Divided Panel Dismisses Indian Tribe's Suit Over Florida's Fuel Task Based on Sovereign Immunity

Seminole Tribe of Florida v. State of Florida Department of Revenue, No. 13-10566, from SDFla

 

Majority: Circuit Judge Pryor, joined by Senior District Judge Friedman (D.D.C.)

 

Concur in part; dissent in part: Circuit Judge Jordan.

 

Summary of Majority: The Seminole tribe sued Florida claiming that Indian tribe sovereignty, the Indian Commerce Clause, and the Equal Protection Clause prevented Florida from collecting a state tax on fuel purchased on Indian lands.  Essentially, the tax was pre-paid by fuel suppliers and passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.  After paying for fuel, a consumer would need to petition Florida for reimbursement if he contended that he was exempt from the tax. 

 

The district court dismissed the complaint for a lack of subject-matter jurisdiction under the Rooker-Feldman doctrine (which bars a losing party in state court from seeking appellate review of the state judgment in a U.S. district court based on the losing party’s claim that the state judgment itself violates the loser’s federal rights), and for violation of the Tax Injunction Act.

 

The panel majority found that the issue of sovereign immunity barred the tribe's claims.  Congress had not validly abrogated Florida’s sovereign immunity, and Florida had not waived its immunity.  Furthermore, the Ex Parte Young doctrine did not allow an end-run around sovereign immunity because when a state officer is named as a defendant in his official capacity a court must ask whether the suit is nonetheless in essence for the recovery of money from the state.  Since the tribe sought the recovery of money, rather than truly equitable (i.e. injunctive) relief from Florida, Ex Parte Young did not apply.

 

The panel explicitly disagreed at length with the dissent because a  the right to an exemption from the tax was essentially a right to a refund under state law (since refunds were provided only retroactively to consumers who had already paid the tax to a fuel supplier), and the relief was accordingly compensatory in nature and barred by sovereign immunity.  Whether the relief sought was “prospective”—as the dissent argued—was irrelevant because the issue was whether the relief sought involved an award of damages.

 

The majority also took the dissent to task for speculating about different methods which Florida could employ to stop pre-collecting the tax from the tribe.  The majority found this speculation improper, because it concerned a matter of public policy for the legislature, rather than for the federal courts. The majority also criticized the dissent’s suggestions as overly broad and impractical.

 

The district court’s dismissal of the complaint was affirmed, albeit on different grounds.

 

Summary of Dissent: Judge Jordan agreed with the majority’s affirmance of the dismissal of two counts of the complaint, which explicitly sought injunctive relief in the form of refunds of already-collected fuel taxes.  He dissented with regard to the dismissal of counts seeking a declaratory judgment against Florida officials that future imposition of certain fuel taxes violated the constitution.  The dissent argued that the majority’s decision created a circuit split with decisions from the Tenth, Ninth, and Fourth Circuits, although the majority explained that these cases were all factually distinguishable because of the pre-collection of Florida’s tax. The dissent also noted that neither the Rooker-Feldman doctrine, nor the Tax Injunction Act barred the lawsuit. 

 

Note: This is a possible candidate for en banc review, as the split on this panel was between two active Eleventh Circuit judges, and the deciding vote was cast by a visiting senior district judge.  This case is somewhat unusual for the Eleventh Circuit in that at least a third of the majority opinion is spent responding to the dissent. 

 

Note: This is the first solo dissent I can specifically remember Judge Jordan issuing in a published opinion.  So far on the Court he has been relatively moderate.  With this opinion, he may be beginning to come into his own as a member of the Court’s liberal wing.  Nevertheless, it should be noted that although one way to view this opinion might be a liberal (Judge Jordan, Obama appointee) versus conservative (Judge Pryor, George W. Bush appointee), split Senior District Judge Friedman, who joined Judge Pryor, is a Clinton appointee.