IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
No. 96-60652
J. RANDOLPH LIPSCOMB, on behalf of
himself and all others similarly situated;
MAYOR, CITY OF COLUMBUS; CITY COUNCIL OF
THE CITY OF COLUMBUS, MISSISSIPPI, as the
statutorily designated successors in office
to the Trustees of Franklin Academy,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
versus
THE COLUMBUS MUNICIPAL SEPARATE SCHOOL
DISTRICT, Dr. Reuben E. Dilworth,
Superintendent; ET AL.,
Defendants,
THE COLUMBUS MUNICIPAL SEPARATE SCHOOL
DISTRICT, Dr. Reuben E. Dilworth,
Superintendent; ET AL.,
Defendant-Appellant,
versus
STATE OF MISSISSIPPI, Eric Clark,
Secretary of State; UNITED STATES
DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT;
ERIC CLARK, Secretary of State,
Defendants-Appellees
Appeals from the United States District Court
For the Northern District of Mississippi
June 23, 1998
Before HIGGINBOTHAM, PARKER, and DENNIS, Circuit Judges.
HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judge:
Plaintiff J. Randolph Lipscomb initiated this class action in
federal district court, seeking a declaration as to the validity of
certain leases of Mississippi sixteenth section land. In light of
the state law issues involved in the case, the district court
abstained from decision. We conclude that the district court
abused its discretion in declining to exercise its proper
jurisdiction.
I.
In 1816, the United States purchased for $130,000 from the
Chickasaw Nation title to land that now comprises parts of northern
Alabama and Mississippi. In 1817, following a pattern that had
been in place since before the ratification of the U.S.
Constitution, see Papasan v. Allain, 478 U.S. 265, 268-69 (1986),
Congress authorized the survey and sale of all these lands, except
for “section No. 16, in each township, which shall be reserved for
the support of schools therein.” Land Sales Act of March 3, 1817,
3 Stat. 375. Parts of the present-day town of Columbus,
Mississippi, fall within these sixteenth section lands.
Responding to the Congressional direction, Mississippi
included in its 1817 Constitution a provision mandating that
sixteenth section lands were never to be sold and that all funds
acquired by the state through the rental or lease of such lands
were to be set aside “for the use of schools.” See Miss. Const. of
1817, art. 6, § 20. In 1821, the Mississippi legislature
authorized the incorporation of the town of Columbus, which was
located at an important crossing of the Tombigbee River. Intending
2
to promote the development of Columbus, the legislature also
established the Franklin Academy, the first public school in
Mississippi. The legislature authorized the president and trustees
of the Academy to lease certain lots in the Columbus sixteenth
section “for the term of ninety-nine years, reserving an annual
rent therefor.” See 1821 Miss. Laws Ch. XLVI, p. 73-74. The
initial annual rent was to be determined by public auction. In
1830, concerned about the problem of lessees forfeiting their
leases, the legislature amended the 1821 statute and ordered the
insertion of the phrase “renewable forever” in all past and future
Columbus sixteenth section leases. See Act of December 13, 1830,
1830 Miss. Laws 14th Sess. Ch. II, pp. 9-10.
In 1890, Mississippi adopted a new constitution, parts of
which are still in force today. The 1890 Constitution placed a new
condition on all sixteenth section lands in the state, directing
that “[l]and belonging to, or under control of the state, shall
never be donated, directly or indirectly, to private corporations
or individuals.” Miss. Const. of 1890, art. IV, § 95. Moreover,
the 1890 Constitution limited the duration of leases of sixteenth
section lands to twenty-five years. See id. art. VIII, § 211. In
1913, fears arose among the Columbus leaseholders that the
constitution’s twenty-five year leasing limit might invalidate
their pre-existing leases. Mindful of the Contracts Clause of the
United States Constitution, see U.S. Const. art. I, § 10 (“No State
shall . . . pass any . . . law impairing the obligation of
contracts . . . .”), the Mississippi legislature in 1914 responded
3
to the Columbus lessees’ concerns by passing a law authorizing the
renewal of the Columbus leases in 1920 at their original terms.
See 1914 Miss. Laws Ch. 462. The leases were so renewed.
In 1989, however, the Columbus leaseholders again became
concerned following a Mississippi Supreme Court decision. In Hill
v. Thompson, 564 So. 2d 1 (Miss. 1989), the court held that a
ninety-nine year lease of a plot of sixteenth section land for the
sum of $7.50 was voidable under the non-donation principle of § 95
of the 1890 Mississippi Constitution.1 As the court acknowledged,
its decision had the effect of invalidating hundreds of sixteenth
section leases across the state. See id. at 12. Notably, however,
the case did not explicitly address leases with “renewable forever”
clauses.
In 1988, after surveying Mississippi’s case law, counsel for
the Department of Housing and Urban Development in Jackson,
Mississippi, determined that the 1890 Constitution rendered
leaseholds of sixteenth section land in Columbus “virtually
uninsurable.” In 1990, responding to Hill and unhappy with the
revenues generated by the Columbus leases, the president of the
Columbus School Board announced that the Columbus sixteenth section
leases were invalid and would have to be renegotiated. Various
leaseholders responded by filing suit in Chancery Court in Lowndes
County, Mississippi, seeking a confirmation of title. On January
1
Previous Mississippi cases had questioned the validity of
sixteenth section leases under the 1890 Constitution, but none went
as far as Hill in striking down those instruments. See, e.g., Keys
v. Carter, 318 So. 2d 862 (Miss. 1975).
4
16, 1992, however, the suit was voluntarily dismissed, to permit
the filing of this complaint in federal court.
A few days later, on January 24, 1992, Randolph Lipscomb2
filed a putative class action in the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Mississippi against the Columbus
School District, the Mississippi Secretary of State (who is
statutorily authorized to administer sixteenth section lands), and
HUD. His suit sought a declaration that the Columbus leases were
valid and that the lessees possessed the right to renew the leases
in 2019 at their original terms. On July 31, 1992, recognizing
that at least 1,473 lessees had similar interests in Lipscomb’s
suit, the district court certified a class pursuant to Fed. R. Civ.
P. 23. Lipscomb moved for summary judgment, and the Secretary of
State moved 1) to decertify the class and 2) for the district court
to abstain.
From February 1993 until July 1996, the district court held
the case under advisement. On July 23, 1996, the court granted the
Secretary of State’s motion to abstain, citing Railroad Comm’n v.
Pullman Co., 312 U.S. 496 (1941), and Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 319
U.S. 315 (1943). The court reasoned that the case required an in-
depth examination of Mississippi statutes and constitutional
provisions, a task it felt was best left to the Mississippi courts.
The court also noted in passing that the plaintiffs’ case likely
2
Lipscomb holds two Columbus leases, the first originally
granted in 1839 and the second in 1843. The rentals for his leases
are $.11/year and $.93/year.
5
did not state a valid federal claim under the Contracts Clause.
This timely appeal followed.
II.
We review a district court’s decision to abstain for an abuse
of discretion. See Allen v. Louisiana State Bd. of Dentistry, 948
F.2d 946, 949 (5th Cir. 1991), cert. denied, 503 U.S. 1006 (1992).
In practice, however, our scrutiny is stricter. Because an
exercise of abstention must occur within the specific limits of a
particular abstention doctrine, “decisions to abstain are reviewed
under a standard narrower than that applicable to decisions such as
evidentiary rulings.” American Bank & Trust Co. v. Dent, 982 F.2d
917, 922 n.6 (5th Cir. 1993).
A.
One of the two bases for abstention relied upon by the
district court was Burford abstention. As the Supreme Court has
defined the Burford doctrine:
Where timely and adequate state court review is available, a
federal court sitting in equity must decline to interfere with
the proceedings or orders of state administrative agencies:
(1) when there are “difficult questions of state law bearing
on policy problems of substantial public import whose
importance transcends the result in the case then at bar;” or
(2) where the “exercise of federal review of the question in
a case and in similar cases would be disruptive of state
efforts to establish a coherent policy with respect to a
matter of substantial public concern.”
6
New Orleans Pub. Serv., Inc. v. Council of New Orleans, 491 U.S.
350, 361 (1989) (citations omitted). Other than citing Burford in
conjunction with Pullman, the district court made little effort to
apply the Burford doctrine.
The district court erred in invoking Burford abstention. As
we have stressed, Burford abstention requires the existence of a
state administrative proceeding to which the federal court could
defer. See St. Paul Ins. Co. v. Trejo, 39 F.3d 585, 589 (5th Cir.
1994). This federal lawsuit interferes with no state
administrative scheme. The Secretary of State argues that his
office has supervisory and regulatory authority over sixteenth
section lands. Yet the Secretary of State has not identified any
administrative process by which the validity of sixteenth section
leases is adjudicated. This lawsuit simply asks for a declaration
of the lessees’ rights, relief that in no way would interfere with
Mississippi’s system of regulating sixteenth section lands. Cf.
St. Paul Ins., 39 F.3d at 589 (rejecting Burford abstention where
lawsuit did not seek to interfere with state regulatory process,
but simply asked for an interpretation of a settlement agreement in
light of a state statute). Accordingly, Burford abstention is
inappropriate here. See American Bank & Trust Co., 982 F.2d at 922
n.6 (noting that district courts abuse their discretion when their
abstention decisions exceed the bounds of narrow abstention
doctrines).
B.
7
The other abstention rationale cited by the district court was
the Pullman doctrine. As the Supreme Court has explained Pullman,
“federal courts should abstain from decision when difficult and
unsettled questions of state law must be resolved before a
substantial federal constitutional question can be decided. By
abstaining in such cases, federal courts will avoid both
unnecessary adjudication of federal questions and ‘needless
friction with state policies . . . .’” Hawaii Hous. Auth. v.
Midkiff, 467 U.S. 229, 236 (1984) (quoting Pullman, 312 U.S. at
500). Pullman abstention depends first and foremost upon an
ambiguity in state law. See Baran v. Port of Beaumont Navigation
Dist., 57 F.3d 436, 442 (5th Cir. 1995). Pullman does not command
district courts to abstain simply to permit state review of an
unambiguous statute that has previously never been interpreted by
a state court. See City of Houston v. Hill, 482 U.S. 451, 469
(1987). Moreover, the mere presence of an ambiguity in state law
and a likelihood of avoiding a constitutional adjudication does not
automatically compel Pullman abstention. Rather, before
abstaining, “[a] district court must carefully assess the totality
of circumstances presented by a particular case. This requires a
broad inquiry which should include consideration of the rights at
stake and the costs of delay pending state court adjudication.”
Duncan v. Poythress, 657 F.2d 691, 697 (5th Cir. 1981), cert.
dismissed, 459 U.S. 1012 (1982).
Here, the district court abstained under Pullman after
determining that a potential conflict between the 1914 Mississippi
8
statute and the Mississippi Constitution of 1890 was a substantial
question of state law that might moot the federal constitutional
issue. This was error.
The district court’s Pullman rationale for abstention
essentially ignored the bite of Lipscomb’s argument. Lipscomb
contends that prior to 1890, lessees in Columbus obtained pursuant
to statutory authorization ninety-nine year leases on Columbus
property that were renewable at their original terms forever.
Lipscomb argues that the School District cannot employ the 1890
Constitution’s prohibition against the donation of public lands to
invalidate the Columbus leases, because doing so would impair the
obligations of a contract in violation of the federal Contracts
Clause. As Lipscomb asserts, the 1914 legislation, which confirmed
that the leases could be renewed in 1920 at their original terms,
is irrelevant to his argument. If the lessees enjoyed before 1890
a contractual right to renew their leases in perpetuity, they did
not need a statute in 1914 to restate that right for them. Cf.
Read v. Plattsmouth, 107 U.S. (17 Otto) 568, 575-76 (1883)(noting
that a law recognizing an existing, binding obligation of the state
is not retroactive). In a sense, therefore, the 1914 legislation
was wholly unnecessary.3
3
Apparently, lessees in Columbus petitioned the Mississippi
legislature in 1913 to pass the statute in order to remove a cloud
over their title created by the 1890 Constitution. The Columbus
City Attorney, E.T. Sykes, wrote a brief to the legislature
requesting the enactment of the statute. The brief strongly stated
that the 1890 Constitution could not impair the vested rights of
the lessees to renew their leases forever, but it requested the
legislation anyway “as a matter of security” to silence various
“Doubting Thomases” who had questioned the leases.
9
The district court, however, focused solely on the legality of
the 1914 statute in deciding to abstain under Pullman. The court
reasoned that since the leases were apparently renewed under the
authority of the 1914 statute, it would take a Mississippi court to
determine whether the 1914 statute conflicted with the 1890
Constitution. Pullman abstention is appropriate only when there
exists an ambiguous issue of state law, the resolution of which by
a state court might help a federal court to avoid a constitutional
decision. See Hawaii Hous. Auth., 467 U.S. at 236. Here, settling
the Mississippi constitutionality of the 1914 statute would not
help to resolve the federal constitutional claims of the class, for
those claims are premised on a conflict between the 1890
Mississippi Constitution and the pre-existing leases.4
Perhaps acknowledging the irrelevance of the 1914 statute, the
Secretary of State advances an alternate basis for finding that
this litigation implicates unsettled questions of state law. The
4
The district court also relied on our opinion in Frazier v.
Lowndes County, Miss. Bd. of Educ., 710 F.2d 1097, 1099 (5th Cir.
1983) to support its argument that the legal threats from the
School District here did not implicate the Contracts Clause.
Although the applicability of Frazier may speak to the merits of
this case, to the extent that the district court relied on Frazier
in its decision to abstain, it erred. In Frazier, we rejected the
claim that a school district’s threatened cancellation of sixteenth
section leases violated the Contracts Clause. We only found the
Contracts Clause inapplicable, however, because the legal authority
upon which the school district relied in challenging the leases
predated those leases. See id. at 1099 (“[T]he Lowndes County
Board of Education claims a right based on a new interpretation of
preexisting authority . . . to terminate the leases.”). Here, on
the other hand, the school district allegedly challenges the
Columbus leases under the authority of the Mississippi Constitution
of 1890, which postdated them -- a potential Contracts Clause
violation.
10
Secretary of State argues that the 1830 statute granting the
trustees of Franklin Academy the right to issue renewable-forever
leases was later repealed by statutes in 1830 and 1833. Lipscomb’s
own leases, along with many others that purportedly contain the
renewable-forever terms, were crafted after 1830. Thus, argues the
Secretary of State, there is an unsettled question of state law
regarding the legality of the renewable-forever terms in the
Columbus leases, which requires adjudication in the first instance
in a Mississippi court.
The statute authorizing the Columbus trustees to issue
renewable-forever leases was enacted on December 13, 1830, and
reads, in pertinent part:
[T]he Trustees of said Franklin Academy be, and they are
hereby authorized to lay off and lease lots, not to consist of
more than ten acres each, for the same time, and in like
manner, and on like condition with those in the present plan
of the town of Columbus, throughout the section; and that said
Trustees be, and are hereby authorized to make out all leases
for the lots of said section, for ninety nine years, dating
from the first leasing of lots in said town of Columbus,
renewable forever. Providing, always, that the payment of
leases on said lots be made annually in advance, as before;
and that all leases heretofore made of lots, by the said
Trustees, be renewable at the expiration of the time for which
these were leases, in like manner as above, provided for, in
cases of lots to be leased hereafter.
Act of December 13, 1830, 1830 Miss. Laws 14th Sess. Ch. II, pp. 9-
10. The Secretary of State notes, however, that three days later
the Mississippi legislature passed a new law. This statute, dated
December 16, 1830, directed the trustees of schools in a variety of
counties, including Lowndes (the county containing Columbus), to
lease sixteenth section lands for fixed ninety-nine year terms,
whenever a “majority of the heads of families in any township”
11
requested them to do so. Act of December 16, 1830, 1830 Miss. Laws
14th Sess. Ch. II, pp. 330-31. The December 16 statute also
contained a repealing clause providing that “all acts and parts of
acts coming within the meaning and purview of this act be, and the
same are hereby repealed.” Id.5 Furthermore, in 1833, the
Mississippi legislature passed another sixteenth section statute,
with substantially the same provisions as the December 16, 1830
statute. See Act of February 27, 1833, 1833 Miss. Laws pp. 452-
54.6 Like the second 1830 act, the 1833 statute contained a clause
5
The December 16 statute reads, in pertinent part:
Sec. 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of
Representatives of the state of Mississippi, in General
Assembly convened, That hereafter whenever a majority of the
heads of families in any township in the counties of Madison,
Jefferson, Claiborne, Monroe, and Lowndes, shall deem it
expedient, and shall in writing, direct the trustees for
schools in said township to lease for the term of ninety-nine
years, the sixteenth section, or other lands reserved in lieu
thereof, it shall be their duty to do so on their giving
thirty days notice in the nearest newspaper and at three of
the most public places in said county of the time and place of
leasing the same.
. . . .
Sec. 3. And be it further enacted, That said land shall
be offered for lease in lots of not more than a quarter of a
section, not less than an eighth of a section . . . .
. . . .
Sec. 6. And be it further enacted, That all acts and
parts of acts coming with the meaning and purview of this act
be, and the same are hereby repealed.
Act of December 16, 1830, 1830 Miss. Laws 14th Sess. Ch. II, pp.
330-31.
6
The 1833 statute reads, in pertinent part:
Section 1. Be it enacted by the Legislature of the state
of Mississippi, That whenever a majority of the resident heads
of families, (minors excepted,) in each township, or
fractional township, containing section No. 16. or such
section as may be reserved for the use of schools in lieu
12
dictating that “all acts and parts of acts contravening the
provisions of this act be and the same are hereby repealed.” Id.
The Secretary of State contends that there is a substantial
question whether the second 1830 statute and the 1833 statute both
repealed the first 1830 statute, which permitted renewable-forever
leases. Accordingly, argues the Secretary of State, the federal
constitutional question regarding the conflict between the 1890
Constitution and the pre-existing Columbus leases is preceded by a
state law question concerning the authority of the school trustees
to enter into renewable-forever leases before 1890. If the
trustees lacked such authority, contends the Secretary of State,
the federal constitutional question would be mooted, thereby
justifying Pullman abstention.
We disagree, for we find that the statutory scheme involved
here is not so ambiguous as to require Pullman abstention. See
City of Houston, 482 U.S. at 469 (requiring ambiguity in statutory
scheme before abstention is to be exercised). The Secretary of
thereof, within this state, shall request the same, it shall
be the duty of the trustees now in office, or who may
hereafter be in office, to lease the said section of their
respective townships to the highest bidder, for the term of
ninety-nine years, . . . Provided, that said trustees may
divide and lease such section in lots of not less than eighty
acres, if they should deem the same most advantageous . . . .
. . . .
Sec. 8. And be it further enacted, That this act shall
not be construed as to affect any prior disposition, which may
have been made of any of the sections of any township within
this state; and that all acts and parts of acts contravening
the provisions of this act be and the same are hereby
repealed.
Act of February 27, 1833, 1833 Miss. Laws pp. 452-54.
13
State faces an uphill struggle in establishing the requisite state-
law ambiguity, for the Mississippi Supreme Court in 1898 confirmed
that the Columbus leases were properly made renewable forever. In
Street v. City of Columbus, 23 So. 773 (Miss. 1898), Columbus
leaseholders challenged the authority of Columbus to tax the
capital value of their leases, a value which had arisen because the
locked-in rents did not reflect the true value of the leaseholds.
In holding that Columbus could so tax the leases, the court
repeatedly acknowledged that the Columbus leases were renewable
forever. See id. at 773 (“These leases, as we learn from the
briefs of counsel, the leases themselves, and the act of the
legislature under which they were made, are renewable forever, at
the option of the lessees.”); id. at 774 (repeatedly noting that a
statute made the leases renewable forever). Although the precise
question of the renewability of the Columbus leases was not before
the Street Court, the opinion’s affirmation of the leases’
perpetual terms was not dicta, for acknowledging that the leases
were so renewable was necessary to establish the extent of their
capital value.
The Street opinion made no mention of the two statutes cited
by the Secretary of State, in all likelihood because no party
thought them relevant to the Columbus leases. Indeed, no
Mississippi authority has ever suggested that the two statutes
affect the renewable-forever nature of the Columbus leases. Cf.
City of Houston, 482 U.S. at 469 (noting that simple fact that
statute has not previously been construed does not supply requisite
14
ambiguity to justify abstention). On the contrary, an 1848
official compilation of the Mississippi Code lists all statutes
governing the Columbus sixteenth section land, but does not refer
to the two laws cited by the Secretary of State. See A.
Hutchinson, Code of Mississippi 246 (1848).
Although the Street opinion alone removes most doubt about the
validity of the perpetual terms in the Columbus leases, we are
confident that even if the Street Court had confronted the
Secretary of State’s two statutes, it would have found them
inapplicable to Columbus. By their terms, the December 16, 1830
and February 27, 1833 statutes did not dissipate any pre-existing
leases nor were they self-executing. Rather, the two statutes
provided that the trustees of school districts in Lowndes county
were to lease sixteenth section lands for ninety-nine year terms
only when the majority of households in a community requested them
to do so. There is no evidence to suggest that the households in
Columbus ever voluntarily invoked those statutes. Indeed, it would
have been absurd for them to have done so. Both the December 16,
1830 and February 27, 1833 statutes mandated a minimum lot size of
eighty acres. The eighty-acre minimum indicates that the
legislature was contemplating rural lots. By 1830, however, the
Columbus sixteenth section was urban. In accordance with its urban
nature, the December 13, 1830 statute that specifically empowered
the Columbus school trustees to authorize renewable-forever leases
permitted lots of no more than ten acres each. The Mississippi
legislature in enacting the general December 16, 1830 statute could
15
not possibly have intended to repeal its more specific December 13,
1830 law, passed just three days earlier. If the December 16, 1830
statute was a mandatory, overriding provision, it would have
allowed only eight lots on the 640-acre Columbus sixteenth section,
thereby depopulating the city of Columbus. The Secretary of State
perhaps should be commended for his creativity, if not his
nineteenth-century legal research, but the two statutes he has
located have failed to create a substantial ambiguity in state law.
Finally, the Secretary of State contends that the December 13,
1830 statute authorizing renewable forever Columbus leases 1) was
invalid under the 1817 Mississippi Constitution, which prohibited
the “sale” of sixteenth section land, and 2) violated the trust
under which Mississippi held the land. While a renewable-forever
lease may in practical effect resemble a “sale,” the United States
Supreme Court has acknowledged that in legal effect such
instruments are leases. See Bosley v. Wyatt, 55 U.S. (14 How.)
390, 396 (1852); see also Street, 23 So. 773 (construing the
Columbus leases as “leases”). The contention that the leasing of
this sixteenth section land violated the trust for the benefit of
schoolchildren under which Mississippi held the land is also easily
dispatched. As we have previously stated with respect to
indistinguishable Choctaw sixteenth section land in Mississippi,
the trust under which Mississippi operated at best created an
honorary, not a mandatory, obligation on the part of the state to
administer the lands for the benefit of schoolchildren. See
Madison County Bd. of Educ. v. Illinois Central R.R. Co., 939 F.2d
16
292, 303-05 (5th Cir. 1991); see also Alabama v. Schmidt, 232 U.S.
168 (1914) (permitting title to similar sixteenth section lands in
Alabama to pass by adverse possession, because trust obligations
were merely honorary in nature). Moreover, it is doubtful that the
leasing of the Columbus sixteenth section land even violated the
honorary trust. The legislature apparently authorized the
renewable-forever terms in the leases to prevent lessees from
forfeiting, an action that itself would deprive the schools of
funds. The renewable-forever terms encouraged the development of
the city of Columbus, an event at least indirectly beneficial to
the schools. See Madison County, 939 F.2d at 306-07 (reasoning
that the development of railroads generally benefitted education in
Mississippi, even if the railroad companies received sixteenth
section right-of-ways for free).
Even assuming, for the sake of argument, that some uncertainty
exists in these unconstrued nineteenth century statutes, the
presence of a minute degree of ambiguity does not in and of itself
demand Pullman abstention. Cf. Baggett v. Bullitt, 377 U.S. 360,
375 (1964) (“The abstention doctrine is not an automatic rule
applied whenever a federal court is faced with a doubtful issue of
state law; it rather involves a discretionary exercise of a court’s
equity powers.”). Instead, in determining whether abstention is
appropriate in any particular case, we must consider the totality
of circumstances. See Duncan, 657 F.2d at 697. Lipscomb cites
several factors that cut against abstention. First, assuming that
the class was properly certified, sending this case back to state
17
court would be inefficient, as Mississippi law does not permit
class action litigation. See Miss. R. Civ. P. 23, Comment (“Class
action practice is not being introduced into Mississippi trial
courts at this time.”). Accordingly, were we to uphold federal
abstention, Lipscomb would either have to litigate this case
individually or join the other 1,400 Columbus lessees to his state
lawsuit. Cf. Travelers Ins. Co. v. Louisiana Farm Bureau
Federation, Inc., 996 F.2d 774, 777 (5th Cir. 1993) (approving of
use of federal declaratory judgment actions to avoid multiplicity
of state lawsuits). Second, the exercise of federal jurisdiction
in this case would not substantially intrude upon Mississippi’s
state interests. Even though there are numerous Columbus lessees,
the Columbus leases, with their renewable-forever terms, are
apparently unique among the sixteenth section leases in
Mississippi. As such, even if we were to resolve a minor ambiguity
in Mississippi law, our decision would have no far reaching
preclusive effects in the state. Cf. Colorado River Water
Conservation Dist. v. United States, 424 U.S. 800, 814 (1976)
(“Abstention is also appropriate where there have been presented
difficult questions of state law bearing on policy problems of
substantial public import whose importance transcends the result in
the case at bar.”).
The district court’s stated reasons for abstention were
erroneous. Moreover, despite the Secretary of State’s suggestions,
the legality of the Columbus leases under pre-1890 law is not so
ambiguous as to require deference to a state court pursuant to
18
Pullman. Even assuming that some minor degree of state-law
ambiguity exists with respect to the leases, other factors in this
case argue in favor of the exercise of federal jurisdiction.
III.
The Secretary of State has advanced a variety of other
arguments against our granting of relief to the class. He notes
that the price terms of Lipscomb’s own leases have changed
throughout the years, perhaps suggesting that Lipscomb’s leases
were not renewals but were in fact new leases. The Secretary of
State also argues that tax sales appear in the chain of title of a
number of the Columbus leases, thereby terminating those leasehold
interests. Neither of these contentions, however, identifies an
ambiguity in state law sufficient to justify abstention. Rather,
the Secretary of State suggests complications that the district
court will have to surmount in ruling on the merits of this case
and/or fashioning class relief.7
We conclude that the district court abused its discretion in
declining to exercise its proper jurisdiction. This litigation
does not implicate any issue of state law that is so ambiguous as
to justify abstention. Similarly, certification to the Mississippi
7
Lipscomb points us to certain exceptional cases in which our
court has addressed the merits of a claim after finding that the
district court below erred in abstaining. See, e.g., Snap-on Tools
Corp. v. Mason, 18 F.3d 1261, 1267 n.7 (5th Cir. 1994). Assuming
that we have the power to grant summary judgment in favor of the
class, as Lipscomb requests, we decline to do so, given the
complexities that remain in this case.
19
Supreme Court would be inappropriate here: “[A]bsent genuinely
unsettled matters of state law, we are reluctant to certify.”
Jefferson v. Lead Indus. Ass’n, Inc., 106 F.3d 1245, 1247 (5th Cir.
1997).
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
20
Lipscomb v. Columbus Municipal Separate School District
Court: Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
Date filed: 1998-06-23
Citations: 145 F.3d 238
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