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Page Number: 8

6 

SACKETT v. EPA 

Opinion of the Court 

Bennett,  supra,  at  178  (quoting  Chicago  &  Southern  Air 
Lines,  Inc.  v.  Waterman  S.  S.  Corp.,  333  U. S.  103,  113 
(1948)).  As the Sacketts learned when they unsuccessfully 
sought a hearing, the “Findings and Conclusions” that the 
compliance  order  contained  were  not  subject  to  further
agency  review.    The  Government  resists  this  conclusion, 
pointing to a portion of the order that invited the Sacketts
to  “engage  in  informal  discussion  of  the  terms  and  re­
quirements”  of  the  order  with  the  EPA  and  to  inform  the 
agency of “any allegations [t]herein which [they] believe[d]
to be inaccurate.”  App. 22–23, ¶2.11.  But that confers no 
entitlement  to  further  agency  review.    The  mere  possibil­
ity  that  an  agency  might  reconsider  in  light  of  “informal 
discussion” and invited contentions of inaccuracy does not
suffice to make an otherwise final agency action nonfinal.

The  APA’s  judicial  review  provision  also  requires  that 
the person seeking APA review of final agency action have
“no other adequate remedy in a court,” 5 U. S. C. §704.  In 
Clean  Water  Act  enforcement  cases,  judicial  review  ordi­
narily  comes  by  way  of  a  civil  action  brought  by  the  EPA 
under 33 U. S. C. §1319.  But the Sacketts cannot initiate 
that process, and each day they wait for the agency to drop
the hammer, they accrue, by the Government’s telling, an 
additional  $75,000  in  potential  liability.  The  other  possi­
ble  route  to  judicial  review—applying  to  the  Corps  of
Engineers for a permit and then filing suit under the APA 
if  a  permit  is  denied—will  not  serve  either.    The  remedy
for denial of action that might be sought from one agency 
does  not  ordinarily  provide  an  “adequate  remedy”  for  ac- 
tion  already  taken  by  another  agency.    The  Government, 
to its credit, does not seriously contend that  other availa­
ble  remedies  alone  foreclose  review  under  §704.    Instead, 
the  Government  relies  on  §701(a)(1)  of  the  APA,  which 
excludes  APA  review  “to  the  extent  that  [other]  statutes 
preclude judicial review.”  The Clean Water Act, it says, is 
such a statute.