United States of America v. State of Louisiana et al
Filing
74
RULING: Because the MJ did not clearly err or act contrary to federal law, the MJ's discovery rulings (Docs. 61, 63) are hereby AFFIRMED and defts appeals (Docs. 64 - 68) are hereby DENIED. Signed by Judge James J. Brady on 3/9/2012. (JDL)
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
MIDDLE DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
CIVIL ACTION
VERSUS
NO. 11-470-JJB
STATE OF LOUISIANA, ET AL.
RULING ON OBJECTION’S TO MAGISTRATE JUDGE’S ORDERS
Before the Court are several objections to discovery rulings made by the magistrate
judge. Specifically, defendants Thomas Schedler, in his official capacity as Louisiana Secretary
of State; the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals (“DHH”); Bruce Greenstein, in his
official capacity as Secretary of DHH; the Louisiana Department of Children and Family
Services (“DCFS”); and Ruth Johnson, in her official capacity as Secretary of DCFS, each
separately move to vacate or modify the magistrate judge’s discovery rulings on three points: the
number of interrogatories allowed, the number of requests for admission allowed, and the
protective order entered. (See Docs. 64-68). The United States filed a consolidated opposition.
(Doc. 70). Oral argument is unnecessary. The Court has jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1331.
I.
This case concerns Louisiana’s alleged violations of the National Voter Registration Act
of 1993 (“NVRA”), 42 U.S.C. § 1973gg et seq. Under NVRA, States are required to distribute
to their citizens voter registration forms. States must also assist citizens in completing the forms
and thereafter transmit them to the appropriate state election officials.
The magistrate judge in this case conducted a status conference on October 20, 2011.
Because of the sensitive and personal nature of the public assistance and voter registration
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documents at issue, and due to the parties’ inability to agree on an appropriate protective order,
the magistrate judge granted the United States’ request for a protective order. (Doc. 61).
Another status conference was held on December 14, 2011, wherein the magistrate judge
allowed the United States to propound 40 interrogatories on each defendant-entity but only
permitted 40 joint interrogatories from the defendants because their aligned interests would
present unduly cumulative discovery requests if not so limited. (Doc. 63, p. 3 (citing Fed. Rule
Civ. P. 26(b)(2)).
Likewise, the United States was allowed to propound 25 requests for
admission on each defendant-entity, but defendants were permitted only 25 joint requests. (Id.).
There are four defendant-entities in this suit: the State, the Secretary of State’s office, DHH, and
DCFS.
II.
District courts review non-dispositive decisions made by magistrate judges under a
clearly erroneous or contrary to law standard. Fed. Rule Civ. P. 72(a); 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(A).
A. Protective Order
Secretary Greenstein, DHH, Secretary Johnson, and DCFS argue that the protective order
issued in this case is neither authorized under Rule 26 nor legally permissible under a host of
state and federal privacy laws protecting confidential information from disclosure. (Docs. 65,
67). Secretary Schedler appeals only to preserve his ability to object to future discovery requests
and otherwise protect sensitive information sought during discovery. (Doc. 64-1, p.4).
Fed. Rule Civ. P. 26(c) provides as follows:
A party or any person from whom discovery is sought may move for a protective
order in the court where the action is pending . . . . The court may, for good
cause, issue an order to protect a party or person from annoyance, embarrassment,
oppression, or undue burden or expense. . . .
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Defendants argue the lack of any commas setting off “or any person from whom discovery is
sought” means that only parties or persons from whom discovery is sought may move for a
protective order. Since the United States in this case is seeking to obtain discovery but is not the
party from whom discovery is sought—at least with respect to the information subject to the
protective order—defendants are correct that the text of this rule precludes the United States
from moving for a protective order. This impression is confirmed by the second sentence quoted
above. It clearly refers to the same party or person referenced in the first sentence, and it would
be strange to include concerns about annoyance, embarrassment, oppression, or undue burden or
expense for parties who are obtaining but not furnishing the discovery sought to be protected.
Thus, on a plain textual reading of Rule 26(c), the United States cannot move for a protective
order covering information it will obtain, but not furnish, via discovery.
But contrary to defendants’ position, that does not end the matter. Aside from the
specific discovery powers delineated in Rule 26(c), district courts have broad inherent powers to
manage discovery. Some of these powers are recognized in other portions of the Federal Rules.
For instance, Rule 26(b)(1) provides in part that the scope of discovery extends to “any
nonprivileged matter that is relevant to any party’s claim or defense . . . [and] [f]or good cause,
the court may order discovery of any matter relevant to the subject matter involved in the
action.” Regarding discovery of electronically stored information, which appears to be the
predominant source of the information sought to be protected here, Rule 26(b)(2)(B) permits the
court to “specify conditions for the discovery” and order discovery, notwithstanding objections
of cost or inconvenience, if the party requesting discovery shows good cause. In short, Rule 26
mandates certain procedures to be followed by the parties and, in certain instances, presents
specific limitations on the court’s discovery powers, but it does not purport to set a ceiling for the
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district court’s exercise of its broad power to manage the case. The Court finds it proper to quote
at length a passage from a Fifth Circuit opinion:
For nearly as long as the federal courts have existed, it has been understood that
certain implied powers must necessarily result to our courts of justice from the
nature of their institution, powers which cannot be dispensed with in a court
because they are necessary to the exercise of all others. The Constitution itself
confers this authority upon all Article III courts as an incident to “The judicial
Power.” The inherent powers of the federal courts are governed not by rule or
statute but by the control necessarily vested in courts to manage their own affairs so
as to achieve the orderly and expeditious disposition of cases. At the same time,
however, these powers must be exercised with restraint and discretion. As we have
said, inherent authority is not a broad reservoir of power, ready at an imperial hand,
but a limited source; an implied power squeezed from the need to make the court
function. In short, the inherent power springs from the well of necessity, and
sparingly so.
Natural Gas Pipeline Co. of America v. Energy Gathering, Inc., 2 F.3d 1397, 1406-07 (5th Cir.
1993) (internal citations and punctuation omitted). This case plainly presents such a scenario.
The United States has brought a claim against the State to enforce federal law, but obtaining
necessary evidence of this non-compliance rests in the hands of the State. Without a protective
order, the United States would have no way of proving with specificity the NVRA noncompliance its statistical data suggests unless the discovery were compelled without a protective
order, which would plainly violate myriad federal and state privacy regulations. Faced with this
unpalatable scenario, the magistrate judge correctly concluded that the inherent power of this
Court permits the issuance of a protective order. See Natural Gas Pipeline Co., 2 F.3d at 1409,
n. 34 (noting that courts may well have inherent power to order a party to produce pertinent
documents).
The federal and state laws cited by defendants are not to the contrary. First, the state
privacy law, La. R.S. 46:56, plainly binds neither the federal government nor a federal court
hearing suit under federal question jurisdiction. See G.D. v. Riley, No. 2:05-CV-980, 2007 WL
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2206559 (S.D. Ohio July 30, 2007) (magistrate judge opinion); A Helping Hand, LLC v.
Baltimore County, Md., 295 F.Supp.2d 585, 592 (D. Md. 2003). Second, the federal statutes and
regulations cited all contain provisos for use of such information pursuant to appropriate court
order. See, e.g., 7 C.F.R. § 272.1(c)(1)(i) (requiring State agencies participating in food stamp
programs to permit disclosure of information regarding applicants of recipients to persons
“directly connected with the administration or enforcement of … Federal assistance programs”);
45 C.F.R. § 205.50(a)(1)(i)(B) (requiring State plans for financial assistance under the Social
Security Act to disclose information concerning applicants and recipients when directly
connected with an investigation, prosecution or criminal or civil proceeding conducted in
connection with the administration of any such plan or program); 42 U.S.C. § 1396a(a)(7)
(requiring State plan for medical assistance to restrict disclosure of information concerning
applicants and recipients to purposes directly connected with administration of the plan); 42
C.F.R. § 431.306 (requiring state agency providing medical assistance under auspices of
Medicare or Medicaid to restrict access to information concerning applicants for or recipients of
Medicaid to persons subject to standards of confidentiality comparable to the state agency
administering the program); 45 C.F.R. § 164.512(e) (under Health Insurance Portability and
Accountability Act (HIPAA), disclosure of protected health information allowed in a judicial
proceeding if a protective order prohibits use of the information outside the litigation and the
information will be returned or destroyed after litigation ends); 34 C.F.R. § 99.31(a)(3)(ii)
(permitting educational agency or institution to disclose personally identifiable information from
a student’s educational record without consent if disclosure is made to authorized representative
of the Attorney General of the United States when enforcing compliance with Federal legal
requirements relating to Federal or State supported education programs).
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As the foregoing suggests, no federal law prevents disclosure of relevant information
sought by the federal government—pursuant to its executive power to “take Care that the Laws
be faithfully executed” under Art. II, § 3 of the Constitution—unless that information is
privileged. See Fed. Rule Civ. P. 26. The State makes no claim that the information is subject to
any cognizable federal privilege.
Lest the defendants forget, the Attorney General is affirmatively empowered by federal
law to “bring a civil action in an appropriate district court for such declaratory or injunctive relief
as is necessary to carry out this Act.” 42 U.S.C. § 1973gg-9(a). The Court cannot escape
concluding that the protective order was appropriately issued.
To rule otherwise would
incentivize a State’s refusal to agree on an appropriate protective order and would effectively
defeat the United States’ enforcement of NVRA. Congress surely contemplated no such obstacle
in either Rule 26 or the other privacy provisions discussed above.
B. Number of Interrogatories and Requests for Admission
Because the magistrate judge’s rationale for forcing joint requests on defendants equal to
plaintiff’s allotted number applies to both types of discovery mechanisms, the Court treats them
in tandem. The defendants chiefly argue that their interests are not so closely aligned as to
justify joint treatment for discovery purposes. While they acknowledge partial alignment of
interests, they contend each entity has independent interests in learning how its agency was
investigated or monitored. They point out that because each entity has programs and obligations
specific to the group of citizens whom they serve, their services necessarily vary and thus the
obligations imposed by NVRA vary as well. Finally, they rely on this Court’s ruling on the
motion to dismiss (Doc. 53), which found that only the Secretary of State and the State itself
could be held responsible for designating voter registration agencies responsible for carrying out
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NVRA responsibilities. They assert that recognition of differing duties necessarily means the
magistrate judge erred in finding an alignment of interests.
The magistrate judge did not clearly err in setting the discovery limits imposed. Any
party may seek leave to file more discovery requests. (Doc. 63, p. 3). Defendants themselves
acknowledge at least partial alignment of interests, and their briefing on these issues appears at
least highly coordinated and at most near mirror images of each other. (Compare, e.g., Doc. 662 with Doc. 68-1). This degree of briefing coordination strongly implies a willingness—and,
hence, an ability—to coordinate discovery as well. Rule 33(a)(1) provides that “[u]nless …
ordered by the court, a party may serve on any other party no more than 25 written
interrogatories, including discrete subparts.” Fed. Rule Civ. P. 36(a) provides that a “party may
serve on any other party a written request to admit … the truth of any matters….” 1 Rule
26(b)(2)(A) expressly permits a court to “alter the limits in these rules on the number of …
interrogatories” as well as “limit the number of requests under Rule 36.” These Rules provide
relatively little guidance to judges on the standards to be employed. This grants them wide
latitude to make discovery rulings based on their impressions on a variety of topics, including
whether “the discovery sought is unreasonably cumulative or duplicative….” Fed. Rule Civ. P.
26(b)(2)(C)(i). The Court remains unconvinced that the magistrate judge’s concerns about
duplicative discovery are clearly erroneous or contrary to law.
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Local Rule 36.2 caps the number of requests at 25 in the aggregate without leave of the Court. It also permits
parties to file written motions for obtaining additional requests.
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III.
Because the magistrate judge did not clearly err or act contrary to federal law, the
magistrate judge’s discovery rulings (Docs. 61, 63) are hereby AFFIRMED and defendants’
appeals (Docs. 64-68) are hereby DENIED.
Signed in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on March 9, 2012.
JAMES J. BRADY, DISTRICT JUDGE
MIDDLE DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA
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