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Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

DONALD E. ENO,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.

SALLY JEWELL; U.S. DEPARTMENT

OF THE INTERIOR; INTERIOR BOARD

OF LAND APPEALS; U.S. FOREST

SERVICE,

Defendants-Appellees.

No. 13-15166

D.C. No.

2:10-cv-01691-

KJM-JFM

OPINION

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of California

Kimberly J. Mueller, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted

March 13, 2015—San Francisco, California

Filed August 27, 2015

Before: M. Margaret McKeown, Mary H. Murguia,

and Michelle T. Friedland, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge McKeown

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2 ENO V. JEWELL

SUMMARY*

Equal Access to Justice Act

The panel affirmed the district court’s order affirming the

Interior Board of Land Appeals’ denial of an application for

fees under the Equal Access to Justice Act.

EAJA entitles those who prevail on a legal claim against

the U.S. government to an award of fees and costs, but only

if they prevail in adversary adjudications; and specifically

excluded from this category are proceedings “for the purpose

of granting or renewing a license.”

The panel held that a hearing under the Mining Claims

Rights Restoration Act of 1955 did not fall within EAJA’s

definition of an adversary adjudication because such a

hearing was held for the purpose of granting a license.

COUNSEL

Steven J. Lechner (argued), Mountain States Legal

Foundation, Lakewood, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Robert G. Dreher, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Mark

R. Haag, Thekla Hansen-Young, James Maysonett (argued),

and Maggie B. Smith, United States Department of Justice,

Environment & Natural Resources Division, Washington,

D.C.; Edward Alan Olsen, Assistant United States Attorney,

* This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has

been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.

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ENO V. JEWELL 3

Sacramento, California; Joshua S. Rider and Andrew R.

Varcoe, United States Department of Agriculture,

Washington, D.C.; and Kendra Nitta, United States

Department of the Interior, Washington, D.C., for

Defendants-Appellees.

OPINION

McKEOWN, Circuit Judge:

The Equal Access to Justice Act (“EAJA”) “departs from

the general rule that each party to a lawsuit pays his or her

own legal fees.” Scarborough v. Principi, 541 U.S. 401, 404

(2004). The EAJA entitles those who prevail on a legal claim

against the U.S. government to an award of fees and costs,

but only if they prevail in adversary adjudications. 

Specifically excluded from this category are proceedings “for

the purpose of granting or renewing a license.” 5 U.S.C.

§ 504(b)(1)(C)(i).

Our question is whether a hearing under the relatively

obscure Mining Claims Rights Restoration Act of 1955 (the

“MiningRestoration Act”)1fallswithin the EAJA’s definition

of an adversary adjudication. Because such a hearing is held

for the purpose of granting a license, we conclude that it does

not. We affirm the district court’s order affirming the Interior

Board of Land Appeals’ denial of the application for fees

under the EAJA.

1 Although the parties refer to the statute as “MCRRA,” we find this

acronym to be cumbersome and prefer a more descriptive designation.

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4 ENO V. JEWELL

BACKGROUND

Donald Eno owns the Hound Dog placer mining claim,

which includes forty acres within the Plumas National Forest

in Plumas County, California. The Hound Dog claim

contains gold and travertine deposits, the latter giving the

area the nickname “Soda Rock.” Unlike lode mining claims,

in which miners blast or tunnel through solid rock, placer

mining claims generally comprise loose deposits of minerals

that are not fixed in rock but can be found in streams, gravel,

or sandy soil. Placer mining is the type popularized by

prospectors during the California Gold Rush. See 30 U.S.C.

§§ 23, 35; United States v. Iron Silver Mining Co., 128 U.S.

673, 678–80 (1888) (noting that deposits in placer claims

“may in most cases be collected by washing or amalgamation

without milling”); What is Placer Gold Mining?, National

Park Service (Aug. 3, 2015), http://www.nps.gov/yuch/learn/

historyculture/placer-mining.htm.

This appeal juxtaposes classic questions of administrative

law against the backdrop of the arcane mining laws that

govern the lands within the Hound Dog claim. A short

history of the federal mining law framework gives necessary

context.

The General Mining Law of 1872, as amended, grants

citizens a right to enter and explore unreserved federal lands

for mining: “all valuable mineral deposits in lands belonging

to the United States, both surveyed and unsurveyed, shall be

free and open to exploration and purchase, and the lands in

which they are found to occupation and purchase . . . .” 

30 U.S.C. § 22. “Location” of a mining claim is “the act or

series of acts whereby the boundaries of the claim are

marked.” Cole v. Ralph, 252 U.S. 286, 296 (1920); 30 U.S.C.

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ENO V. JEWELL 5

§§ 28, 35. A person who locates a claim based on mineral

discovery has “exclusive right of possession and enjoyment

of all the surface included within the lines of their locations”

so long as certain statutory requirements are met. 30 U.S.C.

§ 26; Cole, 252 U.S. at 294–95.

The federal government has broad authority to withdraw

public lands from the operation of the General Mining Law. 

See Swanson v. Babbitt, 3 F.3d 1348, 1352 (9th Cir. 1993). 

Lands so withdrawn “are no longer considered to be within

the public domain and therefore are not subject to the

statutory rights enumerated in the General Mining Law.” 

Kosanke v. U.S. Dep’t of the Interior, 144 F.3d 873, 874

(D.C. Cir. 1998) (citing Oklahoma v. Texas, 258 U.S. 574,

599–602 (1922); Pathfinder Mines Corp. v. Hodel, 811 F.2d

1288, 1291 (9th Cir. 1987)).

The Federal Power Act of 1920, 16 U.S.C. § 818,

withdrew all lands that were or would be “classified” or

“reserved” for power sites from entry or location under the

General Mining Law. See also 43 C.F.R. §§ 2300.0-5,

2320.1. A few decades later, after millions of acres had been

withdrawn under the Federal Power Act, Congress passed the

Mining Restoration Act, 30 U.S.C. §§ 621–625, which

reopened lands classified or reserved for power sites to “entry

for location and patent of mining claims and for mining.” 

30 U.S.C. § 621(a); see also S. Rep. No. 84-1150 (1955),

reprinted in 1955 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3006. The Mining

Restoration Act set forth special provisions regarding placer

claims:

The locator of a placer claim under this

chapter, however, shall conduct no mining

operations for a period of sixty days after the

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6 ENO V. JEWELL

filing of a notice of location . . . . If the

Secretary of the Interior, within sixty days

from the filing of the notice of location,

notifies the locator . . . of the Secretary’s

intention to hold a public hearing to determine

whether placer mining operations would

substantially interfere with other uses of the

land included within the placer claim, mining

operations on that claim shall be further

suspended until the Secretary has held the

hearing and has issued an appropriate order.

30 U.S.C. § 621(b). The Secretary’s order “shall provide for

one of the following: (1) a complete prohibition of placer

mining; (2) a permission to engage in placer mining upon the

condition that the locator shall, following placer operations,

restore the surface of the claim to the condition in which it

was immediately prior to those operations; or (3) a general

permission to engage in placer mining.” Id.

Each of these legal developments has, at some point in

time, affected the status of the lands now included within the

Hound Dog claim. The lands were originally part of the

Delaware 3 placer mining claim, which was located in 1907

under the General Mining Law. In 1993, however, the

Delaware 3 claim was declared abandoned.

Gordon Burton and others located the Hound Dog claim

on August 15, 1996. The lands included in the claim had

been identified in 1927 as Power Site No. 179, and thus were

among those lands that had been withdrawn from mineral

entry under the Federal Power Act and opened again under

the Mining Restoration Act. The day after he located the

Hound Dog claim, Burton filed the notice of location as

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ENO V. JEWELL 7

required by the Mining Restoration Act. 30 U.S.C. § 623. 

On September 12, 1996, the Bureau of Land Management

notified him that the Secretary intended to hold a hearing

pursuant to 30 U.S.C. § 621(b), based on the U.S. Forest

Service’s objections to placer mining of the claim. Mining

operations were suspended pending the outcome of the

hearing.

In 1997, the U.S. Forest Service sought the withdrawal of

the lands within the Hound Dog claim from mineral entry to

protect the area’s geologic, historical, and cultural properties. 

Notice of Proposed Withdrawal and Opportunity for Public

Meeting, 62 Fed. Reg. 48,668 (Sept. 16, 1997). After a

period of notice and comment, the Secretary withdrew the

area “from location and entry under the United States mining

laws” for 50 years, “[s]ubject to valid existing rights.” Public

Land Order No. 7406, 64 Fed. Reg. 47,515 (Aug. 31, 1999). 

The order also stated that the area would remain open to

mineral leasing and that the order “does not alter the

applicability of those land laws governing the use of the

National Forest System land under lease, license, or permit,

or governing the disposal of their mineral or vegetative

resources other than under the mining laws.” Id. In 1998,

while this withdrawal was pending, Eno acquired the Hound

Dog claim from Burton and the others who had located it;

Eno then replaced his predecessors in the Mining Restoration

Act proceedings.

The hearing took place before an Administrative Law

Judge (“ALJ”) at the Department of Interior in June 2002. 

The U.S. Forest Service argued that placer mining would

substantially interfere with cultural, geologic, historical, and

scenic values of the land, and that these factors outweighed

the economic worth of the land’s mineral reserves. Eno

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8 ENO V. JEWELL

countered that the other uses were not substantial and that, in

any event, placer mining operations would not substantially

interfere with them. Eno won. The ALJ granted him general

permission to engage in placer mining. The Interior Board of

Land Appeals (“Board”) eventually affirmed the grant of

general permission to engage in placer mining, although it

departed from the ALJ’s reasoning and conclusions on

several issues.

Citing his success in securing general permission to mine,

Eno applied for an EAJA award of more than $180,000 in

attorneys’ fees and expenses. The EAJA provides for an

award of fees and costs in certain adjudications in which a

party prevails against the government. The case must be an

“adversary adjudication” under 5 U.S.C. § 504(a); the statute

excludes “an adjudication for the purpose of . . . granting or

renewing a license.” 5 U.S.C. § 504(b)(1)(C)(i).

An ALJ denied Eno’s application. In affirming, the

Board held that the Mining Restoration Act hearing was held

for the purpose of granting a license and, alternatively, that it

was not an adjudication “under” 5 U.S.C. § 554. Both

holdings led to the same conclusion: the EAJA does not apply

to this case. The Board did not address whether the

government’s position was substantially justified.

Eno challenged the ruling before the district court, which

affirmed the Board’s decision. The district court construed

the EAJA narrowly as a waiver of sovereign immunity and

reasoned that “any form of permission is a license”—

including the order granting Eno general permission to

engage in placer mining. The district court concluded that the

EAJA does not apply to the Mining Restoration Act hearing

because it was held for the purpose of granting a license.

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ENO V. JEWELL 9

ANALYSIS

Eno’s case hinges on whether the Mining Restoration Act

hearing was an “adversary adjudication” that falls within the

EAJA. We review de novo this question of statutory

interpretation. W. Watersheds Project v. Interior Bd. of Land

Appeals, 624 F.3d 983, 986 (9th Cir. 2010).

Congress adopted the EAJA “to eliminate financial

disincentives for those who would defend against unjustified

governmental action and thereby to deter the unreasonable

exercise of Government authority.” Ardestani v. I.N.S., 502

U.S. 129, 138 (1991). The EAJA accomplishes this objective

by enabling a party that prevails in certain types of actions to

recover fees and expenses. Specifically, the EAJA provides

that “[a]n agency that conducts an adversary adjudication

shall award, to a prevailing party other than the United States,

fees and other expenses . . . unless the adjudicative officer of

the agency finds that the position of the agency was

substantially justified or that special circumstances make an

award unjust.” 5 U.S.C. § 504(a)(1).

Critical to this appeal, the EAJA defines “adversary

adjudication” as “an adjudication under section 554 [of the

Administrative ProcedureAct(“APA”)]in which the position

of the United States is represented by counsel or otherwise,

but excludes an adjudication . . . for the purpose of granting

or renewing a license.” 5 U.S.C. § 504(b)(1)(C)(i). A

“license” is defined by the APA to “include[] the whole or a

part of an agency permit, certificate, approval, registration,

charter, membership, statutory exemption or other form of

permission.” 5 U.S.C. § 551(8). Like many circuits, we

interpret the term expansively based on our reading that “the

definition of license in the APA is extremely broad.” Air N.

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10 ENO V. JEWELL

Am. v. Dep’t of Transp., 937 F.2d 1427, 1437 (9th Cir. 1991);

see also Horn Farms, Inc. v. Johanns, 397 F.3d 472, 478 (7th

Cir. 2005) (“Doubtless [5 U.S.C. § 558] should be read so

that it encompasses all situations in which federal approval is

required to undertake some act . . . .”); Atl. Richfield Co. v.

United States, 774 F.2d 1193, 1200 (D.C. Cir. 1985) (noting

that the definition of “license” is “broad”). For example, we

previously determined that an agency granted a license where

“the absence of agency approval prevented the purported

licensee from engaging in a specific activity.” Ursack, Inc.

v. Sierra Interagency Black Bear Grp., 639 F.3d 949, 961

(9th Cir. 2011); see generally Black’s Law Dictionary (10th

ed. 2014) (defining “license” as “permission, usu. revocable,

to commit some act that would otherwise be unlawful”).

The essence of the order here is a general permission to

conduct placer mining operations, which falls squarelywithin

the APA’s broad definition of license. The order, as defined

by the statute, is a form of permission. See 30 U.S.C.

§ 621(b). Without the order, Eno had no right to engage in

placer mining within the Hound Dog claim. For this

particular category of lands, the Mining Restoration Act

subjects that right to the Secretary’s approval. To begin, the

Mining Restoration Act mandates that “[t]he owner of any

unpatented mining claim located on land [withdrawn or

reserved for power development or power sites] shall file for

record in the United States district land office of the land

district in which the claim is situated . . . within sixty days of

location . . . a copy of the notice of location of the claim.” 

30 U.S.C. § 623. It then conditions the owner’s right to

proceed with placer mining operations on the receipt of the

permission of the Secretary—whether that permission is

granted explicitly (as by an order following a public hearing,

which occurred in this case) or implicitly (as by the

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ENO V. JEWELL 11

Secretary’s failure to set a public hearing and expiration of

the sixty-day waiting period). See 30 U.S.C. § 621(b). Once

the Secretary gave notice in this case that a public hearing

would occur, Eno (and his predecessors) could not conduct

placer mining operations. The right to do so came only with

the Secretary’s order following the hearing.

2 As the Board’s

order explicitly stated, it affirmed the “granting of general

permission to engage in placer mining.”

Eno’s primary argument presents us with a bit of a

chicken-or-the-egg quandary. We must consider what came

first: Eno’s right to conduct placer mining operations or the

hearing. Eno’s position is that the Mining Restoration Act

hearing was held for the purpose of extinguishing his

statutory right to mine—quite the opposite of granting him a

license. According to Eno, the right to mine accrued to his

predecessors-in-interest by operation of the General Mining

Law, 30 U.S.C. § 22, at the time the Hound Dog claim was

located. That right then vested in Eno upon his acquisition of

the claim. The government, predictably, disagrees.

The disagreement illuminates some peculiar aspects ofthe

statutory scheme created by the Mining Restoration Act. We

do not quarrel with Eno’s basic assertion that under the

General Mining Law, property interests accrue to one who

“locates, marks, and records his claim.” See Union Oil Co.

v. Smith, 249 U.S. 337, 348–49 (1919) (noting that such a

person has “an exclusive right of possession to the extent of

 

2

 We observed as much in a prior appeal involving Eno and charges of

unauthorized removal of minerals from these lands. See United States v.

Hook, 38 F. App’x 447, 449 (9th Cir. 2002) (“[N]obody had a right to

conduct placer mining operations on the property to remove minerals . . .

not even Eno himself.”).

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12 ENO V. JEWELL

his claim as located, with the right to extract the minerals,

even to exhaustion”); United States v. Shumway, 199 F.3d

1093, 1097 (9th Cir. 1999) (discussing the rights and interests

that accrue with each stage of patenting a mining claim under

the General Mining Law). Unfortunately for Eno, however,

the lands at issue were withdrawn from the General Mining

Law and thus fall under the Mining Restoration Act, which

sets forth its own framework. Under that framework, a

locator of a claim may not mine without permission from the

Secretary.

The Board is aware that needing to get permission puts

those who seek to mine on power sites in a difficult position. 

In United States Forest Service v. Milender (“Milender II”),

95 Interior Dec. 155, 163 (IBLA 1988), it explained:

[A]ny prospective locator who files a notice

of location prior to completion of exploration

activities runs the risk that he may be unable

to show that the benefits accruing from placer

mining will, in fact, outweigh the detriments.

Most locators would be somewhat reluctant to

proceed with full exploration before locating

the claim since it might make them subject to

topfiling by another locator. But even if they

were protected by pedis possessio in

pre-location prospecting activities, theywould

have no assurance that, should they ultimately

make a discovery, mining might nevertheless

be prohibited under 30 U.S.C. § 621(b)

(1982), because the Secretary deemed the

damaging effects of mining outweighed the

benefits of full-scale development.

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ENO V. JEWELL 13

Thus, the prospective locator is faced with

the Hobson’s choice of either locating his

claim upon relatively meager showings and

running the risk that, should a hearing be held,

he will be unable to establish the benefits that

might flow from full-scale mining, or of

forgoing the location of the claim until

exploration is completed, thereby running the

risk that, even should he succeed in making a

discovery, it will count for nothing should

placer mining ultimately be prohibited.

Id. at 164–65. Eno, having purchased the Hound Dog claim

after it was located, walked into this scenario midstream. Of

course, we have the benefit of hindsight and know that Eno

avoided the unfortunate outcome forecast in Milender II:

Eno’s showing was sufficient and he won the right to conduct

placer mining operations. But when he acquired the claim,

his mining rights were not so fixed.

Our reasoning is unaffected by Collord v. U.S.

Department of the Interior, 154 F.3d 933, 935 (9th Cir.

1998), in which we held that the EAJA applies to proceedings

adjudicating the validity of mining claims. Due process

required those proceedings to be under § 554 of the APA

because the contest proceeding could result in the loss of the

claimant’s “fullyrecognized possessoryinterest” in the claim. 

Id. At issue there was whether an existing claim possessed by

the plaintiff could be extinguished. Collord did not involve

the grant of a license; nothing in that case serves as an analog

to the Secretary’s order granting Eno general permission to

mine. Unlike in Collord, a Mining Restoration Act hearing

does not implicate the claimant’s possessory interest, but

rather only the ability to conduct certain activities. Once a

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14 ENO V. JEWELL

hearing is noticed, the ability to conduct those operations

does not exist without an order from the Secretary. It follows

that a Mining Restoration Act hearing is held for the purpose

of granting a license.3

Finally, the fact that we strictly construe waivers of

sovereign immunity reinforces our conclusion that theMining

Restoration Act hearing is not an adversary adjudication. 

Because the EAJA makes the United States liable for

attorneys’ fees in certain circumstances, it constitutes a

waiver of immunity that “must be construed strictly in favor

of the sovereign, and not enlarge[d] . . . beyond what the

language requires.” Hardisty v. Astrue, 592 F.3d 1072, 1077

(9th Cir. 2010) (alterations in original) (quoting Ruckelshaus

v. Sierra Club, 463 U.S. 680, 685–86 (1983)). We would run

afoul of this canon of construction if we broadened the

availability of attorneys’ fees to Eno’s Mining Restoration

Act hearing and others like it, without an unambiguous

mandate to do so from the EAJA.4

AFFIRMED.

3 Eno points to another provision of the Mining Restoration Act

mentioning “licensees” and argues that the order in this case could not be

a license, but this does not change our analysis. See 30 U.S.C. § 622

(providing that “the United States, its permittees and licensees shall not be

responsible” for loss of a mining claim unless the loss is caused by their

negligence). As the district court correctly explained, there can be more

than one type of “licensee,” and in interpreting the EAJA, we are

concerned here with the APA definition.

4 Because we conclude that the Mining Restoration Act hearing was held

for the purpose of granting a license, we need not consider whether it was

under § 554 of the APA.

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