Also known as: multiplicity of suit · multiple suits · multiplicity
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
An equitable consideration favoring injunctive relief when repeated or continuing wrongful conduct would otherwise force the plaintiff to bring successive actions at law for damages. The factor weighs the burden of multiple suits against the adequacy of a damage remedy and supports granting an injunction to resolve the entire controversy in one proceeding.
Maya Malik owns farmland adjacent to Midwest Airlines' maintenance yard. Airline employees repeatedly drive service vehicles across her fields to reach a back gate, compacting soil and damaging crops each week. Maya sues for trespass and seeks an injunction. The court weighs the cost of repeated damage actions against the single equitable proceeding and grants the injunction because damages would require a multiplicity of suits.
Malcolm McKinley and neighboring homeowners sue Atlantic Cement for ongoing dust and vibration from its plant. The trial court refuses an injunction on public-interest grounds but awards permanent damages. The appellate court affirms that equity may award complete relief in one action to prevent a multiplicity of suits for recurring nuisance harms.
The defendant Atlantic Cement Company operates a large cement plant near Albany. Neighboring land owners brought actions for injunction and damages by alleging injury to property from dirt, smoke and vibration emanating from the plant. A nuisance has been found after trial, temporary damages have been allowed; but an injunction has been denied. The court at Special Term also found the amount of permanent damage attributable to each plaintiff. The total of permanent damages to all plaintiffs thus found was $185,000. Respondent’s investment in the plant is in excess of $45,000,000. There are over 300 people employed there. The total damage to plaintiffs’ properties is, however, relatively small in comparison with the value of defendant’s operation and with the consequences of the injunction which plaintiffs seek. The orders at Special Term and at the Appellate Division denied the injunction. The plant commenced production in 1962.
View caseBeacon Theatres sues Westover for declaratory and injunctive relief under antitrust laws. Westover moves to strike the jury demand. The Supreme Court holds that the adequacy of legal remedies must be assessed before equity proceeds, noting that a single equitable action can avoid a multiplicity of suits that would otherwise arise from piecemeal damage claims.
Fox West Coast Theatres, Inc. operated a movie theatre in San Bernardino, California and exhibited films under contracts with distributors granting exclusive first-run rights and clearance periods during which no other theatre could show the same pictures. Beacon Theatres, Inc. built a drive-in theatre about 11 miles away and notified Fox that it considered the clearance provisions to be violations of the antitrust laws, threatening treble damage suits against Fox and its distributors. Fox filed a complaint for declaratory relief in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California alleging a controversy under the Sherman Antitrust Act and Clayton Act. The complaint sought a declaration that the clearances were reasonable and not in violation of the antitrust laws together with an injunction preventing Beacon from instituting any antitrust actions against Fox and its distributors arising out of the controversy. Beacon filed an answer denying the threats, a counterclaim against Fox, and a cross-claim against an intervening exhibitor. These pleadings asserted that there was no substantial competition between the theatres, that the clearances were unreasonable, and that a conspiracy existed between Fox and distributors to manipulate contracts so as to restrain trade and monopolize first-run pictures. They sought treble damages. Beacon demanded a jury trial of the factual issues under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 38(b). The district court directed that the issues raised by Fox's complaint, including the question of competition between the theatres, be tried to the court first under Rules 42(b) and 57 before any jury determination of the antitrust violation charges in the counterclaim and cross-claim. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denied Beacon's petition for mandamus to vacate the district court's orders, holding that the trial judge had acted within his discretion. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseLorillard Tobacco challenges state regulations restricting outdoor advertising near schools. Multiple retailers and manufacturers file parallel suits seeking declaratory and injunctive relief. The Court recognizes that a single proceeding can resolve the constitutional issues for all parties and thereby avoid a multiplicity of suits.
In November 1998, Massachusetts joined over forty other states in reaching a master settlement agreement with major cigarette manufacturers that provided monetary payments and injunctive relief. Shortly after the agreement, the Attorney General announced plans to issue consumer protection regulations to close gaps in the settlement and prevent recruitment of underage customers. In January 1999, the Attorney General promulgated comprehensive regulations under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 93A § 2 governing the advertising and sale of cigarettes, smokeless tobacco, and cigars, with an effective date of February 1, 2000. The regulations contained three principal restrictions. Outdoor advertising, including billboards and signs visible from outside retail establishments, was prohibited within a 1,000-foot radius of any public playground, playground area in a public park, elementary school, or secondary school. Point-of-sale advertising was barred if any portion appeared lower than five feet from the floor in retail establishments within the same radius, unless the establishment was adult-only. Self-service displays were forbidden, and all tobacco products had to be placed behind counters accessible only to outlet personnel, with limited exceptions for adult-only stores and small text-only signs. Before the regulations took effect, petitioners—including Lorillard Tobacco Company, Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corporation, R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, Philip Morris Incorporated, U. S. Smokeless Tobacco Company, several cigar manufacturers and retailers, and an advertising agency—filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. The complaint alleged that the regulations violated the Commerce Clause, the Supremacy Clause, the First and Fourteenth Amendments, and were preempted by the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act for cigarettes. The District Court granted summary judgment to the Attorney General in two rulings. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part. The Supreme Court granted certiorari in 2001 to address the preemption and First Amendment questions.
View caseMatthew Martinez sues his former employer for breach of an implied contract and tortious discharge. The employer argues the claims belong in arbitration. The court notes that allowing separate actions would produce a multiplicity of suits and therefore channels the related claims into a single proceeding.
Interactive Data Corporation hired John Foley in June 1976 as an assistant product manager at a starting salary of $18,500. As a condition of employment Foley signed a confidential and proprietary information agreement. The company's president told Foley that if he performed his job well he would have a long and rewarding employment with the firm. Over the next six years and nine months Foley received steady salary increases, promotions, bonuses, awards, and superior performance evaluations, rising to branch manager of the Los Angeles office with an annual salary of $56,164 plus a merit bonus. In January 1983 Foley learned that his new supervisor, Robert Kuhne, was under investigation by the FBI for embezzlement from his former employer, Bank of America. Foley reported the information to Vice President Richard Earnest because he was worried about working for Kuhne in a supervisory position. Earnest told Foley not to discuss rumors and to forget what he had heard. In early March 1983 Kuhne informed Foley that the company had decided to replace him for performance reasons and offered a transfer to another division. Foley was later told he could continue as branch manager if he agreed to a performance plan, but when Kuhne met with him the next day Kuhne instead gave Foley the choice of resigning or being fired. Foley was discharged on March 13, 1983. Foley filed suit against Interactive Data Corporation alleging three causes of action: tortious discharge in violation of public policy, breach of an implied-in-fact contract to terminate only for good cause, and tortious breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing. The superior court sustained the company's demurrer without leave to amend and dismissed the action. The Court of Appeal affirmed the judgment. The Supreme Court granted review.
View caseResidents of the Town of Greece sue town officials over the practice of opening board meetings with sectarian prayers. Multiple plaintiffs file overlapping complaints. The Court consolidates the actions, observing that a single suit prevents a multiplicity of suits that would otherwise burden both the court and the municipality.
The Town of Greece, New York, a municipality with a population of 94,000 in upstate New York, began opening its monthly town board meetings with a prayer in 1999 after the newly elected town supervisor, John Auberger, decided to replicate a practice he had observed in the county legislature. Following the roll call and recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, Auberger invited a local clergyman to deliver an invocation, after which he thanked the minister for serving as the board's chaplain for the month and presented a commemorative plaque. The prayer was intended to place board members in a solemn and deliberative frame of mind and invoke divine guidance in town affairs. A town employee selected prayer givers by calling congregations listed in a local directory until finding an available minister for that month's meeting. The town eventually compiled a list of willing board chaplains who had accepted invitations and agreed to return. The town at no point excluded or denied an opportunity to a would-be prayer giver, and its leaders maintained that a minister or layperson of any persuasion, including an atheist, could give the invocation. From 1999 to 2007, however, all participating ministers were Christian because nearly all of the congregations in town were Christian. The town neither reviewed the prayers in advance nor provided guidance as to their tone or content. The resulting prayers often sounded both civic and religious themes, with many invoking the name of Jesus, the Heavenly Father, or the Holy Spirit, and some referencing Christian holidays, scripture, or doctrine such as the death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ or the events of Holy Week and Easter. Typical invocations asked the divinity to abide at the meeting, bestow blessings on the community, and grant wisdom and courage to elected officials. After respondents complained that Christian themes pervaded the prayers, the town invited a Jewish layman and the chairman of the local Baha'i temple to deliver prayers, and a Wiccan priestess who had read press reports about the controversy requested and received an opportunity to give the invocation. Susan Galloway and Linda Stephens, citizens who attended town board meetings to speak about issues of local concern, objected that the prayers violated their religious or philosophical views. They brought suit in the United States District Court for the Western District of New York. They alleged that the town violated the Establishment Clause by preferring Christians over other prayer givers and by sponsoring sectarian prayers such as those given in Jesus' name. They sought an injunction limiting the town to inclusive and ecumenical prayers that referred only to a generic God. The District Court on summary judgment upheld the prayer practice. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reversed, holding that aspects of the prayer program viewed in their totality by a reasonable observer conveyed the message that Greece was endorsing Christianity. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to decide whether the town's prayer practice violates the Establishment Clause.
View caseThe cost supports an injunction when repeated or continuing tortious acts would otherwise require the plaintiff to bring successive damage actions. Courts treat the burden of multiple suits as a factor showing that damages are an inadequate remedy.
Supporting sources
When a public nuisance affects many landowners, an injunction may be granted to one plaintiff because the relief benefits all and thereby avoids a multiplicity of suits for small damages that would otherwise burden the court and the defendant.
Supporting sources
No. The factor applies whenever repeated wrongful conduct would force successive damage actions, including recurring nuisances and other continuing torts. Equity may intervene to provide complete relief in one proceeding.
…to the appellee. This is upon the general equitable principle that equity will give full relief in one action and prevent a multiplicity of suits” (pp. 353-354). It was held that in this type of continuing and recurrent nuisance permanent damages were appropriate. See, also, City of Amarillo v. Ware (120 Tex. 456) where recurring…