stating “[i]t is simply implausible that the Advisory Committee, so concerned about the potential difficulties posed by dealing with mass tort eases under Rule 23(b)(3), with its provisions for notice and the right to opt out, see Rule 23(c)(2), would have uncritically assumed that mandatory versions of such class actions, lacking such protections, could be certified under Rule 23(b)(1)(B),” but adding the Court did not “decide the ultimate question whether Rule 23(b)(1)(B) may ever be used to aggregate individual tort claims”
How later courts described this case
- stating “[i]t is simply implausible that the Advisory Committee, so concerned about the potential difficulties posed by dealing with mass tort eases under Rule 23(b)(3), with its provisions for notice and the right to opt out, see Rule 23(c)(2), would have uncritically assumed that mandatory versions of such class actions, lacking such protections, could be certified under Rule 23(b)(1)(B),” but adding the Court did not “decide the ultimate question whether Rule 23(b)(1)(B) may ever be used to aggregate individual tort claims”
- holding that when certifying a class for settlement purposes only, the district court should pay “heightened attention ... to the justifications for binding the class members .... because certification of a mandatory settlement class, however provisional technically, effectively concludes the proceeding save for the final fairness hearing”
- stating that “an attorney who represents another class against the same defendant may not serve as class counsel,” and finding conflict of interest where attorneys represented proposed settlement class and also separately represented individ *685 ual clients with prior-negotiated, more favorable settlement
- holding that currently injured plaintiffs and exposure-only plaintiffs do not share the same interests for the currently injured, the critical goal is generous immediate payment whereas for the exposure-only plaintiffs, the goal is to ensure an ample, inflation-protected fund for the future.
Written by the judges who cited it.
Distinguished
Distinguished by In re Infants Born Opioid-Dependent Prods. Liab. Litig., 350 F. Supp. 3d 1377 (2018)
Amchem and Ortiz , however, are readily distinguishable, inasmuch as they arose in starkly different procedural circumstances.
Distinguished by In re Suboxone (Buprenorphine Hydrochloride & Naloxone) Antitrust Litigation, 64 F. Supp. 3d 665 (2014)
Therefore, for these additional reasons, I agree with the analysis in Wellbut-rin finding that Amchem and Ortiz are distinguishable, and that class certification is not logically antecedent to standing in this case.
Distinguished by United States v. Merck & Co., 44 F. Supp. 3d 581 (2014)
Because the Ortiz exception is inapplicable, Supreme Court precedent affirming standing as a threshold jurisdictional matter remains controlling.
Distinguished by Oklahoma Police Pension & Retirement System v. U.S. Bank National Ass'n, 986 F. Supp. 2d 412 (2013)
Therefore, in light of our Court of Appeals's caveat in Mahon, the Ortiz logical antecedence rule is to be construed narrowly and is inapplicable to the present case involving a challenge to the sole named plaintiff’s standing to bring a claim under a separate cause of action which it itself does not have standing to bring.
The opinion
CHIEF Justice Rehnquist,
with whom Justice Scalia and Justice Kennedy join, concurring.
Justice Breyer’s dissenting opinion highlights in graphic detail the massive impact of asbestos-related claims on the federal courts. Post, at 866-867. Were I devising a system for handling these claims on a clean slate, I would agree entirely with that dissent, which in turn approves the near-heroic efforts of the District Court in this ease to make the best of a bad situation. Under the present regime, transactional costs will surely consume more and more of a relatively static amount of money to pay these claims.
But we are not free to devise an ideal system for adjudicating these claims. Unless and until the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure are revised, the Court’s opinion correctly states the existing law, and I join it. But the "elephantine mass of asbestos cases,” ante, at 821, cries out for a legislative solution.