United States Court of Appeals 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued December 14, 2018 Decided March 15, 2019 

No. 18-5105 

JEFFREY A. LOVITKY, 

APPELLANT

v. 

DONALD J. TRUMP, IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS PRESIDENT 

OF THE UNITED STATES, 

APPELLEE

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the District of Columbia 

(No. 1:17-cv-00450) 

Jeffrey A. Lovitky argued the cause and filed the briefs for 

appellant. 

Matthew J. Glover, Counsel to the Assistant Attorney, 

U.S. Department of Justice, argued the cause for appellee. 

With him on the brief were Mark B. Stern and Michael Shih, 

Attorneys. 

Before: TATEL and GRIFFITH, Circuit Judges, and 

WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judge. 
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Opinion for the Court filed by Senior Circuit Judge 

WILLIAMS. 

WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judge: Officers of the United 

States swear to “faithfully discharge the duties of the[ir] 

office.” 5 U.S.C. § 3331; see also U.S. Const. art. II, § 1, cl. 8 

(requiring the President to swear that he “will faithfully execute 

the Office of the President”). When they fall short, the 

Mandamus Act offers relief; it vests district courts with 

jurisdiction over “any action in the nature of mandamus to 

compel an officer or employee of the United States . . . to 

perform a duty owed to the plaintiff.” 28 U.S.C. § 1361. The 

question here is whether the Act extends to duties pertaining 

not to an officer’s public office, but to his pre-election (or preappointment) acts. We hold that it does not. 

* * * 

This case concerns a dispute about a then-presidential 

candidate’s financial disclosure report. Under the Ethics in 

Government Act of 1978, candidates for certain offices, 

including the Presidency, must file financial disclosures with 

the Federal Election Commission. 5 U.S.C. app. § 103(e). 

Subject to some limitations, a presidential candidate’s financial 

disclosure “shall include a full and complete statement with 

respect to,” among other things, the “identity and category of 

the total liabilities owed to any creditor.” Id. § 102(a)(4). 

Plaintiff Jeffrey Lovitky, appellant here, alleges that, as a 

presidential candidate, Donald J. Trump filed a financial 

disclosure report with the FEC on May 16, 2016. Compl. ¶ 13, 

J.A. 11; see J.A. 28–131. Part 8 of this disclosure listed 16 

financial liabilities, identifying each creditor, and describing 

the nature and terms of each liability. Compl. ¶ 16, J.A. 12; see 
3 

J.A. 84. The “appropriate reviewing officials” (see generally 5 

U.S.C. app. § 106; 5 C.F.R. § 2634.605) determined that 

candidate Trump’s disclosures were “in apparent compliance 

with the disclosure requirements of the Ethics in Government 

Act.” Compl. ¶ 13, J.A. 11; see J.A. 28. 

Lovitky sees non-compliance. He alleges that thencandidate Trump’s financial disclosure included both personal 

and business liabilities, Compl. ¶¶ 37–42, J.A. 18–19, and that

this violated the Ethics in Government Act, which, Lovitky 

argues, “requires disclosure of only those liabilities for which 

candidates are themselves liable . . . or for which the spouse or 

dependent child of the candidate are liable,” id. ¶ 24, J.A. 15; 

see also id. ¶¶ 43–44, 46, J.A. 19–20. Candidate Trump, 

Lovitky contends, “obscured his liabilities by commingling 

them with the liabilities of business entities.” Appellant’s Br. 

11. 

Lovitky brought suit in the district court for the District of 

Columbia, seeking “relief in the nature of mandamus, directing 

[now-President Trump] to amend his financial disclosure 

report” so that it “specifically identif[ies] any debts [that thencandidate Trump] owed.” Compl. 14, J.A. 21. 

On April 10, 2018, the district court dismissed, holding 

that Lovitky lacked Article III standing because the court could 

not “issue the relief that [he] request[ed]” and thus could not

“redress [his] grievance.” Lovitky v. Trump, 308 F. Supp. 3d 

250, 260 (D.D.C. 2018). Lovitky appeals, and we affirm—but 

on other grounds. 

* * * 

We begin (and end) with subject-matter jurisdiction, 

without reaching the question of standing. See, e.g., Moms 
4 

Against Mercury v. FDA, 483 F.3d 824, 826 (D.C. Cir. 2007) 

(“Where both standing and subject matter jurisdiction are at 

issue . . . a court may inquire into either and, finding it lacking, 

dismiss the matter without reaching the other.”). In his Second 

Amended Complaint, Lovitky asserts three bases of federal 

subject-matter jurisdiction: 28 U.S.C. § 1331 (federal 

question); 28 U.S.C. § 1361 (mandamus); and 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2201 (declaratory judgment). Compl. ¶ 3, J.A. 9; see also 

Appellant’s Br. 1. 

But § 2201 (declaratory judgment) “is not an independent 

source of federal jurisdiction.” Metz v. BAE Sys. Tech. 

Solutions & Servs. Inc., 774 F.3d 18, 25 n.8 (D.C. Cir. 2014) 

(quoting Ali v. Rumsfeld, 649 F.3d 762, 778 (D.C. Cir. 2011)). 

And Lovitky makes no effort to challenge the district court’s 

finding, see 308 F. Supp. 3d at 260 n.8, that he abandoned 

reliance on § 1331 (federal question), thus forfeiting that 

possible font of jurisdiction for purposes of this appeal, see 

DeJesus v. WP Co., 841 F.3d 527, 532 n.1 (D.C. Cir. 2016). 

This leaves the Mandamus Act, which reads in full: 

§ 1361. Action to compel an officer of the United States 

to perform his duty 

The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of any 

action in the nature of mandamus to compel an officer or 

employee of the United States or an agency thereof to 

perform a duty owed to the plaintiff. 

28 U.S.C. § 1361. Lovitky brings this “action . . . to compel”

an individual—namely, President Trump “in his official 

capacity.” See Compl. ¶ 2, J.A. 9. We assume, without 

deciding, that the President is “an officer” subject to the 

Mandamus Act and that the alleged obligation—to provide a 
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“full and complete statement” of liabilities, see, e.g., Compl. ¶ 

44, J.A. 20 (quoting 5 U.S.C. app. § 102(a)(4)); Appellant’s Br. 

35 (same)—is one “owed to the plaintiff.” The only question, 

then, is whether the obligation sued on, see 5 U.S.C. app. 

§ 101(c) (identifying candidates as persons required to file); id.

§ 102(a)(4) (identifying liabilities required to be disclosed), is 

a “duty” within the meaning of the Mandamus Act. 

It is not. Lovitky has challenged only one of Trump’s 

financial disclosure reports—the one filed in May 2016. At 

that time, Trump’s obligation to provide a “full and complete 

statement” of liabilities arose out of his status as a candidate

for the office of President, as he had not yet been elected. See 

5 U.S.C. app. § 101(c) (imposing reporting obligations on 

“candidate[s]” for “the office of President . . . other than an

incumbent President”). That makes all the difference. As we’ll 

develop below, duties within the meaning of the Mandamus 

Act include only those obligations that pertain to a defendant 

officer’s (or employee’s) public office. (Because Lovitky 

bases his claim on an obligation that was supposedly imposed 

by § 101(c), see, e.g., Appellant’s Supplemental Br. 4, we need

not—and do not—express an opinion as to whether other 

provisions of the Ethics in Government Act impose a “duty” 

within the meaning of the Mandamus Act.) 

True, if read in isolation, the phrase “a duty owed to the 

plaintiff,” 28 U.S.C. § 1361, could—at least in theory—mean 

any “tasks” that any officer of the United States happens to be

“obligat[ed]” to perform—whether by statute, private contract, 

or (perhaps) even “feeling[s]” of “moral obligation,” Webster’s 

Third New International Dictionary 705 (1981). 

But the context points to a narrower meaning. See, e.g., 

Life Techs. Corp. v. Promega Corp., 137 S. Ct. 734, 740 

(2017). Here, “duty” is associated (in the text and title of the 
6 

Act) with “officer,” see 28 U.S.C. § 1361—that is, one “who 

performs the duties of the office,” Black’s Law Dictionary 977 

(5th ed. 1979) (emphasis added); see also Webster’s Third, 

supra, at 1567 (defining an “office” as “a special duty, charge, 

or position conferred by an exercise of governmental authority 

and for a public purpose”). (The word “officer,” we note, is 

itself derived from the Latin word officium, meaning “duty.” 

Id.). In this context—where a statute links an officer to his 

“duty”—the most natural reading of “duty” refers only to those 

duties entailed by the office in question. 

The statute’s common law background also supports 

reading it to require that the duty a plaintiff seeks to compel via 

§ 1361 must pertain to a defendant’s public office. “It is a 

settled principle of interpretation that, absent other indication, 

‘Congress intends to incorporate the well-settled meaning of 

the common-law terms its uses.’” Sekhar v. United States, 570 

U.S. 729, 732 (2013) (quoting Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 

1, 23 (1999)). By using the terms “action[s] in the nature of 

mandamus,” § 1361 invokes the common-law writ of 

mandamus. Apart from defendants of no relevance here (i.e., 

common carriers, corporations, and certain public franchises, 

see, e.g., S.S. Merrill, Law of Mandamus §§ 25–28, at 23–28 

(Chicago, T.H. Flood & Co. 1892)), the subjects of mandamus 

under the common law were persons who owed not just any 

act, but an act that “appertain[ed] to their office and duty.” 

Crocker v. Piedmont Aviation, Inc., 49 F.3d 735, 745 (D.C. Cir. 

1995) (quoting 3 William Blackstone, Commentaries *110); 

accord, e.g., Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 147 

(1803) (Marshall, C.J.). The common law writ, in other words, 

issued “to compel the performance of an act which the law 

enjoin[ed] as a duty resulting from an office, trust or station.” 

Merrill, supra, § 13, at 7 (emphasis added), cited in Appellant’s 

Supplemental Br. 2 & n.3; accord, e.g., N. Pac. R.R. Co. v. 

Washington ex rel. Dustin, 142 U.S. 492, 506 (1892); see also, 
7 

e.g., Eberle v. King, 93 P. 748, 753 (Okla. 1908) (“[W]here the 

writ is sought to be invoked, the proper inquiry is, does the duty 

sought to be enforced clearly result from an office, trust, or 

station?”); Merrill, supra, § 23, at 20 (“The rule is, that this writ 

will not . . . lie against an officer for acts done in an unofficial 

character.”). 

Detachment of the duty from the office of the defendant 

would lead to serious incongruities. For example, where an 

officer is sued in his official capacity, as here, Rule 25(d) of the 

Federal Rules of Civil Procedure automatically substitutes as 

defendant the official’s successor in office. See, e.g., Nader v. 

Saxbe, 497 F.2d 676, 677 n.1 (D.C. Cir. 1974). Acceptance of 

Lovitky’s theory would thus, in principle, mean that a public 

official could be compelled to perform the personal financial 

disclosure duties of his predecessor (and who knows what other 

duties)—an exceedingly odd result. 

In sum, the Mandamus Act applies only to duties that flow 

from a defendant’s public office. And because the alleged duty

here—directed at candidates for public office—lacks that 

defining characteristic, the district court had no jurisdiction

under that Act over Lovitky’s claims. 

* * * 

For the foregoing reasons, the district court’s judgment 

dismissing the case is affirmed. 

So ordered.