Anderson v. Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc., No. M2004-01066-COA-R9-CV (Tenn. App. 1/19/2007)

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BARBARA J. ANDERSON, ET AL. v. WATCHTOWER BIBLE AND TRACT SOCIETY OF NEW YORK, INC., ET AL.

No. M2004-01066-COA-R9-CV.

Court of Appeals of Tennessee, at Nashville.

April 14, 2005 Session.

Filed January 19, 2007.

Appeal from the Circuit Court for Coffee County; No. 32382; John W. Rollins, Judge.

Judgment of the Circuit Court Reversed.

Paul D. Polidoro, Patterson, New York; Robb S. Harvey, Eileen Burkhalter Smith, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellants, Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc., et al.

Jerre M. Hood, Winchester, Tennessee; J. Edward Bell, III, Georgetown, South Carolina, for the appellees Barbara J. Anderson, et al.

Patricia J. Cottrell, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which Frank G. Clement, Jr., J., and Donald P. Harris, Senior J., joined.

OPINION

PATRICIA J. COTTRELL, JUDGE.

Two former members of the Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses filed suit against the church and its leaders for damages associated with their expulsion from the organization. The defendants filed a Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(1) motion to dismiss their complaint on the ground that civil courts do not exercise jurisdiction over internal church matters. The trial court denied the motion. On interlocutory appeal, we hold that the trial court should have dismissed all of the plaintiffs' claims because they are barred by the First Amendment's protection of purely religious matters from interference by secular courts.

Plaintiff Barbara J. Anderson was a lifelong Jehovah's Witness. Her husband, A. Joseph Anderson, also a plaintiff, was an elder of the church. Both were members of the Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses in Manchester, Tennessee, but were expelled or "disfellowshipped" from the church, leading to this litigation.

Mr. and Ms. Anderson filed suit against various components of the church hierarchy and some specific church leaders¹ (collectively "Church") and asserted eight claims in their complaint: (1) defamation; (2) defamation to the congregation; (3) false light invasion of privacy; (4) interference with prospective economic advantage; (5) breach of fiduciary duty; (6) fraud; (7) intentional infliction of emotional distress; and (8) wrongful disfellowshipping. They asked for $20 million in compensatory and punitive damages.

The defendants responded to the complaint with a motion to dismiss under Rule 12 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure. They argued that under Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(1), the trial court must dismiss all the plaintiffs' claims for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, because the doctrine of ecclesiastical abstention bars the civil courts from interfering in the internal affairs of religious bodies. They also moved for dismissal under Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6) arguing the complaint failed to state a claim for relief. The trial court denied the motion to dismiss.

I. STANDARD OF REVIEW

The motion at issue herein was in part a Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(1) motion, alleging lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Subject matter jurisdiction involves a court's authority to adjudicate a controversy brought before it. Cawood v. State, 134 S.W.3d 159, 163 (Tenn. 2004); Northland Ins. Co. v. State, 33 S.W.3d 727, 729 (Tenn. 2000). The question of whether a court has subject matter jurisdiction over a particular dispute is a question of law. Heard v. Johnson, 810 A.2d 871, 877 (D.D.C. 2002). Consequently, this court must review the trial court's decision on that issue under a de novo standard, without a presumption of correctness. Cawood, 134 S.W.3d at 163; Letellier v. Letellier, 40 S.W.3d 490, 493 (Tenn. 2001); Northland Ins. Co., 33 S.W.3d at 729.

In determining whether this action should have been dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, we must consider whether the trial court "had the power to enter upon the inquiry; not whether its conclusion in the course of it was right or wrong." Stinson v. State, 344 S.W.2d 369, 373 (Tenn. 1961), quoting Aladdin Industries, Inc. v. Associated Transport, Inc., 323 S.W.2d 222, 229 (1958). Subject matter jurisdiction is dependent upon the nature of the cause of action and the relief sought. Northland Ins. Co., 33 S.W.3d at 729, citing Landers v. Jones, 872 S.W.2d 674, 675 (Tenn. 1994). Thus, in order to determine if a court has authority to hear and decide a particular controversy, it is necessary to identify and examine the nature or gravamen of the case.

Even though we review the trial court's decision on subject matter jurisdiction as a question of law, we must approach that analysis in the case before us in much the same way as a Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6) motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim. That is because a facial challenge to the court's subject matter jurisdiction is based on the allegation that the complaint fails to allege facts that show that the court has power to hear the case.² United States v. Ritchie, 15 F.3d 592, 598 (6th Cir. 1994) (explaining the two types of attacks based on subject matter jurisdiction, facial and factual); Menchaca v. Chrysler Credit Corp., 613 F.2d 507, 511 (5th Cir. 1980); Heard v. Johnson, 810 A.2d. at 877.

In deciding a facial challenge, the court considers the impugned pleading and nothing else. If a complaint attacked on its face competently alleges any facts which, if true, would establish grounds for subject matter jurisdiction, the court must uncritically accept those facts, end its inquiry, and deny the dismissal motion.

Staats v. McKinnon, No. M2005-01631-COA-R9-CV, 2006 WL 1168826 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2006) (citations omitted); see also Holt v. United States, 46 F.3d 1000, 1002 (10th Cir. 1995); Hiles v. Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, 773 N.E.2d 929, 938 n.13 (Mass. 2002).

In the case before us, the Church argued that the complaint asserted causes of action based on an intrachurch dispute that the courts had no authority to adjudicate, thus making a facial challenge to the court's jurisdiction based on the allegations of the complaint. Accordingly, we will apply the principles governing Tenn. R. Civ. P. 12.02(6) motions. Petruska v. Gannon University, 462 F.3d 294 (3rd Cir. 2006); United States v. Ritchie, 15 F.3d at 598, citing Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 235-37 (1974) (holding that in a facial attack, the court must take all of the material allegations in the complaint as true and construe them in the lights most favorable to the nonmoving party); Menchaca v. Chrysler Credit Corp., 613 F.2d at 511.

The first principle is that, for the purposes of the motion, the defendants admit the truth of all relevant and material averments contained in the complaint, but assert that such facts do not constitute a cause of action. Stein v. Davidson Hotel Co., 945 S.W.2d 714, 716 (Tenn. 1997); Davis v. The Tennessean, 83 S.W.3d 125, 127 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2001). Second, we should construe the complaint liberally in favor of the plaintiff, taking all allegations of fact as true. Cook v. Spinnaker's of Rivergate, Inc., 878 S.W.2d 934, 938 (Tenn.1994).

The question is whether, viewing the factual allegations as prescribed, the plaintiffs have stated a claim that the courts have authority to hear, or, stated differently, have subject matter jurisdiction to adjudicate.³

II. FACTUAL ALLEGATIONS

The following account is derived from the allegations in the complaint, which we must assume are true.

Barbara Anderson worked as a volunteer researcher at the international headquarters of the Jehovah's Witnesses in Brooklyn, New York from 1982 to 1992. Ms. Anderson alleged that during the last years of her work at international headquarters she became concerned about the organization's handling of child sexual abuse allegations. She was of the opinion that Church policies and procedures "operated to the detriment of the victim and also to the detriment of the general congregation where the alleged molester or abuser was an active member. . . ."

After she left her headquarters position, Ms. Anderson continued doing research for the organization from her home. She was also quietly assisting Jehovah's Witness abuse victims and interested parties with information and advice. In the year 2000, she began working with an elder from a congregation in Kentucky in a joint effort to change the policies of the church.

When these efforts proved to be fruitless, the elder resigned his position and decided to go public with his concerns. Producers of Dateline, an NBC news television program, invited the elder and Ms. Anderson to be interviewed on the program. According to the complaint, officials of the governing body of the church learned about the planned broadcast and told Joseph Anderson he could be removed as an elder if he did not prevent his wife from appearing on the show. When that warning did not achieve the desired result, they allegedly induced the elders of the Manchester congregation to charge Barbara Anderson with apostasy and to begin disciplinary proceedings against her. According to the Andersons' complaint, apostasy is defined in English common law as turning away from one's faith, and the Jehovah's Witnesses define apostasy as including stirring up unrest or causing divisions within their church.

On May 10, 2002, Ms. Anderson appeared before a judicial committee of the Manchester congregation for trial on the charges of submitting an article to an apostate journal and causing division in the church. New charges were leveled against Ms. Anderson the following week: disrupting the unity of the congregation and "undermining confidence in Jehovah's arrangements."

Ms. Anderson declined to attend the second hearing. On May 19, 2002, the elders of the Manchester congregation found Ms. Anderson guilty of causing divisions in the church and ordered that she be disfellowshipped from the church.

The Dateline broadcast was aired on May 28, 2002. On June 5, Joseph Anderson sent a resignation letter to Watchtower Headquarters. He too was disfellowshipped. On June 8, the Da...