If you practice in federal court and you’re suddenly dealing with a Michigan state court matter, or you’re advising a client who’s gotten a motion under MCR 2.116, the first thing you’ll notice is that this rule looks familiar but works differently than you expect. Ten grounds, a pleadings-only standard for the failure-to-state grounds, and a summary judgment analog that Michigan courts have interpreted in ways that can trip up practitioners who assume the federal framework controls.
Here’s a practical walkthrough.
The Ten Grounds, and Why Most of Them Are Procedural Housekeeping
The rule lists grounds for summary disposition under subrule (C):
(1) The court lacks jurisdiction over the person or property. (2) The process issued in the action was insufficient. (3) The service of process was insufficient. (4) The court lacks jurisdiction of the subject matter. (5) The party asserting the claim lacks the legal capacity to sue. (6) Another action has been initiated between the same parties involving the same claim. (7) Entry of judgment, dismissal of the action, or other relief is appropriate because of release, payment, prior judgment, immunity granted by law, statute of limitations, statute of frauds, an agreement to arbitrate or to litigate in a different forum, infancy or other disability of the moving party, or assignment or other disposition of the claim before commencement of the action. (8) The opposing party has failed to state a claim on which relief can be granted. (9) The opposing party has failed to state a valid defense to the claim asserted against him or her. (10) Except as to the amount of damages, there is no genuine issue as to any material fact, and the moving party is entitled to judgment or partial judgment as a matter of law.
Grounds (C)(1) through (C)(7) are the procedural and threshold defenses: personal jurisdiction, process defects, subject matter jurisdiction, capacity, prior pending action, and the grab-bag of affirmative defenses in (C)(7). The timing rules for these are not uniform, and getting them wrong can cost you the defense:
- Under subrule (D)(1), grounds (C)(1), (2), and (3) must be raised in your first motion under the rule or in your responsive pleading, whichever comes first, or they’re waived.
- Under subrule (D)(2), grounds (C)(5), (6), and (7) must be raised in your responsive pleading, unless you assert them in a motion filed before that first responsive pleading.
- Subject matter jurisdiction under (C)(4) and governmental immunity, on the other hand, can be raised at any time under subrule (D)(3), even after a scheduling order deadline for dispositive motions has passed.
The action in practice is almost always in (C)(8) and (C)(10), which is where the real divergence from federal practice shows up.
(C)(8) vs. (C)(10): Not the Same Motion
Federal practitioners tend to conflate these two, and that’s a mistake. In Michigan courts, (C)(8) and (C)(10) are conceptually distinct and procedurally treated differently.
A (C)(8) motion is Michigan’s equivalent of a 12(b)(6): failure to state a claim. The standard is whether, accepting all well-pleaded factual allegations as true and construing them in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, the claim is legally sufficient. A motion succeeds only where the claims are “so clearly unenforceable as a matter of law that no factual development could possibly justify recovery.” The key procedural constraint is in subrule (G)(5):
Only the pleadings may be considered when the motion is based on subrule (C)(8) or (9).
This is strict. You cannot attach an affidavit to support a (C)(8) motion and expect the court to consider it. If both sides start submitting documentary evidence, the court should be treating the motion as a (C)(10), not a (C)(8). Michigan courts may proceed under the appropriate subrule when a party moves under the wrong one and neither side is misled (Computer Network, Inc v AM Gen Corp, 265 Mich App 309 (2005)), but you should not rely on that happening. If you’re moving under (C)(8), keep it to the pleadings and make your legal argument.
A (C)(10) motion is the summary judgment motion. The rule requires the moving party to specifically identify the issues where no genuine factual dispute exists, and the nonmoving party then must respond with affidavits or other evidence rather than simply relying on pleading allegations. That’s spelled out directly in subrule (G)(4):
When a motion under subrule (C)(10) is made and supported as provided in this rule, an adverse party may not rest upon the mere allegations or denials of his or her pleading, but must, by affidavits or as otherwise provided in this rule, set forth specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial.
If you’re the nonmoving party and you just submit a brief re-arguing your pleading, you’re going to lose.
How Michigan’s (C)(10) Standard Compares to Celotex
Federal practitioners know the summary judgment framework from Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, where the Supreme Court held that a moving party can meet its initial burden simply by pointing out the absence of evidence on an element the nonmoving party bears at trial, without affirmatively disproving that element. That burden-shifting is baked into federal summary judgment practice.
Michigan’s (C)(10) standard uses nearly identical language to Rule 56, and it tracks the Celotex approach more closely than many practitioners assume. In Lowrey v. LMPS & LMPJ, Inc., 500 Mich. 1 (2016), the Michigan Supreme Court held that a moving party may satisfy its initial burden in one of two ways: by submitting affirmative evidence that negates an essential element of the nonmoving party’s claim, or by demonstrating that the nonmoving party’s evidence is insufficient to establish an essential element. The Court expressly held that the movant is “not required to go beyond showing the insufficiency of the nonmoving party’s evidence.” In other words, the “no evidence” route is available in Michigan, just as it is under Celotex.
The genuine Michigan-specific constraint is procedural, not a different allocation of the burden. Subrule (G)(3)(b) requires that a (C)(10) motion be supported by “affidavits, depositions, admissions, or other documentary evidence.” A movant proceeding on a “no evidence” theory therefore cannot simply assert in the brief that the opponent lacks proof; it has to point to the actual record — the deposition testimony, the discovery responses, the absence of evidence on a necessary element — that demonstrates the gap. Once that initial burden is met, the burden shifts, and the nonmoving party may not rest on its pleadings; it must come forward with specific facts, supported by substantively admissible evidence, showing a genuine issue for trial. If it fails to do so, the motion should be granted (Smith v Globe Life Ins Co, 460 Mich 446 (1999)).
So the practical takeaway is not “you must affirmatively disprove the element.” It’s that whichever route you take, you have to support the motion by reference to the actual record. A bare assertion that the other side has no evidence, untethered to anything in the record, won’t carry a (C)(10) motion.
Timing and the Amendment Safety Valve
Under subrule (I)(5), if the court grants summary disposition based on (C)(8), (C)(9), or (C)(10), it must give the parties an opportunity to amend their pleadings under MCR 2.118 before dismissing, unless the evidence shows amendment would be unjustified (caselaw treats this as a futility standard). This is a meaningful protection that sometimes gets overlooked. If you’re opposing a (C)(8) motion and you’re worried about a pleading deficiency, flag the amendment issue in your response brief and be prepared to tell the court what you would add.
The Common Mistake: Mixing Up the Standards Mid-Motion
The error I see most often is a moving party who files under (C)(10) but then argues the case as if it’s a (C)(8): leading with legal sufficiency arguments and supporting them with only the pleadings, without any documentary evidence. Or the reverse: filing under (C)(8) and attaching a stack of exhibits, which the court is required to ignore. Before you file, decide which standard you’re actually arguing under. If you have facts outside the pleadings that help you — or you intend to show the absence of facts in the opponent’s record — that’s a (C)(10) motion. If your argument is purely that the claim fails as a matter of law even accepting every alleged fact, that’s (C)(8), and you should keep your record clean.
The briefing schedule under subrule (G)(1)(a) requires the motion and supporting brief to be filed and served at least 21 days before the hearing, with responses due at least 7 days out and reply briefs due at least 4 days out, limited to 5 pages — all default periods unless the court sets a different time. That’s a tighter schedule than many federal courts run for dispositive motions, so if you’re coming from a federal practice, build your calendar accordingly.