§23.9 The Class Action Fairness Act of 2005

• Jurisdiction: Washington

§23.9THE CLASS ACTION FAIRNESS ACT OF 2005

The Class Action Fairness Act of 2005 (CAFA), Pub. L. No. 109-2,119 Stat. 4 (2005) (codified as amended in scattered sections of 28 U.S.C.), resulted from many years of lobbying in Congress to cure perceived abuses of state court class actions. Supporters of the statute assumed that the central element of its structure, providingfor removal to federal court of most multistate class actions, would dramatically decrease the number of nationwide or regionwide class actions certified in the future, due to the perception that federal courts are much less willing to certify such classes than their counterparts in the various states.

Although the ultimate effects from enactment of this legislation remain unclear, it seems likely that this law will significantly reduce the number of multistate class actions litigated in Washington state courts. CAFA is a complicated statute enacted on February 18, 2005, and it applies only to those class actions commenced after the date of enactment. The statute contains two principal categories of provisions: "[t]hose greatly expanding jurisdiction and removal procedures to allow filing or removal of most state law class actions to federal court; and those providing new standards and requirements relating to class action settlements."

(1)Federal jurisdiction and removal of multistate class actions

The most important provisions of CAFA are those intended to insure that the vast majority of multistate class actions in the future will proceed in federal rather than in state courts. Prior to CAFA, the requirement of "complete diversity" (i.e., that all named plaintiffs and all named defendants must be citizens of different states) and the...