# Quackenbush v. Allstate Insurance > Supreme Court of the United States · June 10, 1996 · 517 U.S. 706 URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9433308 ## Case - **Full name:** Quackenbush, California Insurance Commissioner v. Allstate Insurance Co. - **Court:** Supreme Court of the United States - **Decided:** June 10, 1996 - **Citations:** 517 U.S. 706; 116 S. Ct. 1712; 135 L. Ed. 2d 1; 1996 U.S. LEXIS 3609 - **Precedential status:** Published - **Opinion:** Concurrence by Scalia - **Judges:** O'Connor, Scalia, Kennedy - **Cited by:** 2,085 later opinions in the Frix Law Library ## Citator (automated) - No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases. - Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9433308 ## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction) - finding that a remand order based on abstention principles constituted a final judgment for the purpose of reviewability because, inter alia, (1) “the district court disassociate^] itself from the case entirely, retaining nothing of the matter on the federal court’s docket” an… - recognizing that Burford abstention is appropriate where the action involves “ ‘difficult questions of state law bearing on policy problems of substantial public import,’” or where the exercise of federal review “ ‘would be disruptive of state efforts to establish a coherent p… - explaining the historic framework for abstention and noting that the Supreme Court’s abstention jurisprudence “reflect[s] a doctrine of abstention appropriate to our federal system, where by the federal courts, exercising a wise discretion, restrain their authority because of … - holding that the district court erred in remanding to state court, under Burford, a common-law suit for contract and tort damages, in part because an abstention-based dismissal historically has been appropriate only where a federal court was sitting in equity; the Supreme Cour… - stating four requirements: collateral orders must [1] "conclusively determine a disputed question, that is [2] completely separate from the merits of the action, [3] effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment, and [4] too important to be denied review." (internal… ## Opinion text Justice Scalia, concurring. I join the opinion of the Court. I write separately only to respond to Justice Kennedy’s concurrence. Justice Kennedy, while joining the opinion of the Court, says that he would “not rule out . . . the possibility that a federal court might dismiss a suit for damages in a case where a serious affront to the interests of federalism could be averted in no other way,” post, at 733. I would not have joined today’s opinion if I believed it left such discretionary *732 dismissal available. Such action is foreclosed, I think, by the Court’s holding, clearly summarized in the concluding sentences of the opinion: “Under our precedents, federal courts have the power to dismiss or remand cases based on abstention principles only where the relief being sought is equitable or otherwise discretionary. Because this was a damages action, we conclude that the District Court’s remand order was an unwarranted application of the Burford doctrine.” Ante, at 731. Justice Kennedy’s projected horrible of a “serious affront to the interests of federalism” cannot possibly materialize under the Court’s holding. There is no “serious affront to the interests of federalism” when Congress lawfully decides to pre-empt state action — which is what our cases hold (and today’s opinion affirms) Congress does whenever it instructs federal courts to assert jurisdiction over matters as to which relief is not discretionary. If the Court today felt empowered to decide for itself when congressionally decreed jurisdiction constitutes a “serious affront” and when it does not, the opinion would have read much differently. Most pertinently, it would not have found it unnecessary “to inquire fully as to whether this case presents the sort of ‘exceptional circumstance’ in which Burford abstention or other grounds for yielding federal jurisdiction might be appropriate.” Ibid. There were certainly grounds for such an inquiry if we thought it relevant. The “[then] unsettled but since resolved question of California law” to which Justice Kennedy refers, post, at 733, was only part of the basis for the District Court’s decision to remand to state court; the court also pointed more generally to what it thought was the State’s “overriding interest in regulating insurance insolvencies and liquidations in a uniform and orderly manner,” App. to Pet. for Cert. 34a. As the Court’s opinion says, it is not necessary to inquire fully into that matter because this was a damages action. --- Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9433308. Public record. Not legal advice.