Document Type

Working Paper

Publication Date

9-13-2005

SSRN Discipline

Legal Scholarship Network; Litigation, Procedure & Dispute Resolution eJournals; LSN Subject Matter eJournals; SRPN Subject Matter eJournals; Constitutional Law, Jurisprudence & Legal Philosophy eJournals; Sustainability Research & Policy Network; Social Responsibility of Business eJournals

Abstract

The year 2005 witnessed two watershed developments in federal jurisdiction the US Supreme Courts decision in Exxon Mobil Corp v Allapattah Services Inc and the enactment of the Class Action Fairness Act CAFA Allapattah and CAFA raise the same fundamental question how should courts interpret a statute whose text would expand federal jurisdiction far beyond what Congress apparently intended In Allapattah the Court confronted this question in resolving an aspect of the supplemental jurisdiction statute that had deeply divided both the judiciary and academia CAFAs expansion of federal jurisdiction over class actions will require courts to struggle with this question once again In light of these recent events and their common theme this Article has two goals First it argues that CAFA like its older cousin the supplemental jurisdiction statute contains a fundamental disconnect between the legislative history and the statutory text While CAFAs legislative history indicated that Congress meant to expand federal jurisdiction only to certain large class actions with interstate dimensions the unambiguous text of CAFA authorizes removal of virtually every state court class action to federal court This conflict threatens to create the same level of judicial and academic disagreement that plagued the supplemental jurisdiction statute over the last decadeandahalf Second this Article examines Justice Anthony Kennedys majority decision in Allapattah to divine its lessons for interpreting CAFA Allapattah sent mixed messages however The Courts language in Allapattah imparted an unmistakable endorsement of textualism jurisdictional statutes should be read no more narrowly or broadly than the text provides But the Courts ultimate conclusion compromised strict fidelity to the text in order to avoid expanding jurisdiction far beyond what Congress apparently intended The Court chose a compromise interpretation that expanded federal jurisdiction farther than the legislative history anticipated but not as far as the plain meaning of the statutory text would require Thus federal courts interpreting CAFA face a dilemma follow Allapattahs explicit lesson and construe CAFA according to its text or follow Allapattahs implicit lesson and strike a compromise between the legislative history and the statutory text For courts following the latter approach a compromise reading of CAFA may be available This reading would eliminate certain requirements that had impeded the removal of class actions in the past but it would not create an independent basis for removing all state court class actions rather a basis for removal must exist elsewhere in federal law

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