REVISED, July 16, 1998
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
_______________
No. 97-30323
_______________
VIRGIE LEE VALLEY, et al.,
Plaintiffs,
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Intervenor-
Plaintiff-Appellee,
VERSUS
RAPIDES PARISH SCHOOL BOARD,
Defendant-Appellee,
RICHARD P. IEYOUB,
Attorney General of the State of Louisiana,
Appellant.
_________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Louisiana
_________________________
June 26, 1998
Before WISDOM, SMITH, and DeMOSS, Circuit Judges.
JERRY E. SMITH, Circuit Judge:
The Attorney General of Louisiana appeals a judgment striking
a state constitutional amendment and invalidating implementing
legislation designed to divide the Rapides Parish School District
into two districts. Finding this case not ripe for review, we
vacate and remand.
I.
A.
The Rapides Parish School Board (“RPSB”) operated a
constitutionally impermissible dual school systemSSone for whites
and one for non-whitesSSat the time of Brown v. Board of Educ.,
347 U.S. 483 (1954) (Brown I). In light of Brown and its
progenySSwhich directed that schools be desegregated “with all
deliberate speed,” Brown v. Board of Educ., 349 U.S. 294, 301
(1955) (Brown II)SSblack children in 1965 filed suit against the
RPSB, seeking desegregation.
In the intervening thirty-three years, the district court has
imposed successive plans to achieve integration. None apparently
has achieved unitary status or has brought the district court to
the point of relinquishing its remedial powers over the RPSB.1
At first, the district court settled upon a “free choice” plan
that removed the barriers for blacks to go to white schools and
vice versa, but stopped short of forced integration. When the
1
The district court recently extended its order through the 2005-06 school
year.
2
Supreme Court struck down a similar program in Green v. County
Sch. Bd., 391 U.S. 430 (1968), this court directed the district
court to be more aggressive in achieving integration, using the
Green factors. That was in 1969. See generally Valley v. Rapides
Parish Sch. Bd. (“Valley I”), 646 F.2d 925, 929-30 (describing the
history of the litigation), modified, 653 F.2d 941 (5th Cir. Unit A
May 1981).
Since that time, the district court has given careful
attention to the racial ratios of the students, faculty, and
administrators in each school. The program continues to this day
and involves extensive busing and other means to achieve racial
parity. The district court remains active in redrawing the lines
of attendance at schoolsSSat regular intervalsSSin order to maintain
racial balance and in managing other aspects of running the RPSB.
At issue in this case are Wards 9, 10, and 11 of Rapides
Parish (the “northern wards”), all north of the Red River. These
wards are primarily white, while the remaining wardsSSlocated in
the city of Alexandria, south of the riverSSare more racially
mixed. The northern wards areSSand have beenSSpart of the RPSB.
Throughout the litigation, the district court has made a
continuing effort to maintain racial balance in the city schools of
Alexandria. Accordingly, the court has ordered the RPSB to bus
white students from these suburbs to the city and to do the
opposite with non-white students from the city. The district court
3
has been hindered in its quest for racial balance, however, by
increases in white flight and in black enrollment.
In 1995, the state legislature approved a ballot measure to
change the state constitution to form a separate school district in
the northern wards and to allow it to elect its own school board.
The measure was approved by state voters and proclaimed part of the
state constitution by the governor in November 1995. See LA. CONST.
art. VIII, § 13(D), and advisory notes.
Contemporaneously, the legislature passed enabling
legislationSSAct 973SSto provide, among other things, for the
drawing of election districts for the members of the new district’s
board. See LA. REV. STAT. ANN. § 17:62. Assuming the Justice
Department’s approval of the voting districts under the Voting
Rights Act, the election for the initial board members is to take
place with the congressional elections in November 1998. See id.
§ 17:62(C).
B.
The RPSB filed the instant declaratory judgment actionSSas
part of its ongoing school desegregation litigationSSin October
1996, praying for a declaration that Act 973 is unconstitutional as
applied to the RPSB because it interferes with the RPSB's ability
to conform to the desegregation order. See Valley v. Rapides
Parish Sch. Bd., 960 F. Supp. 96, 97 (W.D. La. 1997). At the
4
district court’s request, the RPSB served notice on the state
attorney general, who is the officer statutorily obliged to defend
the state’s laws.
The attorney general filed a response opposing the declaratory
judgment but did not have the opportunity to introduce evidence in
support of the law.2 Instead, he argued that a declaratory
judgment was improper because the claim is not ripe for review.
Even if it were ripe, he reasoned, the law does not unconstitution-
ally infringe on the district court’s remedial authority.
The district court found that there was a ripe case or
controversy needed to sustain a declaratory judgment action,
because the school district faced substantial uncertainty and
expense if subjected to the possibility of adhering to two
conflicting obligationsSSone imposed by the state constitution and
the other by the federal court. See id. at 98. Reaching the
merits, the court relied on the fact that without the northern
wards, there would be fewer white children in the remaining school
district. The resulting RPSB would become slightly more black than
white, while the new district would be overwhelmingly white.3 The
court held that because of this change in racial balance, Act 973
impermissibly infringes on its remedial powers and thus offends the
2
The district court did not hold an evidentiary hearing before it entered
its order.
3
The students residing in the remaining RPSB would be 60% black and 40%
white, while those residing in the new district would be 87% white and 13% black.
5
federal Constitution. See id. at 100-01.
The state appeals this adverse judgment. The RPSB, and the
United States as plaintiff-intervenor, argue for affirmance.4
II.
A.
Ripeness concerns subject matter jurisdiction, so we consider
it de novo.5 Subject-matter jurisdiction can be raised at any
time, even sua sponte. See, e.g., Marathon Oil Co. v. Ruhrgas,
1998 U.S. App. LEXIS 13358, at *12 (5th Cir. June 22, 1998)
(en banc).
B.
With any declaratory judgment action, there is a concern that
the legal issues will not be sufficiently developed for the court
to make a decision on the merits. Instead, the court may face a
set of facts so contingent on other events that a decision would
constitute no more than an advisory opinion on an abstract legal
4
Not participating in the appeal are the original minority plaintiffsSSthe
parties ostensibly sued by the school district in its declaratory judgment
action. The real adverse parties appear to be the proposed new school district
and the state.
5
See Powder River Basin Resource Council v. Babbitt, 54 F.3d 1477, 1483 (10th
Cir. 1995); Felmeister v. Office of Attorney Ethics, 856 F.2d 529, 535 n.8 (3d Cir.
1988). A decision to stay a declaratory judgment proceeding when there is a
parallel state court proceeding is reviewed for abuse of discretion. See Wilton v.
Seven Falls Co., 515 U.S. 277, 282-83 (1995). We decline to adopt the appellants'
suggestion that Wilton addresses the district court’s finding of Article III
subject-matter jurisdiction under the ripeness doctrine.
6
dispute. Accordingly, before addressing the merits of the case,
courts must be vigilant, in declaratory judgment suits, to make
certain the action is ripe for review.
1.
“Ripeness is a function of an issue’s fitness for judicial
resolution as well as the hardship imposed on the parties by
delaying court consideration.”6 Thus, in considering a declaratory
judgment action’s ripeness for review, we address both a
constitutional requirement and prudential concerns. The Supreme
Court most recently has reminded us of the importance of these
considerations. See Texas v. United States, 118 S. Ct. 1256, 1259-
60 (1998); accord National Treasury Employees Union v. United
States, 101 F.3d 1423, 1427 (D.C. Cir. 1996) (“NTEU”).
a.
A federal court must find that Article III standing
requirements are met. These include (1) “injury in factSSan
invasion of a legally protected interest which is (a) concrete and
particularized and (b) actual or imminent, not conjectural or
hypothetical”; (2) causation, meaning that the injury is “fairly
traceable to the challenged action of the defendant”; and (3)
6
Jobs, Training & Servs., Inc. v. East Tex. Council of Gov’ts, 50 F.3d 1318,
1325 (5th Cir. 1995); see, e.g., Abbott Lab. v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 136, 149 (1967).
7
redressability, meaning that “it must be likely, as opposed to
merely speculative, that the injury will be redressed by a
favorable decision.” Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555,
560-61 (1992) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted); see
NTEU, 101 F.3d at 1427. The standing component that deals
directly with ripeness is the requirement of “imminence.” In a
declaratory action, the threatened injury must be “sufficiently
'imminent' to establish standing.” NTEU, 101 F.3d at 1428.
b.
Once the constitutional showing has been made, a court must
satisfy prudential concerns by balancing the need to expend its
resources on a case it may never need to decide against the expense
and hardship to the parties of having a delayed adjudication. The
court must make sure that a sufficient factual basis, and necessity
on the part of the parties, exist to justify the expenditure of
judicial resources. “Prudentially, the ripeness doctrine exists to
prevent the courts from wasting our resources by prematurely
entangling ourselves in abstract disagreements . . . .” Id. at
1431.7 These prudential concerns ensure that changing hypothetical
circumstances or lack of party interest does not make resolution of
7
See also Ohio Forestry Ass'n, Inc. v. Sierra Club, 118 S. Ct. 1665, 1670
(1998) (“[T]he ripeness requirement is designed 'to prevent the courts, through
avoidance of premature adjudication, from entangling themselves in abstract
disagreements . . . .'”) (quoting Abbott Lab., 387 U.S. at 148-49).
8
the legal issues unnecessary. “Article III courts should not make
decisions unless they have to.” Id.
2.
a.
This case is not ripe for adjudication, because it fails to
satisfy the Article III “case or controversy” requirement. Under
the Article III analysis, there is no imminent threat of harm to
the RPSB or to the desegregation decrees. As the district court
found, there is a potential threat of harm. RPSB could be
subjected to conflicting obligations of the federal court and the
state constitution. The harm’s probability of occurrence, however,
is sufficiently remoteSSgiven the myriad of contingencies necessary
for it to developSSthat it fails to constitute the immediate harm
necessary for Article III justiciability.
In order for the RPSB to face an imminent risk of violation of
the desegregation order, too many contingencies would have to
occur. There would have to be a new district in the northern wards
with a proposed plan that would unconstitutionally interfere with
the court’s remedial authority. For that to occur, there would
have to be a proposed plan about how the new district would operate
in relation to the RPSB. For that to occur, there would have to be
an election of a new board. And for that to occur, there would
have to be Justice Department preclearance of the new voting
9
districts. Because any one of these numerous links may not come to
be, the string of contingencies is too tenuous to support
ripeness.8
b.
Even if these contingencies were to constitute an imminent
injury, prudential concerns strongly dictate against the district
court’s conclusion that this case is ripe for adjudication, for
there is a substantial possibility that the actions of the new
board will not violate the court’s orders. For example, the new
board could adopt an inter-district busing and teacher reassignment
plan with the RPSB to comply with the remedial order. Such a plan
likely would moot the controversy.
Essentially, the threat of noncompliance with the court's
orders will not occur unless the new board seeks to become
operational under Act 973 and then decides to take actions that,
under the existing caselaw,9 would unconstitutionally interfere
8
See Texas v. United States, 118 S. Ct. at 1259 (“A claim is not ripe for
adjudication if it rests upon “'contingent future events that may not occur as
anticipated, or indeed may not occur at all.'”) (quoting Thomas v. Union Carbide
Agric. Prods. Co., 473 U.S. 568, 581 (1985)). The existence of a law is not, by
itself, necessarily sufficient to establish imminent injury. See, e.g., United
Pub. Workers v. Mitchell, 330 U.S. 75, 90 (1947) (“A hypothetical threat is not
enough.”); id. at 91 (“No threat of interference by the Commission with rights
of these appellants appears beyond that implied in the existence of the law and
the regulations.”) (citation omitted).
9
The Supreme Court addressed the constitutionality of “splinter school
districts” in United States v. Scotland Neck City Bd. of Educ., 407 U.S. 484, 490
(1972), and Wright v. Council of the City of Emporia, 407 U.S. 451, 464-66
(1972), and this circuit thoroughly considered the issues in Ross v. Houston
(continued...)
10
with the orders. Although the RPSB need not wait until an actual
disruption occurs in order to seek declaratory and injunctive
relief, it should wait at least until there is a concrete threat.
Here, that would mean that it must defer at least until the new
board is in place and develops a plan for how it proposes to run
the new district.
Also important is the need to conserve judicial resources. As
we have said, this dispute may end up being entirely academic, as
no one can know what a not-yet-elected board will do. The RPSB and
the United States have imputed to this yet-to-exist body its worst-
case parade of horribles. Both have assumed that the new district
will do everything it can to thwart the district court’s remedia-
tion of the past de jure segregated school system. From the
record, there is no basis for that fear. The ripeness balance
therefore weighs in favor of waiting to address this controversy.
Our ripeness holding is underscored by our holding in Ross v.
Houston Indep. Sch. Dist., 577 F.2d 937, 944-45 (5th Cir. 1977)
(per curiam). There, we made plain the proof needed by the
proponent of the splinter district:
WISD [the new school district] must, at the outset,
establish what its operations will be. It cannot meet
this requirement by simply reasserting the admission
previously filed; rather, WISD must express its precise
policy positions on each significant facet of school
district operation. For example, it should state how it
9
(...continued)
Indep. Sch. Dist., 559 F.2d 937, 943-44 (5th Cir. 1977) (per curiam).
11
plans to work with HISD regarding interdistrict pupil
assignments, including transportation; curriculum
composition and control; teacher employment, discharge,
assignment and transfer; financing and taxation; school
building construction, utilization and closing
procedures; special district-wide efforts such as the
magnet school program; administration; and any other
areas of public school operations or support which the
district court may specify as pertinent to the
accomplishment of its underlying desegregation order.
Even after this definitive statement has been made, the
burden remains on WISD to establish that its
implementation and operation will meet the tests outlined
for permitting newly created districts to come into being
for parts of districts already under an ongoing court
desegregation order.
Id. (citation omitted). Given the facts of the instant case, as
now developed, the stateSSand more importantly, the new
boardSSshould have an opportunity to offer such proof.
Finally, there are fairness concerns. The stateSSwhich has
the burden of proving its own law’s constitutionality10SShas had no
reasonable opportunity to meet its burden, as most of the
information it would have to present for this purpose simply does
not exist.
The real adverse party in interest is the yet-to-be-formed
school board. Its actionsSSor inactionsSSare fundamental to a
determination whether the RPSB has an injury of which to complain.
We should not allow the forfeiture of its possible interests
10
In most civil litigation, the burden of proof is on the party seeking
to invoke the court’s remedial authority. Therefore, the failure to introduce
evidence necessary to meet the legal standard would be grounds to dismiss for
failure to state a claim. School desegregation cases, however, are an exception.
The party seeking to escape from the court’s remedial authority bears the burden
of proving that its actions are not intended to re-establish de jure segregation.
See Freeman v. Pitts, 503 U.S. 467, 494 (1992).
12
without the presentation of a defense.
III.
If and when this case becomes ripe for reviewSSand if and when
the parties thereafter decide to reassert a request for reliefSSthe
district court should apply the legal test outlined in Wright v.
Council of the City of Emporia, 407 U.S. 451, 464-66 (1972), and
elucidated in Ross. Necessarily, the district court would have to
hold an evidentiary hearing or otherwise provide an avenue for the
parties to introduce evidence.11
The judgment is VACATED, and this matter is REMANDED for
further proceedings in accordance with this opinion.
ENDRECORD
11
From Ross, the district court should realize that consideration of all
the factors of the Wright test is necessary to inform the use of its remedial
discretion when deciding whether to invalidate the instant state constitutional
amendment and its implementing legislation. See Ross, 559 F.2d at 944 (“The
right of WISD to implement and operate a new and separate school district partly
within the geographic confines of HISD has never been tested by the criteria
established in these precedents. We remand the case so that the district court
can make the required assay.”).
13
WISDOM, Senior Circuit Judge, dissenting:
I respectfully dissent.
This case is so bursting with over-ripeness that it emits an
unpleasant odor.
Should this case be sent back to the district court, the
district judge will find again the controlling fact already well
known to the district judge, a life-long Alexandrian and a federal
district judge since his appointment in October 1970. The
controlling fact, well known to Louisiana and to this Court, is
that the area covered by the ninth, tenth, and eleventh wards of
the eleven wards in Rapides Parish is clearly defined as the
predominantly white section of Alexandria. It is admittedly
eighty-seven per cent white, and may be more. The proposed
majority opinion is, therefore, a blatant attempt to establish a
special public school district for whites in a limited area known
as the white section of Alexandria.
The notion expressed in the first sentence of the proposed
majority opinion that the enabling legislation was “designed to
divide the Rapides Parish School District into two districts”, is
indeed an admission of the fact that the plan is an attempt to
establish de jure segregation in Alexandria public schools -- at
least for the time it will take to overcome stalling and for the
case to be decided en banc or for it to reach the United States
Supreme Court.
14
The enabling legislation is directly contrary to Brown,12 Brown
II,13 and to Bolling v. Sharpe,14 and to the spirit of numerous
decisions of this Court.
The time to stop it is now.15
It is incredible that half a century after Brown, one should
have to ask for an en banc judgment to prevent the establishment of
a school for whites in a public school system. That is necessary
in this case where ripeness “is a cape for unauthorized appellate
12
347 U.S. 483 (1954).
13
349 U.S. 294 (1955).
14
347 U.S. 497 (1954).
15
The majority is willing to accept Wright v. City of
Emporia, 407 U.S. 451 (1972). Fine. The true “test” from Wright
and the similar case of United States v. Scotland Neck City B. Of
Educ.,407 U.S. 484, 490 (1972), is “whether [the splinter district
plan] hinders or furthers the process of desegregation. If the
proposal would impede the dismantling of a dual system, then a
district court, in the exercise of its remedial discretion, may
enjoin it from being carried out”. Ross v. Houston Ind. School Dist.,
559 F.2d 937, 943 (5th Cir. 1977).
Wright, like the Rapides case, involved a school district
under court order to dismantle a dual educational system. 407 U.S.
at 455-9. The Wright court’s chief concern with the creation of a
splinter school district was that the division would impede the
efforts to dismantle the dual system. The court held that “a new
school district may not be created where its effect would be to
impede the process of dismantling the dual system.” Id. at 470.
This point is important. The obvious effect of the plan to divide
the Rapides Parish School District is the creation of a
predominately white school district north of the Red River and a
predominately black school district south of the Red River. There
is no justification for considering the current plan two or three
years down the road, thanks to the appellate process. The court
must now consider the racial makeup of the new district.
15
rule making”.16 Here, however, the cape has rubbed hard against the
rock of controlling fact. The cape is in tatters.
The majority’s opinion, not the first submitted on the
immediate issue, impels an en banc proceeding.
16
Marathon Oil Corp. V. Ruhrgas, No. 96-20361 (5th Cir. 1998)
(en banc) (Higginbotham, J., dissenting).
16