(Download) "New Orleans Public Service Inc. v. Council of City of New Orleans" by United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit # Book PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: New Orleans Public Service Inc. v. Council of City of New Orleans
- Author : United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
- Release Date : January 29, 1990
- Genre: Law,Books,Professional & Technical,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 84 KB
Description
HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judge New Orleans Public Service, Inc. asks us to reverse the district court's determination that the Council's retail rate order is not ""facially"" preempted by federal law, specifically a wholesale rate order the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission made under the Federal Power Act. The Council's order prevented NOPSI from recovering, in its retail rate, wholesale costs FERC ordered it to incur as a result of its participation in building the Grand Gulf 1 nuclear reactor in Port Gibson, Mississippi. In the alternative, NOPSI asks us to reverse the district court's decision to stay NOPSI's remaining claims in light of pending state court proceedings. The remaining claims include an allegation that the stated reasons underlying the Council's order were a pretext for an impermissible attack on FERC's order. We affirm the district court's order, rejecting NOPSI's ""facial"" preemption challenge, in part because of the reading the Supreme Court gave the Council's order on a previous appeal. We further hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion in staying decision of the remaining claims, although it did not acknowledge the relevance of the Council members' motivation to NOPSI's pretext claim in making that decision. Our reading of the Court's opinion on the previous appeal compels us to conclude that the pretext claim cannot succeed in the face of a determination that the stated reasons underlying the Council's order were sufficiently supported by the evidence; and the state trial court had already determined that they were. There was thus no substantial federal issue remaining in the case, and the district court's order was not otherwise an abuse of discretion. I.