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On Appeal from
The United States District Court for the District of Colorado
No. 11-cv-01350-RM-NYW
Hon. Raymond P. Moore, United States District Judge
DAVID E. SKAGGS
Dentons US LLP
1400 Wewatta Street, Suite 700
Denver, Colorado 80202
Email: david.skaggs@dentons.com
Telephone: (303) 634-4000
Appellate Case: 17-1192 Document: 010110237577 Date Filed: 09/30/2019 Page: 2
MICHAEL F. FEELEY
SARAH M. CLARK
CARRIE E. JOHNSON
COLE J. WOODWARD
Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck LLP
410 17th Street, Suite 2200
Denver, Colorado 80202-4437
Email: mfeeley@bhfs.com
sclark@bhsf.com
cjohnson@bhsf.com
cwoodward@bhfs.com
Telephone: (303) 223-1100
JOHN A. HERRICK
2715 Blake Street, #9
Denver, Colorado 80205
Email: john.herrick@outlook.com
Telephone: (720) 987-3122
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
TABLE OF AUTHORITIES ................................................................................... iii
INTRODUCTION .....................................................................................................1
CONCLUSION ..........................................................................................................8
Kerr v. Hickenlooper, 744 F.3d 1156, 1181, 1182-83 (10th Cir. 2014),
Lucero, Circuit Judge ............................................................................................ A-2
Kerr v. Hickenlooper, 824 F.3d 1207, 1217-18 (10th Cir. 2016), Lucero,
Circuit Judge ......................................................................................................... A-2
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TABLE OF AUTHORITIES
Page(s)
Cases
Branson v. Romer,
161 F.3d 619 (10th Cir. 1998) .............................................................................. 2
Day v. Bond,
500 F.3d 1127 (10th Cir.2007) ............................................................................. 3
Hanson v. Wyatt,
552 F.3d 1148 (10th Cir. 2008) ............................................................................ 6
Kerr v. Hickenlooper,
824 F.3d 1207 (10th Cir. 2016) ............................................................................ 7
Kerr v. Hickenlooper,
744 F.3d 1156 (10th Cir. 2014) ....................................................................6, 7, 8
Kerr v. Hickenlooper,
880 F. Supp. 2d 1112 (D. Colo. 2012).............................................................. 6, 8
Luther v. Borden,
48 U.S. (7 How.) 1 (1849) .................................................................................... 6
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Page(s)
Reynolds v. Sims,
377 U.S. 533 (1964) .............................................................................................. 6
Wheeler v. Hurdman,
825 F.2d 257 (10th Cir. 1987) .............................................................................. 4
Other Authorities
10th Cir. R. 35.1(A) ................................................................................................... 1
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INTRODUCTION
The Governor seeks en banc review of the Panel’s holding that the Political
Governor contends the Panel’s holding conflicts with City of Hugo v. Nichols, 656
F.3d 1251 (10th Cir. 2011) and its treatment of political subdivision standing. In
fact, the holding comports with City of Hugo. In addition, the Governor reads an
invented holding into the dicta of Rucho v. Common Cause, 139 S. Ct. 2484 (2019)
that Guarantee Clause claims are per se nonjusticiable. The Rucho Court merely
nonjusticiable. Id. at 2506. These strained grounds fail to clear the high threshold
Cir. R. 35.1(A); see also Fed. R. App. P. 35(a) (“An en banc hearing or rehearing
is not favored and ordinarily will not be ordered . . . .”). The Court may grant en
banc review for one of two reasons: “(1) en banc consideration is necessary to
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The Governor does not argue that the Panel’s holding implicates a question
of exceptional importance. Instead, the Governor asserts solely that the Panel’s
holding conflicts with City of Hugo and Rucho and, thus, impairs the uniformity of
the Court’s precedent. Accordingly, the Court should limit its inquiry to the only
reason alleged by the Governor – i.e., that the Panel’s holding conflicts with City of
Hugo and Rucho. As explained below, the Panel’s holding does not conflict with
either case, and the Governor has not demonstrated the criteria required for en banc
review.
political subdivision standing will occur at the merits stage of this case.1
The Panel did not violate the political subdivision standing doctrine set forth
in City of Hugo because the Panel did not definitively determine whether the
Political Subdivision Plaintiffs have standing. Instead, the Panel held that, even if
the Governor’s reading of City of Hugo were correct, the district court erred in
1
Likewise, the Panel decision follows the Circuit’s other guiding political
subdivision standing case, Branson v. Romer, 161 F.3d 619 (10th Cir. 1998).
Op. 9-10.
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12. The Panel explained that this aspect of standing2 is inextricably intertwined
Id. (citing Largess v. Supreme Judicial Court for State of Mass., 373 F.3d 219, 226
(1st Cir. 2004); see also Day v. Bond, 500 F.3d 1127, 1137 (10th Cir.2007);
Initiative & Referendum Inst. v. Walker, 450 F.3d 1082, 1093 (10th Cir. 2006);
Paper, Allied-Indus., Chem. & Energy Workers Int’l Union v. Cont’l Carbon Co.,
The Governor asserts that the question of whether TABOR violates the
Enabling Act is distinct from the question of whether the Political Subdivision
Plaintiffs have standing to challenge TABOR. But this assertion is conclusory and
ignores the Panel’s analysis. The Panel could not have found that the Enabling Act
fails to support political subdivision standing under City of Hugo without first
deciding what rights are protected by that Act and whether any such rights extend
to the Political Subdivision Plaintiffs here. Those questions are inextricable from,
2
The District Court determined that the Political Subdivision Plaintiffs
established Article III standing, a conclusion the Governor does not contest
on appeal. Op. 7.
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and essential to, a determination of this case on the merits. See Sizova v. Nat’l Inst.
of Standards & Tech., 282 F.3d 1320, 1324 (10th Cir. 2002) (citing Wheeler v.
Hurdman, 825 F.2d 257, 259 (10th Cir. 1987) (A jurisdictional question is
intertwined with the merits when that question “is dependent upon the same statute
which provides the substantive claim in the case.”); see also Op. 14-18. Thus, the
Panel decision did not issue a final ruling on standing that conflicts with City of
Hugo.
en banc review. The brief dicta the Governor cites from Rucho does not contradict
this Court’s Guarantee Clause precedent, in which this Court has already held that
the political question doctrine does not bar this case as nonjusticiable.
Guarantee Clause – like those brought here – do ‘not provide the basis for a
justiciable claim,’” Pet. 2 (quoting Rucho, 139 S. Ct at 2506), and calls this
language from Rucho a “recent holding” that “warrants this Court’s en banc
review,” id. 20. Notwithstanding the previous decision of this Court that the claims
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here are justiciable, the Governor insists that Rucho holds that all Guarantee
The Governor is wrong for at least two reasons. First, the Rucho Court’s
Guarantee Clause discussion is dicta; the decision in Rucho neither relies on nor
engages with the Guarantee Clause in its holding that there are no “constitutional
of partisan gerrymandering. Rucho, 139 S. Ct. at 2508. Other than the one sentence
the Governor cites, there is no discussion of the Guarantee Clause in Rucho. Such a
Second, the Supreme Court’s opinion in Rucho did not state that Guarantee
Clause claims are never justiciable. The Governor selectively excerpts only a
portion of the Rucho Court’s sentence concerning Guarantee Clause claims. Read
in context, the Supreme Court’s statement was simply descriptive of the Supreme
Court’s past decisions: “This Court has several times concluded . . . that the
Guarantee Clause does not provide the basis for a justiciable claim. See, e.g.,
Pacific States Telephone & Telegraph Co. v. Oregon, 223 U.S. 118, 32 S. Ct. 224,
56 L. Ed. 377.” Rucho, 139 S. Ct. at 2506. The plain language of the decision only
establishes that some number of specific Guarantee Clause claims the Court heard
were not justiciable. This sentence did not, contrary to the Governor’s argument,
determine that all claims based on the Guarantee Clause are per se nonjusticiable.
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This Court has previously applied the line of cases cited in Rucho to this
case, concluding in Kerr v. Hickenlooper, 744 F.3d 1156, 1173 (10th Cir. 2014),
that Pacific States and its progeny do not “preclude[] merits consideration in this
case.” See id. at 1176 (“[W]e reject the proposition that Luther [v. Borden, 48 U.S.
(7 How.) 1 (1849)] and Pacific States brand all Guarantee Clause claims as per se
nonjusticiable.”). The dicta in Rucho does not alter that analysis, and it is
consistent with prior decisions from this Court and the Supreme Court, which do
not support the claim that all Guarantee Clause claims are nonjusticiable. See, e.g.,
New York v. United States, 505 U.S. 144, 185 (1992) (“[P]erhaps not all claims
v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 582 (1964) (“[S]ome questions raised under the Guarantee
Clause are nonjusticiable.”); Hanson v. Wyatt, 552 F.3d 1148, 1163 (10th Cir.
2008) (quoting New York, 505 U.S. at 185); Kelley v. United States, 69 F.3d 1503,
1510 (10th Cir. 1995) (suggesting the belief that “the Guarantee Clause cannot be
Recurring in that “long history” have been multiple rulings, first by the District
Court (Kerr v. Hickenlooper, 880 F. Supp. 2d 1112 (D. Colo. 2012)) and twice by
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this Court (744 F.3d 1156 (10th Cir. 2014) and 824 F.3d 1207 (10th Cir. 2016)). In
each of these three rulings, the Governor’s assertion that the political question
The pertinent portions of each of those decisions are set out in Attachment A
to this Response. While those decisions are not quoted at length here, they
demonstrate that this Court has considered, repeatedly and at length, the question
of whether this case is nonjusticiable and has found that question wanting. These
previous decisions are the law of this case regarding the applicability of the
Entek GRB, LLC v. Stull Ranches, LLC, 840 F.3d 1239, 1240 (10th Cir. 2016).3
The Governor’s claim that this case has somehow now become nonjusticiable is
simply wrong.
3
We recognize that “law of the case” jurisprudence encompasses a range of
precedential circumstances that do not lend themselves to easy or simple
description. See generally, Bryan A. Garner, Carlos Bea, Rebecca White
Berch, Neil M. Gorsuch, Harris L. Hartz, Nathan L. Hecht, Brett M.
Kavanaugh, Alex Kozinski, Sandra L. Lynch, William H. Pryor Jr., Thomas
M. Reavley, Jeffrey S. Sutton & Diane P. Wood, The Law of Justicial
Precedent 441-58 (2016). Nonetheless, the prior decisions in this case,
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Importantly, the District Court and this Court, in its first decision in this
case, gave careful analysis to the United States Supreme Court opinions that have
carved out of the political question doctrine space for consideration of Guarantee
Clause claims and noted that blanket assertions of nonjusticiability are suspect. See
744 F.3d at 1134-78; see also, 880 F. Supp. 2d at 143-53. Thus, the extensive
review by this Court and the District Court of the history and underlying
CONCLUSION
The Panel’s opinion does not conflict with either City of Hugo or Rucho, and
the Governor falls far short of meeting the high threshold for warranting the
“disfavored” and “extraordinary” procedure of en banc review. For all the reasons
stated above, the Governor has failed to meet the criteria for a rehearing en banc
rejecting the argument that the political question doctrine bars this
proceeding, are dispositive.
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s/ David E. Skaggs
DAVID E. SKAGGS
Dentons US LLP
1400 Wewatta Street, Suite 700
Denver, Colorado 80202
Email: david.skaggs@dentons.com
Telephone: (303) 634-4000
MICHAEL F. FEELEY
SARAH M. CLARK
CARRIE E. JOHNSON
COLE J. WOODWARD
Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck LLP
410 17th Street, Suite 2200
Denver, Colorado 80202-4437
Email: mfeeley@bhfs.com
sclark@bhsf.com
cjohnson@bhsf.com
cwoodward@bhfs.com
Telephone: (303) 223-1100
Page 9
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32(a)(7)(B)(i) because this brief contains 1,957 words, excluding the parts of the
32(a)(5) and the type style requirements of Fed. R. App. P. 32(a)(6) because this
brief has been prepared in a proportionally spaced typeface using Microsoft Office
s/ David E. Skaggs
DAVID E. SKAGGS
Dentons US LLP
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Digital Form via the Court’s ECF system, is an exact copy of the written document
filed with the Clerk and has been scanned for viruses with Sophos Endpoint
Security and Control, Version number: 10.8.3.441 last update September 30, 2019,
and, according to the program, is free of viruses. In addition, I certify that all
s/ David E. Skaggs
DAVID E. SKAGGS
Dentons US LLP
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CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE
This is to certify that, on this 30th day of September, 2019, I have provided
s/ Kay North
Kay North
113332298\V-1
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ATTACHMENT A
Pertinent Excerpts from Previous Decisions in this case, treating the applicability
of the Political Question Doctrine to the Guarantee Clause and Enabling Act
Claims
Kerr v. Hickenlooper, 880 F.Supp.2d 1112, 1152, 1154-5 (D. C. Colo. 2012),
Martinez, J.
Earlier this year, the Supreme Court again reiterated the rule that federal
courts have jurisdiction to interpret federal statutes, even in politically
charged cases. [citing Zivotofsky ex rel. Zivotofsky v. Clinton, ––– U.S. ––––,
132 S.Ct. 1421, 182 L.Ed.2d 423 (2012)].
Given the sufficiently clear and recent case law authority (some of it binding
U.S. Supreme Court authority from the past three decades) that this Court
has jurisdiction to hear the Enabling Act claim, it would be error to dismiss
this case based only on the fact that Pacific States also involved an Enabling
Act claim. The Court therefore concludes that it has jurisdiction to hear
Plaintiffs’ Enabling Act claim under 28 U.S.C. § 1331, and as a consequence
Plaintiffs’ Enabling Act claim is not subject to dismissal.
Attachment A-1
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Kerr v. Hickenlooper, 744 F.3d 1156, 1181, 1182-83 (10th Cir. 2014), Lucero,
Circuit Judge
We thus affirm the district court's conclusion that the specific Guarantee
Clause claim asserted in this case is not barred by the political question
doctrine. . . .
We AFFIRM the standing and political question rulings of the district court
and REMAND for further proceedings.
Kerr v. Hickenlooper, 824 F.3d 1207, 1217-18 (10th Cir. 2016), Lucero, Circuit
Judge
For similar reasons, we decline to address the political question doctrine. See
Kerr I, 744 F.3d at 1181. Because the district court erred in holding the
legislator-plaintiffs possess standing, we vacate its certified order. On
remand, if the district court concludes the remaining plaintiffs lack standing,
there will be no reason to consider the political question doctrine. See Tenet
v. Doe, 544 U.S. 1, 6 n.4, 125 S.Ct. 1230, 161 L.Ed.2d 82 (2005) (federal
courts possess discretion “to choose among threshold grounds for denying
audience to a case on the merits” (quotation omitted)). If, however, the
district court holds that some other plaintiffs possess standing, the district
court may then consider other justiciability hurdles. In the interest of judicial
economy, we conclude that a remand for consideration of non-legislator
standing is the best course. (Emphasis added.)
Attachment A-2