Source: https://www.chanrobles.com/usa/us_supremecourt/316/4/case.php
Timestamp: 2020-08-14 11:30:44
Document Index: 294910464

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 239', '§ 346', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 16', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 16', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402']

This case is here on certificate from the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Judicial Code § 239, 28 U.S.C. § 346. The question certified relates to the power of the Court of Appeals to stay the enforcement of an order of the Federal Communications Commission pending determination of an appeal taken under § 402(b) of the Communications Act of 1934, 48 Stat. 1064, 1093. chanrobles.com-red
The appellant asked the Court of Appeals to stay the Commission's order pending the disposition of its appeal. Even though the Court "had consistently, over a long period of years and without objection on the part of the Commission, issued stay orders" in cases where such orders were found to be necessary, the Commission opposed the issuance of a stay order in this case on the ground that the Court was without power to grant a stay. The application was heard before the Court sitting with chanrobles.com-red
The Communications Act of 1934 is a hybrid. By that Act, Congress established a comprehensive system for the regulation of communication by wire and radio. To secure effective execution of its policy of making available "a rapid, efficient, nationwide, and worldwide wire and radio communication service with adequate facilities at reasonable charges," Congress created a new agency, the Federal Communications Commission, to which it entrusted authority previously exercised by several other agencies. Under the Radio Act of 1927, 44 Stat. 1162, the Federal Radio Commission had broad powers over the licensing and regulation of radio facilities. The Mann-Elkins Act of 1910, 36 Stat. 539, gave the Interstate Commerce Commission general regulatory authority over telephone and telegraph carriers. In addition, the Postmaster chanrobles.com-red
48 Stat. 1064, 1093. The Urgent Deficiencies Act, which is thus incorporated in § 402(a) of the Communications Act of 1934, provides for review in a specially constituted district court, with direct appeal to this Court. That Act authorizes the district court, in cases "where irreparable damage would otherwise ensue to the petitioner," to allow a temporary stay of the order under review, subject to specified safeguards. 38 Stat. 208, 220 chanrobles.com-red
Thus, in both the Radio Act of 1927 and the Communications Act of 1934, orders granting or denying applications for construction permits or station licenses and for renewal or modification of licenses were made reviewable by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. [Footnote 3] chanrobles.com-red
No court can make time stand still. The circumstances surrounding a controversy may change irrevocably during the pendency of an appeal despite anything a court can do. But, within these limits, it is reasonable that an appellate court should be able to prevent irreparable injury to the parties or to the public resulting from the premature enforcement of a determination which may later be found to have been wrong. It has always been held, therefore, that, as part of its traditional equipment for the administration chanrobles.com-red
The legislative history can furnish no support for this contention. Neither the committee reports nor the hearings nor the debates contain any reference to the power to stay Commission orders on appeal. Significance is found in H.R. 7716, 72d Congress, a bill which was passed by both houses in 1933 but which failed of enactment because chanrobles.com-red
It is suggested that, if Congress had intended in the Act of 1934 to authorize the Court of Appeals to issue stay orders in appeals under § 402(b), it would not have remained silent when, only the year before, it had attempted to enact into law a specific provision conferring that power. But H.R. 7716 and the Communications Act of 1934 were not parallel legislative proposals. The former was not a comprehensive legislative scheme for the unification of federal regulatory authority over communications. It proposed merely to amend the Radio Act of 1927 in several minor particulars. See H.Rep. No. 221, 72d Cong. 1st Sess., p. 7; Sen.Rep. No. 564, 72d Cong., 1st Sess., p. 7; Sen.Rep. No. 1004, 72d Cong., 2d Sess., p. 9. The enactment of the Communications Act of 1934, however, came after a message to Congress from the President on February 26, 1934, recommending the creation of a single authority over communication by wire and radio. Sen.Doc. No. 144, 73d Cong., 2d Sess. Earlier in 1934, an interdepartmental committee had made a study of the entire communications situation. Extensive public hearings on the question of regulating the whole field of communications were held by both the Senate and House Committees on Interstate Commerce. It is obvious, therefore, that what Congress undertook to do by the Communications Act of 1934 was entirely different from what it tried to do the previous year in H.R. 7716. chanrobles.com-red
It is indisputable that, at least since 1930, the Court of Appeals has been staying orders both of the Federal Radio Commission, under § 16 of the Radio Act of 1927, and of the Federal Communications Commission, under § 402(b) of the Communications Act of 1934, whenever stays were regarded as necessary. To be sure, in only one case, the Boston Broadcasting decision, supra, did the Court of Appeals even refer to the granting of a stay order. The explanation is not hard to find. The power to stay was so firmly imbedded in our judicial system, so consonant with the historic procedures of federal appellate courts, that there was no necessity for the Court of Appeals to justify its settled practice. [Footnote 5] chanrobles.com-red
The Communications Act of 1934 did not create new private rights. The purpose of the Act was to protect the public interest in communications. By § 402(b)(2), Congress gave the right of appeal to persons "aggrieved or whose interests are adversely affected" by Commission action. 48 Stat. 1064, 1093. But these private litigants have standing only as representatives of the public interest. Federal Communications Commission v. Sanders Bros. Radio Station, 309 U. S. 470, 309 U. S. 477. Compare National Licorice Co. v. Labor Board, 309 U. S. 350, 309 U. S. 362-363. That chanrobles.com-red
It is urged that the orders reviewable under § 402(a), as to which the power to grant stays is undeniable, are intrinsically different from those reviewable under § 402(b). But, while the two sections route appeals to different courts, the differentiation was, in large measure, the product of Congressional solicitude for the convenience of litigants. It had no relation to the scope of the judicial function which the courts were called upon to perform. For example, if the Commission, on its own motion, modifies a station license, review is had under § 402(a) in the appropriate district court. However, if it grants an application for modification of a license, an appeal lies under § 402(b) chanrobles.com-red
Judged by its own terms, its history, and the practice under it, the Communications Act of 1934 affords no warrant for depriving the Court of Appeals of the conventional power of an appellate court to stay the enforcement of an order pending the determination of an appeals challenging its validity. Indirect light is sometimes cast upon legislation by provisions dealing with the same problem in related enactments. No such light is shed here. The numerous laws in which Congress has established administrative agencies for the exercise of its regulatory powers do not disclose any general legislative policy regarding the power to stay administrative orders pending review. Some statutes are wholly silent; [Footnote 7] some turn a court review into an automatic stay; [Footnote 8] some provide that the commencement of a suit shall not operate as a stay unless the court specifically so provides; [Footnote 9] some authorize the reviewing chanrobles.com-red
The legislative history gives no comfort to the view of the majority. In drafting § 402, Congress had before it H.R. 7716, 72d Congress. That bill, designed to amend the Radio Act of 1927, had been passed by both houses in 1933, but had failed of enactment because of a pocket veto. Under § 16(f) of that bill, orders of the type here in question could be stayed by the appellate court. Congress relied extensively on that earlier bill in drafting § 402. H.Rep. No.1918, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., pp. 47-49. If Congress had intended the appellate court to have the power to stay this type of order, it hardly seems likely, as the Commission points out, that Congress would have failed to include it when, only the year before, it had attempted to write into the statute a specific provision conferring that power. But, if we disregard that circumstance and turn to other parts of the legislative history, there are no indications that the line which Congress drew chanrobles.com-red
Id., p. 309 U. S. 476. Thus, it is manifest that the failure of Congress to extend the stay provisions of § 402(a) to the run of orders of this type makes sense. The Urgent Deficiencies Act, which is incorporated into § 402(a), allows a temporary stay "where irreparable damage would otherwise ensue to the petitioner." 38 Stat. 208, 220. But, where appeals under § 402(b)(2), as in the instant case, are not shown to involve private rights, analogies to situations where the power to issue a stay is implied because irreparable damage may be done an appellant whose individual interest has been unlawfully invaded are inapposite. For the same reason, statistics as to the presence of this power in statutes of other administrative agencies chanrobles.com-red
But it is said that Congress entrusted the vindication of the public interest to private litigants. The Sanders case, properly construed, merely means that the Court of Appeals has jurisdiction of appeals by a "person aggrieved" or by one "whose interests are adversely affected" by the Commission's decision. § 402(b). But chanrobles.com-red