986, Albert Casey on February 25, 1986, and the U.S. Attorney General on February 28, 1986. On April 26, 1986, the defendants (USPS and Wuertz) moved to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, or in the alternative for summary judgment, claiming that the court had no jurisdiction because the named defendants were not suable entities under either Title VII or the Rehabilitation Act. Defendants also claimed that Williams failed to name and timely serve the proper defendant, the Postmaster General, and was now prevented from doing so under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e-16(c)'s 30-day statute of limitations. Williams filed her opposition to these motions, as well as a motion under Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a) and 15(c) to amend her complaint to add the Postmaster General as a defendant.

II. DISTRICT COURT DECISION

On March 4, 1988, the district court granted defendants' motion to dismiss, and denied Williams' motion to amend her complaint. Judge Noland held that Williams had failed to comply with the 30-day time limit in 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e-16(c) by not naming the Postmaster General as a defendant within the 30-day period following Williams' receipt of her right to sue letter from the EEOC. ¹ He then addressed the question of whether the addition of the Postmaster General in an amended complaint would relate back to the filing of Williams' original complaint, and thus provide the court with jurisdiction. He held that the amendment would relate back only if the Postmaster General had actual notice of the suit before November 23, 1985, and that because the Postmaster had neither been served personally nor been notified through service on one of the substitute individuals in Rule 15(c), the amendment would not relate back. The judge therefore denied Williams' motion to add the Postmaster General as a defendant, stating that a court need not allow futile or ineffective amendments.

III. ANALYSIS

It is clear that Williams did not name the Postmaster General within the 30-day period as required by 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e-16(c). Had she done so, the court would have had jurisdiction, and Williams' service of process on the Postmaster on February 26, 1986 would have been proper, as it was within the 120 days allowed for such service under Fed.R.Civ.P. 4(j). Because Williams did not name the Postmaster, however, the court could only have had jurisdiction over her action if adding the Postmaster would relate back to the date of her original complaint. Under Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(c), an amendment changing a party will relate back if

[w]ithin the period provided by law for commencing the action against the party to be brought in by amendment that party (1) has received such notice of the institution of the action that the party will not be prejudiced in maintaining his defense on the merits, and (2) knew or should have known that, but for a mistake concerning the identity of the proper party, the action would have been brought against the party.

The delivery or mailing of process to the United States Attorney, or the United States Attorney's designee, or the Attorney General of the United States, or an agency or officer who would have been a proper defendant if named, satisfies the requirement of clauses (1) and (2) hereof with respect to the United States or any agency or officer thereof to be brought into the action as a defendant. (Emphasis added.)

The district court held that this provision was not satisfied.

"We review a district court's ruling on a motion to amend a complaint only to determine whether the judge has abused his discretion." Bohen v. City of East Chicago, 799 F.2d 1180, 1184 (7th Cir.1986) (citing Zenith Radio Corp. v. Hazeltine Research, 401 U.S. 321, 330, 91 S.Ct. 795, 802, 28 L.Ed.2d 77 (1971)); see also Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182, 83 S.Ct. 227, 230, 9 L.Ed.2d 222 (1962); First Wisconsin Financial Corp. v. Yamaguchi, 812 F.2d 370, 373 (7th Cir.1987). ² While our guiding principle is that leave to amend normally should be freely given, this principle is inapplicable where the amendment would prove futile. Foman, 371 U.S. at 182, 83 S.Ct. at 230; Sarfaty v. Nowak, 369 F.2d 256, 259 (7th Cir.1966), cert. denied, 387 U.S. 909, 87 S.Ct. 1691, 18 L.Ed.2d 627 (1967). When an amendment will not cure the legal deficiencies of the original complaint, the district court does not abuse its discretion by refusing to grant leave to amend. Textor v. Board of Regents of Northern Illinois University, 711 F.2d 1387, 1391 (7th Cir.1983); Jafree v. Barber, 689 F.2d 640, 644 (7th Cir.1982). Failure to remedy the jurisdictional defects of a complaint is one example of where an amendment would prove futile. Textor, 711 F.2d at 1391. Thus, if Williams' proposed addition of the Postmaster General as a defendant would not relate back to the November 22, 1985 filing of her complaint, and thus not cure the court's lack of subject matter jurisdiction over that complaint, we must affirm the district court's denial of Williams' motion to amend. We agree with the district court that the amendment did not relate back under Rule 15(c).

The Postmaster General clearly was not personally notified within the 30-day limitations period. ³ Nor is the final paragraph of Rule 15(c) applicable here to constitute notice to the Postmaster. Although the United States Attorney and the Attorney General were eventually served with process, neither was served within the limitations period. Like the Postmaster himself, these individuals would have to have been notified of the action within the limitations period to invoke relation back under Rule 15(c). Carr v. Veterans Administration, 522 F.2d 1355, 1358 (5th Cir.1975). Indeed, no one was served before November 23, 1985, and thus no individual's receipt of service can be considered as a substitute for notice to the Postmaster General within the 30-day limitations period.

Williams argues, however, that the 120 days allowed for service of process under Fed.R.Civ.P. 4(j) applies to extend the statute of limitations because such service is included in the Rule's reference to "the period provided by law for commencing the action." In an opinion that directly governs this case, the Supreme Court explicitly rejected this position. In Schiavone v. Fortune, 477 U.S. 21, 106 S.Ct. 2379, 91 L.Ed.2d 18 (1986), the plaintiff named Fortune Magazine (an internal division of Time, Inc.) as the defendant, when it should have named Time itself. The court did not allow an amendment adding Time as a defendant to relate back, holding that the amendment of a complaint after the expiration of the limitations period does not provide sufficient notice nor come within the "period provided by law for commencing the action." Id. at 30-31, 106 S.Ct. at 2384-2385. It noted that the plain meaning of Rule 15(c), as well as the Advisory Committee's 1966 Note to the Rule, make it clear that phrase means that the party must receive notice within the applicable limitations period.

We are not inclined ... to temper the plain meaning of the language by engrafting upon it an extension of the limitations period equal to the asserted reasonable time, inferred from Rule 4, for the service of a timely filed complaint. Rule 4 deals only with process. Rule 3 concerns the "commencement" of a civil action. Under Rule 15(c), the emphasis is upon "the period provided by law for commencing the action against" the defendant. An action is commenced by the filing of a complaint.

Id. at 30, 106 S.Ct. at 2385.

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