Corporation of Haverford College v. Reeher

329 F. Supp. 1196, 1971 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12389
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Pennsylvania
DecidedJuly 19, 1971
DocketCiv. A. 70-2411
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 329 F. Supp. 1196 (Corporation of Haverford College v. Reeher) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Corporation of Haverford College v. Reeher, 329 F. Supp. 1196, 1971 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12389 (E.D. Pa. 1971).

Opinions

OPINION

JOSEPH S. LORD, III, District Judge.

Plaintiffs, two colleges and twelve college or university students, seek a declaratory judgment that two Pennsylvania statutes, 24 Pa.Stat.Ann. §§ 5104.1, 5158.2 (1971),1 are unconstitutional and an injunction restraining officials of the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency (PHEAA) from enforcing or otherwise acting under those statutes. This court has jurisdiction of the controversy pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1343, 2201, 2281, 2284, and 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The plaintiffs have moved for summary judgment on all issues of the statutes’ unconstitutionality pursuant to Fed.R. Civ.P. 56.

Plaintiffs seek to maintain this as a class action. Plaintiff Goddard College purports to represent 26 institutions which have refused to execute an -agreement with PHEAA under the statute. We hold that this class is not so numerous that joinder is impracticable, Fed.R.Civ.P. 23(a), and thus Goddard shall not be treated as representative of a class for the purpose of this action. The other named plaintiffs meet the requirements of Rule 23,2 and may main[1200]*1200tain this as a class action. Haverford College represents that class of institutions which have executed reporting agreements with PHEAA in order to retain their status as “approved” institutions whose students will be eligible to receive state aid. Plaintiffs O’Shaughnessy, Hutchins, Levine, Goldman, Rabinowitz and Schaefer represent students who have lost their PHEAA loans or scholarships because they attend institutions which have refused to execute reporting agreements with PHEAA. Plaintiffs Goodwin, Sullivan and McLamb represent students at institutions signing a “Haverford” agreement3 with PHEAA who, in order to get financial aid, must disclose in a supplemental form whether they fall within the provisions of subsections (a) (1), (a) (2) or (a) (3), must agree to inform PHEAA promptly if they act so as to fall within those subsections and must authorize their institutions to verify their answers if PHEAA so requests. Plaintiffs Ingram and Casnoff represent students at institutions signing “Haverford” agreements who refuse to execute such supplemental forms and thus have lost their eligibility for financial assistance.

The record before us consists of the complaint and answer, stipulations of fact agreed on by counsel, exhibits introduced into evidence by plaintiffs and evidence offered at a hearing on plaintiffs’ motion for partial preliminary relief. The undisputed factual issues in the record are the bases for determination of the merits of plaintiffs’ allegations that the statutes are unconstitutionally vague and overbroad and violate the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth and Tenth Amendments and the due process and equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.

I. ABSTENTION

Although neither party has raised the issue, we must consider whether we should abstain from any decision on grounds of vagueness or overbreadth in order to give the state courts an opportunity to construe the statute. This is not a case like Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L.Ed.2d 669 (1971), or Perez v. Ledesma, 401 U.S. 82, 91 S.Ct. 674, 27 L.Ed.2d 701 (1971), where the Supreme Court held improper the issuance of injunctions by the Federal Court against state criminal proceedings. No state court proceedings exist relevant to this case.

Abstention is an equitable doctrine. Younger v. Harris, supra, 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L.Ed.2d at 675; Hostetter v. Idlewild Bon Voyage Liquor Corp., 377 U.S. 324, 328, 84 S.Ct. 1293, 12 L.Ed.2d 350 (1964). In light of the legislative history of the statute and its section (c) saving clause which indicates an intent to permit only verbal expression of views, we do not consider the statute “obviously susceptible of a limiting construction.” See Zwickler v. Koota, 389 U.S. 241, 251 n. 14, 88 S.Ct. 391, 397, 19 L.Ed.2d 444 (1967). Where plaintiffs justifiably claim that the statute is vague and overbroad, abstention can defeat the purposes of those doctrines, which exist at least in part to protect the cautious citizen who might be deterred from engaging in conduct which the state either could not or did not intend to punish. See, e. g., Zwickler v. Koota, supra, at 252, 88 S.Ct. 391; Dombrowski v. Pfister, 380 U.S. 479, 486-487, 492, 85 S.Ct. 1116, 14 L.Ed.2d 22 (1965). Appropriate here are the Supreme Court’s observations about abstention in the face of a vagueness challenge to a loyalty oath:

“ * * * In these circumstances it is difficult to see how an abstract construction [by the state courts] of the challenged terms * * * in a declaratory judgment action could eliminate the vagueness from these terms. It is fictional to believe that anything less than extensive adjudications, un[1201]*1201der the impact of a variety of factual situations, would bring the oath within the bounds of permissible constitutional certainty. Abstention does not require this.” Baggett v. Bullitt, 377 U.S. 360, 378, 84 S.Ct. 1316, 1326, 12 L.Ed.2d 377 (1964).

The lengthy delay which would occur if we referred this case to the state courts would occasion an equally lengthy period of impingement on the rights plaintiffs seek to protect in this action, assuming their claims to be valid. In addition, our worries about possible friction with state officials arising from failure to abstain are mitigated somewhat by the fact that the attorneys representing the state agency have never raised the abstention issue. For these reasons, in the discretionary exercise of our equity powers, Baggett v. Bullitt, supra, at 375, 84 S.Ct. 1316, we decline to abstain from deciding the merits of plaintiffs’ claims.

II. VAGUENESS

Plaintiffs allege that subsections (a) (1), (a) (2) and (a) (3) of the two sections are unconstitutionally vague. They charge that the standards which govern PHEAA’s eligibility determinations are so “vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at [their] meaning” and therefore violate “the first essential of due process of law.” Connally v. General Construction Co., 269 U. S. 385, 391, 46 S.Ct. 126, 127, 70 L.Ed. 322 (1926).

While the Connally test has been articulated generally as the guide to judicial determinations of vagueness, its mere recital followed by a conclusion that a statute is or is not unconstitutionally uncertain often produces seemingly inconsistent results4 and provides little assistance to legislators concerned with drafting definite statutes.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Nelson v. DEPT. OF BUS. & PRO. REGULATION
707 So. 2d 378 (District Court of Appeal of Florida, 1998)
Township of Susquehanna v. H & M, Inc.
70 A.L.R. Fed. 480 (M.D. Pennsylvania, 1983)
State Ex Rel. Oklahoma Bar Ass'n v. Denton
1979 OK 116 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1979)
Commonwealth v. Suplee
387 A.2d 85 (Superior Court of Pennsylvania, 1978)
Clark v. Lutcher
436 F. Supp. 1266 (M.D. Pennsylvania, 1977)
Corr v. Mattheis
407 F. Supp. 847 (D. Rhode Island, 1976)
Campbell v. A. C. Petersen Farms Inc.
69 F.R.D. 457 (D. Connecticut, 1975)
Carbonaro v. Reeher
392 F. Supp. 753 (E.D. Pennsylvania, 1975)
State v. Silva
525 P.2d 903 (New Mexico Court of Appeals, 1974)
Wilburn v. Steamship Trade Ass'n of Baltimore, Inc.
376 F. Supp. 1228 (D. Maryland, 1974)
Undergraduate Student Ass'n v. Peltason
367 F. Supp. 1055 (N.D. Illinois, 1973)
Undergraduate Student Association v. Peltason
367 F. Supp. 1055 (N.D. Illinois, 1973)
Furumoto v. Lyman
362 F. Supp. 1267 (N.D. California, 1973)
Rasche v. Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
353 F. Supp. 973 (N.D. Illinois, 1972)
Lowery v. Adams
344 F. Supp. 446 (W.D. Kentucky, 1972)
Corp. of Haverford College v. Reeher
54 F.R.D. 374 (E.D. Pennsylvania, 1972)
Corporation of Haverford College v. Reeher
329 F. Supp. 1196 (E.D. Pennsylvania, 1971)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
329 F. Supp. 1196, 1971 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12389, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/corporation-of-haverford-college-v-reeher-paed-1971.