Michigan Supreme Court Lansing, Michigan
Megan K. Cavanagh, Chief Justice Brian K. Zahra Richard H. Bernstein Elizabeth M. Welch Kyra H. Bolden Kimberly A. Thomas Noah P. Hood,
Justices
Order
July 3, 2025
167831
In re CERTIFIED QUESTION FROM THE
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR
THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN.
_________________________________________ WHITNEY BEAUBIEN, Personal Representative of the ESTATE OF CRAIG A. BEAUBIEN, Plaintiff,
v SC: 167381
US Dist Ct: 2:21-cv-11000
CHARU TRIVEDI, M.D., and TOLEDO CLINIC, INC., d/b/a TOLEDO CLINIC CANCER
CENTERS,
Defendants. __________________________________________/ On order of the Court, the question certified by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan is considered, and the Court respectfully declines the request to answer the certified question.
CAVANAGH, C.J. (concurring).
I concur with the Court's decision to decline to answer this certified question. While I express no opinion on the merits of plaintiff's arguments, I write separately to explain why a certified question under MCR 7.308(A)(2)(a) is not the proper vehicle to reexamine the issues presented in this case.
The certified question at issue concerns the constitutionality of MCL 600.1483, which caps noneconomic damages in medical-malpractice cases. Specifically, the certified question asks whether this cap violates the right to trial by jury, equal-protection guarantees, or the separation-of-powers doctrine under Michigan's 1963 Constitution. The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan found these constitutional questions to be unsettled under Michigan law and concluded that our intervention is necessary to resolve them. Beaubien v Trivedi, opinion of the United States District Court
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for the Eastern District of Michigan, issued November 8, 2024 (Case No. 21-cv-11000), pp 9-10.
Historically, the certified-question process has aimed to resolve unclear questions of state law where no controlling precedent exists. See, e.g., Bagg v Detroit, 5 Mich 66, 70 (1858) (explaining that certified questions are proper only where "the judge below has well founded doubts upon them, save when they are new, and of public importance"); Reichert v Metro Trust Co, 262 Mich 123, 135 (1933) (same). Our court rules have followed suit, limiting certification to cases in which courts lack guidance on important questions of state law. MCR 7.308(A). Applicable here is MCR 7.308(A)(2)(a), the rule that paves the way for federal courts to certify questions to this Court:
When a federal court, another state's appellate court, or a tribal court considers a question that Michigan law may resolve and that is not controlled by Michigan Supreme Court precedent, the court may on its own initiative or that of an interested party certify the question to the Court. [Emphasis added.] When this standard is met, we may resolve the question by issuing a peremptory order or rendering a decision in the ordinary form of an opinion to be published with other opinions of the Court. MCR 7.308(A)(5). The Court may also "deny the request for a certified question by order[.]" Id.1
Against that backdrop, the certified question in this case fails to meet the threshold requirement for certification because the issues presented within it are controlled by binding state precedent. In Phillips v Mirac, Inc, 470 Mich 415 (2004), this Court held that MCL 257.401(3)—an analogous damages cap that limits the amount of a lessor's liability in certain motor vehicle leases—does not offend a plaintiff's rights to a jury trial, equal protection, and due process under the Michigan Constitution. Id. at 419. The Court framed the jury-trial issue as "whether this constitutional provision makes what the Legislature attempted to do—cap damages even though a jury found that the damages were
1 Although not binding on this Court, analogous federal authorities track our state certification standards. Take the Eastern District's local rule governing certified questions, which provides that a certified question is proper only when "the issue certified is an unsettled issue of State law." ED Mich LR 83.40 (emphasis added). Consider, too, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit's guidance that if an "issue is novel or unsettled, a federal court has the discretion to request that a state's highest court provide the definitive state-law answer through certification." In re Nat'l Prescription Opiate Litigation, 82 F4th 455, 461 (CA 6, 2023) (emphasis added). In fact, the Sixth Circuit has declined to certify a question even though a state "ha[d] not addressed the exact question at issue" because the state had "well-established principles" to govern the issue. Transamerica Ins Co v Duro Bag Mfg Co, 50 F3d 370, 372 (CA 6, 1995).
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greater than the cap—unconstitutional." Id. at 424. The Phillips Court answered no, and that is squarely the jury-trial issue presented in the instant case. On the equal-protection front, the Phillips Court identified the claimed right not as
"the overarching right to have a jury trial but, more precisely, a claimed right to have a jury's assessment of damages be unmodifiable as a matter of law." Id. at 433. So framed, the Court rejected the argument that strict or heightened scrutiny applied to the damages cap because such a claimed right "clearly does not result in discrimination by race, national origin, or ethnicity, nor affect an interest that is fundamental," nor does it involve
"allegations of gender or illegitimacy." Id. at 434. That left the deferential rational-basis test, which this Court held was met, in part, because the Legislature's purpose in enacting the cap was to reduce costs. Id. at 435.2In like manner, the damages cap in dispute here does not involve any of these categories as framed by the Phillips Court and also bears a purported cost-saving purpose. See Zdrojewski v Murphy, 254 Mich App 50, 80-81 (2002). So Phillips' reasoning also applies to the equal-protection challenge raised here. All in all, Phillips—rightly or wrongly decided—constitutes controlling precedent under MCR 7.308(A)(2)(a) and thus equipped the federal district court with "a reasonably clear and principled course" on how to resolve the issues presented. See Pennington v State Farm Mut Auto Ins Co, 553 F3d 447, 450 (CA 6, 2009) (quotation marks and citation omitted).
In addition, our Court of Appeals—both independently and relying on this Court's Phillips decision—has several times rejected the exact arguments raised in the present case.3For instance, in Zdrojewski, 254 Mich App 50, the Court of Appeals analyzed MCL
2 Notably, we recently reaffirmed Phillips' equal-protection framework in Andary v USAA Cas Ins Co, 512 Mich 207, 268, 270 (2023).
3 To be sure, I recognize that Court of Appeals precedent carries less persuasive weight than decisions of our Court when determining whether an issue of state law is a settled one. And, true, MCR 7.308(A)(2)(a) speaks only of controlling precedent from the "Michigan Supreme Court." But I believe that how our Court of Appeals has interpreted our precedent and applied it to the very issue in dispute certainly remains probative of whether such precedent controls a certified question under MCR 7.308(A)(2)(a). This is especially so when, as here, a federal court exercises diversity jurisdiction. As a matter of constitutional law, a federal court sitting in diversity must apply state substantive law, Erie R Co v Tompkins, 304 US 64, 78 (1938), and state substantive law includes published state court of appeals decisions absent persuasive data calling those decisions into question, see West v American Tel & Tel Co, 311 US 223, 237 (1940) (holding that when "an intermediate appellate state court rests its considered judgment upon the rule of law which it announces, that is a datum for ascertaining state law which is
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600.1483—the very damages cap in dispute here—and held that it does not violate a plaintiff's right to a jury trial, equal protection, or separation of powers under the Michigan Constitution. In so doing, the Zdrojewski panel relied heavily on the Court of Appeals' opinion in Phillips that this Court later affirmed. Id. at 76-80. See also Wiley v Henry Ford Cottage Hosp, 257 Mich App 488, 505-509 (2003) (recognizing the binding nature of Zdrojewski in analyzing the constitutionality of MCL 600.1483, albeit reluctantly, a year before this Court decided Phillips).4Then, in the wake of our decision in Phillips, the Court of Appeals held that both Phillips and Zdrojewski foreclosed a plaintiff's argument that MCL 600.1483 violates the right to a jury trial, the separation-of-powers doctrine, and equal-protection guarantees under the Michigan Constitution. Jenkins v Patel (On Remand), 263 Mich App 508, 509-510 (2004).5Because Zdrojewski, Wiley, Jenkins, and their progeny track this Court's reasoning in Phillips and remain binding on state courts,6I believe that they bolster the settled nature of this certified question.7 not to be disregarded by a federal court unless it is convinced by other persuasive data that the highest court of the state would decide otherwise"); MCR 7.215(C)(2) (according published Court of Appeals opinions precedential authority in state courts).
4 After the judges of the Court of Appeals were polled "to determine whether the particular question is both outcome-determinative and warrants convening a special panel," MCR 7.215(J)(3)(a), the Court of Appeals decided that a special panel "shall not be convened to resolve the conflict" between Wiley and Zdrojewski. Wiley v Henry Ford Cottage Hosp, 257 Mich App 801, 801 (2003). So Zdrojewski remained controlling even before we decided Phillips.
5 The Court of Appeals has also applied Phillips and Zdrojewski to other damages caps. See, e.g., Wessels v Garden Way, Inc, 263 Mich App 642, 646 (2004) (citing Phillips and Zdrojewski to hold that the noneconomic-damages cap applicable in product-liability cases does not violate the right to a jury trial, equal protection, or separation of powers).
6 The Sixth Circuit, which also binds the Eastern District, has cited Phillips and Zdrojewski in rejecting similar constitutional challenges to MCL 600.1483. Smith v Botsford Gen Hosp, 419 F3d 513, 519-520 (CA 6, 2005).
7 To support its conclusion that Phillips, Zdjrojewski, and Jenkins do not represent settled law, the Eastern District cited several earlier cases—many of the same ones cited by the Phillips dissent—for the proposition that setting damages is a part of a fact-finder's role in civil cases. See, e.g., Weil v Longyear, 263 Mich 22 (1933); Leary v Fisher, 248 Mich 574 (1929); Aho v Conda, 347 Mich 450 (1956); Precopio v Detroit, 415 Mich 457 (1982). Although this proposition is undisputably true, I do not believe that these earlier cases strip Phillips and its progeny of their controlling nature, as these cases neither pertained to damages caps nor established a per se rule that a jury's award of damages is unassailable.
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I, Larry S. Royster, Clerk of the Michigan Supreme Court, certify that the foregoing is a true and complete copy of the order entered at the direction of the Court. July 3, 2025
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Clerk In sum, our certified-question process exists to resolve unsettled questions of state law, not to relitigate settled ones. Because the certified question in this case is controlled by binding state precedent, this Court need not answer it for the federal court in this case. The question has already been answered, rightly or wrongly. And, if existing state law ought to be changed, that change must come through the proper state appellate channels— not by stretching the certification process beyond its intended bounds. For these reasons, I concur with the Court's decision to decline to answer this certified question. BERNSTEIN, J., would grant the request from the Eastern District of Michigan to hear oral argument and answer the certified question.
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