Source: http://yalejreg.com/nc/d-c-circuit-review-reviewed-a-special-judge-kavanaugh-edition-co-authored-by-jenn-mascott/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 19:11:50+00:00

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You may have noticed that Notice & Comment has hosted a series of posts highlighting the administrative law views of several judges on President Trump’s list of potential Supreme Court nominees. In light of this week’s big news (and no, we aren’t talking about the D.C. Circuit’s Revised Bills of Costs), it’s time for D.C. Circuit Review — Reviewed to join the fun. And to make this post even more exciting, why not add a co-author? After all, it is not every day that a D.C. Circuit judge is reported to be on the shortlist for the Supreme Court, nor that a former clerk of said judge happens to be Notice & Comment’s own Jenn Mascott. Yup, this post will be about Judge Brett Kavanaugh. To be clear, however, we aren’t cheerleading for Kavanaugh.* Based on his body of work, we suspect that he would be a fine justice — but so would many others. We do think, however, that no discussion of administrative law is complete if he is not included.
One of us (Jenn) set out to describe Judge Kavanaugh’s most important opinions. It turns out that is a hard thing to do. In his twelve years on the bench, he has issued opinions in many well-known separation-of-powers and administrative law cases. It’s impossible to go through all of them. But here is a sample.
Even as a new judge, Judge Kavanaugh focused his attention on the constitutional accountability of the administrative state. In 2008, during his second year on the bench, Kavanaugh issued a lengthy dissenting opinion in Free Enterprise Fund v. Public Company Accounting Oversight Board. The panel in the case upheld the structure of the PCAOB, established by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002. The PCAOB was designed as an “independent” board whose members are appointed by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Was that independence—obtained by removal protections—constitutional? The panel said yes; after all, the Supreme Court has held that some restrictions on presidential removal are permissible.
[T]he majority opinion views this case as Humphrey’s Executor redux. But this case is Humphrey’s Executor squared. There is a world of difference between the legion of Humphrey’s Executor-style agencies and the PCAOB: The heads of the Humphrey’s Executor independent agencies are removable for cause by the President, whereas members of the PCAOB are removable for cause only by another independent agency, the Securities and Exchange Commission. The President’s power to remove is critical to the President’s power to control the Executive Branch and perform his Article II responsibilities. Yet under this statute, the President is two levels of for-cause removal away from Board members, a previously unheard-of restriction on and attenuation of the President’s authority over executive officers. This structure effectively eliminates any Presidential power to control the PCAOB, notwithstanding that the Board performs numerous regulatory and law-enforcement functions at the core of the executive power.
Two years later, Judge Kavanaugh’s dissenting opinion was vindicated by the Supreme Court’s decision in the case. Citing Kavanaugh, the Court agreed that the double for-cause removal protections for the Board members were an unconstitutional constraint on executive power. Although it is impossible to know for certain, it is likely that the Supreme Court would not have taken the case but for Kavanaugh’s dissent. To be sure, not everyone agrees with Kavanaugh’s analysis; the Supreme Court’s opinion prompted a dissent of its own. These are hard questions. But Kavanaugh’s analysis commanded assent from a majority of the Justices.
Because the CFPB is an independent agency headed by a single Director and not by a multi-member commission, the Director of the CFPB possesses more unilateral authority—that is, authority to take action on one’s own, subject to no check— than any single commissioner or board member in any other independent agency in the U.S. Government. Indeed, as we will explain, the Director enjoys more unilateral authority than any other officer in any of the three branches of the U.S. Government, other than the President.
Also important, as Joseph Palmore and Bryan Leitch helpfully recounted here at Notice & Comment, Judge Kavanaugh further concluded that the $109 million order imposed by Director Richard Cordray was contrary to the statute and unlawfully retroactive in violation of fair notice principles.
Although the en banc court disagreed with Judge Kavanaugh on the removal question, it agreed with his other holding, which is significant in its own right. The case did not reach the Supreme Court after PHH declined to appeal, presumably because the judgment was in its favor. But Kavanaugh’s opinion in what has been called perhaps “the most important separation-of-powers case in a generation” remains alive in the courts. Just last week, for instance, a district judge in the Southern District of New York adopted four of five sections of Kavanaugh’s opinion in finding the CFPB’s director removal protections to be unconstitutional. Again, obviously, not everyone agrees with Kavanaugh’s analysis; there are good faith arguments on all sides. But it is safe to say that we haven’t heard the last of this Kavanaugh opinion.
Suppose you were the EPA Administrator. You have to decide whether to go forward with a proposed air quality regulation. Your only statutory direction is to decide whether it is ‘‘appropriate’’ to go forward with the regulation. Before making that decision, what information would you want to know? You would certainly want to understand the benefits from the regulations. And you would surely ask how much the regulations would cost. You would no doubt take both of those considerations—benefits and costs—into account in making your decision. That’s just common sense and sound government practice.
On appeal to the Supreme Court in Michigan v. EPA, Justice Scalia wrote for the Court, observing that “[o]ne does not need to open up a dictionary in order to realize the capaciousness” of the phrase “appropriate and necessary.” Scalia then quoted Judge Kavanaugh’s observation that “‘appropriate’ is ‘the classic broad and all-encompassing term that naturally and traditionally includes consideration of all the relevant factors,’” and concluded that EPA had wrongly failed to consider costs. Once more, this is a difficult case and Justice Kagan’s dissent has received a lot of attention too. For purposes here, however, it is enough to again observe that Kavanaugh correctly identified the analysis that the Supreme Court ultimately adopted.
This case raises significant questions about the scope of the Executive’s authority to disregard federal statutes. The case arises out of a longstanding dispute about nuclear waste storage at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The underlying policy debate is not our concern. The policy is for Congress and the President to establish as they see fit in enacting statutes, and for the President and subordinate executive agencies (as well as relevant independent agencies such as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission) to implement within statutory boundaries. Our more modest task is to ensure, in justiciable cases, that agencies comply with the law as it has been set by Congress.
Judge Kavanaugh also has expressed concern about, in his view, overly broad applications of Chevron deference. For example, in United States Telecom Association v. FCC, he explained why Chevron cannot be applied to permit major agency actions that are not clearly authorized by statutory text. Kavanaugh wrote that “[i]f the Supreme Court’s major rules doctrine means what it says, then the net neutrality rule is unlawful because Congress has not clearly authorized the FCC to issue this major rule.” This analysis, of course was mooted by subsequent events. And similar to Justice Gorsuch’s June 2018 analysis in Wisconsin Central Ltd. v. United States, Kavanaugh has conducted Chevron analysis with a comprehensive Step One that incorporates text, statutory context, and statutory structure—all the tools that a textualist judge would use in a case of ordinary statutory interpretation (see, e.g., Loving v. IRS, decided in 2014).
His separate opinion in American Radio Relay League, Inc. v. FCC also merits a read because it shows intellectual honesty and a willingness to follow the text of a statute where it takes him. This is true when the text cuts against the agency’s view, and when it cuts in favor of agencies. Specifically, Judge Kavanaugh concluded that courts do not have authority to require agencies to use procedures beyond those set out in the text of the Administrative Procedure Act. In Perez v. Mortgage Bankers Association, the Supreme Court similarly declined to impose extra-textual requirements on APA rulemaking procedures. In short, Kavanaugh takes text seriously.
This is just a small sample of his work, of course. Since becoming a judge, Judge Kavanaugh has authored close to 300 opinions. In at least 11 cases, the Supreme Court ultimately adopted positions that Judge Kavanaugh advanced, and in at least five of those cases explicitly cited him. And although not really an administrative law opinion (though qualified immunity and administrative law have more in common than you might think), earlier this year the Supreme Court unanimously adopted Kavanaugh’s view in Wesby v. District of Columbia. When Kavanaugh speaks, the Supreme Court listens.
Finally, Judge Kavanaugh also is a scholar. If you want to better understand his views, read his speeches and writings, including his 2017 Joseph Story Distinguished Lecture on the separation of powers, his 2016 Harvard Law Review book review addressing statutory interpretation, and his 2014 article on constitutional text in the Notre Dame Law Review. These are important writings.
In sum, Judge Kavanaugh has had a lot to say about the administrative state. And as a judge on the D.C. Circuit, he has seen many, many aspects of it. By any measure, he is a serious judge with a significant voice in the federal courts.
* Well, Jenn might be a touch biased! After all, she served as a law clerk to Judge Kavanaugh during his first year on the bench from 2006 to 2007.
Judge Kavanaugh also gave this excellent lecture a few months ago where he criticized Chevron deference and spoke very sincerely of the need to cabin it. He seems like a good pick overall.

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