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Living constitutionalismOriginalism
Powell v. Utz applies the state-action requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment strictly to bar a private racial discrimination claim, reflecting a textual and historical reading rather than an evolving one. Powell v. Utz ↗
The case involved a subcontractor's claim against the United States for conversion of approximately 9,000 cubic yards of concrete aggregates that the plaintiff had stockpiled at a government-owned pit (Potholes pit) while performing work on the Columbia Basin Project. The plaintiff alleged that Bureau of Reclamation personnel had encouraged and permitted the extra production and sales to other contractors, creating an informal right or permit to the materials, but the government later directed him to vacate and took the aggregates without compensation. The district court granted the defendant's motion for summary judgment. The core reasoning was that federal regulations required written permits for removal of materials from project lands, with charges unless competitively bid; affidavits established that no such permit had been issued to the plaintiff; and under Rule 56, uncontradicted evidentiary material could not be overcome by mere pleadings allegations to create a genuine issue of material fact.
This case involved claims by a use plaintiff supplier against a prime contractor and its surety under the Miller Act for unpaid amounts on three federal government contracts performed in Washington state. After the surety deposited the principal sums claimed into the court registry, the only remaining issues were the plaintiff's entitlement to interest and reasonable attorney's fees. The court held that interest at six percent per annum was recoverable under Washington state law from the date the claims became due until the deposit date because Miller Act interest follows the law of the state where the contract is performed when claims do not exceed the bond penalty. Attorney's fees were denied because the Miller Act is silent on the issue and contains no provision for them, and no generally applicable Washington statute authorized such fees in this type of action.
This case involved farmers in Washington state who purchased federal crop insurance policies from the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation for their 1955-1956 wheat crops. After the crops were destroyed by winter-kill, a Corporation official informed them that claims would not be paid, prompting the farmers to reseed at their own expense and sue for reseeding costs, reinstatement of coverage, and related damages. The court granted the Corporation's motion for summary judgment and dismissed the action. The core reasoning was that the policies were governed by federal regulations with the force of law, which did not authorize coverage or payment under the circumstances, and that government agents lack authority to bind the Corporation beyond those regulatory limits, as established in Federal Crop Insurance Corp. v. Merrill.
This case involved a U.S. government action to seize and destroy imported publications under 19 U.S.C. § 1305 on grounds that they were obscene. The publications were mostly nudist magazines containing photographs of nude men and women. The court applied the legal standard that a publication is obscene if its dominant effect, viewed as a whole, offends the sense of decency of the average person in the community, and nudity alone is not determinative. After examining each exhibit, the court held most of the publications obscene and subject to forfeiture due to explicit frontal depictions of genitalia, but found a few not obscene because they used more artistic poses, clothing, or shading that avoided a dominant obscene tone.
The case involved a California student suing a Washington charitable college for personal injuries sustained in a toboggan accident during a school-organized event at an Idaho ski resort, where the college had allegedly been negligent in allowing and supervising tobogganing despite warnings that the terrain was unsafe. The defendant moved for summary judgment, arguing it was immune from tort liability as a charitable corporation under applicable law. The court determined that Washington conflict-of-laws rules required application of Idaho substantive law, under which charitable institutions enjoyed immunity from negligence claims by beneficiaries at the time of the injury. Even considering the law of the college's incorporation state, the court found that Washington immunity rules in effect on the date of the accident would have barred the claim. The motion for summary judgment was granted on the pleadings and pretrial record.
The case involved contractors who sued the United States under the Tucker Act to recover the costs of removing snow and repairing damage to buildings they had constructed near Havre, Montana, pursuant to government plans and specifications. The court ruled for the plaintiffs and awarded them $4,662 plus interest. The core reasoning was that the damage was caused by the government's faulty design of narrow ventilation slots that allowed snow to enter during a blizzard, the contract did not require the contractors to insure against harm from the government's own negligence or errors, and no administrative exhaustion was needed because the dispute concerned a question of law rather than fact.