D.Utah.: Another bad ADA immunity decision

Utah's federal district court misapplied Supreme Court precedent on state sovereign immunity under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

The court failed to consider whether the Act validly abrogated immunity for the claims at hand regardless of whether the plaintiff asserted a constitutional violation. Instead, the court dismissed a university student's ADA claims solely on the basis that they did not allege actual constitutional violations.  Taylor v. Young, 2008 WL 4533915 (D.Utah Sep. 29, 2008) (No. 2:08-CV-177).

Young was a University of Utah student who sued the school pro se. The nature of his alleged disability is not clear from the court's decision. According to the court, Young alleged that the school did not allow him to see an assigned student housing unit before moving in; failed to provide assistance with note-taking in class in a timely manner; and failed to provide computer training appropriate to his disability.

The court did not consider whether Young had a disability or whether he stated valid claims under the ADA. Instead, the court said:

Under Title II, the ADA may abrogate state sovereign immunity but only “insofar as Title II creates a private cause of action for damages against the States for conduct that actually violates the Fourteenth Amendment.”  United States v. Georgia, 546 U.S. 151, 159 (2006)....None of the acts alleged in the complaint rise to the level of a constitutional violation under the Fourteenth Amendment. Accordingly, Title II does not abrogate the state's sovereign immunity in this case, and Plaintiff is precluded from suing University of Utah Center for Disability Services.

This analysis disregard's the Georgia Court's clear statement that courts must determine, “on a claim-by-claim basis....insofar as such misconduct violated Title II but did not violate the [Constitution], whether Congress's purported abrogation of sovereign immunity as to that class of conduct is nevertheless valid.” Under this analysis, all four circuits to consider the question have concluded that Title II validly abrogates sovereign immunity in the context of higher education. Bowers v. National Collegiate Athletic Association, 475 F.3d 524 (3d Cir. 2007) (summary here); Toledo v. Sanchez, 454 F.3d 24 (1st Cir. 2006); Constantine v. Rectors and Visitors of George Mason, 411 F.3d 474 (4^th Cir. 2005); Association for Disabled Americans Incorporated v. Florida International University, 405 F.3d 954 (11th Cir. 2005).

 

Unfortunately, this is the third case in which we have seen a district court misapply Georgia in this manner. The others are Morris v. State Bar of California, 2008 WL 4067448 (N.D. Cal. Aug. 22, 2008) (No. 07-2890) (attorney suit against state Bar), and Fox v. Poole, 2008 WL 1991103 (W.D.N.Y. Apr. 24, 2008) (prisoner suit; summary here). Although none of these cases appeared strong on the merits, these sloppy decisions represent a disturbing trend.