Source: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/cadc/99-5215/99-5215a-2011-03-24.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 06:47:59+00:00

Document:
Henry, Joshua B. Frank, Paul Levy, Beth Goodman, Ma- thew Bogin, Margaret Kohn,and Paul Dalton.
Edward E. Schwab, Assistant Corporation Counsel, Office of the Corporation Counsel, argued the cause for appel- lees/cross-appellants District of Columbia, et al. With him on the brief were Robert R. Rigsby, Interim Corporation Coun- sel, and Charles L. Reischel, Deputy Corporation Counsel. Donna M. Murasky, Assistant Corporation Counsel, entered an appearance.
Alfred Mollin, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, ar- gued the cause for appellee/cross-appellant United States of America. With him on the brief were David W. Ogden, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Michael Jay Singer, Attorney, and Wilma A. Lewis, U.S. Attorney.
Separate opinion dissenting in part filed by Circuit Judge Ginsburg.
Tatel, Circuit Judge: A rider to the District of Columbia Appropriations Act imposes limits on fees the District may pay under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, known as IDEA, to attorneys who represent prevailing par- ties in actions against the D.C. Public Schools. In this suit by disabled students and their parents, the district court reject- ed challenges to the fee cap, finding it neither preempted by IDEA nor contrary to the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. The district court also held that the rider restricts only the District's authority to pay attorneys' fees, not court authority to award fees pursuant to IDEA. Find- ing no error, we affirm in all respects.
dent living." 20 U.S.C. s 1400(d)(1)(A). As a condition of receiving funds under the Act, IDEA requires school districts to adopt procedures to ensure appropriate educational place- ment of disabled students. See 20 U.S.C. s 1413. In addi- tion, school districts must develop comprehensive plans for meeting the special educational needs of disabled students. See 20 U.S.C. s 1414(d)(2)(A). Known as "individualized education programs," or IEPs, these plans must include "a statement of the child's present levels of educational perfor- mance, ... a statement of measurable annual goals, [and] a statement of the special education and related services ... to be provided to the child...." 20 U.S.C. s 1414(d)(1)(A).
IDEA guarantees parents of disabled children an opportu- nity to participate in the identification, evaluation, and place- ment process. See 20 U.S.C. ss 1414(f), 1415(b)(1). Parents who object to their child's "identification, evaluation, or edu- cational placement" are entitled to an "impartial due process hearing," 20 U.S.C. ss 1415(b)(6), (f)(1), at which they have a "right to be accompanied and advised by counsel." 20 U.S.C. s 1415(h)(1). Parents "aggrieved by" a hearing officer's find- ings and decision may bring a civil action in either state or federal court without regard to the amount in controversy. 20 U.S.C. s 1415(i)(2).
Section 1415(i)(3)(B) of IDEA gives courts authority to "award reasonable attorneys' fees as part of the costs to the parents of a child with a disability who is the prevailing party." Prevailing parents may also recover fees incurred during administrative proceedings. See Moore v. District of Columbia, 907 F.2d 165 (D.C. Cir. 1990) (en banc). The amount of fees awarded "shall be based on rates prevailing in the community in which the action or proceeding arose for the kind and quality of services furnished." 20 U.S.C. s 1415(i)(3)(C).
By 1998, the District of Columbia School System's ... failure to fulfill its obligations under IDEA reached crisis proportions. The District had virtually ceased to con- duct timely hearings requested by parents under IDEA and to issue final decisions within the required timelines. Other of its obligations under IDEA were also not being met to a significant extent. See also Blackman v. District of Columbia, 185 F.R.D. 4, 5 (D.D.C. 1999) (finding that DCPS's noncompliance with IDEA has resulted in "significant delays both in the place- ment of children in appropriate educational settings and in the provision of crucial medical services, delays that have the potential to permanently harm the physical and emotional health of many young children."). At a June 1997 public hearing, DCPS identified several factors responsible for its noncompliance, including "inadequate management[,].... poor information management systems, lack of staff training, inappropriate staff allocation and lack of appropriate pro- grams." Notice of Written Findings and Decision and Com- pliance Agreement, 63 Fed. Reg. 41370, 41373. A year later, the Secretary of Education stated that, after "working with DCPS over a number of years to address its serious and on- going failure to comply with the requirements of [IDEA]," he determined that immediate compliance was "not feasible." Id. at 41371. The Secretary and DCPS entered into a Compliance Agreement mandating that DCPS "be in full compliance with the requirements of [IDEA in] no later than three years." Id. at 41374.
DCPS's failure to meet the special education needs of its disabled students has resulted in an exceedingly large num- ber of parental complaints. The record shows that in 1995, although DCPS served less than two-thousandths of one percent of the nation's disabled students, over forty-five percent of requests for due process hearings nationwide were made in D.C.
million to attorneys. That same year, the Washington Post reported that legal representation of special education stu- dents, once "an obscure niche," had developed into a "boom- ing, lucrative industry." Doug Struck and Valerie Strauss, Special Ed Law Is Big Business; Students' Attorneys Collec- tively Receiving Millions in Fees, The Wash. Post, July 20, 1998, at B7. Describing special education cases as "easy [to] win," the Post stated that "when the city's school system is crying for money to try to build an adequate special education system--and thereby begin to lessen the flood of legal chal- lenges--these attorney fees rankle school officials who say the money should be spent on children." Id.
None of the funds contained in this Act may be made available to pay the fees of an attorney who represents a party who prevails in an action, including an administra- tive proceeding, brought against the District of Columbia Public Schools under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (20 U.S.C. s 1400 et seq.) if-- (1) the hourly rate of compensation of the attorney exceeds [$50]; or (2) The maximum amount of compensation of the at- torney exceeds [$1,300], except that compensation and reimbursement in excess of such maximum may be approved for extended or complex representation in accordance with section 11-2604(c), District of Colum- bia Code. Congress included a similar rider in the District's fiscal year 2000 appropriations bill. Fearful of the rider's impact on disabled children, President Clinton vetoed the bill. "In the long run," the President's veto message explained, "this provision would likely limit the access of the District's poor families to quality legal representation, thus impairing their due process protections provided by ... IDEA." See District of Columbia Appropriations Act, 2000--Veto Message from The President of The United States (H. Doc. No. 106-135), 145 Cong. Rec. H8941, H8942 (Sept. 28, 1999). Persisting, Congress included the fee cap (with minor revisions not relevant to this litigation) in a reenacted FY 2000 appropria- tions bill. This time the President signed. See Section 129, District of Columbia Appropriations, 2000, Pub. L. No. 106- 113, 113 Stat. 1501, 1517 (November 29, 1999).
in education law ... who informed me that, due to the passage of Section 130 of the D.C. Appropriations Act, her firm was no longer able to accept special education cases on a contingency basis. She indicated that she was not aware of any other private attorney in the District of Columbia who would...."
The families mounted two challenges to section 130. Rely- ing on the Supremacy Clause of Article VI of the Constitu- tion, they argued that section 130--which they referred to as a "local law"--is preempted by IDEA. They also argued that by singling out disabled children residing in the District of Columbia for unfavorable treatment, section 130 violates the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Finally, the families sought a declaratory ruling that section 130 does not affect a district court's authority to award reasonable attor- neys' fees under IDEA. Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. s 2403(a), the United States intervened to defend section 130's constitution- ality. The District of Columbia, which joined the United States' defense of the statute, argued that section 130 amend- ed IDEA, thus barring courts in D.C. from awarding fees in excess of the amount the District is authorized to pay.
Rejecting plaintiffs' challenges to section 130, the district court granted summary judgment in favor of the District. The court also rejected the District's interpretation of section 130, ruling that the rider had "done nothing to affect the district court's ability under [IDEA] to base a determination of reasonable attorneys' fees [on] rates prevailing in the community."
The families now appeal, and the District of Columbia cross-appeals. Although the United States defends section 130's constitutionality, it takes no position on the proper interpretation of the section. Our review of all issues is de novo. See Tao v. Freeh, 27 F.3d 635, 638 (D.C.Cir.1994) ("Our review of the grant of summary judgment is de novo, applying the same standards as the district court."); United States v. Williams-Davis, 90 F.3d 490, 512 (D.C. Cir. 1996) (applying de novo review to a question of statutory construc- tion).
Beginning with the families' appeal, we can easily dispose of their Supremacy Clause argument. Because IDEA is national legislation, the families argue, it preempts under the Supremacy Clause any state or local legislation that impedes its accomplishment, such as section 130. In support, the families cite Brown v. United States, 742 F.2d 1498, 1502 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (en banc), where we stated that "Congress frequently enacts legislation applicable only to the District and.... [a]bsent evidence of contrary congressional intent, such enactments should be treated as local law, interacting with federal law as would the laws of the several states." Even assuming the Supremacy Clause applies to Congress when it legislates for the District under Article I, section 8 of the Constitution--a proposition for which we have found no persuasive support--the families' argument suffers from a fatal weakness: it requires us to believe that Congress enact- ed section 130 for the purpose of having it instantaneously preempted by a statute enacted over a decade earlier. See Cipollone v. Liggett, 505 U.S. 504, 516 (1992) ("[T]he purpose of Congress is the ultimate touchstone of pre-emption analy- sis.") (internal quotation marks omitted).
section 130 burdens the educational opportunities of a disad- vantaged group, i.e., children with disabilities.
Minorities can usually protect themselves by playing their role in the political process and forming coalitions with other groups to secure a majority. But it is sense- less to remit District residents to the political process, since for them there is no political process.... In this context, ... the normal arguments for judicial restraint become no more than hollow shibboleths grotesquely detached from the logic which once supported them.... Therefore, discriminatory classifications affecting District residents must be subjected to the strictest possible review. Id. at 1341 (internal citation omitted).
[E]ven if one accepts the thesis that the class in question is residents of the District of Columbia, the mere lack of the ballot does not establish political powerlessness, or, if it does, political powerlessness alone is not enough for "suspect class" status. Minors, for example, are not a suspect class. It is, in any event, fanciful to consider as "politically powerless" a city whose residents include a high proportion of the officers of all three branches of the federal government, and their staffs. Id. (internal citation omitted).
within the court. A portion of the court's opinion responds to a concurring opinion's effort to devise a framework by which differential treatment of D.C. residents would, in certain circumstances, raise special equal protection concerns. See id. at 132 n.10, 136 n.12, responding to id. at 141-50 (Mikva, J., concurring). For all of these reasons, a panel of this court may not now depart from the en banc court's conclusion that D.C. residents do not comprise a suspect class for equal protection purposes.
In support of their second argument for heightened scruti- ny--that section 130 burdens the educational opportunities of a disadvantaged group--the families rely on Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202, 223-24 (1982), which applied heightened scruti- ny to invalidate a Texas statute denying public education to children not legally admitted to the United States. In subse- quent cases, however, the Supreme Court limited Plyler to its facts. In Kadrmas v. Dickinson Public Schools, the Court rejected a claim that charging some students a fee for trans- portation to school triggered heightened scrutiny under Plyl- er, saying "we have not extended [Plyler's] holding beyond the unique circumstances that provoked its unique confluence of theories and rationales." 487 U.S. 450, 459 (1988) (internal citations and quotation marks omitted). Those "unique cir- cumstances" are not present here. In Plyler, the doors to the public schools were completely closed to children of undocumented aliens. See Plyler, 457 U.S. at 205. Although section 130 may make it less likely that disabled children will receive an education that conforms to IDEA, the doors to the schoolhouse remain open, as they did in Kadrmas. And the Supreme Court has made clear that a statute burdening the educational opportunities of disadvantaged children does not by that fact alone trigger heightened scrutiny. See San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1 (1973) (applying rational basis review to uphold Texas's use of property taxes to finance local school districts even though that funding system resulted in fewer educational opportuni- ties for poor students than for students in districts with richer tax bases).
We thus review the families' equal protection challenge under the rational basis standard. We ask whether "there is a rational relationship between the disparity of treatment and some legitimate governmental purpose." Heller v. Doe, 509 U.S. 312, 320 (1993). "On rational-basis review, a ... statute ... comes to us bearing a strong presumption of validity, and those attacking the rationality of the legislative classification have the burden to negative every conceivable basis which might support it." FCC v. Beach Communications, Inc., 508 U.S. 307, 314 (1993) (internal citations and quotation marks omitted).
Pointing to The Washington Post article, the District's brief refers to "evidence of abuse by attorneys in the legal services process," presumably implying--though never direct- ly so stating--that section 130 was designed to curb excessive or unjustified fees. The families and their lawyers resist any such charges, and at oral argument counsel for the District conceded that the city has no evidence of attorney miscon- duct. The District, moreover, "adopts" the United States' brief, which argues not that section 130 stemmed from evi- dence of attorney abuse, but that in view of DCPS's manifest inability to meet its obligations under IDEA, Congress could rationally have concluded that "it was more important for the District to spend its funds on remedying these systemic defects and providing primary services rather than upon litigation fees." According to the government, then, section 130's legitimate governmental purpose is to assist disabled children in D.C. by allocating additional funds to primary special education services. The statute is rationally related to that objective, we are left to infer, because limiting payments to attorneys will leave more funds available for direct ser- vices.
section 130 limits attorneys' fees even when paid from sources other than DCPS's budget; while the statute caps fees for both administrative proceedings and court litigation, pay- ments for the latter come from the Corporation Counsel's Settlement and Judgment fund. Finally, the families ask, even if section 130 actually made more funds available for special education, would any improvements that might flow from such expenditures outweigh section 130's harmful ef- fects?
Whatever the doubts about section 130, "rational-basis review in equal protection analysis is not a license for courts to judge the wisdom, fairness, or logic of legislative choices." Heller, 509 U.S. at 319 (internal quotation marks omitted). "The Constitution presumes that, absent some reason to infer antipathy, even improvident decisions will eventually be recti- fied by the democratic process and that judicial intervention is generally unwarranted no matter how unwisely we may think a political branch has acted." Beach Communications, 508 U.S. at 314. Moreover, "courts are compelled under rational-basis review to accept a legislature's generalizations even when there is an imperfect fit between means and ends." Heller, 509 U.S. at 321.
Applying these highly deferential principles, we cannot conclude that Congress acted irrationally. Assisting disabled children is a legitimate governmental purpose. It is at least conceivable, moreover, that capping fees will produce addi- tional resources for direct educational services, and that, despite limiting parents' ability to use litigation as a means of enforcing IDEA, section 130 will yield a net benefit for disabled children. Notwithstanding the doubts of the families and the President, supra at 12-13, 6, that possibility suffices for the statute to survive rational basis review.
the well-settled principle that "[w]hile appropriation acts are 'Acts of Congress' which can substantively change existing law, there is a very strong presumption that they do not." Building & Construction Trades Dept., AFL-CIO v. Martin, 961 F.2d 269, 273 (D.C. Cir. 1992). As we have elsewhere observed, "the established rule [is] that, when appropriations measures arguably conflict with the underlying authorizing legislation, their effect must be construed narrowly. Such measures have the limited and specific purpose of providing funds for authorized programs." Donovan v. Carolina Stal- ite Co., 734 F.2d 1547, 1558 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (internal citation and quotation marks omitted). Applying this principle, we agree with the district court that section 130 limits only District authority to pay fees from FY 1999 appropriations, not court authority to award fees under IDEA.
We begin, as we must, with section 130's plain language: "None of the funds contained in this Act may be made available to pay the fees of an attorney who represents a party who prevails in an action ... brought against [DCPS] under [IDEA]" in excess of $50 per hour or $1,300 total. Note that nothing in section 130 restricts court authority to award fees under section 1415(i)(3)(B) of IDEA; the rider concerns only District authority to pay fees from FY 1999 appropriations. As the district court observed, section 130 and IDEA regulate different government authorities: "The IDEA attorney's fees provision provides the courts with discretion ... to award reasonable attorneys' fees. By con- trast, section 130 governs the District of Columbia's appropri- ations and right to pay those fees."
130 is "a limitation upon the district court's authority to award attorneys' fees").
In view of the "very strong presumption" that appropria- tion acts do not amend substantive law, we face a straightfor- ward question of statutory construction: has Congress unam- biguously expressed an intent to limit court authority to award fees under IDEA? When Congress wants to use an appropriations act to limit court authority, it knows precisely how to do so. For example, section 311 of the 2000 Appropri- ations Act says, "section 5 of the Y2K Act ... is amended" to state that "punitive damages in a Y2K action may not be awarded against an institution of higher education." Section 311, Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2000, Pub. L. 106-113, 113 Stat. 1501, 1537 (Nov. 29, 1999). Section 130 contains no similar limiting language.
The District argues that even if section 130 does not expressly amend IDEA, the appropriations rider nevertheless represents an implied limit on court authority to award fees. Otherwise, the District claims, section 130 might increase the District's eventual fee liability by encouraging litigation to recover fees in excess of section 130's caps. Repeals by implication, however, are disfavored--a policy that "applies with even greater force when the claimed repeal rests solely on an Appropriations Act." TVA, 437 U.S. at 190. "[I]n the absence of some affirmative showing of an intention to repeal, the only permissible justification for a repeal by implication is when the earlier and later statutes are irreconcilable." Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). No irreconcilable conflict exists here since, as we have pointed out, section 130 and IDEA are directed at different governmental entities.
Congress, by appropriating funds for completion of the dam after learning that the snail darter had been placed on the endangered species list, had implicitly amended the Endan- gered Species Act to allow construction to continue. See id. at 189-90. Disagreeing, the Court explained that "[w]hile it is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial depart- ment to say what the law is, it is equally--and emphatically-- the exclusive province of the Congress not only to formulate legislative policies and mandate programs and projects, but also to establish their relative priority for the Nation." Id. at 194 (internal citation and quotation marks omitted). Just as the Supreme Court left it to Congress to resolve the incon- gruity of appropriating funds for a dam that another statute prohibited, we leave to Congress the resolution of the incon- gruity in this case.
The cases relied on by the dissent do not require a differ- ent result. See Slip Op. at 2-11 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting). In American Federation of Government Employees, AFL- CIO v. Campbell, 659 F.2d 157 (D.C. Cir. 1980), we held that an appropriations rider containing language similar to section 130 "modified pro tanto" a substantive statute. 659 F.2d at 161. The rider provided that "[n]o ... funds appropriated for the fiscal year  may be used to pay the salary or pay of any individual ... in an amount which exceeds [a five and one-half percent raise] as a result of any adjustments ... under [the 'prevailing rate' act]." Pub. L. No. 95-429, s 614(a), 92 Stat. 1001, 1018 (1978). Had the prevailing rate statute been given effect, government employees would have received raises in 1979 of between seven and twelve percent. Because of the appropriations rider, however, pay increases that year were limited to five and a half percent. Govern- ment employees "sued to enforce their alleged rights to wage increases based solely on the ... prevailing rate statute." Campbell, 659 F.2d at 159. We rejected their claim, conclud- ing that the appropriations act, by including a new ceiling on wage increases, and "by express reference to the earlier statute, effectively modified [it]." Id. at 161. We thus gave the appropriations act the effect that its express terms re- quired--limiting pay increases for FY 1979.
Observing that section 130 expressly refers to IDEA and includes a fee schedule, our dissenting colleague relies on Campbell for the conclusion that Congress intended to modify IDEA. See Slip Op. at 4-5 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting). We think Campbell and this case are different. As in Campbell, we have given the rider the effect that its plain text re- quires--limiting the District's payment of fees for FY 1999-- but this case presents an additional question, one not raised in Campbell: in the absence of clear legislative intent, evi- denced either through statutory language or legislative histo- ry, to amend substantive law, does an appropriations act funding one governmental entity restrict the substantive au- thority of a separate entity, indeed a separate branch of government? Given the "very strong presumption" that ap- propriation acts do not amend substantive statutes, neither section 130's reference to IDEA nor its fee schedule warrants an inference that an appropriations rider directed at the District of Columbia restricts the authority of the federal courts. Indeed, Congress could hardly have identified the class of payments affected by section 130 without mentioning IDEA. Nor could Congress have limited the District's FY 1999 payments without specifying the amounts of those limits.
If, as the dissent claims, section 130's ceiling on payments and reference to IDEA sufficed to modify IDEA, the existing presumption would be reversed and replaced with a presump- tion that appropriation riders do amend substantive law. Under the dissent's theory, Congress could limit the District's fee payments from particular appropriations without also restricting court authority to award fees only by adding an express statement that substantive law remains intact. That is not the law of this circuit.
promulgate, administer, or enforce [the OPM regulations]." Devine, 733 F.2d at 116. The Director of OPM interpreted the rider to mean that "each federal agency would simply have to administer and enforce the regulations without OPM's assistance...." Id. at 116. We rejected this interpretation of the rider, resting our decision on two factors. First, because "the express terms of the regulations require[d] OPM to play a critical and continuing role in their implemen- tation, administration, and enforcement," id. at 119, we doubt- ed whether the regulations could "sensibly ... be effectuated without OPM's continued participation." Id. at 120. Indeed, we viewed the Director's interpretation of the rider as "abdi- cating [OPM's] central responsibility for executing, adminis- tering, and enforcing civil service rules and regulations." Id. at 119 (internal quotation marks omitted). Second, after examining the rider's legislative history, we found "clear indications of Congress' intent" to foreclose significant changes in personnel management policies. Id. at 120.
Neither factor is present in this case. To begin with, because the District plays no role in a court's awarding of fees, section 130 does not prevent the implementation of IDEA's fee provision in the same manner as the rider in National Treasury Employees Union v. Devine impeded implementation of OPM's regulations. Nor, for the same reason, does section 130 produce any "abdication" of District responsibility. Moreover, section 130's legislative history demonstrates no clear congressional intent to amend IDEA. Although the House Appropriations Committee wrote of an earlier version of section 130 that it would limit "the award of attorney fees," H.R. Rep. No. 105-670, at 50 (1998), see also Slip Op. at 5 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting), the Conference Re- port accompanying the final bill speaks only of "plac[ing] a limit on the payment of fees to attorneys." H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 105-825, at 1116 (1998). As the Supreme Court has observed, "[l]egislative materials may be without probative value, or contradictory, or ambiguous, ... and in such cases will not be permitted to control the customary meaning of words...." United States v. Dickerson, 310 U.S. 554, 562 (1940).
neither more nor less than its plain text states. The rider's express terms restrict District payment of IDEA fees from FY 1999 appropriations. We give section 130 precisely that effect. If Congress wishes to restrict court authority to award fees against the District, it may do so either through the D.C. appropriations bill or through the enactment of substantive legislation amending IDEA. But until Congress demonstrates clear intent to modify substantive law, either through statutory language or persuasive legislative history, we presume in accordance with circuit precedent that it did not use section 130 to limit the power of federal courts to award fees under IDEA.
Ginsburg, Circuit Judge, dissenting in part: I concur in Parts I and II of the opinion for the Court and in the judgment in No. 99-5215, rejecting the families' constitutional challenges. I dissent from Part III of the opinion and from the judgment in No. 99-5216 because I believe that for FY 1999 the Congress modified the authority of the district court to award attorneys' fees under s 615 of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. s 1415.
In any action or proceeding brought under this section, the [district] court, in its discretion, may award reason- able attorneys' fees as part of the costs to the parents of a child with a disability who is the prevailing party. Id. at 92, codified at 20 U.S.C. s 1415(i)(3)(B).
None of the funds contained in this Act may be made available to pay the fees of an attorney who represents a party who prevails in an action, including an administra- tive proceeding, brought against the District of Columbia Public Schools under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (20 U.S.C. s 1400 et seq.) if (1) the hourly rate of compensation of the attorney exceeds the hourly rate of compensation under section 11-2604(a), District of Columbia Code [i.e., $50 per hour], or (2) the maximum amount of compensation of the attor- ney exceeds the maximum amount of compensation un- der section 11-2604(b)(1), District of Columbia Code [i.e., $1,300 total], except that compensation and reimburse- ment in excess of such maximum may be approved for extended or complex representation in accordance with section 11-2604(c), District of Columbia Code. Obviously, s 130 has some effect upon attorneys' fees under the IDEA. The question before us is what effect: Is s 130 a limitation for FY 1999 upon the court's pre-existing authority in s 615 to award attorneys' fees in excess of $50 per hour and $1,300 per case? Or does it merely "prohibit[ ] the District from paying during the same fiscal year" any fee the district court might award in excess of those caps, Slip Op. at 15, thereby leaving the District liable for such awards after the end of that fiscal year? Today the court, citing an interpretive presumption and then declining to address the evidence offered by the District to overcome that presump- tion, gives the latter answer. I would give the former: s 130 limits the authority of the district court under IDEA s 615 because in s 130 the Congress "by clear implication, if not express statement, modified pro tanto the previous substan- tive law." American Federation of Government Employees v. Campbell, 659 F.2d 157, 161 (D.C. Cir. 1980).
In Campbell this court held that an appropriations rider strikingly similar in text and structure to s 130 modified pro tanto the prior substantive statute to which it referred. There, the plaintiffs were federal employees whose wages were determined under the "prevailing rate statute," 5 U.S.C. ss 5341-5349 (1976 & Supp. III 1979). That statute required that wages be "fixed and adjusted from time to time ... in accordance with prevailing rates," as determined by wage surveys of the private sector to be conducted by "lead agenc[ies]." Id. s 5343(a), (a)(3).
No ... funds appropriated for the fiscal year  ... may be used to pay the salary or pay of any individual ... in an amount which exceeds [a 5.5% raise] as a result of any adjustments which take effect during such fiscal year under ... (3) section 5343 of Title 5 ... if such adjustment is granted pursuant to a wage survey.... Pub. L. No. 95-429, s 614(a), 92 Stat. 1001, 1018 (1978). The Civil Service Commission interpreted the rider as prohibiting the employing agencies from granting any pay increase great- er than 5.5%, and the agencies therefore ordered raises of only that percentage. See Campbell, 659 F.2d at 159.
The plaintiffs argued to this court that the rider did not modify the prevailing rate statute, and therefore the employ- ing agencies were still required by law to order pay raises in the 7%-12% range recommended by the lead agencies. See id. at 160. We rejected this argument and concluded that for the fiscal year the appropriations rider modified the prevail- ing rate statute, limiting the plaintiffs' salary increase below the amount that would have been called for under that statute. We reached this conclusion based exclusively upon two elements in the text of the rider, which we accepted as clearly and unequivocally demonstrating that the Congress meant to and did modify the preexisting statute.
recognized the importance of such a reference (or lack there- of) in TVA v. Hill itself, see 437 U.S. at 189, and two of our sister circuits have since done so, see United States v. Joya- Martinez, 947 F.2d 1141, 1144 (4th Cir. 1991); Republic Airlines, Inc. v. United States Dep't of Transp., 849 F.2d 1315, 1322 (10th Cir. 1988). But compare Firebaugh Canal Co. v. United States, 203 F.3d 568, 576 n.4 (9th Cir. 2000) (express reference "not [ ] meaningful"), with id. at 579 (Trott, J., dissenting) (express reference crucial).
Second, in Campbell we noted that the Congress had "specifically set a ceiling on wage increases" in the appropria- tions rider, which differentiated the rider from a "mere failure to appropriate funds." 659 F.2d at 161 n.10. We distinguished New York Airways, Inc. v. United States, 369 F.2d 743 (Ct. Cl. 1966), upon this basis. Again, the Supreme Court had already drawn the same distinction: The mere act of appropriating funds, see TVA v. Hill, 437 U.S. at 190, or of failing to do so, see Langston, 118 U.S. at 394, says little about the underlying substantive obligation; but inclusion in an appropriations act of a new framework to govern the substantive obligation indicates that the Congress was modi- fying the prior statutory framework, see, e.g., United States v. Mitchell, 109 U.S. 146, 149-50 (1883). Therefore we conclud- ed that because the "Congress specifically set a ceiling on wage increases, and directly referred to the prevailing rate statute as one of the substantive statutes affected by the appropriations bill," the appropriations rider "contains words that by clear implication, if not express statement, modified pro tanto the previous substantive law." Campbell, 659 F.2d at 161 & n.10.
__________ * That s 130 expressly limits only the "pay[ment]" of IDEA attorneys' fees raises the possibility--and indeed, as the court notes, the presumption--that the Congress meant to affect only the payment and not the award of such fees. The Supreme Court has long held, however, that the use of "payment" or a similar term in an appropriations act does not end a court's inquiry into congres- sional intent. See United States v. Dickerson, 310 U.S. 554, 561-62 (1940) ("deny[ing] that such words [prohibiting only payment during a particular fiscal year] when used in an appropriation bill are words of art or have a settled meaning" sufficient to end the court's inquiry into congressional intent).
Both the Supreme Court and this court have found that appropri- ations riders that by their express terms limit or prohibit only payment may nonetheless alter the underlying substantive obli- gation and not just its payment. See United States v. Will, 449 U.S. 200, 205-08, 223-24 (1980); Campbell, 659 F.2d at 159 n.6; City of Los Angeles v. Adams, 556 F.2d 40, 46 (D.C. Cir. 1977); see also Tayloe v. Kjaer, 171 F.2d 343, 344 (D.C. Cir. 1948).
2000 provision identical in relevant part to s 130] would cap the award of plaintiffs' attorneys' fees in [IDEA] cases") (emphases supplied).
Finally, the District argues that the incongruous and plain- ly unintended results ensuing from the court's interpretation suggest that s 130 is a limitation upon the district court's authority to award attorneys' fees; common sense tells us the District is right. Otherwise, one would have to believe that the Congress intended awards of attorneys' fees above the caps to accumulate as IOUs, payable at the end of the fiscal year when the appropriations rider is no longer operative. Of course, the Congress does, not infrequently, decline to appro- priate money for an undertaking authorized under prior law. In cases where the prior statute merely authorizes the under- taking, however, no obligation can lawfully be incurred until funds have been appropriated, see 31 U.S.C. 1341(a); the effect in such a case is to postpone until a later date any steps that actually cause the Government to incur an obligation. This case is entirely different: Under the court's interpreta- tion of s 130, the District will continue to incur additional liabilities, which will continue to accumulate while its authori- ty to pay them remains in suspense.
Congress ... was simply appropriating a part of that which it knew was due." Belknap v. United States, 150 U.S. 588, 595 (1893); see also Will, 449 U.S. at 224 ("Congress intended to rescind [Adjustment Act] raises entirely, not simply to con- sign them to the fiscal limbo of an account due but not payable"); cf. National Treasury Employees Union v. De- vine, 733 F.2d 114, 120 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (rejecting interpreta- tion of appropriations resolution that would have resulted in "steady accumulation of unreviewed proposals").
As the District points out in its brief, the result of the court's interpretation of s 130 is in fact more than just peculiar--it accomplishes the exact opposite of what the Congress sought to achieve through s 130. Most IDEA complaints filed with the District are resolved in an adminis- trative proceeding before the D.C. school system, that is, without resort to the district court. Before s 130 was enact- ed, the District had adopted guidelines under which, as required by the IDEA, it would award and pay reasonable attorneys' fees in such cases upon the submission of a proper fee application; thus in FY 1998 the District, without any court involvement, approved and paid $10,400,000 in IDEA attorneys' fees for administrative proceedings; during the same year the District paid only $664,000 in fees awarded by the court. When s 130 became effective, however, the Dis- trict revised its guidelines, in conformity therewith, to pre- clude any fee application that sought attorneys' fees above the caps. In other words, the District interpreted s 130 as limiting its authority to award as well as to pay attorneys' fees above the caps during FY 1999--an interpretation the court today necessarily accepts as correct in the way it tries to distinguish Campbell, Slip Op. at 17.
the district court may include in its uncapped award reason- able fees for the attorneys' fee litigation, see Moore v. District of Columbia, 674 F. Supp. 901 (D.D.C. 1987) (awarding $29,357 for IDEA representation and $19,117 for representa- tion in subsequent attorneys' fee litigation before the district court). Under the court's interpretation of s 130, therefore, the Congress not only failed effectively to cap the fees awarded against the District, it managed to increase the District's fee liability--as well as the District's expenditures for its own legal representation--by requiring and enabling families to go to district court to obtain a higher award. I do not think that was what the legislature meant to do or did. See Clinton v. New York, 524 U.S. 417, 430 (1998) (rejecting interpretation of statute that "would produce an absurd ... result which Congress could not have intended").
The greatest problem for the court is that no matter how it analyzes s 130 it runs into Campbell. As for the undoubted presumption against finding that an appropriations act effects a substantive modification of law, in Campbell we concluded unequivocally that the appropriations act repealed pro tanto the prevailing rate statute, and the presumption was over- come based upon only the two textual elements that are likewise present in s 130. As for the undoubted rule that repeal by implication is disfavored, even if we treat s 130 as an implied repealer--and I do not believe that either this case or Campbell involves an implied repealer as exemplified by the argument urged upon the Court in TVA v. Hill--the same two textual factors provide the "affirmative showing of an intent to repeal" required under TVA v. Hill, 437 U.S. at 190.
__________ extensive and uncontested evidence regarding incongruous out- comes in order to determine what the Congress most likely meant by s 130. Slip Op. at 15. The portion of TVA v. Hill quoted by the court, however, Slip Op. at 14, 16, merely states that after a court has determined what the Congress commanded in the statute, it should not use its remedial discretion effectively to nullify that command by withholding a remedy based upon its own "appraisal of the wisdom or unwisdom of [the] particular course consciously selected by the Congress." Id. at 194. This rule certainly does not authorize, let alone require, this court to ignore the District's arguments about what the statute means in the first place.
that we held sufficient in Campbell to show the Congress meant to modify substantive law. The real issue lurking in the court's rhetorical question, then, is not whether evidence of congressional intent is required but whether such evidence can ever show that an appropriations act funding one govern- mental entity is meant to restrict the substantive authority of another entity. As a pair of cases from this court demon- strates, the answer is yes, if that is what the Congress discernably meant the appropriations act to do.
In Devine, 733 F.2d at 114, the Office of Personnel Man- agement had issued new personnel regulations less than a month before the Congress enacted an appropriations rider stating that "[n]one of the funds appropriated under this Act [funding the OPM] shall be obligated or expended to imple- ment, promulgate, administer, or enforce the [new OPM regulations]." 733 F.2d at 116. Based upon the precise wording of the rider, the OPM took the position that the rider "does not prevent any agency other than OPM from imple- menting, administering and enforcing the regulations within that agency." Id. at 116-17. We rejected that argument for two reasons, both based expressly upon the intent of the legislature: first, the Congress did not intend personnel regulations to be applied by other agencies without the OPM's involvement; and second, "even assuming arguendo that the regulations could be implemented workably without further participation by the OPM, it is evident that Congress intended to prevent this." Id. at 119-20.
[The appropriations rider] was the beginning of an effort by some members of Congress to shift [certain mining] operations from MSHA to OSHA jurisdiction. That effort ultimately did not succeed and we think it would be wholly unreasonable to suppose that Congress intended a temporary suspension to wreak the procedural havoc with ongoing appeals that [petitioner] urges. We inter- pret [the rider] to indicate only Congress' intent that MSHA initiate no new enforcement litigation. Id. at 1558. Thus, the court did not interpret the rider as doing anything more than limiting new enforcement actions by the MSHA because there was no indication that the Congress had the seemingly unreasonable intent to affect actions already in the hands of the Solicitor.
The text of s 130 makes clear that the Congress modified for FY 1999 the authority of the district court to award attorneys' fees under s 615 of the IDEA, 20 U.S.C. s 1415. Even if s 130 is analyzed under the rubric of an implied repealer, the same text provides the clear and manifest "affirmative showing of an intention to [modify]" required under TVA v. Hill, 437 U.S. 190. I therefore dissent from Part III of the opinion for the Court and from the judgment in No. 99-5216.
__________ view of the absurd results brought on by the contrary interpreta- tion--and only secondarily upon legislative history.

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