Armour and Company v. Ball

337 F. Supp. 938, 1971 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10805
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Michigan
DecidedNovember 12, 1971
DocketCiv. A. 6250
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 337 F. Supp. 938 (Armour and Company v. Ball) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Michigan primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Armour and Company v. Ball, 337 F. Supp. 938, 1971 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10805 (W.D. Mich. 1971).

Opinion

OPINION

FOX, Chief Judge.

Plaintiffs Armour and Company, Wilson and Co., Inc., and Geo. A. Hormel and Company brought this action against B. Dale Ball, the Director of the Michigan Department of Agriculture, and Ronald M. Leach, Acting Chief of the Food Inspection Division of the Michigan Department of Agriculture. They request the court to enjoin the defendants from enforcing the marketing, labeling, packaging and ingredient provisions of the Michigan Comminuted Meat Law, P.A.1952, No. 228, M.S.A. § 12.964 (1) et seq., M.C.L.A. § 289.581 et seq. and further ask the court to declare the Michigan Comminuted Meat law unconstitutional and therefore, unenforceable against the plaintiffs.

*940 The preamble to the Michigan Com-minuted Meat Act states that it is an act:

providing for the protection of the public health and the prevention of fraud and deception by prohibiting the manufacture, sale, the offering for sale or exposing for sale or having in possession with intent to sell, sausage, meat loaf, hamburger, chili con carne, liver sausage, head cheese, sulze, blood sausage, New York (New England) (pressed luncheon), and tongue sausage, that is adulterated or deleterious or not in compliance with this act; defining the mentioned products and other terms used; providing for licensing; regulating labeling and advertising; prescribing penalties for violations of this act; and repealing certain acts and parts of acts.

Thus, the act focuses on the labeling and marketing of processed meats.

The United States Congress has likewise passed an act, the Federal Wholesome Meat Act, 21 U.S.C.App. § 601 et seq., regulating the labeling, marketing, inspection and other aspects of the meat industry.

The plaintiffs attack the Michigan Comminuted Meat Act on the basis of the Federal Wholesome Meat Act, claiming that the federal act entirely preempts the field of meat labeling and ingredient requirements. Specifically at issue in this case are Michigan’s requirements that:

(1) Sausage and similar processed meat products be labeled “Grade I.”
(2) All labels of such meat products carry the name of the manufacturer.
(3) Such meat products must contain at least 12% protein.

Central to the dispute in this case is the 12% protein requirement. The regulations promulgated under the Federal Wholesome Meat Act fail to provide for minimum protein content in processed meats such as sausage. The Michigan Act, however, provides “[t]he total percentage of protein shall not be less than 12%.” M.S.A. § 12.964(2), M.C.L.A. § 289.582.

Furthermore, the Michigan act specifies that, “Grade 1 sausage shall consist only of skeletal fresh meat ... of cattle, swine or sheep ... or the striated muscle of chicken or turkey.” Federal regulations, on the other hand, allow the use of hearts, tongues, tripe, lungs, melts, eyes, stomachs, udders, lips, ears, snouts, spleens, esophagus, glands, bladders, and paunches. (See appendix.)

Violation of the Michigan act is made a misdemeanor punishable by a $100.00 fine and/or 90 days in jail. Two convictions within a 12-month period result in a mandatory hearing before the director of Agriculture to determine whether the offender’s license to sell sausage in the state should be revoked.

Plaintiffs call upon this court to enjoin state officials from enforcing the Michigan act and for a declaration of the act’s invalidity.

IRREPARABLE INJURY

Standing as a fundamental concept of equity is the rule that an injunction will not issue unless the complaining party demonstrates irreparable injury. Here the plaintiffs seek to enjoin public officials from enforcing an act that imposes criminal sanctions. They assert that they are irreparably injured by the costs of complying with the Michigan act and by the threat to their licenses posed by possible prosecution under the act.

It has long been the general rule in federal courts that:

“ * * * equity will not interfere to prevent the enforcement of a criminal statute even though unconstitutional. Hygrade Provision Co. v. Sherman, 266 U.S. 497, 500 [45 S.Ct. 141, 69 L.Ed. 402]. See, also, In re Sawyer, 124 U.S. 200, 209-211 [8 S. Ct. 482, 31 L.Ed. 402]; Davis & Farnum Manufacturing Co. v. Los Angeles, 189 U.S. 207, 217 [23 S.Ct. 498, 47 L.Ed. 778]. To justify such inter *941 ference there must be exceptional circumstances and a clear showing that an injunction is necessary in order to afford adequate protection of constitutional rights. See Terrace v. Thompson, 263 U.S. 197, 214 [44 S.Ct. 15, 68 L.Ed. 255]; Packard v. Banton, 264 U.S. 140, 143 [44 S.Ct. 257, 68 L.Ed. 596]; Tyson [& Bros. United Theatre Ticket Offices] v. Banton, 273 U.S. 418, 428 [47 S.Ct. 426, 71 L.Ed. 718, 58 A.L.R. 1236]; Cline v. Frink Dairy Co., 274 U.S. 445, 452 [47 S.Ct. 681, 71 L.Ed. 1146]; Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 161, 162 [28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714, 13 L.R.A. (N.S.) 932, 14 Ann.Cas. 764]. We have said that it must appear that ‘the danger of irreparable loss is both great and immediate’; otherwise, the accused should first set up his defense in the state court, even though the validity of a statute is challenged.” Spielman Motor Sales Co. v. Dodge, 295 U.S. 89, 95, 55 S.Ct. 678, 680, 79 L.Ed. 1322 (1935). (Emphasis supplied.)

In the Spielman case, Spielman Motor Company brought its action to restrain a threatened prosecution under the New York “Code of Fair Competition for the Motor Vehicle Retailing Trade.” In holding that the plaintiff failed to demonstrate “irreparable damage” the court stated:

The bill alleged that appellant had a large business in buying and selling motor vehicles, but the statute did not prohibit the continuance of that business and the bill gave no facts to show that the particular requirements of the code, which were in question, would create such a serious interference as to require equitable relief. Aside from the statement of general and unsupported conclusions, the case presented by the bill was the ordinary one of a criminal prosecution which would afford appropriate opportunity for the assertion of appellant’s rights.
295 U.S. at 96, 55 S.Ct. at 681.

Like the plaintiff in Spielman, the plaintiffs in this action fail to allege “such a serious interference as to require equitable relief.” The plaintiffs in this case are threatened with criminal proceedings.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
337 F. Supp. 938, 1971 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10805, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/armour-and-company-v-ball-miwd-1971.