Torres v. Tex. Dep't of Pub. Safety

142 S.Ct. 2455

213 L.Ed.2d 808

Le Roy TORRES, Petitioner

v.TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY

No. 20-603

Supreme Court of the United States.

Argued March 29, 2022

Decided June 29, 2022

Andrew T. Tutt, Washington, DC, for petitioner.

Christopher G. Michel for the United States as amicus curiae, by special leave of the Court, supporting the petitioner.

Judd E. Stone, II, Solicitor General, for respondent.

Brian J. Lawler, Pilot Law, P.C., San Diego, CA, Stephen J. Chapman, Chapman Law Firm, Corpus Christi, TX, Elisabeth S. Theodore, Andrew T. Tutt, Counsel of Record, Stephen K. Wirth, Samuel F. Callahan, Kyle Lyons-Burke, Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer LLP, Washington, DC, for Petitioner.

Ken Paxton, Attorney General of Texas, Brent Webster, First Assistant Attorney General. Office of The, Attorney General, Austin, Texas, Judd E. Stone II, Solicitor General, Counsel of Record, Lanora C. Pettit, Principal Deputy Solicitor, General. Ari Cuenin, William F. Cole, Ryan S. Baasch, Assistant Solicitors General, Christopher J.f. Galiardo, Assistant Attorney General, for Respondent.

Justice BREYER delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Constitution vests in Congress the power "[t]o raise and support Armies" and "[t]o provide and maintain a Navy." Art. I, § 8, cls. 1, 12 – 13. Pursuant to that authority, Congress enacted a federal law that gives returning veterans the right to reclaim their prior jobs with state employers and authorizes suit if those employers refuse to accommodate them. See Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act of 1994 (USERRA), 38 U.S.C. § 4301 et seq . This case asks whether States may invoke sovereign immunity as a legal defense to block such suits.

In our view, they cannot. Upon entering the Union, the States implicitly agreed that their sovereignty would yield to federal policy to build and keep a national military. States thus gave up their immunity from congressionally authorized suits pursuant to the " ‘plan of the Convention,’ " as part of " ‘the structure of the original Constitution itself.’ " PennEast Pipeline Co. v . New Jersey , 594 U. S. ––––, ––––, 141 S.Ct. 2244, 2258, 210 L.Ed.2d 624 (2021) (quoting Alden v. Maine , 527 U.S. 706, 728, 119 S.Ct. 2240, 144 L.Ed.2d 636 (1999) ).

I

A

Congress has "broad and sweeping" power "to raise and support armies." United States v. O'Brien , 391 U.S. 367, 88 S.Ct. 1673, 20 L.Ed.2d 672, 677 (1968). It has long exercised that power to encourage service in the Armed Forces in a variety of ways. See, e.g., Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, Inc. , 547 U.S. 47, 126 S.Ct. 1297, 164 L.Ed.2d 156, 158 (2006) (campus recruiting); Johnson v. Robison , 415 U.S. 361, 94 S.Ct. 1160, 39 L.Ed.2d 389, 396 (1974) (educational benefits). Since before the United States’ entry into World War II, Congress has sought, in particular, to smooth volunteers’ reentry into civilian life by recognizing veterans’ "right to return to civilian employment without adverse effect on ... career progress" in the federal work force and private employment. H. R. Rep. No. 105–448, p. 2 (1998); see Selective Training and Service Act of 1940, §§ 8(b)(A)–(B), (e), 54 Stat. 890, 891 (damages remedy against private employers).

The Vietnam War prompted Congress to extend these protections to employment by States. Amidst political opposition to the war, "some State and local jurisdictions ha[d] demonstrated a reluctance, and even an unwillingness, to reemploy" returning servicemembers. S. Rep. No. 93–907, p. 110 (1974). So Congress authorized private damages suits against States to ensure that "veterans who [had] previously held jobs as school teachers, policemen, firemen, and other State, county, and city employees" would not be denied their old jobs as reprisal for their service. Ibid . The statute at issue, USERRA, embodies these protections today.

B

Petitioner Le Roy Torres enlisted in the Army Reserves in 1989. In 2007, he was called to active duty and deployed to Iraq. While serving, Torres was exposed to toxic burn pits, a method of garbage disposal that sets open fire to all manner of trash, human waste, and military equipment.

Torres received an honorable discharge. But he returned home with constrictive bronchitis, a respiratory condition that narrowed his airways and made breathing difficult. These ailments, Torres alleges, changed his life and left him unable to work at his old job as a state trooper. Torres asked his former employer, respondent Texas Department of Public Safety (Texas), to accommodate his condition by reemploying him in a different role. Texas refused to do so.

Torres sued Texas in state court. He argued that Texas had violated USERRA's mandate that state employers rehire returning servicemembers, use "reasonable efforts" to accommodate any service-related disability, or find an "equivalent" position (or its "nearest approximation") where such disability prevents the veteran from holding his prior position. 38 U.S.C. § 4313(a)(3). Texas moved to dismiss the suit by invoking sovereign immunity. The trial court denied the motion. A divided intermediate appellate court reversed, stating this Court's precedents established that Congress could not authorize private suits against nonconsenting States pursuant to its Article I powers except under the Bankruptcy Clause and citing Central Va. Community College v. Katz , 546 U.S. 356, 126 S.Ct. 990, 163 L.Ed.2d 945 (2006). See 583 S.W.3d 221, 225–230 (Tex. App. 2018). The Supreme Court of Texas denied discretionary review.

After the decision below, this Court decided PennEast , 594 U. S. ––––, 141 S.Ct. 2244, 210 L.Ed.2d 624. There, we recognized that the States had waived their sovereign immunity as to the exercise of the federal eminent domain power under the structure of the Constitution pursuant to the "plan of the Convention." See id., at ––––, 141 S.Ct., at 2258. We then granted Torres’ petition for certiorari to decide whether, in light of that intervening decision, USERRA's damages remedy against state employers is constitutional.

II

Congress enacted USERRA as an exercise of its power "[t]o raise and support Armies" and "[t]o provide and maintain a Navy." U. S. Const., Art. I, § 8, cls. 12 – 13. The question before us is whether the Constitution allows Congress to enforce these federal reemployment protections by authorizing private litigation against noncompliant state employers that do not wish to consent to suit.

A

The Constitution forged a Union, but it also protected the sovereign prerogatives of States within our government. Generally speaking, "the States entered the federal system with their sovereignty," including their sovereign immunity, "intact." Blatchford v. Native Village of Noatak , 501 U.S. 775, 779, 111 S.Ct. 2578, 115 L.Ed.2d 686 (1991). Basic tenets of sovereign immunity teach that courts may not ordinarily hear a suit brought by any person against a nonconsenting State. See ibid.

But States still remain subject to suit in certain circumstances. States may, of course, consent to suit. See Sossamon v. Texas , 563 U.S. 277, 284, 131 S.Ct. 1651, 179 L.Ed.2d 700 (2011). Congress may also enact laws abrogating their immunity under the Fourteenth Amendment. See Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer , 427 U.S. 445, 456, 96 S.Ct. 2666, 49 L.Ed.2d 614 (1976). And, as relevant here, States may be sued if they agreed their sovereignty would yield as part of the "plan of the Convention," PennEast , 594 U. S., at ––––, 141 S.Ct., at 2259 —that is, if "the structure of the original Constitution itself " reflects a waiver of States’ sovereign immunity, Alden , 527 U.S. at 728, 119 S.Ct. 2240. "[A]ctions do not offend state sovereignty" if "the States consented" to them "at the founding." PennEast , 594 U. S., at ––––, 141 S.Ct., at 2263.

Alexander Hamilton described three circumstances where the "plan of the Convention" implied that the States waived their sovereign immunity: "where the Constitution in express terms granted an exclusive authority to the Union; where it granted in one instance an authority to the Union and in another prohibited the States from exercising the like authority; and where it granted an authority to the Union, to which a similar authority in the States would be absolutely and totally contradictory and repugnant ." The Federalist No. 32, p. 200 (J. Cooke ed. 1961) (emphasis in original); see id ., No. 81, at 548–549 (A. Hamilton).

Consistent with these principles, this Court has found structural waiver as to suits between States, in South Dakota v . North Carolina , 192 U.S. 286, 24 S.Ct. 269, 48 L.Ed. 448 (1904), and suits by the United States against a State, in United States v. Texas , 143 U.S. 621, 12 S.Ct. 488, 36 L.Ed. 285 (1892). The States, we said, must have recognized that these waivers of immunity from suit were "a necessary feature of the formation of a more perfect Union" and thus "inherent in the constitutional plan." Principality of Monaco v. Mississippi , 292 U.S. 313, 329, 54 S.Ct. 745, 78 L.Ed. 1282 (1934). The alternative to consenting to litigation between sovereigns, after all, could be civil war.

A century later, in Central Va. Community College v. Katz , 546 U.S. 356, 126 S.Ct. 990, 163 L.Ed.2d 945, the Court recognized another structural waiver. We held that States could not assert sovereign immunity to block suits by private parties pursuant to federal bankruptcy laws. Id., at 359, 126 S.Ct. 990. There, too, we based our holding on the constitutional structure. We noted the text's insistence on "uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies," U. S. Const., Art. I, § 8, cl. 4, the Framers’ concerns about States’ passing patchwork legislation and refusing to discharge the debts of noncitizens (as had happened under the Articles of Confederation), and the history of habeas laws related to bankruptcy. See 546 U.S. at 368–377, 126 S.Ct. 990. All that evidence led us to conclude that, by ratifying the Constitution, the States had agreed that their sovereignty would...