NC Chamber supports ACC in legal fights with Florida State, Clemson

North Carolina’s leading business group is supporting the Atlantic Coast Conference in its ongoing legal disputes with Florida State and Clemson universities. The NC Chamber Legal Institute filed a friend-of-the-court brief Friday at the North Carolina Supreme Court in lawsuits pitting the conference against the two schools.

Both suits involve disputes over hundreds of millions of dollars linked to ACC membership and the schools’ athletic media rights. The NC Chamber’s brief arrived on the same day South Carolina’s attorney general filed a competing brief discussing the impact of sovereign immunity on the Clemson case.

“The issue before the Court is one that significantly affects the state’s legal climate, namely, whether an out-of-state governmental entity that conducts business in North Carolina — including by entering into private contracts in North Carolina and joining a North Carolina unincorporated association — can be held accountable in North Carolina courts for breaching its North Carolina contracts,” wrote the NC Chamber institute’s lawyers. “Specifically, Florida State University and Clemson University, members of the North Carolina-based Atlantic Coast Conference, assert that sovereign immunity protects them from suit in North Carolina and that they can be sued only in their home state for breaching their agreements with the ACC.”

“This case is of great importance to collegiate athletics. The arguments by Florida State and Clemson attack the economic viability of the ACC — with wider ramifications for every athletic conference in the United States,” the court filing continued.

“College athletics, in turn, have a major impact on the North Carolina economy,” NC Chamber lawyers wrote, citing a recent study showing a $1.13 billion annual economic impact from University of North Carolina System athletics. “And that figure does not include the economic impact of the numerous private colleges and universities in North Carolina with major athletic programs, including ACC members Duke University and Wake Forest University.”

“It is therefore extraordinarily important to the North Carolina business community that the contracts governing these schools’ athletic competition are honored and enforced, and that North Carolina businesses (such as the ACC) are not forced to chase governmental entities into foreign courts when those same governmental entities deliberately reached into North Carolina to join the very corporate organizations and contracts they now disavow,” the brief continued.

The NC Chamber cited the ACC’s economic impact in North Carolina, including $21 million in 2023 from the conference’s men’s and women’s basketball tournaments and $29 million from the football conference championship game.

“ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips has publicly estimated that upcoming ACC championship events could have an economic impact in North Carolina of more than $400 million,” the court filing added. “The importance of the ACC to the North Carolina economy has been recognized by the GeneralAssembly, which provided funds to the Conference in connection with procuring and upfitting its new headquarters.”

“More broadly, the Court’s decision in this case will affect every North Carolina business that works with state-affiliated entities,” the brief argued. “This could include a North Carolina technology company providing software for an out-of-state college, a North Carolina engineering firm designing bridges for an out-of-state department of transportation, or a North Carolina manufacturer producing security equipment for an out-of-state prison.”

“Under the legal rule promoted by Florida State and Clemson, these types of North Carolina businesses would have no remedy in our courts if they are wronged by state-government entities who have chosen to reach into North Carolina, form North Carolina contracts, take advantage of business opportunities here, and profit from those business relationships,” the institute’s lawyers wrote.

The ACC urged the North Carolina Supreme Court on Jan. 3  to reject attempts from Clemson and Florida State to end legal action in this state.

While Clemson seeks to restrict its court fight to a South Carolina courtroom. Florida State hopes to confine its case to a courtroom in the Sunshine State. The disputes address the multimillion-dollar price tag associated with leaving the athletic conference. One court filing labeled the FSU case a “$700 million” dispute. The legal battle with FSU started in December 2023. The lawsuit against Clemson began in March.

Lower courts rejected both universities’ requests to have the ACC’s lawsuits thrown out of North Carolina courts. Appeals in both suits sit now with the North Carolina Supreme Court.

Now-retired North Carolina Business Court Judge Louis Bledsoe issued a 53-page order last July granting part of Clemson’s request to dismiss the ACC’s legal claims. But Bledsoe refused to dismiss the lawsuit in its entirety. He also rejected Clemson’s motion to stay the proceedings in the North Carolina case.

Bledsoe also issued an earlier ruling rejecting Florida State’s request to throw out the ACC’s suit in North Carolina.

“The only court that has jurisdiction over FSU, Clemson, and the ACC — and thus the only court that can assure a consistent, uniform interpretation of the Grant of Rights Agreements and the ACC’s Constitution and Bylaws, the determinations at the core of the Pending Actions — is a North Carolina court,” Bledsoe wrote.

“The Florida court in the Florida Action cannot bind Clemson in South Carolina. The South Carolina court in the South Carolina Action cannot bind FSU in Florida. Each of these courts and this Court could reach conflicting conclusions about the same terms of the same North Carolina contracts upon which the Pending Actions rest — and in so doing create procedural chaos and tremendous confusion at a time when the ACC, FSU, and Clemson need binding clarity concerning their rights under the ACC’s most important contracts with its Members,” the judge continued.

“Only a North Carolina court, most likely in a single consolidated action in North Carolina, can render consistent, uniform determinations binding the ACC, FSU, and Clemson concerning the documents that are at issue in all four Pending Actions,” Bledsoe added.

The post NC Chamber supports ACC in legal fights with Florida State, Clemson first appeared on Carolina Journal.