Minnesota. Attorney General. Civil Litigation Division.

The case concerns the constitutional challenge to the state's Farmer-Lender Mediation Act [Laws 1986 c398] brought by the Federal Land Bank et al. against [Attorney General] Hubert H. Humphrey III et al. The plaintiffs were all member institutions of the farmer-owned Farm Credit System. The Mediation Act called for mandatory meditation in most farm-credit disputes. The case not only stated that the federal Bankruptcy and Farm Credit Acts pre-empted the mediation portion of the act but also challenged three other provisions of the act, those giving the former owner first option to buy or lease land that had been foreclosed, an increase in the homestead exemption from 80 to 160 acres, and procedural restrictions on deficiency judgments, on the grounds that their contract rights and due process rights had been violated. The case was dropped in August 1987, the plaintiffs deciding to pursue the changes through legislation.