Summary
The Supreme Court held that Chevron plausibly alleged a close relationship between its wartime crude-oil production and its performance of federal aviation-gasoline refining duties, satisfying the “relating to” requirement of the federal officer removal statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a)(1). The Court rejected the arguments that Chevron’s refining contract had to expressly direct crude-oil production or that government allocation of crude oil to refineries severed the relationship. The judgment of the Fifth Circuit was vacated and the case remanded.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether a state-court environmental suit challenging Chevron's wartime crude-oil production was for or related to an act under color of federal office under 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a)(1).
- Whether the federal officer removal statute requires the specific conduct challenged in the state suit to have been directly ordered or specifically required by a federal officer or federal contract.
- Whether the statutory acting-under and for-or-relating-to requirements must be conflated so that removal is permitted only when the challenged conduct itself was performed under federal authority.
Holdings
- A removing defendant satisfies the federal officer removal statute's for-or-relating-to requirement when the challenged conduct has a close connection to the performance of federal duties and the connection is not tenuous, remote, or peripheral. Chevron plausibly alleged such a connection between its wartime crude-oil production and its federal aviation-gasoline refining duties.
- The federal officer removal statute does not require a removing defendant to show that federal duties specifically required, invited, or expressly directed the conduct challenged by the state suit.
- An intermediary in the causal chain does not necessarily sever the relationship between challenged conduct and federal duties.
- The acting-under and for-or-relating-to requirements are distinct elements of the federal officer removal statute, and the latter may be satisfied even when the specific conduct challenged in the state suit was not itself performed under federal authority.
Key quotations
“The phrase “relating to” sweeps broadly.” (7)
“The ordinary understanding of “relating to” requires a connection that is not “tenuous, remote, or peripheral.”” (8)
“In this all-hands-on-deck, wartime context, Chevron needed to produce more crude oil as quickly as possible to facilitate more avgas refining, including its own.” (10)
“Louisiana’s interpretation would leave the “relating to” requirement with little, if any, independent function, impermissibly conflating the “acting under” and “connected or associated with” elements of the federal officer removal test.” (12)
Factual background
During the Second World War, Chevron's predecessor contracted with the Federal Government to expand its refining capacity and refine crude oil into aviation gasoline for the military. Chevron also produced crude oil in Plaquemines Parish, and some of that oil was used in its wartime aviation-gasoline refining. Plaquemines Parish's environmental suit challenged wartime production practices, including vertical drilling, use of canals instead of roads, and use of earthen pits. Chevron alleged that those challenged practices increased crude-oil production and were closely connected to its performance of federal wartime refining duties.
Procedural history
Plaquemines Parish and other Louisiana parishes filed state-court environmental suits against oil and gas companies under the State and Local Coastal Resources Management Act. Chevron removed the suit under 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a)(1), arguing that the claims concerning its wartime crude-oil production related to its federal contract to refine crude oil into aviation gasoline for the military. The District Court granted remand, and the Fifth Circuit affirmed, concluding that Chevron's crude-oil production did not relate to its federal refining duties because the refining contract did not specify how crude oil was to be obtained. The Supreme Court vacated the Fifth Circuit's judgment and remanded.
Remand instructions
The case was remanded to the Fifth Circuit for further proceedings consistent with the Supreme Court's opinion.