Source: http://openjurist.org/484/us/439
Timestamp: 2015-04-02 03:14:22
Document Index: 641853556

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 638', '§ 1349', '§ 5596', '§ 1491', '§ 7701', '§ 22', '§ 7301', '§ 703', '§ 5', '§ 7511', '§ 7511', '§ 213']

484 US 439 United States v. A Fausto | OpenJurist
484 U.S. 439 - United States v. A Fausto	Home484 us 439 united states v. a fausto
484 US 439 United States v. A Fausto 484 U.S. 439
108 S.Ct. 668
98 L.Ed.2d 830
UNITED STATES, Petitionerv.Joseph A. FAUSTO.
Decided Jan. 25, 1988.
Rehearing Denied March 21, 1988.
See 485 U.S. 972, 108 S.Ct. 1250.
SCALIA, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which REHNQUIST, C.J., and WHITE, BLACKMUN, and O'CONNOR, JJ., joined. BLACKMUN, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, ----. STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BRENNAN and MARSHALL, JJ., joined, post, ----.
Christopher J. Wright, for the petitioner.
John M. Nannes, Washington D.C., as amicus curiae in support of the judgment below.
* Respondent was hired by FWS in January 1978, as an administrative officer for the Young Adult Conservation Corps camp in Virginia Beach, Virginia. His position was in the excepted service,1 and was to last for the duration of the Conservation Corps program at Virginia Beach, but not beyond September 30, 1982.
In November 1980, FWS advised respondent that it intended to dismiss him for a number of reasons, including unauthorized use of a Government vehicle. After respondent replied to the charges, he received a memorandum from FWS informing him that he would be removed effective January 16, 1981. That memorandum did not advise respondent of his grievance rights under Department of the Interior regulations, which included the right to a formal hearing conducted by a grievance examiner. See Department of the Interior Federal Personnel Manual—231, pt. 370 DM, ch. 771, subch. 3, 3.22A (May 4, 1981).2
Respondent sought review of his removal with the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), which dismissed his appeal in August 1981, on the ground that under the CSRA a nonpreference eligible in the excepted service has no right to appeal to the MSPB. Fausto v. Department of Interior, No. PH 075281102271 (M.S.P.B. Aug. 27, 1981), aff'd, 738 F.2d 454 (CA Fed.1984) (judgment order). On September 18, 1981, FWS permanently closed the camp at Virginia Beach. In March 1982, in response to an inquiry initiated on behalf of respondent, FWS admitted that respondent had not been informed of his grievance rights, and offered him the opportunity to challenge his removal. Respondent filed a formal grievance, and on June 30, 1982, FWS concluded, based on the administrative file and without a hearing, that respondent should not have been removed. FWS found that most of the charges against respondent were de minimis and warranted no penalty, but imposed a 30-day suspension for misuse of a Government vehicle. See 31 U.S.C. § 638a(c)(2) (1976 ed.) (now codified at 31 U.S.C. § 1349(b)). FWS offered respondent backpay from February 15, 1981, the date his 30-day suspension would have ended, through September 18, 1981, the date the camp was closed.
In February 1983, respondent filed the present action under the Back Pay Act, 5 U.S.C. § 5596, in the Claims Court. The Claims Court dismissed, holding that the CSRA comprised the exclusive catalog of remedies for civil servants affected by adverse personnel action. 7 Cl.Ct. 459, 461 (1985). The Federal Circuit reversed and remanded, 783 F.2d 1020 (1986), holding that although the CSRA did not afford nonpreference excepted service employees a right of appeal to the MSPB, it did not preclude them from seeking the Claims Court review traditionally available under the Tucker Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1491, based on the Back Pay Act. 783 F.2d, at 1022-1023. On the merits it found Fausto's suspension wrongful and awarded backpay for the period of the suspension. Id., at 1023-1024. The Court of Appeals denied the Government's petition for rehearing of the case en banc, but issued a second panel opinion reaffirming its decision. 791 F.2d 1554 (1986).
We have recognized that the CSRA "comprehensively overhauled the civil service system," Lindahl v. OPM, 470 U.S. 768, 773, 105 S.Ct. 1620, 1624, 84 L.Ed.2d 674 (1985), creating an elaborate "new framework for evaluating adverse personnel actions against [federal employees]," id., at 774, 105 S.Ct., at 1624. It prescribes in great detail the protections and remedies applicable to such action, including the availability of administrative and judicial review. No provision of the CSRA gives nonpreference members of the excepted service the right to administrative or judicial review of suspension for misconduct. The question we face is whether that withholding of remedy was meant to preclude judicial review for those employees, or rather merely to leave them free to pursue the remedies that had been available before enactment of the CSRA. The answer is to be found by examining the purpose of the CSRA, the entirety of its text, and the structure of review that it establishes. See Lindahl, supra, at 779, 105 S.Ct., at 1627; Block v. Community Nutrition Institute, 467 U.S. 340, 345, 104 S.Ct. 2450, 2453-54, 81 L.Ed.2d 270 (1984).
A leading purpose of the CSRA was to replace the haphazard arrangements for administrative and judicial review of personnel action, part of the "outdated patchwork of statutes and rules built up over almost a century" that was the civil service system, S.Rep. No. 95-969, p. 3 (1978), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1978, p. 2723. Under that pre-existing system, only veterans enjoyed a statutory right to appeal adverse personnel action to the Civil Service Commission (CSC), the predecessor of the MSPB. 5 U.S.C. § 7701 (1976 ed.). Other employees were afforded this type of administrative review by Executive Order. Exec. Order No. 11491, § 22, 3 CFR 874 (1966-1970 Comp.), note following 5 U.S.C. § 7301 (1976 ed.) (extending CSC review to competitive service employees). Still others, like employees in respondent's classification, had no right to such review. As for appeal to the courts: Since there was no special statutory review proceeding relevant to personnel action, see 5 U.S.C. § 703, employees sought to appeal the decisions of the CSC, or the agency decision unreviewed by the CSC, to the district courts through the various forms of action traditionally used for so-called nonstatutory review of agency action, including suits for mandamus, see, e.g., Taylor v. United States Civil Service Comm'n, 374 F.2d 466 (CA9 1967), injunction, see, e.g., Hargett v. Summerfield, 100 U.S.App.D.C. 85, 243 F.2d 29 (1957), and declaratory judgment, see, e.g., Camero v. McNamara, 222 F.Supp. 742 (ED Pa.1963). See generally R. Vaughn, Principles of Civil Service Law § 5.4, p. 5-21, and nn. 13-17 (1976) (collecting cases). For certain kinds of personnel decisions, federal employees could maintain an action in the Court of Claims of the sort respondent seeks to maintain here. See, e.g., Ainsworth v. United States, 185 Ct.Cl. 110, 399 F.2d 176 (1968).
Criticism of this "system" of administrative and judicial review was widespread. The general perception was that "appeals processes [were] so lengthy and complicated that managers [in the civil service] often avoid[ed] taking disciplinary action" against employees even when it was clearly warranted. S.Rep. No. 95-969, at 9, U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1978, p. 2731. With respect to judicial review in particular, there was dissatisfaction with the "wide variations in the kinds of decisions . . . issued on the same or similar matters," id., at 63, U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1978, p. 2785, which were the product of concurrent jurisdiction, under various bases of jurisdiction, of the district courts in all Circuits and the Court of Claims. Moreover, as the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit repeatedly noted, beginning the judicial process at the district court level, with repetition of essentially the same review on appeal in the court of appeals, was wasteful and irrational. See Polcover v. Secretary of Treasury, 155 U.S.App.D.C. 338, 341-342, 477 F.2d 1223, 1226-1228 (1973).
Congress responded to this situation by enacting the CSRA, which replaced the patchwork system with an integrated scheme of administrative and judicial review, designed to balance the legitimate interests of the various categories of federal employees with the needs of sound and efficient administration. See S.Rep. No. 95-969, at 4. Three main sections of the CSRA govern personnel action taken against members of the civil service. In each of these sections, Congress deals explicitly with the situation of nonpreference members of the excepted service, granting them limited, and in some cases conditional, rights.
The Court of Appeals viewed the exclusion of nonpreference members of the excepted service from the definitional sections of Chapter 75 as congressional silence on the issue of what review these employees should receive for the categories of personnel action covered by that chapter, including a suspension of the duration at issue here, which would come within Subchapter II. The court therefore found respondent free to pursue whatever judicial remedies he would have had before enactment of the CSRA. We view the exclusion quite differently. In the context of the entire statutory scheme, we think it displays a clear congressional intent to deny the excluded employees the protections of Chapter 75—including judicial review—for personnel action covered by that chapter.
In Block v. Community Nutrition Institute, 467 U.S., at 345-348, 104 S.Ct., at 2453-2455, we observed that, under the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1937, the omission of review procedures for consumers affected by milk market orders, coupled with the provision of such procedures for milk handlers so affected, was strong evidence that Congress intended to preclude consumers from obtaining judicial review. Similarly, in United States v. Erika, Inc., 456 U.S. 201, 102 S.Ct. 1650, 72 L.Ed.2d 12 (1982), we found that in the context of the "precisely drawn provisions" of the Medicare statute, the provision of judicial review for awards made under Part A of the statute, coupled with the omission of judicial review for awards under Part B, "provides persuasive evidence that Congress deliberately intended to foreclose further review of such claims." Id., at 208, 102 S.Ct., at 1654 (citations omitted). The same type of analysis applies here. The comprehensive nature of the CSRA, the attention that it gives throughout to the rights of nonpreference excepted service employees, and the fact that it does not include them in provisions for administrative and judicial review contained in Chapter 75, combine to establish a congressional judgment that those employees should not be able to demand judicial review for the type of personnel action covered by that chapter. Their exclusion from the scope of those protections can hardly be explained on the theory that Congress simply did not have them in mind, since, as noted earlier, Congress specifically included in Chapter 75 preference eligible excepted service employees, § 7511(a)(1)(B), and specifically provided for optional inclusion (at the election of OPM) of certain nonpreference excepted service employees with respect to certain protections of the chapter, including MSPB and judicial review, § 7511(c). (Respondent, incidentally, falls within the category eligible for that optional inclusion, see ibid.; 5 CFR § 213.3102(hh) (1978), which OPM has chosen not to invoke.) It seems to us evident that the absence of provision for these employees to obtain judicial review is not an uninformative consequence of the limited scope of the statute, but rather manifestation of a considered congressional judgment that they should not have statutory entitlement to review for adverse action of the type governed by Chapter 75.