Justia Agriculture Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiffs, six states, filed suit seeking to block enforcement of California's laws and regulations prescribing standards for the conditions under which chickens must be kept in order for their eggs to be sold in the state. Plaintiffs seek to block enforcement before the laws and regulations take effect. The court agreed with the district court that plaintiffs lacked standing to bring this case as parens patriae where plaintiffs failed to demonstrate an interest apart from the interests of particular private parties because plaintiffs' alleged harm to the egg farmers in plaintiffs' states is insufficient to satisfy the first prong of parens patriae; plaintiffs' allegations regarding the potential economic effects of the laws, after implementation, were necessarily speculative; and plaintiffs’ reliance on cases granting parens patriae standing to challenge discrimination against a state’s citizens is misplaced where the laws do not distinguish among eggs based on their state of origin. The court also concluded that plaintiffs would be unable to assert parens patriae standing in an amended complaint. Because plaintiffs could allege post-effective-date facts that might support standing, the complaint should have been dismissed without prejudice. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment and remanded with instructions to dismiss the action without prejudice. View "State of Missouri ex rel. Koster v. Harris" on Justia Law

Vernon Smith appeals the district court’s award of attorney fees to Treasure Valley Seed Company, LLC and its owner Don Tolmie (collectively TVSC). This case arose out of a contract for the sale of lima beans between Victoria H. Smith and TVSC. In 2013, Victoria’s son, Vernon, filed a complaint against TVSC alleging claims for breach of the lima beans contract. As plaintiff, the complaint named “VICTORIA H. SMITH, by and through her attorney in fact, Vernon K. Smith, by and through his Durable and Irrevocable Power of Attorney.” In 2014, TVSC learned Victoria had died on September 11, 2013—roughly three months before the complaint was filed. TVSC then moved to dismiss the complaint, contending there was no real party in interest. Vernon responded and argued he was the real party in interest because of his durable and irrevocable power of attorney. The district court concluded Vernon’s power of attorney had terminated at Victoria’s death. Further, the district court reasoned that because no personal representative had been appointed through probate, there was no real party in interest. Accordingly, the district court granted TVSC’s motion to dismiss. Vernon appealed. The Supreme Court found, after review of this matter: (1) there was indeed a real party in interest; and (2) the district court erred by assessing attorney fees jointly and severally against Victoria and Vernon. The matter was remanded for further proceedings. View "Smith v. Treasure Valley Seed Co." on Justia Law

A common-benefit trust fund was established to compensate attorneys leading the MDL concerning Bayer’s LibertyLink LL601 genetically modified rice. On appeal, Bayer and Riceland challenge the district court's order requiring Bayer to cause the deposit of a portion of a settlement between Bayer and Riceland into the fund. Bayer and Riceland argue that because their settlement was the product of negotiations following a state-court judgment, the district court lacked jurisdiction to order Bayer to cause a percentage of the settlement to be deposited into the fund. The court concluded that the district court properly ordered Bayer to hold back a portion of the Bayer-Riceland settlement. In this case, application of the Common Benefit Order was a comparable collateral matter that the district court had jurisdiction to resolve in light of the settlement; the district court properly applied the Common Benefit Order to the settlement and required a percentage of the entire settlement to be redirected to the common-benefit fund; and the district court did not plainly err in assigning to Bayer the duty of causing a deposit of the funds due under the Common Benefit Order. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Riceland Foods v. Bayer Cropscience US" on Justia Law

The Fergusons proposed to repay their farm debts under Bankruptcy Code Chapter 12, including a $300,000 loan from First Community Bank, secured by a mortgage plus a lien on farm equipment and crops, and a $176,000 loan from FS, secured by a junior lien on equipment and crops. The bankruptcy judge approved a sale of equipment and crops, which yielded $238,000. The Bank, as senior creditor, demanded those proceeds. FS argued that the Bank should be required to recoup through the mortgage, allowing FS to be repaid from the equipment sale; "marshaling" is not mentioned in the Code, but available under state law. The Fergusons wanted reorganization, to keep their farm. The judge awarded the Bank $238,000. The parties could not agree on a repayment plan. The judge converted the case to a Chapter 7 liquidation. The trustee sold the farm for $411,000, paying the Bank the balance of its claim. About $261,000 remains. FS wanted to be treated as a secured creditor and repeated its request for marshaling. The equipment sale generated federal and state tax bills, with priority among unsecured creditors, 11 U.S.C. 507(a)(8). FS’s status—as a secured creditor with marshaling, or a general unsecured creditor without it—determines whether the taxes will be paid during the bankruptcy. Tax debts are not dischargeable; the Fergusons opposed marshaling. The bankruptcy judge approved FS’s request, stating that he would have approved the original request had he known that the farm would be sold. The district court remanded, stating that marshaling is proper only if two funds exist simultaneously. One fund (equipment and crop proceeds) is gone, only the land sale fund still exists. The Seventh Circuit dismissed an appeal for lack of jurisdiction; the remand was not a final order. View "Ferguson v. West Central FS, Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against the USDA and others, claiming that defendants violated the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA), 15 U.S.C. 1691 et seq., because they denied his debt settlement offers on the basis of his race and in retaliation for his being a member of the Pigford class-action litigation. Plaintiff also alleged that defendants engaged in a conspiracy under 42 U.S.C. 1985(3) to interfere with his civil rights, and that they violated his rights under the Fifth and Thirteenth Amendments. The district court granted defendants' motion to dismiss plaintiff's claims. The court held that a final agency decision by the USDA resolving a complaint under 7 C.F.R. Pt. 15d using the administrative procedures currently in effect does not result in claim preclusion. In this case, the complaint does not contain sufficient allegations to state a plausible claim that Thomas Brown and M. Terry Johnson, both of whom are employed with the USDA’s National Appeals Division, are creditors for ECOA purposes. Accordingly, the court affirmed the dismissal of the ECOA claims with respect to Thomas Brown and M. Terry Johnson, and reversed the dismissal of these claims with respect to the remaining defendants. The court also concluded that plaintiff's conspiracy claims under 42 U.S.C. 1985(3) were properly dismissed pursuant to the intracorporate conspiracy doctrine. Finally, the court reversed the dismissal of the Bivens claims because, when a remedial scheme is created entirely by regulation, it does not preclude a Bivens claim. View "Johnson v. USDA" on Justia Law

This case centered on a rural water conservation program administered in part by Defendants-Appellees United States Department of Agriculture (“USDA”), the Secretary of the USDA, the Farm Service Agency (“FSA”), and the Administrator of the FSA (collectively, “the agency”). Plaintiffs-Appellants Cure Land, LLC, and Cure Land II, LLC (collectively “Cure Land”) argued that the agency’s handling of a proposed amendment to the conservation program violated the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”) and the Administrative Procedures Act (“APA”). The district court upheld the agency’s actions. Finding no reversible error after review of this matter, the Tenth Circuit affirmed. View "Cure Land v. USDA" on Justia Law

On April 21 and April 29, 2015, the Oklahoma Senate and the Oklahoma House of Representatives, respectively, passed House Joint Resolution Number 1012, directing the Oklahoma Secretary of State to refer a proposed constitutional amendment to a vote of the people of Oklahoma. The proposed amendment would add a new section to Article II, prohibiting the Legislature from passing any law "which abridges the right of citizens and lawful residents of Oklahoma to employ agricultural technology and livestock production and ranching practices without a compelling state interest." Plaintiffs filed a petition in the district court, urging that the measure was facially unconstitutional. Defendants filed a motion to dismiss, submitting that the challenge was untimely. The district court granted the motion to dismiss finding the challenge was timely and was not facially unconstitutional. Plaintiffs appealed. Finding no reversible error, the Oklahoma Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal of the case, but on grounds that the district court should have abstained from review of a referendum before voted on by the people. View "Save the Illinois River, Inc. v. Oklahoma ex rel. Oklahoma Election Board" on Justia Law

Compart, a producer of breeding swine, filed a negligence suit against the United States under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U.S.C. 2671 et seq. Compart intended to export over three hundred pigs to China but China suspended all imports from Compart after it was notified by the United States government that the test results from a small set of the blood samples were "inconclusive" for Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome virus (PRRSv). The district court dismissed the suit for lack of jurisdiction. The court affirmed, concluding that the discretionary function exemption precludes jurisdiction over Compart's negligence claims because the testing and reporting of Compart's swine was governed by discretionary governmental procedures and susceptible to policy analysis. View "Compart's Boar Store, Inc. v. United States" on Justia Law

A federal district court certified two questions of law to the Iowa Supreme Court in a priority dispute between competing creditors of a bankrupt hog operation. Crooked Creek Corporation operated a farrow-to-finish hog facility where it bred gilts and sows and raised their litters for slaughter. After the company filed for bankruptcy, the hogs were sold, but the sale did not generate enough money to pay off competing liens asserted by two of Crooked Creek’s creditors: Oyens Feed & Supply, Inc. and Primebank. Oyens Feed held an agricultural supply dealer lien because it sold Crooked Creek feed “on credit . . . to fatten the hogs to market weight.” Primebank had a perfected article 9 security interest in the hogs to secure two promissory notes predating Oyens Feed’s section 570A.5(3) agricultural supply dealer lien in the hogs. At trial, Oyens Feed claimed it was entitled to all of the escrowed funds because its agricultural supply dealer lien had superpriority over Primebank’s earlier perfected security interest. The bankruptcy court concluded the plain meaning of section 570A.4 created a “discrete window of time,” beginning with the farmer’s purchase of feed and ending thirty-one days later, within which an agricultural supply dealer must file a financing statement to perfect its lien. The bankruptcy court concluded Oyens Feed had only perfected its lien as to amounts for feed delivered in the thirty-one days preceding the filing of each of its financing statements. In reaching its decision on the extent of Oyens Feed’s lien in the escrowed funds, the bankruptcy court reasoned the acquisition price of the hogs was zero because Crooked Creek raised hogs from birth rather than purchasing them. The court concluded “the ‘purchase price’ comprises the vast majority, if not all of, the ‘acquisition price’ for . . . purposes of Iowa Code § 570A.5(3).” The United States District Court for the Northern District of Iowa asked the Iowa Supreme Court: (1) whether, pursuant to Iowa Code section 570A.4(2), was an agricultural supply dealer required to file a new financing statement every thirty-one (31) days in order to maintain perfection of its agricultural supply dealer’s lien as to feed supplied within the preceding thirty-one (31) day period?; and (2) whether pursuant to Iowa Code section 570A.5(3), was the “acquisition price” zero when the livestock are born in the farmer’s facility? The Supreme Court answered both certified questions in the affirmative. View "Oyens Feed & Supply, Inc. v. Primebank" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs are partners in the business of dairy farming. Defendant is an agricultural cooperative in the business of producing and supplying dairy products. In 1980, plaintiffs became members of defendant’s cooperative, paid $15 for shares of defendant’s common stock, and entered into a “Milk Marketing Agreement” with defendant. In 2005, plaintiffs temporarily ceased milk production. Defendant notified plaintiffs that it had terminated their agreement and plaintiffs’ membership in the cooperative and tendered $15 to plaintiffs to redeem the shares of common stock. Plaintiffs rejected the payment and sought shareholder remedies pursuant to the Business Corporation Act (805 ILCS 5/12.56). Based on defendant’s alleged concealment, suppression, or omission of its interpretation of its by-laws, count II alleged a claim under the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act (815 ILCS 505/1), and count III alleged common-law fraud. Plaintiffs’ counsel withdrew and they obtained multiple extensions. After a voluntary dismissal, plaintiffs refiled. The circuit court dismissed the refiled action on grounds of res judicata and the statute of limitations. The appellate court reversed and remanded and the Illinois Supreme Court affirmed. Although nearly five years elapsed between the time plaintiffs were granted leave to file an amended complaint and their voluntary dismissal, defendant did not seek a final order dismissing the matter with prejudice, definitively ending the action. View "Richter v. Prairie Farms Dairy" on Justia Law