United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 15-1327
ESTHER MERCADO,
Plaintiff, Appellant,
v.
COMMONWEALTH OF PUERTO RICO; SUPREME COURT OF PUERTO RICO;
OFICINA DE ADMINISTRACIÓN DE TRIBUNALES; and ADMINISTRACIÓN DE
SERVICIOS DE SALUD MENTAL Y CONTRA LA ADDICIÓN,
Defendants, Appellees.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO
[Hon. Pedro A. Delgado-Hernández, U.S. District Judge]
Before
Lipez, Hawkins, and Barron,
Circuit Judges.
Juan H. Saavedra Castro for appellant.
Rosa Elena Pérez-Agosto, Assistant Solicitor General, with
whom Margarita Mercado-Echegaray, Solicitor General, was on brief,
for appellees Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Supreme Court of Puerto
Rico, and Oficina de Administración de Tribunales.
Michael Craig McCall, with whom Luis Pabón Roca and Clarisa
Sola Gómez were on brief, for appellee Administración de Servicios
de Salud Mental y Contra La Addición.
Of the Ninth Circuit, sitting by designation.
February 29, 2016
BARRON, Circuit Judge. Esther Mercado sued the
Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and three other Puerto Rico
governmental entities under Title II of the Americans with
Disabilities Act ("ADA"). She alleged that they had denied her
access to public services and discriminated against her because
she was "regarded as" having a physical or mental impairment within
the meaning of the ADA. 42 U.S.C. §§ 12102, 12132. The only
question that we must decide is whether Mercado brought her suit
too late. And the answer to that question turns on whether the
limitations period set forth in 28 U.S.C. § 1658 applies to her
case.
That provision establishes a four-year, "catch-all"
limitations period for statutes that, like the ADA, do not set
forth their own limitations period. But the catch-all period
applies only to actions "arising under" a federal statute enacted
after December 1, 1990, the date on which § 1658 became law. The
parties agree that if that four-year, catch-all limitations period
does apply here, then Mercado's suit was timely filed. Otherwise,
Mercado concedes that Puerto Rico law would supply the limitations
period, that the applicable period under Puerto Rico law would
only be one year, and that her suit would have been filed too late.
The District Court concluded that Mercado's "regarded
as" claims did not "aris[e] under" a federal statute enacted after
December 1, 1990, because the ADA was passed prior to that date.
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Thus, the District Court applied the one-year Puerto Rico statute
of limitations and dismissed her suit as time-barred. We conclude,
however, that § 1658's limitations period does apply here because
Mercado's legal claims were made possible by the 2008 amendments
to the ADA codified in the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 ("the
ADAAA"). We thus reverse the District Court's order of dismissal.
I.
Mercado initially filed her complaint in federal court
on August 14, 2013, before filing an amended complaint on March 1,
2014. [Dkt Nos. 1, 18]. The amended complaint (which we will refer
to as "the complaint" from here on out) names the Commonwealth of
Puerto Rico, the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico, the "Oficina de
Administración de Tribunales," and the "Administración de
Servicios de Salud Mental y Contra la Addición" as defendants.
[Dkt. No. 18].
The complaint alleges that the defendants subjected
Mercado to involuntary institutional confinement by ordering her
committed to a psychiatric hospital without giving her an
opportunity to be heard. [Am. Compl. ¶¶ 4.1-4.4, 5.7]. The
complaint further alleges the defendants violated Title II of the
ADA because, in so confining her, they discriminated against her
and denied public services to her "by reason of her disability."
[Am. Compl. ¶¶ 5.5, 5.7, 5.9, 6.3].
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The complaint sets out what it identifies as three
separate causes of action. The first two are for damages based on
discrimination or denial of public services under Title II of the
ADA. [Am. Compl. ¶¶ 5.1-5.11, 6.1-6.3].1 The last is for an
injunction ordering Puerto Rico to devise a system guaranteeing
counsel, as well as notice and the right to be heard, to any
disabled person who faces involuntary confinement in a psychiatric
hospital. [Am. Compl. ¶¶ 7.1-7.6].
The complaint does not allege that Mercado had a
"disability" in the sense that she had what the ADA refers to as
an "impairment." See 42 U.S.C. §§ 12102(1)(A). Nor does the
complaint allege that she was discriminated against because she
had such an impairment. Instead, the complaint alleges that the
defendants discriminated against Mercado "by reason of" the fact
that she was "regarded as" having a physical or mental impairment
within the meaning of the ADA. See id. §§ 12102(1)(C), 12132.2
In pleading "regarded as" discrimination claims under
the ADA, the complaint alleges that Mercado had a "disability"
1
The complaint also recites, within the two causes of action
for damages, violations of the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process
Clause. But Mercado has not challenged the District Court's
dismissal of her Fourteenth Amendment claims, and so we will not
address that dismissal.
2
The parties do not separately address this request for
injunctive relief in their arguments to us. We thus treat this
request as pleading "regarded as" discrimination, just like the
other two "causes of action" identified in the complaint.
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within the meaning of the ADA "[b]y virtue of the [ADA] Amendments
Act of 2008, and changes in definition of the term
'disability' . . . because defendants regarded [her] as having a
major 'mental impairment.'" [Am. Compl. ¶¶ 4.19, 5.6]. The 2008
amendments altered the ADA by, among other things, stating that
[a]n individual meets the requirement of 'being regarded
as having such an impairment' if the individual
establishes that he or she has been subjected to an
action prohibited under this chapter because of an
actual or perceived physical or mental impairment
whether or not the impairment limits or is perceived to
limit a major life activity.
ADA Amendments Act of 2008, Pub. L. No. 110-325, sec. 4(a), §
3(3)(A), 122 Stat. 3553, 3555 (codified at 42 U.S.C. §
12102(3)(A)).
The defendants moved to dismiss the complaint. They
argued that a one-year statute of limitations applied to Mercado's
claims under Puerto Rico law and that she had not filed within
that period. [Dkts. No. 29, 30]. Mercado opposed the motion.
She did so solely on the ground that her claims' dependence on the
2008 amendments to the ADA made the four-year, "catch-all" period
in § 1658, rather than the one-year limitations period under Puerto
Rico law, applicable to her suit. [Dkt. No. 40 (citing Jones, 541
U.S. at 382)].
The District Court rejected Mercado's argument. The
District Court concluded that her claims "would have been
actionable under the original provisions of the ADA," Mercado v.
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Puerto Rico, 86 F. Supp. 3d 46, 49 (D.P.R. 2015), and thus that
§ 1658's limitations period did not apply. Because the District
Court agreed with the defendants that, under Puerto Rico law, a
one-year statute of limitations applied to Mercado's claims and
that she had not complied with it, the District Court dismissed
her complaint as time-barred. Id. at 49-50.
On appeal, Mercado does not contest the District Court's
ruling that the one-year Puerto Rico statute of limitations would
apply to her suit if the four-year period established by § 1658
does not apply in its stead. Nor does she contest that her suit
was not filed within that one-year time period. Rather, she
challenges only the District Court's determination that § 1658's
four-year limitations period does not apply. And so that is the
only issue that we address.
II.
The question that we must decide is one of statutory
interpretation, for which our review is de novo. Highmark Inc. v.
Allcare Health Mgmt. Sys., Inc., 134 S. Ct. 1744, 1748 (2014).
But the question is not one that we answer on a blank slate.
Rather, in Jones v. R.R. Donnelley & Sons Co., 541 U.S. 369, 382
(2004), the Supreme Court interpreted the meaning of the key phrase
in § 1658: "a civil action arising under an Act of Congress." We
thus begin by describing Jones in more detail. We then explain
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why, in light of Jones, we conclude that the four-year limitations
period set forth in § 1658 applies to Mercado's claims.
A.
In Jones, the Court explained that many federal statutes
do not set forth their own limitations period and that, in
response, courts had developed the "settled practice" of borrowing
state statutes of limitations to fill the "void." Id. at 377.3
Jones recognized, however, that this practice had "generated a
host of issues that required resolution on a statute-by-statute
basis" and, as a result, had "spawned a vast amount of litigation."
Id. at 377-78. For example, Jones noted that in the course of
undertaking such gap filling, courts had confronted a range of
difficult issues. Courts were required to decide, among other
things, from which state the limitations period should be borrowed,
which limitations period should be borrowed from that state, and
whether federal or state law governed certain procedural matters
related to the calculation of that period -- such as "when an
3We have described this practice, which is still used when
§ 1658 does not apply, as one that requires the courts to identify
"the most analogous statute of limitations in the state where the
action was brought." Greenwood ex rel. Estate of Greenwood v.
N.H. Pub. Utils. Comm'n, 527 F.3d 8, 13 (1st Cir. 2008). Mercado
does not challenge the District Court's determination that the
"most analogous" Puerto Rico statute of limitations "is the one-
year term set for tort actions by Article 1868 of the Civil Code,
P.R. Laws Ann. tit. 31 § 5298(1)." See Mercado v. Puerto Rico, 86
F. Supp. 3d 46, 49 (D.P.R. 2015).
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action was 'commenced,' or when service of process had to be
effectuated." Id. at 378-79.
The Court emphasized that Congress was "keenly aware" of
the difficulties federal courts faced in filling the statute-of-
limitations "void." Id. at 380. The Court thus concluded that
the "central purpose" of § 1658, which Congress enacted on December
1, 1990, was to reduce the need for courts to engage in such
litigation-inducing work. Id.
In light of this legislative purpose, the Court
explained that the phrase "a civil action arising under an Act of
Congress" in § 1658 should be interpreted in a manner "that fills
more rather than less of the void that has created so much
unnecessary work for federal judges." Id. The Court thus declined
to construe § 1658's text so narrowly that it would apply only to
claims that are based on "post–1990 statute[s] that establish[] a
new cause of action without reference to preexisting law." Id. at
381 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).
But the Court also agreed that § 1658 should not be
interpreted in a way that "disrupt[ed] the settled expectations"
of litigants. Id. And so the Court rejected a construction of
§ 1658 "under which any new amendment to federal law would suffice
to trigger the 4–year statute of limitations," id. at 382 (emphasis
added), no matter how inconsequential that amendment might be to
the plaintiff's ability to bring the claims at issue.
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Having dispensed with each of these polar-opposite
interpretations of the scope of § 1658, the Court then described
the course that it concluded Congress had actually steered.
According to the Court, an enactment that "creates a new right to
maintain an action" is one under which a civil action may "aris[e]"
within the meaning of § 1658. Id. at 382. And the Court noted
that "Congress routinely creates new rights of action by amending
existing statutes, and altering statutory definitions, or adding
new definitions of terms previously undefined, is a common way of
amending statutes." Id. at 381 (alterations, citations, and
internal quotation marks omitted).
No matter the form an enactment takes, though, the Court
made clear that "[w]hat matters is the substantive effect of an
enactment -- the creation of new rights of action and corresponding
liabilities." Id. Thus, Jones held, a claim that "necessarily
depend[s]" on such an enactment is a claim that "was made possible
by" a post-December 1, 1990 enactment and thus a claim for which
§ 1658 supplies the limitations period. Id. at 382, 384.
The Court explained that it was "not persuaded that any
guess work is required to determine whether the plaintiff has
alleged a violation of the relevant statute as it stood prior to
December 1, 1990, or whether her claims necessarily depend on a
subsequent amendment." Id. at 384 (citations and internal
quotation marks omitted)). The Court did acknowledge that such a
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determination could be "particularly complicated in cases in which
there was a split of authority regarding the scope of the original
statute." Id. at 384 n.18. A case of that type could require a
court "to determine whether the amendment clarified existing law
or created new rights and liabilities." Id. But the Court
concluded that such an analysis was "hardly beyond the judicial
ken." Id. After all, the Court noted, "[c]ourts must answer
precisely the same question when deciding whether an amendment may
be applied retrospectively." Id.
B.
The Jones Court then applied § 1658 to the facts of that
case. The Jones plaintiffs had brought a number of race
discrimination claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1981, which was originally
enacted in 1866. That statute protects, among other things, the
right "to make and enforce contracts" free from discrimination on
the basis of race. Id. at 372 (quoting 42 U.S.C. § 1981).
Section 1981 does not contain its own limitations
period, however, and the two-year state-law limitations period
that would have otherwise applied in Jones had already expired by
the time that the Jones plaintiffs filed suit. Id. The Jones
plaintiffs nonetheless contended that their claims were not time-
barred. Id. The plaintiffs argued that the four-year limitations
period established by § 1658 applied to their claims due to the
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relationship between those claims and the changes that had been
made to Section 1981 after § 1658's enactment. Id. at 372-73.
Specifically, in 1989, the Court had ruled in another
case that § 1981 "did not protect against . . . conduct that
occurred after the formation of the contract." Id. (citing
Patterson v. McLean Credit Union, 491 U.S. 164 (1989)). But, the
plaintiffs noted, in 1991 (and thus after the enactment of § 1658),
Congress amended § 1981 to define the term "make and enforce
contracts" to include the "termination of contracts, and the
enjoyment of all benefits, privileges, terms, and conditions of
the contractual relationship." Id. at 373 (quoting 42 U.S.C. §
1981(b)). As a result, this amendment "enlarged the category of
conduct that is subject to § 1981 liability" to include post-
contract-formation discriminatory conduct like that alleged by the
Jones plaintiffs. Id. at 383 (quoting Rivers v. Roadway Express,
Inc., 511 U.S. 298, 308 (1994)).
In light of this legislative change, the Court concluded
that § 1658 did supply the statute of limitations for the Jones
plaintiffs' claims. The Court explained that their legal claims
"did not allege a violation of the pre–1990 version of § 1981 but
did allege violations of the amended statute." Id. at 383. As a
result, the Court held that the Jones plaintiffs' legal claims
were "made possible by" the 1991 amendment to § 1981, as their
suit to recover for defendants' post-contract-formation conduct
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could succeed only by virtue of that amendment and thus
"necessarily depend[ed]" on it. Id. at 383, 384.
C.
We have had one occasion to construe the scope of § 1658
following Jones. In Millay v. Me. Dep't of Labor, Bureau of
Rehab., Div. for Blind & Visually Impaired, 762 F.3d 152, 155-56
(1st Cir. 2014), we considered whether a statutory amendment
sufficed to trigger the catch-all limitations period set forth in
§ 1658. We concluded that the amendment had a "substantive effect"
that "made possible" the claim at issue because the amendment
permitted expanded possibilities for judicial review of the
administrative action that the plaintiff was challenging. Id.
Of course, an amendment that makes a new avenue of
judicial review available has a "substantive effect" that is
distinct from the liability-enlarging effect of the amendment that
was at issue in Jones. But we nevertheless concluded in Millay
that such an amendment still met the Jones standard of having "made
possible" the claim at issue. Id. at 155.
We explained that, although some courts had previously
allowed similar challenges to the underlying administrative action
"to be enforced through 42 U.S.C. § 1983," the relevant amendments
still "created a new and broader remedy" than the one that had
previously existed. Id. at 156. We thus concluded that the
amendments there at issue (the 1998 amendments to the
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Rehabilitation Act), even if deemed "purely procedural," id.,
"made possible" the plaintiff's claims because they "enabled the
plaintiff to bring the [then-]current proceeding for judicial
review," id. And we explained that this conclusion made sense in
light of the great interpretive weight that must be given to
Congress's clear intention that § 1658 be applied broadly in order
to reduce the need for courts to borrow state limitations periods.
Id. at 157.
III.
In light of Jones, and consistent with our application
of that precedent in Millay, we conclude that § 1658 establishes
the limitations period for Mercado's "regarded as" claims. To
explain why we reach this conclusion, we first describe the
"substantive effect" of the changes that the ADAAA made to the
ADA. We then explain why Mercado's claims "necessarily depend" on
those amendments and thus why we conclude that the ADAAA "made
possible" Mercado's claims. See Jones, 541 U.S. at 382.
A.
A review of the relevant legislative history reveals the
substantive effect of the change made to the ADA by the ADAAA.
When first enacted on July 26, 1990, the ADA defined the term
"disability" with respect to an individual as "(A) a physical or
mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life
activities of such individual; (B) a record of such an impairment;
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or (C) being regarded as having such an impairment." Americans
with Disabilities Act of 1990, Pub. L. No. 101-336, § 3(2), 104
Stat. 327, 329-30 (codified as amended at 42 U.S.C. § 12102(1)).
Years later, however, the Supreme Court narrowly construed the
third prong of that original definition. Sutton v. United Air
Lines, Inc., 527 U.S. 471, 489 (1999). Specifically, the Supreme
Court interpreted that prong to require a plaintiff to plead and
prove that she was regarded as having an impairment that fit the
terms of the first prong -- that is, that she was regarded as
having an impairment that substantially limited one or more major
life activities. Id.
Nearly a decade later, however, Congress passed the
ADAAA. Those 2008 amendments expressly rejected the
interpretation of "regarded as having such an impairment" that the
Court had set forth in Sutton. Pub. L. No. 110-325, sec. 1, §
2(b)(3). In enacting those amendments, Congress changed the
relevant portion of the ADA by adding a new paragraph (3). That
new paragraph defined the scope of the term "being regarded as
having such an impairment," id. sec. 4, § 3(1)(C), as follows:
An individual meets the requirement of 'being regarded
as having such an impairment' if the individual
establishes that he or she has been subjected to an
action prohibited under this Act because of an actual or
perceived physical or mental impairment whether or not
the impairment limits or is perceived to limit a major
life activity.
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Id. sec. 4, § 3(3)(A) (emphasis added).4
Thus, the 2008 amendments codified in the ADAAA made the
ADA's definition of being "regarded as" having an impairment
substantively broader than that definition had been in the period
after Sutton. During that period, a plaintiff could maintain an
ADA claim based on being regarded as having an impairment only if
she pleaded that she was regarded as having a physical or mental
impairment that substantially limited one or more major life
activities. See Sutton, 527 U.S. at 489. After the enactment of
the ADAAA, however, a plaintiff bringing a "regarded as" claim
under the ADA needs to plead and prove only that she was regarded
as having a physical or mental impairment. Such a plaintiff no
longer needs to plead and prove that such impairment substantially
limited one or more major life activities. Pub. L. No. 110-325,
sec. 4, § 3(3)(A). Thus, while the change made to the ADA by the
ADAAA may not be as significant as the change made by the amendment
to section 1981 at issue in Jones, the change is still one that
had a substantive effect. Cf. McCormick v. Miami Univ., 693 F.3d
654, 663 (6th Cir. 2012) (declining to apply § 1658 where the
operative amendments -- the 1992 Amendments to the Rehabilitation
Act -- "essentially changed the nomenclature in [the relevant
4 The ADAAA also amended the third prong of the definition of
disability to read: "being regarded as having such an impairment
(as described in paragraph (3))." Pub. L. No. 110-325, § 3(a).
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section] by replacing the word 'handicap' with the word
'disability.'").
B.
The remaining question is whether Mercado's "regarded
as" claims "necessarily depend" on the substantive effect brought
about by the change that the ADAAA made to the ADA. See Jones,
541 U.S. at 384. We conclude that the claims she brought in her
2014 complaint do "necessarily depend" on that change and thus
that her claims were "made possible" by those 2008 amendments. See
id. at 382.
Mercado's complaint expressly refers to the 2008
amendments in pleading her "regarded as" claims. By "enlarg[ing]
the category of conduct that is subject to [] liability," id. at
383, those amendments permit Mercado to plead and prove one fewer
element of her "regarded as" claims than she would have been
required to plead and prove under the ADA as it existed prior to
those amendments. By virtue of those liability-enlarging
amendments, Mercado need not plead and prove that the defendants
regarded her as having a physical or mental impairment that
substantially limited a major life activity. She need plead and
prove only that the defendants regarded her as having a physical
or mental impairment, no matter the defendants' view of the
magnitude of the effect of the perceived impairment on her life
activities.
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For that reason, Mercado's legal claims "necessarily
depend" on the 2008 amendments. See id. at 384. Accordingly, her
claims "aris[e] under" an Act of Congress passed after December 1,
1990. See 28 U.S.C. § 1658.
C.
The District Court mistakenly concluded otherwise by
holding that the ADAAA merely "clarif[ied]" a pre-existing ADA
right to be protected from "regarded as" discrimination. Mercado,
86 F. Supp. 3d at 49. According to the District Court, this
conclusion followed because it was "apparent" that the "elements"
of the ADA's definition of "disability" were "identical" pre- and
post-amendment by the ADAA. Id. at 49 n.2. Thus, the District
Court ruled that Mercado's claims "would have been actionable under
the original provisions of the ADA." Id. at 49.
But, as we have explained, the ADAAA added a new
paragraph to the ADA that changed the definition of the term
"regarded as having such an impairment." ADA Amendments Act of
2008, Pub. L. No. 110-325, sec. 4, § 3(3)(A). That new paragraph
removed a key element of that definition and thereby broadened the
ADA's substantive scope. Thus, contrary to the District Court's
assertion, the elements of the definition pre- and post-amendment
are not identical. They are instead substantively distinct, with
the consequence that the amended definition creates a broader right
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to be free from "regarded as" discrimination than did the unamended
definition.
To be sure, the preamble to the ADAAA, Pub. L. No. 110-
325, sec. 2, §§ 2(a)(4), 2(b)(1), does state that Congress
originally intended the term "regarded as having such an
impairment" to be read more broadly than the Supreme Court read it
to be in Sutton, 527 U.S. at 489. But, even if that statement can
be said to have characterized the 2008 amendments as having merely
clarified (rather than altered) the original scope of the ADA,
such a legislative statement cannot strip the 2008 amendments of
the "substantive effect" that they undeniably had. The ADAAA
explicitly rejected Sutton. In so doing, the ADAAA quite clearly
broadened the definition of being "regarded as" having an
impairment beyond what it had been under the previously controlling
Supreme Court interpretation of that phrase. Pub. L. No. 110-325,
sec. 2, § 2(b)(3), sec. 4, § 3(3)(A).
Thus, this is not a case in which "there was a split of
authority regarding the scope of the original statute" that would
require us to "determine whether the amendment clarified existing
law or created new rights and liabilities." Jones, 541 U.S. at
385. Rather, this is a case in which the substantive effect of
the amendments in question is clear. Those 2008 amendments
rejected the narrow interpretation of the statute set forth in a
controlling Supreme Court opinion. By doing so, those amendments
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clearly created new rights and liabilities. And because, as we
have explained, Mercado's claims "necessarily depend" on the
expanded liability created by those amendments, her claims are
governed by the catch-all limitations period that § 1658 sets
forth. See Jones, 541 U.S. at 384.
D.
The defendants do make one additional argument against
our conclusion, but we do not find it to be persuasive. The
defendants argue that § 1658's limitations period does not apply
because Mercado's actual complaint alleges that she was regarded
by the defendants as having a "major" mental impairment rather
than a minor one. [Administración Br. 23]. The defendants contend
that this reference to a "major" impairment in her complaint shows
that her complaint alleges facts that would have been sufficient
to state a claim even under the ADA as it stood after Sutton but
before the enactment of the ADAAA. For that reason, the defendants
assert, Mercado's claims do not "necessarily depend" on -- and
thus are not "made possible by" -- the 2008 amendments set forth
in the ADA. Rather, the defendants argue that her complaint -- on
the strength of the factual allegation that she was "regarded as"
having a "major" impairment -- states claims on which relief under
the ADA could have been granted even if the ADAAA had never been
enacted.
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The defendants' contention arguably draws support from
the fact that the Jones plaintiffs' claims of hostile work
environment, wrongful termination, and failure to transfer
"alleged violations of the amended statute" but "did not allege a
violation of the pre-1990 version of section 1981." 541 U.S. at
383 (emphasis added). Here, by contrast, defendants contend that
Mercado is -- by referring to a "major" impairment in her complaint
-- alleging a claim that she could have brought under the original
version of the ADA.
But we do not believe Jones requires that we attribute
the significance that defendants do to the complaint's reference
to a "major" impairment. The 1991 amendment to § 1981 that was at
issue in Jones left the pre-existing version of the discrimination
claim intact even as it also made possible new discrimination
claims by subjecting post-contract-formation conduct to § 1981
liability for the first time. The ADAAA, by contrast, replaced
the pre-existing "regarded as" claim with a new "regarded as" claim
that requires a plaintiff to plead and prove one fewer element.
The ADAAA thus did not add a new claim so much as it reduced the
requirements to prove an existing one. But this difference in the
form that Congress used to enlarge liability does not mean that
the ADAAA did not "ma[k]e possible" Mercado's claims. See Jones,
541 U.S. at 382.
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Just as the 1991 amendment to § 1981 at issue in Jones
allowed plaintiffs to plead and prove elements of a discrimination
claim that previously was not available, so, too, does the ADAAA.
Under the 2008 amendments, on which Mercado's 2014 complaint
relies, she may now recover for discrimination without showing (as
the ADA previously required) that the defendants regarded her
impairment as a substantially life-altering one. Thus, by
asserting in her complaint a violation of the new, substantively
broader right protected by the amended ADA rather than the narrower
right protected by the unamended ADA, she is asserting a claim
that did not exist before just as was true of the plaintiffs in
Jones. The 2008 amendments therefore "made possible" the
particular legal claims that Mercado has brought, even if her
complaint also contains factual allegations that perhaps could
have supported the different and harder-to-prove "regarded as"
claim that existed prior to the 2008 amendments but that Congress
has replaced and that she is not now bringing.5
Simply put, an amendment to a statute that bars a new,
broader form of discrimination may still "ma[ke] possible" a
plaintiff's suit to redress that discrimination, even if it may be
true that the plaintiff has also suffered a different, more
5 This conclusion obviates the need to engage with the
precedent cited by Mercado for the proposition that her complaint
would not have stated a claim under the pre-ADAAA version of the
ADA.
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specific form of discrimination that the unamended statute already
barred. We thus conclude that -- notwithstanding the reference to
a "major" impairment in Mercado's complaint -- Mercado's legal
claims "necessarily depend" on the 2008 amendments to the ADA no
less than the Jones plaintiffs' legal claims "necessarily
depend[ed]" on the 1991 amendment to § 1981. See id. at 384.
Indeed, in this case, a contrary conclusion would oddly make the
catch-all limitations period that § 1658 sets forth applicable
only if Mercado amended her complaint to delete a factual
allegation that she need not make in order to plead the only
"regarded as" claims that she actually brings in her 2014
complaint. We decline to read Jones to require such a strange
result.
IV.
Congress enacted § 1658 in order to reduce the need for
litigation about how best to fill the "void" that arises when
statutes fail to specify the limitations period applicable to the
causes of action they create. See Jones, 541 U.S. at 380.
Recognizing that purpose, Jones construed § 1658 broadly. Id. at
380-82. Following the same interpretive approach, and consistent
with our precedent instructing that we should do so, see Millay,
762 F.3d at 155-57, we conclude that § 1658 supplies the
limitations period here, due to the 2008 amendments that "made
possible" Mercado's claims. See Jones, 541 U.S. at 382.
- 23 -
For the foregoing reasons, we reverse the District
Court's order of dismissal and we remand for further proceedings.
- 24 -
Mercado v. Government of PR
Court: Court of Appeals for the First Circuit
Date filed: 2016-03-03
Citations: 814 F.3d 581
Copy CitationsCombined Opinion