Article III’s requirement that a plaintiff have standing to bring the claim applies to proposed class actions, and doomed class plaintiffs who were alleging that certain beef products were not kosher as marketed. See Wallace v. Conagra Foods, Inc., No. 13-1485 (8th Cir. 4/4/14).

Melvin Wallace and several other consumers claimed that some Hebrew National beef products were not “100% kosher.” Defendant removed to federal court, invoking the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005 (CAFA), 28 U.S.C. § 1453, then moved to dismiss contending the consumers lacked Article III standing and that the district court lacked jurisdiction to address religious questions
underlying the consumers’ claims. The district court decided the First Amendment prohibited the courts from adjudicating the consumers’ legal claims and, they appealed.

Plaintiffs argued that their purchase and consumption of the Hebrew National brand products was not motivated by faith, but rather on the belief that kosher is the “New Organic,” a promise of food purity amid other products full of artificial ingredients. They claimed this led them to pay an unjustified premium for Hebrew National’s ostensibly kosher beef.

The court of appeals concluded that the consumers lacked traditional Article III standing to pursue this case, and instructed the district court to remand the case to state court.

Defendant argued that even if the consumers would have overpaid if the Hebrew National products they bought were not actually kosher, the consumers did not adequately allege that the products they each purchased were defective.   Here, the consumers’ allegations did not establish that all or even most Hebrew National products were not kosher, which means the particular packages of
processed beef they purchased may have been—and indeed more than likely were—prepared in accordance with minimum kosher standards.

The court noted that Article III requires “an injury [to] be concrete, particularized, and actual or  imminent.” Monsanto Co. v. Geertson Seed Farms, 130 S. Ct. 2743, 2752 (2010). An alleged injury cannot be “too speculative for Article III purposes.” Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 564 n.2 (1992). If there is no “actual” harm, then there must at least be an “imminent” harm. Id. As the Supreme Court emphasized just last year, “mere speculation” that injury did or might occur “cannot satisfy the requirement that any injury in fact must be fairly traceable to” the alleged source. Clapper v. Amnesty Int’l USA, 133 S. Ct. 1138, 1148 (2013).

Here, the consumers’ allegations failed to show that any of the particular packages of Hebrew National beef they personally purchased contained non-kosher beef. The consumers frankly admitted that it was impossible for any reasonable consumer to detect whether purportedly kosher meat is non-kosher. The Supreme Court has made it clear that standing must be particularized, meaning the alleged injury must affect the plaintiff in a personal and individual way. In the context of defective products, it is not enough for a plaintiff to allege that a product line contains a defect or that a product is at risk for manifesting this defect; rather, the plaintiffs must allege that their product actually exhibited the alleged defect. See In re Zurn Pex Plumbing Prods. Liab. Litig., 644 F.3d
604, 616 (8th Cir. 2011).

Without any particularized reason to think the consumers’ own packages of Hebrew National beef actually exhibited the alleged non-kosher defect, the consumers lacked Article III standing to sue.  Even supposing some beef was improperly certified as kosher, the consumers gave the court no reason to think all the beef marked as kosher under the quota did not meet kosher standards. Which means, it was pure speculation to say the particular packages sold to the consumers were tainted by non-kosher beef.  Speculation and conjecture are not injuries cognizable under Article III. See, e.g., Clapper, 133 S. Ct. at 1148.  Because the consumers suffered no particularized and actual injury, Monsanto, 130 S. Ct. at 2752, the court of appeals was bound to conclude the consumers lacked traditional Article III standing.  CAFA did not extend federal jurisdiction to this case.