By E. King Poor (Partner, left), William
A. Walden and Matthew A. Sloan (Associates), Quarles & Brady LLP
Joining state law claims in a federal suit is common. But
until the Supreme Court decided Artis v. District of Columbia, 2018 WL 491524 (Jan. 22, 2018), this question
remained unsettled: How much time does a plaintiff have to refile state law
claims if all the federal claims are dismissed? In Artis, the Court provided a simple answer: a state statute of
limitations is suspended while the federal case is pending and a plaintiff has
the time remaining on that statute, plus 30 days, to refile.
Yet simple answers are not always the product of simple
decisions. Here, in answering this narrow question of civil procedure, the
Supreme Court split five-to-four. Justice Ginsberg authored a majority opinion
relying on the textualism championed by the late Justice Scalia. Yet Justice
Gorsuch’s dissent harkened back to the common law of the 1600s and argued that
the majority’s position was not only contrary to the principles of federalism,
but unconstitutional.
“Tolling” Means
What the Text Says
Employment cases, like many federal suits, often join
state law claims under a federal court’s “supplemental jurisdiction.” The Artis case followed that pattern. After
being terminated from her job with the District of Columbia, the plaintiff
brought suit in federal court and joined D.C. law claims in her suit. Later,
the court dismissed the federal claims without deciding those brought under
D.C. law.
Section 1367(d) of the Judicial Code (28 U.S. C. §
1367(d)) governs how much time a plaintiff has to refile in state court, after
any federal claims are dismissed. It states that the time to refile in state
court is “tolled while the claim is pending and for a period of 30 days after
it is dismissed unless State law provides for a longer tolling period.”
In Artis, when
the case was filed, almost two years remained on D.C.’s three-year statute of
limitations, but by the time that the case was dismissed, the entire three-year
period had elapsed. The plaintiff then filed suit in a D.C. court 59 days after
the dismissal. That court dismissed the new case as untimely. It concluded that
§ 1367(d) did not suspend the running of the statute, and therefore, filing 29
days after the 30-day grace period was too late. The D.C. Court of Appeals
affirmed following a ruling by the California Supreme Court, which in turn,
conflicted with decisions from other state supreme courts.
The Supreme Court took the case to resolve this division
of authority. Writing for the majority, Justice Ginsburg recognized that the
case turned on the statute’s use of the word “tolled.” The Court noted that
while “toll” may have other meanings (something that bells do or that drivers
pay on a highway), in the context of statutes of limitations, it meant to
suspend, or as the Court put it, “stop the clock.” To reach this conclusion,
the Court focused on the text of the statute and stated that not only did the
dictionary treat “toll” as suspending or stopped, the Court’s own decisions
have consistently treated the word the same way. It also pointed out that
adding a brief “grace period” such as 30 days, is “not unusual in
stop-the-clock statutes.”
Finally, the Court was unpersuaded by the dissent’s
argument that a stop-the-clock interpretation of “tolling” violated the
Necessary and Proper Clause of the United States Constitution as a federal
intrusion on state control of statutes of limitations. In rejecting this
argument, the Court relied on its earlier precedent that § 1367(d) was
necessary to the “administration of justice in federal court,” because it keeps
plaintiffs from having to file in both federal and state courts for an action
arising from the same event. The Court explained that whether Congress chose to
use a stop-the-clock approach or a 30-day grace period was a matter within its
discretion that did not implicate the Constitution.
Dissent:
Stop-the-Clock Contrary to Common Law, Federalism and the Constitution
Justice Gorsuch argued in his dissent that, “It may be
only a small statute that we are interpreting, but the result that the Court
reaches today represents no small intrusion on traditional state functions and
no small departure from our foundational principles of federalism.” In
particular, he maintained that § 1367(d) grew out of a “rich common law and
statutory tradition” that would have interpreted the word “tolling” to mean
only a grace period, not a suspension of the statute. Relying on case law from
as far back as the early 1600s, he stated that the common law provided only for
enough time to “journey” to a new court after another case was dismissed.
The dissent also contended the majority’s stop-the-clock
interpretation violated the Necessary and Proper Clause. Claiming that this
interpretation unnecessarily intrudes on the ability of states to regulate
their own statutes of limitation, the dissent concluded that “The Court today
clears away a fence that once marked a basic boundary between federal and state
power.”
Practice Pointers
Despite the varying arguments in Artis, the basic rule to emerge from the case is still straightforward:
State claims may be refiled within the time remaining on a statute of
limitations when the case was filed, plus 30 days. That may be a short period
if the case was filed near the end of the statute. Or it may be lengthy, if the
case was filed when months or even years remained before the statute expired.
As a result, defendants in particular should be mindful of
the need to preserve all evidence and maintain litigation holds even after all
the federal claims have been dismissed, when any state claims are still
undecided. Any evidence preservation should remain in place until there is
confirmation that the remaining periods for any state statute of the
limitations, plus 30 days, have expired.
DISCLAIMER: The
Appellate Lawyers Association does not provide legal services or legal advice.
Discussions of legal principles and authority, including, but not limited to,
constitutional provisions, statutes, legislative enactments, court rules, case
law, and common-law doctrines are for informational purposes only and do not
constitute legal advice.
