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IN RE WHITAKER
No. 93-9220.
Decided October 11, 1994
Per Curiam.
Pro se petitioner Fred Whitaker filed a petition for writ of mandamus and requests permission to proceed in forma pauperis under this Court’s Rule 39. Pursuant to Rule 39.8, we deny petitioner leave to proceed in forma pauperis. Petitioner is allowed until November 1, 1994, within which to pay the docketing fee required by Rule 38(a) and to submit a petition for a writ of prohibition in compliance with Rule 33 of the Rules of this Court. For the reasons explained below, we also direct the Clerk of the Court not to accept any further petitions for extraordinary writs from petitioner in noncriminal matters unless he pays the docketing fee required by Rule 38(a) and submits his petition in compliance with Rule 33.
Since 1987, petitioner has filed 23 claims for relief, including 18 petitions for certiorari, 9 of which have been filed in the last three Terms. That total also includes five petitions for extraordinary writs filed since June 1992. We have denied all of the petitions without recorded dissent. We have also denied petitioner leave to proceed in forma pauperis pursuant to Rule 39.8 for the last two petitions in which he has sought extraordinary relief. In re Whitaker, 511 U. S. 1105 (1994); In re Whitaker, 506 U. S. 983 (1992).
Petitioner’s current claim involves a civil action brought in the Alameda, California, Superior Court against Lake Merritt Lodge & Residence, alleging damages of $2 in illegal taxes. His legal arguments here are just as frivolous as those he has made in previous petitions.
Although petitioner has exhibited frequent filing patterns with respect to petitions for writ of certiorari, we limit our sanctions at this time to the type of relief requested today— styled as petitions for extraordinary writs. We have imposed similar sanctions in the past. See, e. g., In re Anderson, 511 U. S. 364 (1994); In re Demos, 500 U. S. 16 (1991); In re Sindram, 498 U. S. 177 (1991); In re McDonald, 489 U. S. 180 (1989). As we concluded in Sindram:
“The goal of fairly dispensing justice ... is compromised when the Court is forced to devote its limited resources to the processing of repetitious and frivolous requests. Pro se petitioners have a greater capacity than most to disrupt the fair allocation of judicial resources because they are not subject to the financial considerations — filing fees and attorney’s fees — that deter other litigants from filing frivolous petitions. The risks of abuse are particularly acute with respect to applications for extraordinary relief, since such petitions are not subject to any time limitations and, theoretically, could be filed at any time without limitation. In order to prevent frivolous petitions for extraordinary relief from unsettling the fair administration of justice, the Court has a duty to deny in forma pauperis status to those individuals who have abused the system.” 498 U. S., at 179-180 (citation omitted).
Rule 39.8 provides: “If satisfied that a petition for a writ of certiorari, jurisdictional statement, or petition for an extraordinary writ, as the case may be, is frivolous or malicious, the Court may deny a motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis.” | What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify the manner in which the Court took jurisdiction. The Court uses a variety of means whereby it undertakes to consider cases that it has been petitioned to review. The most important ones are the writ of certiorari, the writ of appeal, and for legacy cases the writ of error, appeal, and certification. For cases that fall into more than one category, identify the manner in which the court takes jurisdiction on the basis of the writ. For example, Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137 (1803), an original jurisdiction and a mandamus case, should be coded as mandamus rather than original jurisdiction due to the nature of the writ. Some legacy cases are "original" motions or requests for the Court to take jurisdiction but were heard or filed in another court. For example, Ex parte Matthew Addy S.S. & Commerce Corp., 256 U.S. 417 (1921) asked the Court to issue a writ of mandamus to a federal judge. Do not code these cases as "original" jurisdiction cases but rather on the basis of the writ. | What is the manner in which the Court took jurisdiction? | [
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Herman Avery GUNDY, Petitioner
v.
UNITED STATES
No. 17-6086
Supreme Court of the United States.
Argued October 2, 2018
Decided June 20, 2019
Sarah Baumgartel, New York, NY, for Petitioner.
Jeffrey B. Wall, Washington, DC, for Respondent.
Noel J. Francisco, Solicitor General, Brian A. Benczkowski, Assistant Attorney General, Jeffrey B. Wall, Deputy Solicitor General, Jonathan C. Bond, Assistant to the Solicitor General, Sonja M. Ralston, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for Respondent.
Jeffrey L. Fisher, David T. Goldberg, Pamela S. Karlan, Stanford Law School, Supreme Court, Litigation Clinic, Stanford, CA, Sarah Baumgartel, Federal Defenders of New York, Inc., Yuanchung Lee, Barry D. Leiwant, Edward S. Zas, New York, NY, for Petitioner.
Justice KAGAN announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion, in which Justice GINSBURG, Justice BREYER, and Justice SOTOMAYOR join.
The nondelegation doctrine bars Congress from transferring its legislative power to another branch of Government. This case requires us to decide whether 34 U.S.C. § 20913(d), enacted as part of the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA), violates that doctrine. We hold it does not. Under § 20913(d), the Attorney General must apply SORNA's registration requirements as soon as feasible to offenders convicted before the statute's enactment. That delegation easily passes constitutional muster.
I
Congress has sought, for the past quarter century, to combat sex crimes and crimes against children through sex-offender registration schemes. In 1994, Congress first conditioned certain federal funds on States' adoption of registration laws meeting prescribed minimum standards. See Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against Children and Sexually Violent Offender Registration Act, § 170101, 108 Stat. 2038, 42 U.S.C. § 14071 et seq. (1994 ed.). Two years later, Congress strengthened those standards, most notably by insisting that States inform local communities of registrants' addresses. See Megan's Law, § 2, 110 Stat. 1345, note following 42 U.S.C. § 13701 (1994 ed., Supp. II). By that time, every State and the District of Columbia had enacted a sex-offender registration law. But the state statutes varied along many dimensions, and Congress came to realize that their "loopholes and deficiencies" had allowed over 100,000 sex offenders (about 20% of the total) to escape registration. See H. R. Rep. No. 109-218, pt. 1, pp. 20, 23-24, 26 (2005) (referring to those sex offenders as "missing" or "lost"). In 2006, to address those failings, Congress enacted SORNA. See 120 Stat. 590, 34 U.S.C. § 20901 et seq .
SORNA makes "more uniform and effective" the prior "patchwork" of sex-offender registration systems. Reynolds v. United States , 565 U.S. 432, 435, 132 S.Ct. 975, 181 L.Ed.2d 935 (2012). The Act's express "purpose" is "to protect the public from sex offenders and offenders against children" by "establish[ing] a comprehensive national system for [their] registration." § 20901. To that end, SORNA covers more sex offenders, and imposes more onerous registration requirements, than most States had before. The Act also backs up those requirements with new criminal penalties. Any person required to register under SORNA who knowingly fails to do so (and who travels in interstate commerce) may be imprisoned for up to ten years. See 18 U.S.C. § 2250(a).
The basic registration scheme works as follows. A "sex offender" is defined as "an individual who was convicted of" specified criminal offenses: all offenses "involving a sexual act or sexual contact" and additional offenses "against a minor." 34 U.S.C. §§ 20911(1), (5)(A), (7). Such an individual must register-provide his name, address, and certain other information-in every State where he resides, works, or studies. See §§ 20913(a), 20914. And he must keep the registration current, and periodically report in person to a law enforcement office, for a period of between fifteen years and life (depending on the severity of his crime and his history of recidivism). See §§ 20915, 20918.
Section 20913-the disputed provision here-elaborates the "[i]nitial registration" requirements for sex offenders. §§ 20913(b), (d). Subsection (b) sets out the general rule: An offender must register "before completing a sentence of imprisonment with respect to the offense giving rise to the registration requirement" (or, if the offender is not sentenced to prison, "not later than [three] business days after being sentenced"). Two provisions down, subsection (d) addresses (in its title's words) the "[i]nitial registration of sex offenders unable to comply with subsection (b)." The provision states:
"The Attorney General shall have the authority to specify the applicability of the requirements of this subchapter to sex offenders convicted before the enactment of this chapter ... and to prescribe rules for the registration of any such sex offenders and for other categories of sex offenders who are unable to comply with subsection (b)."
Subsection (d), in other words, focuses on individuals convicted of a sex offense before SORNA's enactment-a group we will call pre-Act offenders. Many of these individuals were unregistered at the time of SORNA's enactment, either because pre-existing law did not cover them or because they had successfully evaded that law (so were "lost" to the system). See supra, at 2121 - 2122. And of those potential new registrants, many or most could not comply with subsection (b)'s registration rule because they had already completed their prison sentences. For the entire group of pre-Act offenders, once again, the Attorney General "shall have the authority" to "specify the applicability" of SORNA's registration requirements and "to prescribe rules for [their] registration."
Under that delegated authority, the Attorney General issued an interim rule in February 2007, specifying that SORNA's registration requirements apply in full to "sex offenders convicted of the offense for which registration is required prior to the enactment of that Act." 72 Fed. Reg. 8897. The final rule, issued in December 2010, reiterated that SORNA applies to all pre- Act offenders. 75 Fed. Reg. 81850. That rule has remained the same to this day.
Petitioner Herman Gundy is a pre-Act offender. The year before SORNA's enactment, he pleaded guilty under Maryland law for sexually assaulting a minor. After his release from prison in 2012, Gundy came to live in New York. But he never registered there as a sex offender. A few years later, he was convicted for failing to register, in violation of § 2250. He argued below (among other things) that Congress unconstitutionally delegated legislative power when it authorized the Attorney General to "specify the applicability" of SORNA's registration requirements to pre-Act offenders. § 20913(d). The District Court and Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit rejected that claim, see 695 Fed.Appx. 639 (2017), as had every other court (including eleven Courts of Appeals) to consider the issue. We nonetheless granted certiorari.
583 U.S. ----, 138 S.Ct. 1260, 200 L.Ed.2d 416 (2018). Today, we join the consensus and affirm.
II
Article I of the Constitution provides that "[a]ll legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States." § 1. Accompanying that assignment of power to Congress is a bar on its further delegation. Congress, this Court explained early on, may not transfer to another branch "powers which are strictly and exclusively legislative." Wayman v. Southard , 23 U.S. (10 Wheat.) 1, 42-43, 6 L.Ed. 253 (1825). But the Constitution does not "deny[ ] to the Congress the necessary resources of flexibility and practicality [that enable it] to perform its function[s]." Yakus v. United States , 321 U.S. 414, 425, 64 S.Ct. 660, 88 L.Ed. 834 (1944) (internal quotation marks omitted). Congress may "obtain[ ] the assistance of its coordinate Branches"-and in particular, may confer substantial discretion on executive agencies to implement and enforce the laws. Mistretta v. United States , 488 U.S. 361, 372, 109 S.Ct. 647, 102 L.Ed.2d 714 (1989). "[I]n our increasingly complex society, replete with ever changing and more technical problems," this Court has understood that "Congress simply cannot do its job absent an ability to delegate power under broad general directives." Ibid. So we have held, time and again, that a statutory delegation is constitutional as long as Congress "lay[s] down by legislative act an intelligible principle to which the person or body authorized to [exercise the delegated authority] is directed to conform." Ibid. (quoting J. W. Hampton, Jr., & Co. v. United States , 276 U.S. 394, 409, 48 S.Ct. 348, 72 L.Ed. 624 (1928) ; brackets in original).
Given that standard, a nondelegation inquiry always begins (and often almost ends) with statutory interpretation. The constitutional question is whether Congress has supplied an intelligible principle to guide the delegee's use of discretion. So the answer requires construing the challenged statute to figure out what task it delegates and what instructions it provides. See, e.g., Whitman v. American Trucking Assns. , Inc., 531 U.S. 457, 473, 121 S.Ct. 903, 149 L.Ed.2d 1 (2001) (construing the text of a delegation to place constitutionally adequate "limits on the EPA's discretion"); American Power & Light Co. v. SEC , 329 U.S. 90, 104-105, 67 S.Ct. 133, 91 L.Ed. 103 (1946) (interpreting a statutory delegation, in light of its "purpose[,] factual background[, and] context," to provide sufficiently "definite" standards). Only after a court has determined a challenged statute's meaning can it decide whether the law sufficiently guides executive discretion to accord with Article I. And indeed, once a court interprets the statute, it may find that the constitutional question all but answers itself.
That is the case here, because § 20913(d) does not give the Attorney General anything like the "unguided" and "unchecked" authority that Gundy says. Brief for Petitioner 37, 45. The provision, in Gundy's view, "grants the Attorney General plenary power to determine SORNA's applicability to pre-Act offenders-to require them to register, or not, as she sees fit, and to change her policy for any reason and at any time." Id., at 42. If that were so, we would face a nondelegation question. But it is not. This Court has already interpreted § 20913(d) to say something different-to require the Attorney General to apply SORNA to all pre-Act offenders as soon as feasible. See Reynolds , 565 U.S. at 442-443, 132 S.Ct. 975. And revisiting that issue yet more fully today, we reach the same conclusion. The text, considered alongside its context, purpose, and history, makes clear that the Attorney General's discretion extends only to considering and addressing feasibility issues. Given that statutory meaning, Gundy's constitutional claim must fail. Section 20913(d)'s delegation falls well within permissible bounds.
A
This is not the first time this Court has had to interpret § 20913(d). In Reynolds , the Court considered whether SORNA's registration requirements applied of their own force to pre-Act offenders or instead applied only once the Attorney General said they did. We read the statute as adopting the latter approach. But even as we did so, we made clear how far SORNA limited the Attorney General's authority. And in that way, we effectively resolved the case now before us.
Everything in Reynolds started from the premise that Congress meant for SORNA's registration requirements to apply to pre-Act offenders. The majority recounted SORNA's "basic statutory purpose," found in its text, as follows: "the 'establish[ment of] a comprehensive national system for the registration of [sex] offenders' that includes offenders who committed their offenses before the Act became law." 565 U.S. at 442, 132 S.Ct. 975 (quoting § 20901 ; emphasis and alterations in original; citation omitted). That purpose, the majority further noted, informed SORNA's "broad[ ]" definition of "sex offender," which "include[s] any 'individual who was convicted of a sex offense.' " Id., at 442, 132 S.Ct. 975 (quoting § 20911(1) ; emphasis added). And those two provisions were at one with "[t]he Act's history." Id., at 442, 132 S.Ct. 975. Quoting statements from both the House and the Senate about the sex offenders then "lost" to the system, Reynolds explained that the Act's "supporters placed considerable importance upon the registration of pre-Act offenders." Ibid. In recognizing all this, the majority (temporarily) bonded with the dissenting Justices, who found it obvious that SORNA was "meant to cover pre-Act offenders." Id., at 448, 132 S.Ct. 975 (Scalia, J., dissenting). And indeed, the dissent emphasized that common ground, remarking that "the Court acknowledges" and "rightly believes" that registration of pre-Act offenders was "what the statute sought to achieve." Id., at 448-449, 132 S.Ct. 975.
But if that was so, why had Congress (as the majority held) conditioned the pre-Act offenders' duty to register on a prior "ruling from the Attorney General"? Id., at 441, 132 S.Ct. 975. The majority had a simple answer: "[I]nstantaneous registration" of pre-Act offenders "might not prove feasible," or "[a]t least Congress might well have so thought." Id., at 440-441, 443, 132 S.Ct. 975. Here, the majority explained that SORNA's requirements diverged from prior state law. See id. , at 440, 132 S.Ct. 975 ; supra, at 2121 - 2122. Some pre-Act offenders (as defined by SORNA) had never needed to register before; others had once had to register, but had fulfilled their old obligations. And still others (the "lost" or "missing" offenders) should have registered, but had escaped the system. As a result, SORNA created a "practical problem[ ]": It would require "newly registering or reregistering a large number of pre-Act offenders."
Reynolds , 565 U.S. at 440, 132 S.Ct. 975 (internal quotation marks omitted). And attached to that broad feasibility concern was a more technical one. Recall that under SORNA "a sex offender must initially register before completing his 'sentence of imprisonment.' " Id., at 439, 132 S.Ct. 975 (quoting § 20913(b) ); see supra, at 2122. But many pre-Act offenders were already out of prison, so could not comply with that requirement. That inability raised questions about "how[ ] the new registration requirements applied to them." 565 U.S. at 441, 132 S.Ct. 975. "Congress['s] solution" to both those difficulties was the same: Congress "[a]sk[ed] the Department of Justice, charged with responsibility for implementation, to examine [the issues] and to apply the new registration requirements accordingly." Ibid.
On that understanding, the Attorney General's role under § 20913(d) was important but limited: It was to apply SORNA to pre-Act offenders as soon as he thought it feasible to do so. That statutory delegation, the Court explained, would "involve[ ] implementation delay." Id., at 443, 132 S.Ct. 975. But no more than that. Congress had made clear in SORNA's text that the new registration requirements would apply to pre-Act offenders. See id., at 442-445, 132 S.Ct. 975. So (the Court continued) "there was no need" for Congress to worry about the "unrealistic possibility" that "the Attorney General would refuse to apply" those requirements on some excessively broad view of his authority under § 20913(d). Id., at 444-445, 132 S.Ct. 975. Reasonably read, SORNA enabled the Attorney General only to address (as appropriate) the "practical problems" involving pre-Act offenders before requiring them to register. Id., at 440, 132 S.Ct. 975. The delegation was a stopgap, and nothing more.
Gundy dismisses Reynolds 's relevance, but his arguments come up short. To begin, he contends that Reynolds spoke "tentative[ly]"-with "might[s], may[s], or could[s]"-about Congress's reasons for enacting § 20913(d). Reply Brief 11; see supra, at 2124 (quoting such phrases). Gundy concludes from such constructions-which are indeed present-that the Court was "not offering a definitive reading of the statute." Reply Brief 11. But the Court used those locutions to convey not its own uncertainty but Congress's. The point of the opinion was that Congress had questions about how best to phase SORNA's application to pre-Act offenders, so gave the Attorney General flexibility on timing. The "mights, mays, and coulds" were there to describe the legislative mindset responsible for § 20913(d), and thus formed part of the Court's own-yes, "definitive"-view of that provision's meaning. Anticipating that explanation, Gundy falls back on the claim that the Court's account of Congress's motivations "cannot supply the intelligible principle Congress failed to enact into law." Id., at 12 (citing Whitman , 531 U.S. at 473, 121 S.Ct. 903 ). But the Court in Reynolds did not invent a standard Congress omitted. Rather, the Court read the statute to contain a standard-again, that the Attorney General should apply SORNA to pre-Act offenders as soon as feasible. And as the next part of this opinion shows, in somewhat greater detail than Reynolds thought necessary, we read the statute in the same way.
B
Recall again the delegation provision at issue. Congress gave the Attorney General authority to "specify the applicability" of SORNA's requirements to pre-Act offenders. § 20913(d). And in the second half of the same sentence, Congress gave him authority to "prescribe rules for the registration of any such sex offenders ... who are unable to comply with" subsection (b)'s initial registration requirement. Ibid. What does the delegation in § 20913(d) allow the Attorney General to do?
The different answers on offer here reflect competing views of statutory interpretation. As noted above, Gundy urges us to read § 20913(d) to empower the Attorney General to do whatever he wants as to pre-Act offenders: He may make them all register immediately or he may exempt them from registration forever (or he may do anything in between). See Brief for Petitioner 41-42; supra, at 2123 - 2124. Gundy bases that argument on the first half of § 20913(d), isolated from everything else-from the second half of the same section, from surrounding provisions in SORNA, and from any conception of the statute's history and purpose. Reynolds took a different approach (as does the Government here), understanding statutory interpretation as a "holistic endeavor" which determines meaning by looking not to isolated words, but to text in context, along with purpose and history. United Sav. Assn. of Tex. v. Timbers of Inwood Forest Associates, Ltd. , 484 U.S. 365, 371, 108 S.Ct. 626, 98 L.Ed.2d 740 (1988).
This Court has long refused to construe words "in a vacuum," as Gundy attempts. Davis v. Michigan Dept. of Treasury , 489 U.S. 803, 809, 109 S.Ct. 1500, 103 L.Ed.2d 891 (1989). "It is a fundamental canon of statutory construction that the words of a statute must be read in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme." National Assn. of Home Builders v. Defenders of Wildlife , 551 U.S. 644, 666, 127 S.Ct. 2518, 168 L.Ed.2d 467 (2007) (internal quotation marks omitted); see Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA , 573 U.S. 302, 321, 134 S.Ct. 2427, 189 L.Ed.2d 372 (2014) ("[R]easonable statutory interpretation must account for both the specific context in which ... language is used and the broader context of the statute as a whole" (internal quotation marks omitted)). And beyond context and structure, the Court often looks to "history [and] purpose" to divine the meaning of language. Maracich v. Spears , 570 U.S. 48, 76, 133 S.Ct. 2191, 186 L.Ed.2d 275 (2013) (internal quotation marks omitted). That non-blinkered brand of interpretation holds good for delegations, just as for other statutory provisions. To define the scope of delegated authority, we have looked to the text in "context" and in light of the statutory "purpose." National Broadcasting Co. v. United States , 319 U.S. 190, 214, 216, 63 S.Ct. 997, 87 L.Ed. 1344 (1943) (internal quotation marks omitted); see American Power & Light , 329 U.S. at 104, 67 S.Ct. 133 (stating that the delegation at issue "derive[d] much meaningful content from the purpose of the Act, its factual background and the statutory context"). In keeping with that method, we again do so today.
So begin at the beginning, with the "[d]eclaration of purpose" that is SORNA's first sentence. § 20901. There, Congress announced (as Reynolds noted, see supra, at 2123 - 2124) that "to protect the public," it was "establish[ing] a comprehensive national system for the registration" of "sex offenders and offenders against children." § 20901. The term "comprehensive" has a clear meaning-something that is all-encompassing or sweeping. See, e.g., Webster's Third New International Dictionary 467 (2002) ("covering a matter under consideration completely or nearly completely"); New Oxford American Dictionary 350 (2d ed. 2005) ("complete; including all or nearly all elements or aspects of something"). That description could not fit the system SORNA created if the Attorney General could decline, for any reason or no reason at all, to apply SORNA to all pre-Act offenders. After all, for many years after SORNA's enactment, the great majority of sex offenders in the country would be pre-Act offenders. If Gundy were right, all of those offenders could be exempt from SORNA's registration requirements. So the mismatch between SORNA's statement of purpose and Gundy's view of § 20913(d) is as stark as stark comes. Responding to that patent disparity, Gundy urges us to ignore SORNA's statement of purpose because it is "located in the Act's preface" rather than "tied" specifically to § 20913(d). Brief for Petitioner 46. But the placement of such a statement within a statute makes no difference. See A. Scalia & B. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 220 (2012). Wherever it resides, it is "an appropriate guide" to the "meaning of the [statute's] operative provisions." Id., at 218. And here it makes clear that SORNA was supposed to apply to all pre-Act offenders-which precludes Gundy's construction of § 20913(d).
The Act's definition of "sex offender" (also noted in Reynolds , see supra, at 2124) makes the same point. Under that definition, a "sex offender" is "an individual who was convicted of a sex offense." § 20911(1). Note the tense: "was," not "is." This Court has often "looked to Congress' choice of verb tense to ascertain a statute's temporal reach," including when interpreting other SORNA provisions. Carr v. United States , 560 U.S. 438, 447-448, 130 S.Ct. 2229, 176 L.Ed.2d 1152 (2010) (holding that because SORNA "sets forth [its] travel requirement in the present tense," the statute's criminal penalties do not apply to a person whose interstate travel predated enactment); see, e.g., United States v. Wilson , 503 U.S. 329, 333, 112 S.Ct. 1351, 117 L.Ed.2d 593 (1992) ; Gwaltney of Smithfield, Ltd. v. Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Inc. , 484 U.S. 49, 57, 108 S.Ct. 376, 98 L.Ed.2d 306 (1987). Here, Congress's use of the past tense to define the term "sex offender" shows that SORNA was not merely forward-looking. The word "is" would have taken care of all future offenders. The word "was" served to bring in the hundreds of thousands of persons previously found guilty of a sex offense, and thought to pose a current threat to the public. The tense of the "sex offender" definition thus confirms that the delegation allows only temporary exclusions, as necessary to address feasibility issues. Contra Gundy, it does not sweep so wide as to make a laughingstock of the statute's core definition.
The Act's legislative history backs up everything said above by showing that the need to register pre-Act offenders was front and center in Congress's thinking. (Once again, the Reynolds majority noted this history, but Justice Scalia's dissent thought that was gilding the lily. See supra, at 2124, and n. 1. He had a point, but we can't resist.) Recall that Congress designed SORNA to address "loopholes and deficiencies" in existing registration laws. See supra, at 2121 - 2122. And no problem attracted greater attention than the large number of sex offenders who had slipped the system. According to the House Report, "[t]he most significant enforcement issue in the sex offender program is that over 100,000 sex offenders" are " 'missing,' meaning that they have not complied with" then-current requirements.
H. R. Rep. No. 109-218, at 26. There is a "strong public interest," the Report continued, in "having [those offenders] register with current information to mitigate the risks of additional crimes against children." Id., at 24. Senators struck a similar chord in the debates preceding SORNA's passage, repeatedly stressing that the new provisions would capture the missing offenders. See, e.g., 152 Cong. Rec. 15338 (2006) (statement of Sen. Kyl) ("The penalties in this bill should be adequate to ensure that [the 100,000 missing offenders] register"); id., at 13050 (statement of Sen. Frist) ("Every day that we don't have this national sex offender registry, these missing sex predators are out there somewhere"). Imagine how surprising those Members would have found Gundy's view that they had authorized the Attorney General to exempt the missing "predators" from registering at all.
With that context and background established, we may return to § 20913(d). As we have noted, Gundy makes his stand there (and there only), insisting that the lonesome phrase "specify the applicability" ends this case. See supra, at 2126. But in so doing, Gundy ignores even the rest of the section that phrase is in. Both the title and the remaining text of that section pinpoint one of the "practical problems" discussed above: At the moment of SORNA's enactment, many pre-Act offenders were "unable to comply" with the Act's initial registration requirements. § 20913(d) ; Reynolds , 565 U.S. at 440, 132 S.Ct. 975 ; see supra, at 2124 - 2125. That was because, once again, the requirements assumed that offenders would be in prison, whereas many pre-Act offenders were on the streets. In identifying that issue, § 20913(d) itself reveals the nature of the delegation to the Attorney General. It was to give him the time needed (if any) to address the various implementation issues involved in getting pre-Act offenders into the registration system. "Specify the applicability" thus does not mean "specify whether to apply SORNA" to pre-Act offenders at all, even though everything else in the Act commands their coverage. The phrase instead means "specify how to apply SORNA" to pre-Act offenders if transitional difficulties require some delay. In that way, the whole of § 20913(d) joins the rest of SORNA in giving the Attorney General only time-limited latitude to excuse pre-Act offenders from the statute's requirements. Under the law, he had to order their registration as soon as feasible.
And no Attorney General has used (or, apparently, thought to use) § 20913(d) in any more expansive way. To the contrary. Within a year of SORNA's enactment (217 days, to be precise), the Attorney General determined that SORNA would apply immediately to pre-Act offenders. See Interim Rule, 72 Fed. Reg. 8897 ; supra, at 2122 - 2123. That rule has remained in force ever since (save for a technical change to one of the rule's illustrative examples). See Final Rule, 75 Fed. Reg. 81850. And at oral argument here, the Solicitor General's office-rarely in a hurry to agree to limits on the Government's authority-acknowledged that § 20913(d) does not allow the Attorney General to excuse a pre-Act offender from registering, except for reasons of "feasibility." Tr. of Oral Arg. 41-42. We thus end up, on close inspection of the statutory scheme, exactly where Reynolds left us. The Attorney General's authority goes to transition-period implementation issues, and no further.
C
Now that we have determined what § 20913(d) means, we can consider whether it violates the Constitution. The question becomes: Did Congress make an impermissible delegation when it instructed the Attorney General to apply SORNA's registration requirements to pre-Act offenders as soon as feasible? Under this Court's long-established law, that question is easy. Its answer is no.
As noted earlier, this Court has held that a delegation is constitutional so long as Congress has set out an "intelligible principle" to guide the delegee's exercise of authority. J. W. Hampton, Jr., & Co. , 276 U.S. at 409, 48 S.Ct. 348 ; see supra, at 2123. Or in a related formulation, the Court has stated that a delegation is permissible if Congress has made clear to the delegee "the general policy" he must pursue and the "boundaries of [his] authority." American Power & Light , 329 U.S. at 105, 67 S.Ct. 133. Those standards, the Court has made clear, are not demanding. "[W]e have 'almost never felt qualified to second-guess Congress regarding the permissible degree of policy judgment that can be left to those executing or applying the law.' " Whitman , 531 U.S. at 474-475, 121 S.Ct. 903 (quoting Mistretta , 488 U.S. at 416, 109 S.Ct. 647 (Scalia, J., dissenting)). Only twice in this country's history (and that in a single year) have we found a delegation excessive-in each case because "Congress had failed to articulate any policy or standard" to confine discretion. Mistretta , 488 U.S. at 373, n. 7, 109 S.Ct. 647 (emphasis added); see A. L. A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States , 295 U.S. 495, 55 S.Ct. 837, 79 L.Ed. 1570 (1935) ; Panama Refining Co. v. Ryan , 293 U.S. 388, 55 S.Ct. 241, 79 L.Ed. 446 (1935). By contrast, we have over and over upheld even very broad delegations. Here is a sample: We have approved delegations to various agencies to regulate in the "public interest." See, e.g., National Broadcasting Co. , 319 U.S. at 216, 63 S.Ct. 997 ; New York Central Securities Corp. v. United States , 287 U.S. 12, 24, 53 S.Ct. 45, 77 L.Ed. 138 (1932). We have sustained authorizations for agencies to set "fair and equitable" prices and "just and reasonable" rates. Yakus , 321 U.S. at 422, 427, 64 S.Ct. 660 ; FPC v. Hope Natural Gas Co. , 320 U.S. 591, 64 S.Ct. 281, 88 L.Ed. 333 (1944). We more recently affirmed a delegation to an agency to issue whatever air quality standards are "requisite to protect the public health." Whitman , 531 U.S. at 472, 121 S.Ct. 903 (quoting 42 U.S.C. § 7409(b)(1) ). And so forth.
In that context, the delegation in SORNA easily passes muster (as all eleven circuit courts to have considered the question found, see supra, at 2122 - 2123). The statute conveyed Congress's policy that the Attorney General require pre-Act offenders to register as soon as feasible. Under the law, the feasibility issues he could address were administrative-and, more specifically, transitional-in nature. Those issues arose, as Reynolds explained, from the need to "newly register[ ] or reregister[ ] 'a large number' of pre-Act offenders" not then in the system. 565 U.S. at 440, 132 S.Ct. 975 ; see supra, at 2124 - 2125. And they arose, more technically, from the gap between an initial registration requirement hinged on imprisonment and a set of pre- Act offenders long since released. See 565 U.S. at 441, 132 S.Ct. 975 ; see supra, at 2124 - 2125. Even for those limited matters, the Act informed the Attorney General that he did not have forever to work things out. By stating its demand for a "comprehensive" registration system and by defining the "sex offenders" required to register to include pre-Act offenders, Congress conveyed that the Attorney General had only temporary authority. Or again, in the words of Reynolds , that he could prevent "instantaneous registration" and impose some "implementation delay." 565 U.S. at 443, 132 S.Ct. 975. That statutory authority, as compared to the delegations we have upheld in the past, is distinctly small-bore. It falls well within constitutional bounds.
Indeed, if SORNA's delegation is unconstitutional, then most of Government is unconstitutional-dependent as Congress is on the need to give discretion to executive officials to implement its programs. Consider again this Court's long-time recognition: "Congress simply cannot do its job absent an ability to delegate power under broad general directives." Mistretta , 488 U.S. at 372, 109 S.Ct. 647 ; see supra , at 2123. Or as the dissent in that case agreed: "[S]ome judgments ... must be left to the officers executing the law." 488 U.S. at 415, 109 S.Ct. 647 (opinion of Scalia, J.); see Whitman , 531 U.S. at 475, 121 S.Ct. 903 ("[A] certain degree of discretion[ ] inheres in most executive" action (internal quotation marks omitted)). Among the judgments often left to executive officials are ones involving feasibility. In fact, standards of that kind are ubiquitous in the U.S. Code. See, e.g., 12 U.S.C. § 1701z-2(a) (providing that the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development "shall require, to the greatest extent feasible, the employment of new and improved technologies, methods, and materials in housing construction[ ] under [HUD] programs"); 47 U.S.C. § 903(d)(1) (providing that "the Secretary of Commerce shall promote efficient and cost-effective use of the spectrum to the maximum extent feasible" in "assigning frequencies for mobile radio services"). In those delegations, Congress gives its delegee the flexibility to deal with real-world constraints in carrying out his charge. So too in SORNA.
It is wisdom and humility alike that this Court has always upheld such "necessities of government." Mistretta , 488 U.S. at 416, 109 S.Ct. 647 (Scalia, J., dissenting) (internal quotation marks omitted); see ibid. ("Since Congress is no less endowed with common sense than we are, and better equipped to inform itself of the 'necessities' of government; and since the factors bearing upon those necessities are both multifarious and (in the nonpartisan sense) highly political ... it is small wonder that we have almost never felt qualified to second-guess Congress regarding the permissible degree of policy judgment that can be left to those executing or applying the law"). We therefore affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
It is so ordered.
As to that point, the dissent criticized the majority only for basing its view in part on legislative history. 565 U.S. at 448, n., 132 S.Ct. 975 (opinion of Scalia, J.). The dissent found the majority's excursion into history "quite superfluous" given that the "text of the Act itself makes clear that Congress sought" to ensure the registration of all pre-Act offenders. Ibid. In reaching that conclusion, the dissent relied on the Act's express statement of purpose and its "sex offender" definition. See infra , at 2126 - 2128.
Once again, the dissent agreed with the Court that § 20913(d) could not sensibly be read to give the Attorney General any greater power. "[I]t is simply implausible," the dissent concluded, "that the Attorney General was given discretion to determine whether coverage of pre-Act offenders (one of the purposes of the Act) should exist." 565 U.S. at 450, 132 S.Ct. 975 (opinion of Scalia, J.). The dissent parted ways with the Court only in interpreting § 20913(d) to provide the Attorney General with even less authority.
Gundy tries to dispute that simple fact, but fails. He points to changes that Attorneys General have made in guidelines to States about how to satisfy SORNA's funding conditions. See Brief for Petitioner 32-33. But those state-directed rules are independent of the only thing at issue here: the application of registration requirements to pre-Act offenders. Those requirements have been constant since the Attorney General's initial rule, as the guidelines themselves affirm. See 73 Fed. Reg. 38046 (2008) ; 76 Fed. Reg. 1639 (2011). Indeed, the guidelines to States are issued not under § 20913(d) at all, but under a separate delegation in § 20912(b). See 73 Fed. Reg. 38030 ; 76 Fed. Reg. 1631.
Even Gundy conceded at oral argument that if the statute means what we have said, it "likely would be constitutional." Tr. of Oral Arg. 25. That is why all of his argument is devoted to showing that it means something else.
Justice KAVANAUGH took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
Justice ALITO, concurring in the judgment.
The Constitution confers on Congress certain "legislative [p]owers," Art. I, § 1, and does not permit Congress to delegate them to another branch of the Government. See Whitman v. American Trucking Assns. , Inc., 531 U.S. 457, 472, 121 S.Ct. 903, 149 L.Ed.2d 1 (2001). Nevertheless, since 1935, the Court has uniformly rejected nondelegation arguments and has upheld provisions that authorized agencies to adopt important rules pursuant to extraordinarily capacious standards. See ibid .
If a majority of this Court were willing to reconsider the approach we have taken for the past 84 years, I would support that effort. But because a majority is not willing to do that, it would be freakish to single out the provision at issue here for special treatment.
Because I cannot say that the statute lacks a discernable standard that is adequate under the approach this Court has taken for many years, I vote to affirm.
Justice GORSUCH, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE and Justice THOMAS join, dissenting.
The Constitution promises that only the people's elected representatives may adopt new federal laws restricting liberty. Yet the statute before us scrambles that design. It purports to endow the nation's chief prosecutor with the power to write his own criminal code governing the lives of a half-million citizens. Yes, those affected are some of the least popular among us. But if a single executive branch official can write laws restricting the liberty of this group of persons, what does that mean for the next?
Today, a plurality of an eight-member Court endorses this extraconstitutional arrangement but resolves nothing. Working from an understanding of the Constitution at war with its text and history, the plurality reimagines the terms of the statute before us and insists there is nothing wrong with Congress handing off so much power to the Attorney General. But Justice ALITO supplies the fifth vote for today's judgment and he does not join either the plurality's constitutional or statutory analysis, indicating instead that he remains willing, in a future case with a full Court, to revisit these matters. Respectfully, I would not wait.
I
For individuals convicted of sex offenses after Congress adopted the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA) in 2006, the statute offers detailed instructions. It requires them "to provide state governments with (and to update) information, such as names and current addresses, for inclusion on state and federal sex offender registries." The law divides offenders into three tiers based on the seriousness of their crimes: Some must register for 15 years, others for 25 years, and still others for life. The statute proceeds to set registration deadlines: Offenders sentenced to prison must register before they're released, while others must register within three business days after sentencing. The statute explains when and how offenders must update their registrations. And the statute specifies particular penalties for failing to comply with its commands. On and on the statute goes for more than 20 pages of the U.S. Code.
But what about those convicted of sex offenses before the Act's adoption? At the time of SORNA's enactment, the nation's population of sex offenders exceeded 500,000, and Congress concluded that something had to be done about these "pre-Act" offenders too. But it seems Congress couldn't agree what that should be. The treatment of pre-Act offenders proved a "controversial issue with major policy significance and practical ramifications for states." Among other things, applying SORNA immediately to this group threatened to impose unpopular and costly burdens on States and localities by forcing them to adopt or overhaul their own sex offender registration schemes. So Congress simply passed the problem to the Attorney General. For all half-million pre-Act offenders, the law says only this, in 34 U.S.C. § 20913(d) :
"The Attorney General shall have the authority to specify the applicability of the requirements of this subchapter to sex offenders convicted before the enactment of this chapter ... and to prescribe rules for the registration of any such sex offender."
Yes, that's it. The breadth of the authority Congress granted to the Attorney General in these few words can only be described as vast. As the Department of Justice itself has acknowledged, SORNA "does not require the Attorney General" to impose registration requirements on pre-Act offenders "within a certain time frame or by a date certain; it does not require him to act at all." If the Attorney General does choose to act, he can require all pre-Act offenders to register, or he can "require some but not all to register." For those he requires to register, the Attorney General may impose "some but not all of [SORNA's] registration requirements," as he pleases. And he is free to change his mind on any of these matters "at any given time or over the course of different [political] administrations." Congress thus gave the Attorney General free rein to write the rules for virtually the entire existing sex offender population in this country-a situation that promised to persist for years or decades until pre-Act offenders passed away or fulfilled the terms of their registration obligations and post-Act offenders came to predominate.
Unsurprisingly, different Attorneys General have exercised their discretion in different ways. For six months after SORNA's enactment, Attorney General Gonzales left past offenders alone. Then the pendulum swung the other direction when the Department of Justice issued an interim rule requiring pre-Act offenders to follow all the same rules as post-Act offenders. A year later, Attorney General Mukasey issued more new guidelines, this time directing the States to register some but not all past offenders. Three years after that, Attorney General Holder required the States to register only those pre-Act offenders convicted of a new felony after SORNA's enactment. Various Attorneys General have also taken different positions on whether pre-Act offenders might be entitled to credit for time spent in the community before SORNA was enacted.
These unbounded policy choices have profound consequences for the people they affect. Take our case. Before SORNA's enactment, Herman Gundy pleaded guilty in 2005 to a sexual offense. After his release from prison five years later, he was arrested again, this time for failing to register as a sex offender according to the rules the Attorney General had then prescribed for pre-Act offenders. As a result, Mr. Gundy faced an additional 10-year prison term-10 years more than if the Attorney General had, in his discretion, chosen to write the rules differently.
II
A
Our founding document begins by declaring that "We the People ... ordain and establish this Constitution." At the time, that was a radical claim, an assertion that sovereignty belongs not to a person or institution or class but to the whole of the people. From that premise, the Constitution proceeded to vest the authority to exercise different aspects of the people's sovereign power in distinct entities. In Article I, the Constitution entrusted all of the federal government's legislative power to Congress. In Article II, it assigned the executive power to the President. And in Article III, it gave independent judges the task of applying the laws to cases and controversies.
To the framers, each of these vested powers had a distinct content. When it came to the legislative power, the framers understood it to mean the power to adopt generally applicable rules of conduct governing future actions by private persons-the power to "prescrib[e] the rules by which the duties and rights of every citizen are to be regulated," or the power to "prescribe general rules for the government of society."
The framers understood, too, that it would frustrate "the system of government ordained by the Constitution" if Congress could merely announce vague aspirations and then assign others the responsibility of adopting legislation to realize its goals. Through the Constitution, after all, the people had vested the power to prescribe rules limiting their liberties in Congress alone. No one, not even Congress, had the right to alter that arrangement. As Chief Justice Marshall explained, Congress may not "delegate ... powers which are strictly and exclusively legislative." Or as John Locke, one of the thinkers who most influenced the framers' understanding of the separation of powers, described it:
"The legislative cannot transfer the power of making laws to any other hands; for it being but a delegated power from the people, they who have it cannot pass it over to others. The people alone can appoint the form of the commonwealth, which is by constituting the legislative, and appointing in whose hands that shall be. And when the people have said we will submit to rules, and be governed by laws made by such men, and in such forms, nobody else can say other men shall make laws for them; nor can the people be bound by any laws but such as are enacted by those whom they have chosen and authorised to make laws for them."
Why did the framers insist on this particular arrangement? They believed the new federal government's most dangerous power was the power to enact laws restricting the people's liberty. An "excess of law-making" was, in their words, one of "the diseases to which our governments are most liable." To address that tendency, the framers went to great lengths to make lawmaking difficult. In Article I, by far the longest part of the Constitution, the framers insisted that any proposed law must win the approval of two Houses of Congress-elected at different times, by different constituencies, and for different terms in office-and either secure the President's approval or obtain enough support to override his veto. Some occasionally complain about Article I's detailed and arduous processes for new legislation, but to the framers these were bulwarks of liberty.
Nor was the point only to limit the government's capacity to restrict the people's freedoms. Article I's detailed processes for new laws were also designed to promote deliberation. "The oftener the measure is brought under examination," Hamilton explained, "the greater the diversity in the situations of those who are to examine it," and "the less must be the danger of those errors which flow from want of due deliberation, or of those missteps which proceed from the contagion of some common passion or interest."
Other purposes animated the framers' design as well. Because men are not angels and majorities can threaten minority rights, the framers insisted on a legislature composed of different bodies subject to different electorates as a means of ensuring that any new law would have to secure the approval of a supermajority of the people's representatives. This, in turn, assured minorities that their votes would often decide the fate of proposed legislation. Indeed, some even thought a Bill of Rights would prove unnecessary in light of the Constitution's design; in their view, sound structures forcing "[a]mbition [to] ... counteract ambition" would do more than written promises to guard unpopular minorities from the tyranny of the majority. Restricting the task of legislating to one branch characterized by difficult and deliberative processes was also designed to promote fair notice and the rule of law, ensuring the people would be subject to a relatively stable and predictable set of rules. And by directing that legislating be done only by elected representatives in a public process, the Constitution sought to ensure that the lines of accountability would be clear: The sovereign people would know, without ambiguity, whom to hold accountable for the laws they would have to follow.
If Congress could pass off its legislative power to the executive branch, the "[v]esting [c]lauses, and indeed the entire structure of the Constitution," would "make no sense." Without the involvement of representatives from across the country or the demands of bicameralism and presentment, legislation would risk becoming nothing more than the will of the current President. And if laws could be simply declared by a single person, they would not be few in number, the product of widespread social consensus, likely to protect minority interests, or apt to provide stability and fair notice. Accountability would suffer too. Legislators might seek to take credit for addressing a pressing social problem by sending it to the executive for resolution, while at the same time blaming the executive for the problems that attend whatever measures he chooses to pursue. In turn, the executive might point to Congress as the source of the problem. These opportunities for finger-pointing might prove temptingly advantageous for the politicians involved, but they would also threaten to " 'disguise ... responsibility for ... the decisions.' "
The framers warned us against permitting consequences like these. As Madison explained, " '[t]here can be no liberty where the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or body of magistrates.' " The framers knew, too, that the job of keeping the legislative power confined to the legislative branch couldn't be trusted to self-policing by Congress; often enough, legislators will face rational incentives to pass problems to the executive branch. Besides, enforcing the separation of powers isn't about protecting institutional prerogatives or governmental turf. It's about respecting the people's sovereign choice to vest the legislative power in Congress alone. And it's about safeguarding a structure designed to protect their liberties, minority rights, fair notice, and the rule of law. So when a case or controversy comes within the judicial competence, the Constitution does not permit judges to look the other way; we must call foul when the constitutional lines are crossed. Indeed, the framers afforded us independence from the political branches in large part to encourage exactly this kind of "fortitude ... to do [our] duty as faithful guardians of the Constitution."
B
Accepting, then, that we have an obligation to decide whether Congress has unconstitutionally divested itself of its legislative responsibilities, the question follows: What's the test? Madison acknowledged that "no skill in the science of government has yet been able to discriminate and define, with sufficient certainty, its three great provinces-the legislative, executive, and judiciary." Chief Justice Marshall agreed that policing the separation of powers "is a subject of delicate and difficult inquiry." Still, the framers took this responsibility seriously and offered us important guiding principles.
First, we know that as long as Congress makes the policy decisions when regulating private conduct, it may authorize another branch to "fill up the details." In Wayman v. Southard , this Court upheld a statute that instructed the federal courts to borrow state-court procedural rules but allowed them to make certain "alterations and additions." Writing for the Court, Chief Justice Marshall distinguished between those "important subjects, which must be entirely regulated by the legislature itself," and "those of less interest, in which a general provision may be made, and power given to those who are to act ... to fill up the details." The Court upheld the statute before it because Congress had announced the controlling general policy when it ordered federal courts to follow state procedures, and the residual authority to make "alterations and additions" did no more than permit courts to fill up the details.
Later cases built on Chief Justice Marshall's understanding. In In re Kollock , for example, the Court upheld a statute that assigned the Commissioner of Internal Revenue the responsibility to design tax stamps for margarine packages. Later still, and using the same logic, the Court sustained other and far more consequential statutes, like a law authorizing the Secretary of Agriculture to adopt rules regulating the "use and occupancy" of public forests to protect them from "destruction" and "depredations." Through all these cases, small or large, runs the theme that Congress must set forth standards "sufficiently definite and precise to enable Congress, the courts, and the public to ascertain" whether Congress's guidance has been followed.
Second, once Congress prescribes the rule governing private conduct, it may make the application of that rule depend on executive fact-finding. Here, too, the power extended to the executive may prove highly consequential. During the Napoleonic Wars, for example, Britain and France each tried to block the United States from trading with the other. Congress responded with a statute instructing that, if the President found that either Great Britain or France stopped interfering with American trade, a trade embargo would be imposed against the other country. In Cargo of Brig Aurora v. United States , this Court explained that it could "see no sufficient reason, why the legislature should not exercise its discretion [to impose an embargo] either expressly or conditionally , as their judgment should direct." Half a century later, Congress likewise made the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge depend on a finding by the Secretary of War that the bridge wouldn't interfere with navigation of the East River. The Court held that Congress "did not abdicate any of its authority" but "simply declared that, upon a certain fact being established, the bridge should be deemed a lawful structure, and employed the secretary of war as an agent to ascertain that fact."
Third, Congress may assign the executive and judicial branches certain non-legislative responsibilities. While the Constitution vests all federal legislative power in Congress alone, Congress's legislative authority sometimes overlaps with authority the Constitution separately vests in another branch. So, for example, when a congressional statute confers wide discretion to the executive, no separation-of-powers problem may arise if "the discretion is to be exercised over matters already within the scope of executive power." Though the case was decided on different grounds, the foreign-affairs-related statute in Cargo of the Brig Aurora may be an example of this kind of permissible lawmaking, given that many foreign affairs powers are constitutionally vested in the president under Article II. Wayman itself might be explained by the same principle as applied to the judiciary: Even in the absence of any statute, courts have the power under Article III "to regulate their practice."
C
Before the 1930s, federal statutes granting authority to the executive were comparatively modest and usually easily upheld. But then the federal government began to grow explosively. And with the proliferation of new executive programs came new questions about the scope of congressional delegations. Twice the Court responded by striking down statutes for violating the separation of powers.
In A. L. A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States , the Court considered a statute that transferred to the President the power "to approve 'codes of fair competition' " for slaughterhouses and other industries. But Congress offered no meaningful guidance. It did not, for example, reference any pre-existing common law of fair competition that might have supplied guidance on the policy questions, as it arguably had done earlier with the Sherman Act. And it did not announce rules contingent on executive fact-finding. Nor was this assigned power one that anyone thought might inhere in the executive power. Proceeding without the need to convince a majority of legislators, the President adopted a lengthy fair competition code written by a group of (possibly self-serving) New York poultry butchers.
Included in the code was a rule that often made it a federal crime for butchers to allow customers to select which individual chickens they wished to buy. Kosher butchers such as the Schechters had a hard time following these rules. Yet the government apparently singled out the Schechters as a test case; inspectors repeatedly visited them and, at times, apparently behaved abusively toward their customers. When the Schechters finally kicked the inspectors out, they were greeted with a criminal indictment running to dozens of counts. After a trial in which the Schechters were found guilty of selling one allegedly "unfit" chicken and other miscellaneous counts, this Court agreed to hear the case and struck down the law as a violation of the separation of powers. If Congress could permit the President to write a new code of fair competition all his own, Justice Cardozo explained, then "anything that Congress may do within the limits of the commerce clause for the betterment of business [could] be done by the President ... by calling it a code. This is delegation running riot."
The same year, in Panama Refining Co. v. Ryan , the Court struck down a statute that authorized the President to decide whether and how to prohibit the interstate transportation of " 'hot oil,' " petroleum produced or withdrawn from storage in excess of state-set quotas. As in Schechter Poultry , the law provided no notice to regulated parties about what the President might wind up prohibiting, leading the Court to observe that Congress "ha[d] declared no policy, ha[d] established no standard, ha[d] laid down no rule." The Court explained that the statute did not call for the executive to "ascertai[n] the existence of facts to which legislation is directed." Nor did it ask the executive to " 'fill up the details' " "within the framework of the policy which the legislature has sufficiently defined." "If [the statute] were held valid," the Court continued, "it would be idle to pretend that anything would be left of limitations upon the power of the Congress to delegate its law-making function."
After Schechter Poultry and Panama Refining , Congress responded by writing a second wave of New Deal legislation more "[c]arefully crafted" to avoid the kind of problems that sank these early statutes. And since that time the Court hasn't held another statute to violate the separation of powers in the same way. Of course, no one thinks that the Court's quiescence can be attributed to an unwavering new tradition of more scrupulously drawn statutes. Some lament that the real cause may have to do with a mistaken "case of death by association" because Schechter Poultry and Panama Refining happened to be handed down during the same era as certain of the Court's now-discredited substantive due process decisions. But maybe the most likely explanation of all lies in the story of the evolving "intelligible principle" doctrine.
This Court first used that phrase in 1928 in J. W. Hampton, Jr., & Co. v. United States , where it remarked that a statute "lay[ing] down by legislative act an intelligible principle to which the [executive official]
is directed to conform" satisfies the separation of powers. No one at the time thought the phrase meant to effect some revolution in this Court's understanding of the Constitution. While the exact line between policy and details, lawmaking and fact-finding, and legislative and non-legislative functions had sometimes invited reasonable debate, everyone agreed these were the relevant inquiries. And when Chief Justice Taft wrote of an "intelligible principle," it seems plain enough that he sought only to explain the operation of these traditional tests; he gave no hint of a wish to overrule or revise them. Tellingly, too, he wrote the phrase seven years before Schechter Poultry and Panama Refining , and it did nothing to alter the analysis in those cases, let alone prevent those challenges from succeeding by lopsided votes.
There's a good argument, as well, that the statute in J. W. Hampton passed muster under the traditional tests. To boost American competitiveness in international trade, the legislation directed the President to " 'investigat[e]' " the relative costs of production for American companies and their foreign counterparts and impose tariffs or duties that would " 'equalize' " those costs. It also offered guidance on how to determine costs of production, listing several relevant factors and establishing a process for interested parties to submit evidence. The President's fact-finding responsibility may have required intricate calculations, but it could be argued that Congress had made all the relevant policy decisions, and the Court's reference to an "intelligible principle" was just another way to describe the traditional rule that Congress may leave the executive the responsibility to find facts and fill up details.
Still, it's undeniable that the "intelligible principle" remark eventually began to take on a life of its own. We sometimes chide people for treating judicial opinions as if they were statutes, divorcing a passing comment from its context, ignoring all that came before and after, and treating an isolated phrase as if it were controlling. But that seems to be exactly what happened here. For two decades, no one thought to invoke the "intelligible principle" comment as a basis to uphold a statute that would have failed more traditional separation-of-powers tests. In fact, the phrase sat more or less silently entombed until the late 1940s. Only then did lawyers begin digging it up in earnest and arguing to this Court that it had somehow displaced (sub silentio of course) all prior teachings in this area.
This mutated version of the "intelligible principle" remark has no basis in the original meaning of the Constitution, in history, or even in the decision from which it was plucked. Judges and scholars representing a wide and diverse range of views have condemned it as resting on "misunderst[ood]
historical foundations." They have explained, too, that it has been abused to permit delegations of legislative power that on any other conceivable account should be held unconstitutional. Indeed, where some have claimed to see "intelligible principles" many "less discerning readers [have been able only to] find gibberish." Even Justice Douglas, one of the fathers of the administrative state, came to criticize excessive congressional delegations in the period when the intelligible principle "test" began to take hold.
Still, the scope of the problem can be overstated. At least some of the results the Court has reached under the banner of the abused "intelligible principle" doctrine may be consistent with more traditional teachings. Some delegations have, at least arguably, implicated the president's inherent Article II authority. The Court has held, for example, that Congress may authorize the President to prescribe aggravating factors that permit a military court-martial to impose the death penalty on a member of the Armed Forces convicted of murder-a decision that may implicate in part the President's independent commander-in-chief authority. Others of these cases may have involved laws that specified rules governing private conduct but conditioned the application of those rules on fact-finding-a practice that is, as we've seen, also long associated with the executive function.
More recently, too, we've sought to tame misunderstandings of the intelligible principle "test." In Touby v. United States , the Court considered a provision of the Controlled Substances Act that allowed the Attorney General to add a substance to a list of prohibited drugs temporarily if he determined that doing so was " 'necessary to avoid an imminent hazard to the public safety.' " Notably, Congress required the Attorney General, before acting, to consider the drug's " 'history and current pattern of abuse,' " the " 'scope, duration, and significance of [that] abuse,' " and " '[w]hat, if any, risk there is to the public health.' " In approving the statute, the Court stressed all these constraints on the Attorney General's discretion and, in doing so, seemed to indicate that the statute supplied an "intelligible principle" because it assigned an essentially fact-finding responsibility to the executive. Whether or not one agrees with its characterization of the statute, in proceeding as it did Touby may have at least begun to point us back in the direction of the right questions. To determine whether a statute provides an intelligible principle, we must ask: Does the statute assign to the executive only the responsibility to make factual findings? Does it set forth the facts that the executive must consider and the criteria against which to measure them? And most importantly, did Congress, and not the Executive Branch, make the policy judgments? Only then can we fairly say that a statute contains the kind of intelligible principle the Constitution demands.
While it's been some time since the Court last held that a statute improperly delegated the legislative power to another branch-thanks in no small measure to the intelligible principle misadventure-the Court has hardly abandoned the business of policing improper legislative delegations. When one legal doctrine becomes unavailable to do its intended work, the hydraulic pressures of our constitutional system sometimes shift the responsibility to different doctrines. And that's exactly what's happened here. We still regularly rein in Congress's efforts to delegate legislative power; we just call what we're doing by different names.
Consider, for example, the "major questions" doctrine. Under our precedents, an agency can fill in statutory gaps where "statutory circumstances" indicate that Congress meant to grant it such powers. But we don't follow that rule when the "statutory gap" concerns "a question of deep 'economic and political significance' that is central to the statutory scheme." So we've rejected agency demands that we defer to their attempts to rewrite rules for billions of dollars in healthcare tax credits, to assume control over millions of small greenhouse gas sources, and to ban cigarettes. Although it is nominally a canon of statutory construction, we apply the major questions doctrine in service of the constitutional rule that Congress may not divest itself of its legislative power by transferring that power to an executive agency.
Consider, too, this Court's cases addressing vagueness. "A vague law," this Court has observed, "impermissibly delegates basic policy matters to policemen, judges, and juries for resolution on an ad hoc and subjective basis." And we have explained that our doctrine prohibiting vague laws is an outgrowth and "corollary of the separation of powers." It's easy to see, too, how most any challenge to a legislative delegation can be reframed as a vagueness complaint: A statute that does not contain "sufficiently definite and precise" standards "to enable Congress, the courts, and the public to ascertain" whether Congress's guidance has been followed at once presents a delegation problem and provides impermissibly vague guidance to affected citizens. And it seems little coincidence that our void-for-vagueness cases became much more common soon after the Court began relaxing its approach to legislative delegations. Before 1940, the Court decided only a handful of vagueness challenges to federal statutes. Since then, the phrase "void for vagueness" has appeared in our cases well over 100 times.
Nor have we abandoned enforcing other sides of the separation-of-powers triangle between the legislative, executive, and judiciary. We have not hesitated to prevent Congress from "confer[ring] the Government's 'judicial Power' on entities outside Article III." We've forbidden the executive from encroaching on legislative functions by wielding a line-item veto. We've prevented Congress from delegating its collective legislative power to a single House. And we've policed legislative efforts to control executive branch officials. These cases show that, when the separation of powers is at stake, we don't just throw up our hands. In all these areas, we recognize that abdication is "not part of the constitutional design." And abdication here would be no more appropriate. To leave this aspect of the constitutional structure alone undefended would serve only to accelerate the flight of power from the legislative to the executive branch, turning the latter into a vortex of authority that was constitutionally reserved for the people's representatives in order to protect their liberties.
III
A
Returning to SORNA with this understanding of our charge in hand, problems quickly emerge. Start with this one: It's hard to see how SORNA leaves the Attorney General with only details to fill up. Of course, what qualifies as a detail can sometimes be difficult to discern and, as we've seen, this Court has upheld statutes that allow federal agencies to resolve even highly consequential details so long as Congress prescribes the rule governing private conduct. But it's hard to see how the statute before us could be described as leaving the Attorney General with only details to dispatch. As the government itself admitted in Reynolds , SORNA leaves the Attorney General free to impose on 500,000 pre-Act offenders all of the statute's requirements, some of them, or none of them. The Attorney General may choose which pre-Act offenders to subject to the Act. And he is free to change his mind at any point or over the course of different political administrations. In the end, there isn't a single policy decision concerning pre-Act offenders on which Congress even tried to speak, and not a single other case where we have upheld executive authority over matters like these on the ground they constitute mere "details." This much appears to have been deliberate, too. Because members of Congress could not reach consensus on the treatment of pre-Act offenders, it seems this was one of those situations where they found it expedient to hand off the job to the executive and direct there the blame for any later problems that might emerge.
Nor can SORNA be described as an example of conditional legislation subject to executive fact-finding. To be sure, Congress could have easily written this law in that way. It might have required all pre-Act offenders to register, but then given the Attorney General the authority to make case-by-case exceptions for offenders who do not present an " 'imminent hazard to the public safety' " comparable to that posed by newly released post-Act offenders. It could have set criteria to inform that determination, too, asking the executive to investigate, say, whether an offender's risk of recidivism correlates with the time since his last offense, or whether multiple lesser offenses indicate higher or lower risks than a single greater offense.
But SORNA did none of this. Instead, it gave the Attorney General unfettered discretion to decide which requirements to impose on which pre-Act offenders. The Attorney General's own edicts acknowledge the considerable policy-making powers he enjoys, describing his rules governing pre-Act offenders as " 'of fundamental importance to the initial operation of SORNA, and to its practical scope ... since [they] determin[e] the applicability of SORNA's requirements to virtually the entire existing sex offender population.' " These edicts tout, too, the Attorney General's "discretion to apply SORNA's requirements to sex offenders with pre-SORNA convictions if he determines (as he has) that the public benefits of doing so outweigh any adverse effects." Far from deciding the factual predicates to a rule set forth by statute, the Attorney General himself acknowledges that the law entitles him to make his own policy decisions.
Finally, SORNA does not involve an area of overlapping authority with the executive.
Congress may assign the President broad authority regarding the conduct of foreign affairs or other matters where he enjoys his own inherent Article II powers. But SORNA stands far afield from any of that. It gives the Attorney General the authority to "prescrib[e] the rules by which the duties and rights" of citizens are determined, a quintessentially legislative power.
Our precedents confirm these conclusions. If allowing the President to draft a "cod[e] of fair competition" for slaughterhouses was "delegation running riot," then it's hard to see how giving the nation's chief prosecutor the power to write a criminal code rife with his own policy choices might be permissible. And if Congress may not give the President the discretion to ban or allow the interstate transportation of petroleum, then it's hard to see how Congress may give the Attorney General the discretion to apply or not apply any or all of SORNA's requirements to pre-Act offenders, and then change his mind at any time. If the separation of powers means anything, it must mean that Congress cannot give the executive branch a blank check to write a code of conduct governing private conduct for a half-million people.
The statute here also sounds all the alarms the founders left for us. Because Congress could not achieve the consensus necessary to resolve the hard problems associated with SORNA's application to pre-Act offenders, it passed the potato to the Attorney General. And freed from the need to assemble a broad supermajority for his views, the Attorney General did not hesitate to apply the statute retroactively to a politically unpopular minority. Nor could the Attorney General afford the issue the kind of deliberative care the framers designed a representative legislature to ensure. Perhaps that's part of the reason why the executive branch found itself rapidly adopting different positions across different administrations. And because SORNA vested lawmaking power in one person rather than many, it should be no surprise that, rather than few and stable, the edicts have proved frequent and shifting, with fair notice sacrificed in the process. Then, too, there is the question of accountability. In passing this statute, Congress was able to claim credit for "comprehensively" addressing the problem of the entire existing population of sex offenders (who can object to that?), while in fact leaving the Attorney General to sort it out.
It would be easy enough to let this case go. After all, sex offenders are one of the most disfavored groups in our society. But the rule that prevents Congress from giving the executive carte blanche to write laws for sex offenders is the same rule that protects everyone else. Nor is it hard to imagine how the power at issue in this case-the power of a prosecutor to require a group to register with the government on pain of weighty criminal penalties-could be abused in other settings. To allow the nation's chief law enforcement officer to write the criminal laws he is charged with enforcing-to " 'unit[e]' " the " 'legislative and executive powers ... in the same person' "-would be to mark the end of any meaningful enforcement of our separation of powers and invite the tyranny of the majority that follows when lawmaking and law enforcement responsibilities are united in the same hands.
Nor would enforcing the Constitution's demands spell doom for what some call the "administrative state." The separation of powers does not prohibit any particular policy outcome, let alone dictate any conclusion about the proper size and scope of government. Instead, it is a procedural guarantee that requires Congress to assemble a social consensus before choosing our nation's course on policy questions like those implicated by SORNA. What is more, Congress is hardly bereft of options to accomplish all it might wish to achieve. It may always authorize executive branch officials to fill in even a large number of details, to find facts that trigger the generally applicable rule of conduct specified in a statute, or to exercise non-legislative powers. Congress can also commission agencies or other experts to study and recommend legislative language. Respecting the separation of powers forecloses no substantive outcomes. It only requires us to respect along the way one of the most vital of the procedural protections of individual liberty found in our Constitution.
B
What do the government and the plurality have to say about the constitutional concerns SORNA poses? Most everyone, the plurality included, concedes that if SORNA allows the Attorney General as much authority as we have outlined, it would present "a nondelegation question." So the only remaining available tactic is to try to make this big case "small-bore" by recasting the statute in a way that might satisfy any plausible separation-of-powers test. So, yes, just a few years ago in Reynolds the government represented to this Court that SORNA granted the Attorney General nearly boundless discretion with respect to pre-Act offenders. But now , faced with a constitutional challenge, the government speaks out of the other side of its mouth and invites us to reimagine SORNA as compelling the Attorney General to register pre-Act offenders "to the maximum extent feasible." And, as thus reinvented, the government insists, the statute supplies a clear statement of legislative policy, with only details for the Attorney General to clean up.
But even this new dream of a statute wouldn't be free from doubt. A statute directing an agency to regulate private conduct to the extent "feasible" can have many possible meanings: It might refer to "technological" feasibility, "economic" feasibility, "administrative" feasibility, or even "political" feasibility. Such an "evasive standard" could threaten the separation of powers if it effectively allowed the agency to make the "important policy choices" that belong to Congress while frustrating "meaningful judicial review." And that seems exactly the case here, where the Attorney General is left free to make all the important policy decisions and it is difficult to see what standard a court might later use to judge whether he exceeded the bounds of the authority given to him.
But don't worry over that; return to the real world. The bigger problem is that the feasibility standard is a figment of the government's (very recent) imagination.
The only provision addressing pre-Act offenders, § 20913(d), says nothing about feasibility. And the omission can hardly be excused as some oversight: No one doubts that Congress knows exactly how to write a feasibility standard into law when it wishes. Unsurprisingly, too, the existence of some imaginary statutory feasibility standard seemed to have escaped notice at the Department of Justice during the Attorney General's many rulemakings; in those proceedings, as we have seen, the Attorney General has repeatedly admitted that the statute affords him the authority to "balance" the burdens on sex offenders with "public safety interests" as and how he sees fit.
Unable to muster a feasibility standard from the only statutory provision addressing pre-Act offenders, the plurality invites us to hunt in other and more unlikely corners. It points first to SORNA's "[d]eclaration of purpose," which announces that Congress, "[i]n order to protect the public from sex offenders and offenders against children ... establishes a comprehensive national system for the registration of those offenders." But nowhere is feasibility mentioned here either. In fact, this provision doesn't purport to guide the Attorney General's discretion at all. Instead, it simply declares what Congress believed the rest of the statute's enacted provisions had already "establishe[d]," without the need for any action by the Attorney General. And by now surely we must all agree that broad and sweeping statements like these about "a statute's 'basic purpose' are ... inadequate to overcome the words of its text regarding the specific issue under consideration." While those adopting SORNA might have declared that they hoped and wished for a "comprehensive national system," the fact remains that the law they actually adopted for pre-Act offenders leaves everything to the Attorney General. Hopes and dreams are not laws.
Besides, even if we were to pretend that § 20901 amounted to a directive telling the Attorney General to establish a "comprehensive national system" for pre-Act offenders, the plurality reads too much into the word "comprehensive." Comprehensive coverage does not mean coverage to the maximum extent feasible. "Comprehensive" means "having the attribute of comprising or including much; of large content or scope," "[i]nclusive of; embracing," or "[c]ontaining much in small compass; compendious." So, for example, a criminal justice system may be called "comprehensive" even though many crimes go unpursued. And SORNA itself contains all sorts of coverage exceptions for post-Act offenders yet claims to comprehensively address them. In the same way, no reason exists why SORNA might not also claim to address pre-Act offenders "comprehensively" even though the Attorney General is free to exercise his discretion to forgo registration for some, many, or maybe all of them. The statute still "comprehensively" addresses these persons by indicating they must abide whatever rules an Attorney General may choose. In all these ways, SORNA might be said to address sex offenders past, present, and future in a way that "compris[es] or includ[es] much," and that is "of large content or scope," but in a way that nevertheless delegates important policy decisions to the executive branch.
Finding it impossible to conscript the statute's declaration of purpose into doing the work it needs done, the government and plurality next ask us to turn to SORNA's definition of " 'sex offender.' " They emphasize that SORNA defines a "sex offender" as " 'an individual who was convicted of a sex offense' "-and, they note, pre-Act offenders meet this definition. Because pre-Act offenders fall within the definition of "sex offender[s]," the government and plurality continue, it follows that the Attorney General must ensure all of them are registered and subject to SORNA's demands.
That much, however, does not follow. To say that pre-Act sex offenders fall within the definition of "sex offenders" is merely a truism: Yes, of course, these people have already been convicted of sex offenses under state law. But whether these individuals are also subject to federal registration requirements is a different question entirely. And as we have seen, the only part of the statute that speaks to pre-Act sex offenders- § 20913(d) -makes plain that they are not automatically subject to all the Act's terms but are left to their fate at the hands of the Attorney General. Look at it this way: If the statute's definitional section were really enough to command the registration of all sex offenders, the Act would have had no need to proceed to explain, as it does at great length, when post- Act sex offenders must register and when they need not.
If that argument won't work, the plurality points us to § 20913(d)'s second clause, which grants the Attorney General the authority "to prescribe rules for the registration of ... sex offenders ... who are unable to comply" with the Act's initial registration requirements. According to the plurality, this language suggests that Congress expected the Attorney General to register pre-Act offenders to the maximum extent feasible. But, of course, this clause, too, says nothing of the sort. And the authority provided under § 20913(d)'s first clause-which gives the Attorney General the blanket authority "to specify the applicability of the requirements of this subchapter"-is additional to the authority granted under the second clause. So not only does the Attorney General have the authority to prescribe rules for the registration of pre-Act offenders under the second clause, he is free to specify which statutory requirements he does and does not wish to apply under the first clause. Far from suggesting a maximalist approach then, the second clause read in light of the first only serves to underscore the breadth of the Attorney General's discretion.
With so little in statutory text to work with, the government and the plurality "can't resist" highlighting certain statements from the Act's legislative history. But "legislative history is not the law." Still less can committee reports or statements by individual legislators be used "to muddy clear statutory language" like that before us. And even taken on their own terms, these statements do no more than confirm that some members of Congress hoped and wished that the Attorney General would exercise his discretion to register at least some pre-Act offenders. None of these snippets mentions a "feasibility" standard, and none can obscure the absence of such a standard in the law itself.
That leaves the plurality and the government to try to fish its feasibility standard from our decision in Reynolds . But Reynolds would make a difference only if it bound us as a matter of stare decisis to adopt an interpretation inconsistent with the statute's terms. And, of course, it does no such thing. The government and the plurality submit that Reynolds was premised on an understanding that Congress intended the statute to apply to pre-Act offenders to the maximum extent feasible. To support their reading they point to Reynolds ' surmise that Congress "may well have thought [that there could be] practical problems" with applying SORNA to pre-Act offenders and for that reason left their registration obligations to be sorted out by the Attorney General. But speculation about some of Congress's motives in adopting § 20913(d) aside, Reynolds plainly understood the statute itself as investing the Attorney General with sole power to decide whether and when to apply SORNA's requirements to pre-Act offenders.
*
Nothing found here can come as a surprise. In Reynolds , the government told this Court that SORNA supplies no standards regulating the Attorney General's treatment of pre-Act offenders. This Court agreed, and everyone proceeded with eyes open about the potential constitutional consequences; in fact, the dissent expressly warned that adopting such a broad construction of the statute would yield the separation-of-powers challenge we face today. Now, when the statute faces the chopping block, the government asks us to ignore its earlier arguments and reimagine (really, rewrite) the statute in a new and narrower way to avoid its long-predicted fate. No wonder some of us are not inclined to play along.
The only real surprise is that the Court fails to make good on the consequences the government invited, resolving nothing and deferring everything. In a future case with a full panel, I remain hopeful that the Court may yet recognize that, while Congress can enlist considerable assistance from the executive branch in filling up details and finding facts, it may never hand off to the nation's chief prosecutor the power to write his own criminal code. That "is delegation running riot."
Reynolds v. United States , 565 U.S. 432, 434, 132 S.Ct. 975, 181 L.Ed.2d 935 (2012).
34 U.S.C. §§ 20911, 20915(a).
§ 20913(b).
§ 20913(c).
§ 20913(e).
Logan, The Adam Walsh Act and the Failed Promise of Administrative Federalism, 78 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 993, 999-1000 (2010).
Id. , at 1003-1004.
Brief for United States in Reynolds v. United States , O. T. 2011, No. 106549, p. 23.
Id. , at 24.
Ibid.
Ibid.
See, e.g. , 72 Fed. Reg. 8894 (2007) ; 73 Fed. Reg. 38030 (2008) ; 76 Fed. Reg. 1639 (2011).
28 CFR § 72.3 (2007) ; 72 Fed. Reg. 8894.
See 73 Fed. Reg. 38030.
See 76 Fed. Reg. 1639.
Compare 73 Fed. Reg. 38036 (no credit given) with 75 Fed. Reg. 81851 (full credit given).
The Federalist No. 78, p. 465 (C. Rossiter ed. 1961) (A. Hamilton).
Fletcher v. Peck , 10 U.S. (6 Cranch) 87, 136, 3 L.Ed. 162 (1810) ; see also J. Locke, The Second Treatise of Civil Government and a Letter Concerning Toleration § 22, p. 13 (1947) (Locke, Second Treatise); 1 W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 44 (1765).
Marshall Field & Co. v. Clark , 143 U.S. 649, 692, 12 S.Ct. 495, 36 L.Ed. 294 (1892).
Wayman v. Southard , 23 U.S. (10 Wheat.) 1, 42-43, 6 L.Ed. 253 (1825).
Locke, Second Treatise § 141, at 71.
The Federalist No. 48, at 309-312 (J. Madison).
Id. , No. 62, at 378. See also id ., No. 73, at 441-442 (Hamilton); Locke, Second Treatise § 143.
The Federalist No. 73, at 443.
Id. , No. 51, at 322 (Madison); D. Schoenbrod, Power Without Responsibility 29 (1993) (Schoenbrod).
The Federalist No. 51, at 322. See also id. , No. 84, at 515 (Hamilton).
Id. , No. 62, at 378-380.
Schoenbrod 99; see also The Federalist No. 50, at 316 (Madison).
Lawson, Delegation and Original Meaning, 88 Va. L. Rev. 327, 340 (2002).
The Federalist No. 47, at 303 (Madison); id. , No. 62, at 378 (same).
Rao, Administrative Collusion: How Delegation Diminishes the Collective Congress, 90 N. Y. U. L. Rev. 1463, 1478 (2015). See also B. Iancu, Legislative Delegation: The Erosion of Normative Limits in Modern Constitutionalism 87 (2012).
The Federalist No. 47, at 302 (Madison). Accord, 1 Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, at 142; see also Cass, Delegation Reconsidered: A Delegation Doctrine for the Modern Administrative State, 40 Harv. J. L. & Pub. Pol'y 147, 153 (2016).
The Federalist No. 78, at 470.
Id. , No. 37, at 228 (Madison).
Wayman , 10 Wheat. at 46.
Id. , at 31, 43.
165 U.S. 526, 532, 17 S.Ct. 444, 41 L.Ed. 813 (1897).
United States v. Grimaud , 220 U.S. 506, 522, 31 S.Ct. 480, 55 L.Ed. 563 (1911). See also Buttfield v. Stranahan , 192 U.S. 470, 496, 24 S.Ct. 349, 48 L.Ed. 525 (1904) ; ICC v. Goodrich Transit Co. , 224 U.S. 194, 210, 215, 32 S.Ct. 436, 56 L.Ed. 729 (1912).
Yakus v. United States , 321 U.S. 414, 426, 64 S.Ct. 660, 88 L.Ed. 834 (1944).
11 U.S. (7 Cranch) 382, 388, 3 L.Ed. 378 (1813) (emphasis added).
Miller v. Mayor of New York , 109 U.S. 385, 393, 3 S.Ct. 228, 27 L.Ed. 971 (1883).
See Loving v. United States , 517 U.S. 748, 768, 116 S.Ct. 1737, 135 L.Ed.2d 36 (1996) ; id. , at 776, 116 S.Ct. 1737 (Scalia, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment); United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corp. , 299 U.S. 304, 320, 57 S.Ct. 216, 81 L.Ed. 255 (1936) ; Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer , 343 U.S. 579, 635, 72 S.Ct. 863, 96 L.Ed. 1153 (1952) (Jackson, J., concurring).
Schoenbrod, The Delegation Doctrine: Could the Court Give It Substance? 83 Mich. L. Rev. 1223, 1260 (1985).
10 Wheat. at 43.
295 U.S. 495, 521-522, 55 S.Ct. 837, 79 L.Ed. 1570 (1935).
See State Oil Co. v. Khan , 522 U.S. 3, 21, 118 S.Ct. 275, 139 L.Ed.2d 199 (1997) ; National Soc. of Professional Engineers v. United States , 435 U.S. 679, 688, 98 S.Ct. 1355, 55 L.Ed.2d 637 (1978) ; Letwin, The English Common Law Concerning Monopolies, 21 U. Chi. L. Rev. 355 (1954).
See A. Shlaes, The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression 214-225 (2007).
Schechter Poultry , 295 U.S. at 553, 55 S.Ct. 837 (concurring opinion).
Panama Refining Co. v. Ryan , 293 U.S. 388, 415, 418, 430, 55 S.Ct. 241, 79 L.Ed. 446 (1935).
Id. , at 426, 55 S.Ct. 241.
Id. , at 426, 55 S.Ct. 241 (quoting Wayman , 10 Wheat. at 43 ); 293 U.S. at 429, 55 S.Ct. 241.
Id. , at 430, 55 S.Ct. 241.
M. McKenna, Franklin Roosevelt and the Great Constitutional War: The Court-Packing Crisis of 1937, p. 424 (2002).
J. Ely, Democracy and Distrust: A Theory of Judicial Review 133 (1980).
276 U.S. 394, 409, 48 S.Ct. 348, 72 L.Ed. 624 (1928).
Id. , at 401, 48 S.Ct. 348.
Id. , at 401-402.
But see Department of Transportation v. Association of American Railroads , 575 U.S. 43, ----, ----, and n. 4, 135 S.Ct. 1225, 1247, 1249, and n. 4, 191 L.Ed.2d 153 (2015) (THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment).
See, e.g. , Reiter v. Sonotone Corp. , 442 U.S. 330, 341, 99 S.Ct. 2326, 60 L.Ed.2d 931 (1979).
See, e.g. , Lichter v. United States , 334 U.S. 742, 785, 68 S.Ct. 1294, 92 L.Ed. 1694 (1948) (upholding a statute authorizing the executive to define " 'excessive profits' " earned by military contractors on the basis that the statute contained an " 'intelligible principle' ").
Association of American Railroads , 575 U.S., at ----, 135 S.Ct., at 1249 (THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment). See also n. 62, infra (collecting sources).
Lawson, 88 Va. L. Rev., at 329. See also Mistretta v. United States , 488 U.S. 361, 415-417, 109 S.Ct. 647, 102 L.Ed.2d 714 (1989) (Scalia, J., dissenting); Ely, supra , at 132 ("[B]y refusing to legislate, our legislators are escaping the sort of accountability that is crucial to the intelligible functioning of a democratic republic"); Wright, Beyond Discretionary Justice, 81 Yale L. J. 575, 583 (1972) ("[T]he delegation doctrine retains an important potential as a check on the exercise of unbounded, standardless discretion by administrative agencies"); Michigan Gambling Opposition v. Kempthorne , 525 F.3d 23, 34 (CADC 2008) (Brown, J., dissenting) ("[The majority] conjures standards and limits from thin air to construct a supposed intelligible principle") (collecting cases); Schoenbrod, 83 Mich. L. Rev., at 1231 ("[T]he [intelligible principle] test has become so ephemeral and elastic as to lose its meaning"); Schwartz, Of Administrators and Philosopher-Kings: The Republic, the Laws, and Delegations of Power, 72 Nw. U. L. Rev. 443, 446 (1977) ("[T]he requirement of defined standards has ... become all but a vestigial euphemism"); P. Hamburger, Is Administrative Law Unlawful? 378 (2014) ("[T]he notion of an 'intelligible principle' sets a ludicrously low standard for what Congress must supply"); M. Redish, The Constitution as Political Structure 138-139 (1995); Gewirtz, The Courts, Congress, and Executive Policy-Making: Notes on Three Doctrines, 40 Law & Contemp. Prob., pt. 2, pp. 46, 50-51 (Summer 1976); McGowan, Congress, Court, and Control of Delegated Power, 77 Colum. L. Rev. 1119, 1127-1128, and n. 33 (1977).
"Washington, D. C., is filled with lobbyists for every special interest that is trying to make a fast buck out of some piece of the public domain.... In the thirties and forties I had viewed the creation of an agency as the solution of a problem. I learned that agencies soon became spokesmen for the status quo, that few had the guts to carry through the reforms assigned to them. I also realized that Congress defaulted when it left it up to an agency to do what the 'public interest' indicated should be done. 'Public interest' is too vague a standard to be left to free-wheeling administrators. They should be more closely confined to specific ends or goals." W. Douglas, Go East, Young Man 216-217 (1974).
Loving , 517 U.S. at 771-774, 116 S.Ct. 1737.
See, e.g. , Skinner v. Mid-America Pipeline Co. , 490 U.S. 212, 215, 219-220, 109 S.Ct. 1726, 104 L.Ed.2d 250 (1989) (statute directing Secretary of Transportation to establish pipeline safety user fees " 'sufficient to meet the costs of [specified] activities' " but not " 'exceed[ing] 105 percent of the aggregate of appropriations made for such fiscal year for activities to be funded by such fees' ").
500 U.S. 160, 166, 111 S.Ct. 1752, 114 L.Ed.2d 219 (1991).
Ibid.
See, e.g. , McDonald v. Chicago , 561 U.S. 742, 758, 130 S.Ct. 3020, 177 L.Ed.2d 894 (2010) (incorporating the Second Amendment through the Due Process Clause instead of the Privileges or Immunities Clause).
United States v. Mead Corp. , 533 U.S. 218, 229, 121 S.Ct. 2164, 150 L.Ed.2d 292 (2001).
King v. Burwell , 576 U.S. ----, ----, 135 S.Ct. 2480, 2488-2489, 192 L.Ed.2d 483 (2015).
Ibid.
Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA , 573 U.S. 302, 324, 134 S.Ct. 2427, 189 L.Ed.2d 372 (2014).
FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. , 529 U.S. 120, 159-160, 120 S.Ct. 1291, 146 L.Ed.2d 121 (2000).
Grayned v. City of Rockford , 408 U.S. 104, 108-109, 92 S.Ct. 2294, 33 L.Ed.2d 222 (1972) ; see Kolender v. Lawson , 461 U.S. 352, 358, n. 7, 103 S.Ct. 1855, 75 L.Ed.2d 903 (1983) ; Sessions v. Dimaya , 584 U.S. ----, ---- - ----, 138 S.Ct. 1204, 1226-1228, 200 L.Ed.2d 549 (2018) (GORSUCH, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment).
Id ., at ---- - ----, 138 S.Ct., at 1212-1213 (opinion of KAGAN, J.).
Yakus , 321 U.S. at 426, 64 S.Ct. 660.
Stern v. Marshall , 564 U.S. 462, 484, 131 S.Ct. 2594, 180 L.Ed.2d 475 (2011) ; Plaut v. Spendthrift Farm, Inc. , 514 U.S. 211, 225-226, 115 S.Ct. 1447, 131 L.Ed.2d 328 (1995).
Clinton v. City of New York , 524 U.S. 417, 449, 118 S.Ct. 2091, 141 L.Ed.2d 393 (1998).
INS v. Chadha , 462 U.S. 919, 103 S.Ct. 2764, 77 L.Ed.2d 317 (1983).
Free Enterprise Fund v. Public Company Accounting Oversight Bd. , 561 U.S. 477, 496-497, 130 S.Ct. 3138, 177 L.Ed.2d 706 (2010) ; Lucia v. SEC , 585 U.S. ----, 138 S.Ct. 2044, 201 L.Ed.2d 464 (2018).
Clinton , 524 U.S. at 452, 118 S.Ct. 2091 (Kennedy, J., concurring).
Cf. Touby , 500 U.S. at 166, 111 S.Ct. 1752.
75 Fed. Reg. 81850 (quoting 72 Fed. Reg. 8896 ).
75 Fed. Reg. 81850.
The Federalist No. 78, at 465 (Hamilton); see also Part II-A, supra .
Schechter Poultry , 295 U.S. at 552-553, 55 S.Ct. 837 (Cardozo, J., concurring).
Panama Refining , 293 U.S. at 430, 55 S.Ct. 241.
The Federalist No. 47, at 302.
Ante , at 2123 - 2124.
Ante, at 2129 - 2130.
Industrial Union Dept., AFL-CIO v. American Petroleum Institute , 448 U.S. 607, 676, 685-686, 100 S.Ct. 2844, 65 L.Ed.2d 1010 (1980) (Rehnquist, J., concurring in judgment).
See, e.g. , 42 U.S.C. §§ 1310(b)(2)(C), 1383b(e)(2)(B) ; 20 U.S.C. § 3509 ; 49 U.S.C. § 24201(a)(1).
75 Fed. Reg. 81851-81852.
34 U.S.C. § 20901. See also ante , at 2126 - 2127.
Mertens v. Hewitt Associates , 508 U.S. 248, 261, 113 S.Ct. 2063, 124 L.Ed.2d 161 (1993) (emphasis deleted).
3 Oxford English Dictionary 632 (2d ed. 1989).
See, e.g. , 34 U.S.C. §§ 20911(7)(A)-(B), (8), 20915(a), (b)(1).
Ante , at 2127 - 2128.
Ibid.
Ante , at 2128.
See ante , at 2127 - 2128.
Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis , 584 U.S. ----, ---- (2018) (slip op., at 23).
Milner v. Department of Navy , 562 U.S. 562, 572, 131 S.Ct. 1259, 179 L.Ed.2d 268 (2011).
Reynolds , 565 U.S. at 440-441, 132 S.Ct. 975.
Id. , at 445, 132 S.Ct. 975 (holding that "the Act's registration requirements do not apply to pre-Act offenders until the Attorney General so specifies"); id. , at 439, 132 S.Ct. 975 (rejecting argument that any SORNA requirements apply to pre-Act offenders "before the Attorney General validly specifies" they do); id. , at 440-441, 132 S.Ct. 975 (observing that the Attorney General might conclude that "different federal registration treatment of different categories of pre-Act offenders" is "warranted").
See id. , at 450, 132 S.Ct. 975 (Scalia, J., dissenting).
Schechter Poultry , 295 U.S. at 553, 55 S.Ct. 837 (Cardozo, J., concurring). | What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify the reason, if any, given by the court for granting the petition for certiorari. | What reason, if any, does the court give for granting the petition for certiorari? | [
"case did not arise on cert or cert not granted",
"federal court conflict",
"federal court conflict and to resolve important or significant question",
"putative conflict",
"conflict between federal court and state court",
"state court conflict",
"federal court confusion or uncertainty",
"state court confusion or uncertainty",
"federal court and state court confusion or uncertainty",
"to resolve important or significant question",
"to resolve question presented",
"no reason given",
"other reason"
] | [
10
] | sc_certreason |
LOUISIANA POWER & LIGHT CO. v. CITY OF THIBODAUX.
No. 398.
Argued April 2, 1959.
Decided June 8, 1959.
J. Raburn Monroe argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the brief were /. Blanc Monroe, Monte M. Lemann, Malcolm L. Monroe and Andrew P. Carter.
Louis Fenner Claiborne argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was Remy Chiasson.
Mr. Justice Frankfurter
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The City of Thibodaux, Louisiana, filed a petition for expropriation in one of the Louisiana District Courts, asserting a taking of the land, buildings, and equipment of petitioner Power and Light Company. Petitioner, a Florida corporation, removed the case to the United States District Court for the Eastern District.of Louisiana on the basis of diversity of citizenship. After a .pre-trial conference in which various aspects of the case were discussed, the district judge, on his own motion, ordered that “Further proceedings herein, therefore, will be stayed until the Supreme Court of Louisiana has been afforded an opportunity to interpret Act 111 of 1900,” the authority on which the city's expropriation order was based. 153 F. Supp. 515, 517-518. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reversed, holding that the procedure adopted by the district judge was not available in an expropriation proceeding, and that in any event no exceptional circumstances were present to justify the procedure even if available. 255 F. 2d 774. We granted certiorari, 358 U. S. 893, because of the importance of the question in the judicial enforcement of the power of eminent domain under diversity jurisdiction.
In connection with the first decision in which a closely divided Court considered and upheld jurisdiction over an eminent domain proceeding removed to the federal courts on the basis of diversity of citizenship, Madisonville Traction Co. v. St. Bernard Mining Co., 196 U. S. 239, 257, Mr. Justice Holmes made the following observation:
“The fundamental fact is that eminent domain is a prerogative of the State, which on the one hand may be exercised in any way that the State thinks fit, and on the other may not be exercised except by an authority which the State confers.”
While this was said in the dissenting opinion, the distinction between expropriation proceedings and ordinary diversity cases, though found insufficient to restrict diversity jurisdiction, remains a relevant and important consideration in the appropriate judicial administration of such actions in the federal courts.
We have increasingly recognized the wisdom of slaying actións in the federal courts pending determination by a state court of decisive issues of state law. Thus in Railroad Comm’n v. Pullman Co., 312 U. S. 496, 499, it was said:
“Had we or they [the lower court judges] no choice in the matter but to decide what is the law of the state, we should hésitatVlong before rejecting their forecast of Texas law. But no matter how seasoned the judgment of the district court may be, it cannot escape being a forecast rather than a determination.”
On the other hand, we have held that the mere difficulty of state law does not justify a federal court’s relinquishment of jurisdiction in favor of state court action. Meredith v. Winter Haven, 320 U. S. 228, 236. But where the issue touched upon the relationship of City to State, Chicago v. Fieldcrest Dairies, Inc., 316 U. S. 168, or involved the scope of a previously uninterpreted state statute which, if applicable, was of questionable constitutionality, Leiter Minerals, Inc., v. United States, 352 U. S. 220, 229, we have required District Courts, and not merely sanctioned an exercise of their discretionary power, to stay their proceedings pending the submission of the state law question to state determination.
These prior cases have been cases in equity, but they did not apply a technical rule of equity procedure. They reflect a deeper policy derived from our federalism. We have drawn upon the judicial discretion of the chancellor to decline jurisdiction over a part or all of a case brought before him. See Railroad Comm’n v. Pullman Co., supra. Although an eminent domain proceeding is deemqd for certain purposes of legal classification a “suit at common, law,” Kohl v. United States, 91 U. S. 367, 375-376, it is of a special and peculiar nature. Mr. Justice Holmes set forth one differentiating characteristic of eminent domain: it is intimately involved with sovereign prerogative. And when, as here, a city’s power to condemn is challenged, a further aspect of sovereignty is introduced. A determination of the nature and extent of delegation of the power of eminent domain concerns the apportionment of governmental powers between City and State. The issues normally turn on legislation with much local variation interpreted in local settings. The considerations that prevailed in conventional equity suits for avoiding the hazards of serious disruption by federal courts of state government or needless friction between state and federal authorities are similarly appropriate in a state eminent domain proceeding brought in, or removed to, a federal court.
The special nature of eminent domain justifies a district judge, when his familiarity with the problems of local law so counsels him, to ascertain the meaning of a.disputed state statute from the only tribunal empowered to speak definitively — the courts of the State under whose statute eminent domain is sought to be exercised — rather than himself make a .dubious and tentative forecast. This course does not constitute abnegation of judicial duty. On the contrary, it is a wise and productive discharge of it. There is only postponement of decision for its best fruition. Eventually the District Court will award compensation ,if the taking is sustained. If for some reason a declaratory judgment is not promptly sought from the state courts and obtained within a reasonable time, the District Court, having retained complete control of the litigation, will doubtless assert it to decide also the question of the meaning of the state statute. The justification for this power, to be exercised within the indicated limits, lies in regard for the respective competence of the state and federal court systems and for the maintenance of harmonious federal-state relations in a matter close to the political interests of a State.
It would imply an unworthy conception of the federal judiciary to give weight to the suggestion that acknowledgment of this power will tempt some otiose or timid judge to shuffle off responsibility. “Such apprehension implies a lack of discipline and of disinterestedness on the part of the lower courts, hardly a worthy or wise basis for fashioning rules of procedure.” Kerotest Mfg. Co. v. C-O-Two Fire Equipment Co., 342 U. S. 180, 185. Procedures for effective judicial administration presuppose a .federal judiciary composed of judges well-equipped and of sturdy character in whom may safely be vested, as is already, a wide range of. judicial discretion, subject to appropriate review on appeal.
In light of these considerations, the immediate situation quickly falls into place. In providing on his own motion for a stay in this case, an experienced district judge was responding in a sensible way to a quandary about the power of the City of Thibodaux into which he was placed by an opinion of the Attorney General of Louisiana in which it was concluded that in a strikingly similar case a Louisiana city did not have the power here claimed by the City. A Louisiana statute apparently seems to grant such a power. But that statute has never been interpreted, in respect to a situation like that before the judge, by the Louisiana courts and it would not be the first time that the authoritative tribunal has found in a statute less than meets the outsider’s eye. Informed local courts may find meaning not discernible to the outsider. The consequence of allowing this to come to pass would be that this case would be the only case in which the Louisiana statute is construed as we would, construe it, whereas the rights of all''other litigants would be thereafter governed -by a decision of the Supreme Court of Louisiana quite different from ours.
Caught between the language of an old but uninterpreted statute and the pronouncement of the Attorney General of Louisiana, the district judge determined to solve his conscientious perplexity by directing utilization of the legal resources of Louisiana for a prompt ascertainment of meaning through the only tribunal whose interpretation could be controlling — the Supreme Court of Louisiana. The District Court was thus exercising a fair and well-considered judicial discretion in staying proceedings pending the institution of a declaratory judgment action and subsequent decision by the Supreme Court of Louisiana.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed and the stay order of the district Court reinstated. We assume that both,parties will cooperate in taking prompt and effective steps to secure a declaratory judgment under the Louisiana Declaratory Judgment Act, La. Rev. Stat., 1950, Tit. 13, §-§ 4231-4246, and a review of that judgment by the Supreme Court of Louisiana. By retaining the case the District Court, of course, reserves power to take such steps as may be necessary for the just disposition of the litigation should anything prevent a prompt state court determination.
Reversed.
In the petition for certiorari there was also raised the question of the appealability of the District Court’s order. In our grant of the writ we eliminated this question by limiting the scope of review. 358 U. S. 893.
The issue in Meredith v. Winter Haven, 320 U. S. 228, is, of course, decisively different from the issue now before 'the Court. Here the issue is whether an experienced district judge, especially conversant with Louisiana law, who, when troubled with the construction which Louisiana courts may give to a Louisiana statute, himself initiates the taking of appropriate measures for securing construction of this doubtful and unsettled statute, (and not at all in response to any alleged attempt by petitioner to delay a decision by that judge), should be jurisdictionally disabled from seeking the controlling light of the Louisiana Supreme Court. The issue in Winter Haven was not that. It was whether jurisdiction must be surrendered to the state court. At the very outset of his opinion Mr. Chief Justice Stone stated this issue:
“The question is whether the Circuit Court of Appeals, on appeal from the judgment of the District Court, rightly declined to exercise its jurisdiction on the ground that decision of the case on the merits turned on questions of Florida constitutional and statutory law which the decisions of the Florida courts had left in a state of uncertainty.” 320 U. S., at 229.
In Winter Haven the Court of Appeals directed the action to be dismissed. In this case the Court of Appeals .denied a conscientious exercise by the federal district judge of his discretionary power merely to stay disposition of a retained case until he could get controlling light from the state court. | What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify the respondent of the case. The respondent is the party being sued or tried and is also known as the appellee. Characterize the respondent as the Court's opinion identifies them.
Identify the respondent by the label given to the party in the opinion or judgment of the Court except where the Reports title a party as the "United States" or as a named state. Textual identification of parties is typically provided prior to Part I of the Court's opinion. The official syllabus, the summary that appears on the title page of the case, may be consulted as well. In describing the parties, the Court employs terminology that places them in the context of the specific lawsuit in which they are involved. For example, "employer" rather than "business" in a suit by an employee; as a "minority," "female," or "minority female" employee rather than "employee" in a suit alleging discrimination by an employer.
Also note that the Court's characterization of the parties applies whether the respondent is actually single entitiy or whether many other persons or legal entities have associated themselves with the lawsuit. That is, the presence of the phrase, et al., following the name of a party does not preclude the Court from characterizing that party as though it were a single entity. Thus, identify a single respondent, regardless of how many legal entities were actually involved. If a state (or one of its subdivisions) is a party, note only that a state is a party, not the state's name. | Who is the respondent of the case? | [
"attorney general of the United States, or his office",
"specified state board or department of education",
"city, town, township, village, or borough government or governmental unit",
"state commission, board, committee, or authority",
"county government or county governmental unit, except school district",
"court or judicial district",
"state department or agency",
"governmental employee or job applicant",
"female governmental employee or job applicant",
"minority governmental employee or job applicant",
"minority female governmental employee or job applicant",
"not listed among agencies in the first Administrative Action variable",
"retired or former governmental employee",
"U.S. House of Representatives",
"interstate compact",
"judge",
"state legislature, house, or committee",
"local governmental unit other than a county, city, town, township, village, or borough",
"governmental official, or an official of an agency established under an interstate compact",
"state or U.S. supreme court",
"local school district or board of education",
"U.S. Senate",
"U.S. senator",
"foreign nation or instrumentality",
"state or local governmental taxpayer, or executor of the estate of",
"state college or university",
"United States",
"State",
"person accused, indicted, or suspected of crime",
"advertising business or agency",
"agent, fiduciary, trustee, or executor",
"airplane manufacturer, or manufacturer of parts of airplanes",
"airline",
"distributor, importer, or exporter of alcoholic beverages",
"alien, person subject to a denaturalization proceeding, or one whose citizenship is revoked",
"American Medical Association",
"National Railroad Passenger Corp.",
"amusement establishment, or recreational facility",
"arrested person, or pretrial detainee",
"attorney, or person acting as such;includes bar applicant or law student, or law firm or bar association",
"author, copyright holder",
"bank, savings and loan, credit union, investment company",
"bankrupt person or business, or business in reorganization",
"establishment serving liquor by the glass, or package liquor store",
"water transportation, stevedore",
"bookstore, newsstand, printer, bindery, purveyor or distributor of books or magazines",
"brewery, distillery",
"broker, stock exchange, investment or securities firm",
"construction industry",
"bus or motorized passenger transportation vehicle",
"business, corporation",
"buyer, purchaser",
"cable TV",
"car dealer",
"person convicted of crime",
"tangible property, other than real estate, including contraband",
"chemical company",
"child, children, including adopted or illegitimate",
"religious organization, institution, or person",
"private club or facility",
"coal company or coal mine operator",
"computer business or manufacturer, hardware or software",
"consumer, consumer organization",
"creditor, including institution appearing as such; e.g., a finance company",
"person allegedly criminally insane or mentally incompetent to stand trial",
"defendant",
"debtor",
"real estate developer",
"disabled person or disability benefit claimant",
"distributor",
"person subject to selective service, including conscientious objector",
"drug manufacturer",
"druggist, pharmacist, pharmacy",
"employee, or job applicant, including beneficiaries of",
"employer-employee trust agreement, employee health and welfare fund, or multi-employer pension plan",
"electric equipment manufacturer",
"electric or hydroelectric power utility, power cooperative, or gas and electric company",
"eleemosynary institution or person",
"environmental organization",
"employer. If employer's relations with employees are governed by the nature of the employer's business (e.g., railroad, boat), rather than labor law generally, the more specific designation is used in place of Employer.",
"farmer, farm worker, or farm organization",
"father",
"female employee or job applicant",
"female",
"movie, play, pictorial representation, theatrical production, actor, or exhibitor or distributor of",
"fisherman or fishing company",
"food, meat packing, or processing company, stockyard",
"foreign (non-American) nongovernmental entity",
"franchiser",
"franchisee",
"lesbian, gay, bisexual, transexual person or organization",
"person who guarantees another's obligations",
"handicapped individual, or organization of devoted to",
"health organization or person, nursing home, medical clinic or laboratory, chiropractor",
"heir, or beneficiary, or person so claiming to be",
"hospital, medical center",
"husband, or ex-husband",
"involuntarily committed mental patient",
"Indian, including Indian tribe or nation",
"insurance company, or surety",
"inventor, patent assigner, trademark owner or holder",
"investor",
"injured person or legal entity, nonphysically and non-employment related",
"juvenile",
"government contractor",
"holder of a license or permit, or applicant therefor",
"magazine",
"male",
"medical or Medicaid claimant",
"medical supply or manufacturing co.",
"racial or ethnic minority employee or job applicant",
"minority female employee or job applicant",
"manufacturer",
"management, executive officer, or director, of business entity",
"military personnel, or dependent of, including reservist",
"mining company or miner, excluding coal, oil, or pipeline company",
"mother",
"auto manufacturer",
"newspaper, newsletter, journal of opinion, news service",
"radio and television network, except cable tv",
"nonprofit organization or business",
"nonresident",
"nuclear power plant or facility",
"owner, landlord, or claimant to ownership, fee interest, or possession of land as well as chattels",
"shareholders to whom a tender offer is made",
"tender offer",
"oil company, or natural gas producer",
"elderly person, or organization dedicated to the elderly",
"out of state noncriminal defendant",
"political action committee",
"parent or parents",
"parking lot or service",
"patient of a health professional",
"telephone, telecommunications, or telegraph company",
"physician, MD or DO, dentist, or medical society",
"public interest organization",
"physically injured person, including wrongful death, who is not an employee",
"pipe line company",
"package, luggage, container",
"political candidate, activist, committee, party, party member, organization, or elected official",
"indigent, needy, welfare recipient",
"indigent defendant",
"private person",
"prisoner, inmate of penal institution",
"professional organization, business, or person",
"probationer, or parolee",
"protester, demonstrator, picketer or pamphleteer (non-employment related), or non-indigent loiterer",
"public utility",
"publisher, publishing company",
"radio station",
"racial or ethnic minority",
"person or organization protesting racial or ethnic segregation or discrimination",
"racial or ethnic minority student or applicant for admission to an educational institution",
"realtor",
"journalist, columnist, member of the news media",
"resident",
"restaurant, food vendor",
"retarded person, or mental incompetent",
"retired or former employee",
"railroad",
"private school, college, or university",
"seller or vendor",
"shipper, including importer and exporter",
"shopping center, mall",
"spouse, or former spouse",
"stockholder, shareholder, or bondholder",
"retail business or outlet",
"student, or applicant for admission to an educational institution",
"taxpayer or executor of taxpayer's estate, federal only",
"tenant or lessee",
"theater, studio",
"forest products, lumber, or logging company",
"person traveling or wishing to travel abroad, or overseas travel agent",
"trucking company, or motor carrier",
"television station",
"union member",
"unemployed person or unemployment compensation applicant or claimant",
"union, labor organization, or official of",
"veteran",
"voter, prospective voter, elector, or a nonelective official seeking reapportionment or redistricting of legislative districts (POL)",
"wholesale trade",
"wife, or ex-wife",
"witness, or person under subpoena",
"network",
"slave",
"slave-owner",
"bank of the united states",
"timber company",
"u.s. job applicants or employees",
"Army and Air Force Exchange Service",
"Atomic Energy Commission",
"Secretary or administrative unit or personnel of the U.S. Air Force",
"Department or Secretary of Agriculture",
"Alien Property Custodian",
"Secretary or administrative unit or personnel of the U.S. Army",
"Board of Immigration Appeals",
"Bureau of Indian Affairs",
"Bonneville Power Administration",
"Benefits Review Board",
"Civil Aeronautics Board",
"Bureau of the Census",
"Central Intelligence Agency",
"Commodity Futures Trading Commission",
"Department or Secretary of Commerce",
"Comptroller of Currency",
"Consumer Product Safety Commission",
"Civil Rights Commission",
"Civil Service Commission, U.S.",
"Customs Service or Commissioner of Customs",
"Defense Base Closure and REalignment Commission",
"Drug Enforcement Agency",
"Department or Secretary of Defense (and Department or Secretary of War)",
"Department or Secretary of Energy",
"Department or Secretary of the Interior",
"Department of Justice or Attorney General",
"Department or Secretary of State",
"Department or Secretary of Transportation",
"Department or Secretary of Education",
"U.S. Employees' Compensation Commission, or Commissioner",
"Equal Employment Opportunity Commission",
"Environmental Protection Agency or Administrator",
"Federal Aviation Agency or Administration",
"Federal Bureau of Investigation or Director",
"Federal Bureau of Prisons",
"Farm Credit Administration",
"Federal Communications Commission (including a predecessor, Federal Radio Commission)",
"Federal Credit Union Administration",
"Food and Drug Administration",
"Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation",
"Federal Energy Administration",
"Federal Election Commission",
"Federal Energy Regulatory Commission",
"Federal Housing Administration",
"Federal Home Loan Bank Board",
"Federal Labor Relations Authority",
"Federal Maritime Board",
"Federal Maritime Commission",
"Farmers Home Administration",
"Federal Parole Board",
"Federal Power Commission",
"Federal Railroad Administration",
"Federal Reserve Board of Governors",
"Federal Reserve System",
"Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation",
"Federal Trade Commission",
"Federal Works Administration, or Administrator",
"General Accounting Office",
"Comptroller General",
"General Services Administration",
"Department or Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare",
"Department or Secretary of Health and Human Services",
"Department or Secretary of Housing and Urban Development",
"Interstate Commerce Commission",
"Indian Claims Commission",
"Immigration and Naturalization Service, or Director of, or District Director of, or Immigration and Naturalization Enforcement",
"Internal Revenue Service, Collector, Commissioner, or District Director of",
"Information Security Oversight Office",
"Department or Secretary of Labor",
"Loyalty Review Board",
"Legal Services Corporation",
"Merit Systems Protection Board",
"Multistate Tax Commission",
"National Aeronautics and Space Administration",
"Secretary or administrative unit of the U.S. Navy",
"National Credit Union Administration",
"National Endowment for the Arts",
"National Enforcement Commission",
"National Highway Traffic Safety Administration",
"National Labor Relations Board, or regional office or officer",
"National Mediation Board",
"National Railroad Adjustment Board",
"Nuclear Regulatory Commission",
"National Security Agency",
"Office of Economic Opportunity",
"Office of Management and Budget",
"Office of Price Administration, or Price Administrator",
"Office of Personnel Management",
"Occupational Safety and Health Administration",
"Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission",
"Office of Workers' Compensation Programs",
"Patent Office, or Commissioner of, or Board of Appeals of",
"Pay Board (established under the Economic Stabilization Act of 1970)",
"Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation",
"U.S. Public Health Service",
"Postal Rate Commission",
"Provider Reimbursement Review Board",
"Renegotiation Board",
"Railroad Adjustment Board",
"Railroad Retirement Board",
"Subversive Activities Control Board",
"Small Business Administration",
"Securities and Exchange Commission",
"Social Security Administration or Commissioner",
"Selective Service System",
"Department or Secretary of the Treasury",
"Tennessee Valley Authority",
"United States Forest Service",
"United States Parole Commission",
"Postal Service and Post Office, or Postmaster General, or Postmaster",
"United States Sentencing Commission",
"Veterans' Administration",
"War Production Board",
"Wage Stabilization Board",
"General Land Office of Commissioners",
"Transportation Security Administration",
"Surface Transportation Board",
"U.S. Shipping Board Emergency Fleet Corp.",
"Reconstruction Finance Corp.",
"Department or Secretary of Homeland Security",
"Unidentifiable",
"International Entity"
] | [
2
] | sc_respondent |
BROWN, SECRETARY OF STATE OF CALIFORNIA v. CHOTE
No. 71-1583.
Argued February 22, 1973
Decided May 7, 1973
Burger, C. J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.
Henry O. Ullerich, Deputy Attorney General of California, argued the cause for appellant. With him on the brief were Evelle J. Younger, Attorney General, and Iver E. Skjeie, Assistant Attorney General.
Philip Elman, by appointment of the Court, 409 U. S. 1035, argued the cause and filed a brief for appellee.
Melvin L. Wulf, Sanford, J. Rosen, Marguerite Buckley, A. L. Wirin, Fred Okrand, and Laurence R. Sperber filed a brief for the American Civil Liberties Union et al. as amici curiae urging affirmance.
Mr. Chief Justice Burger
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case arises under 28 U. S. C. § 1253 on direct appeal from a three-judge district court in the Northern District of California. The court was convened pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 2281 when appellee called into question the constitutionality of those provisions of the California Elections Code which require candidates in a primary election to pay a filing fee prior to having their names listed on the primary ballot. Cal. Elections Code §§ 6552 and 6553 (Supp. 1973). Under these provisions, candidates for the Federal House of Representatives must pay $425 (1% of the annual salary of the office); candidates for the Federal Senate must pay $850 (2% of the salary of the office). Those wishing to run for statewide offices must pay similar fees ranging in amount from $192 for State Assemblyman (1% of the annual salary) to $982 for Governor (2% of the annual salary). Other portions of the California Elections Code, not challenged in the present suit, require prospective candidates to file with appropriate state officials a declaration of candidacy and sponsor certificates. Cal. Elections Code §§ 6490-6491, 6494-6495 (1961 and Supp. 1973).
Appellee commenced this class action on March 3,1972. He moved, and was granted permission by, a single district judge, to proceed in forma pauperis and as his own attorney. In his complaint, appellee asserted that he wished to become a candidate for the Federal House of Representatives from the 17th District of California, and had taken the following steps to place his name in nomination in the June 6, 1972, California primary election. On February 17, 1972, appellee called the Registrar of Voters of Santa Clara County, an official designated by state law to dispense those forms necessary to place a name in nomination. Appellee was purportedly told.by the Registrar or a member of his office that he was required to pay $425 in advance in order to secure blank copies of the necessary papers. According to appellee, the Registrar’s Office also advised him that the papers would be delivered in exchange for a worthless check.
Appellee proceeded immediately to the Registrar’s Office where he presented a personal check for $425 and requested copies of the necessary forms. Across the face of the check, appellee had typed “Written under protest for filing fee.” The Registrar issued the requisite papers to appellee and informed him that his check would be forwarded to the California Secretary of State when his completed papers were submitted. Subsequently, a Deputy Secretary of State informed appellee that his name would not be placed on the ballot if his check was not honored.
Citing Bullock v. Carter, 405 U. S. 134 (1972), appellee asserted that California’s filing-fee system was unconstitutional since it barred indigents, such as himself, from seeking elective office and from voting for the candidate of his choice. In addition to requesting declaratory and permanent injunctive relief, appellee moved the District Court to issue a preliminary injunction so as to allow him to participate as a candidate in the upcoming primary. Under state law, the final date on which appellee could submit nominating papers for that primary was March 10, 1972, one week away.
Because of the impending filing deadline, the District Court proceeded quickly to set the case for argument. On March 3, 1972, the same date on which the suit was filed, the single District Judge to whom the case was assigned entered an order requiring appellant to show cause why interlocutory relief should not be granted. The State was given five days in which to respond. It was not until March 7 that the Chief Judge of the Ninth Circuit was notified of the application for a three-judge court. On March 8, he designated the judges who were to compose the panel. On the same day, the court convened and heard oral argument. Because of the speed with which the case had developed, neither the court nor appellee had an opportunity prior to the hearing to consider appellant’s return to the order to show cause, the only paper which the State had been able to prepare.
On March 9, 1972, one day after oral argument and one day before the deadline for filing nomination papers, the District Court granted appellee’s motion for a preliminary injunction, stating:
“Since no . . . showing has been made by the State, concerning either the necessity, the purpose or the reasonableness of the filing fee statutes in question, we conclude that within the rationale and holding of Bullock [v. Carter, 405 U. S. 134 (1972)], plaintiff may prevail on the merits and that, absent a preliminary injunction, his constitutional right may be irreparably lost.” 342 F. Supp. 1353, 1355— 1356. (Emphasis added.)
Under the terms of the preliminary injunction, the State was required to allow appellee and others similarly situated to place their names on the ballot without paying the required fee, so long as they were otherwise eligible for the applicable state or federal office and had deposited with an appropriate state official an affidavit attesting to their indigency.
The State appealed directly to this Court under 28 U. S. C. § 1253. Its Jurisdictional Statement posed two questions:
“Under the decision of this Court in Bullock v. Carter, 405 U. S. 134 (1972), when a state statute requiring a candidate’s filing fee of one per cent (1%) of the first year’s salary for the office is challenged on Equal Protection grounds does the ‘rational basis’ or ‘close scrutiny’ standard of judicial review apply?
“Do California Elections Code sections 6552 and 6553 deny voters or indigent prospective candidates equal protection of the laws?”
Thus, the State of California, for reasons not clear to us in light of the limited record, asked the Court to address itself to the ultimate merits of appellee’s constitutional claim, a question which the District Court did not reach. In the present posture of the case, there is no occasion to consider any issues beyond those addressed by the District Court.
The issuance of the requested preliminary injunction was the only action taken by the District Court. In determining whether such relief was required, that court properly addressed itself to two relevant factors: first, the appellee’s possibilities of success on the merits; and second, the possibility that irreparable injury would have resulted, absent interlocutory relief. As the District Court opinion clearly evidences, issuance of the injunction reflected the balance which that court reached in weighing these factors and was not in any sense intended as a final decision as to the constitutionality of the challenged statute. In the exigent circumstances, the grant of extraordinary interim relief was a permissible choice; but on the very limited record before the District Court a decision on the merits would not have been appropriate.
In reviewing such interlocutory relief, this Court may only consider whether issuance of the injunction constituted an abuse of discretion. Alabama v. United States, 279 U. S. 229 (1929); United States v. Corrick, 298 U. S. 435 (1936); United Fuel Gas Co. v. Public Service Comm’n of West Virginia, 278 U. S. 322 (1929); National Fire Insurance Co. of Hartford v. Thompson, 281 U. S. 331 (1930). In light of the arguments presented by appellee and the fact that appellee’s opportunity to be a candidate would have been foreclosed, absent some relief, we cannot conclude that the court’s action was an abuse of discretion. We therefore affirm the action taken by the District Court in granting interim relief.
In doing so, we intimate no view as to the ultimate merits of appellee’s contentions. The record in this case clearly reflects the limited time which the parties had to assemble evidence and prepare their arguments. While the District Court’s swift action is understandable in view of the deadline which it faced, the resulting record was simply insufficient to allow that court to consider fully the grave, far-reaching constitutional questions presented.
The specific deadline which led the District Court to grant equitable relief has now passed. Nothing precludes appellee from seeking a trial on the merits, if he chooses to proceed. The case is therefore remanded to the District Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
Affirmed and remanded.
The State denies that such advice was ever communicated to appellee. In an affidavit submitted to the District Court, the Registrar of Voters of Santa Clara County stated that it was the policy of his office not to distribute the required forms to anyone who represented to the Registrar that the check submitted was worthless. The Registrar further stated that, to his knowledge, neither he nor anyone in his office had ever informed appellee that forms would be issued upon presentation of a worthless check.
When the case was argued before the District Court, appellee claimed that he had also told the Registrar or a member of his office that the account on which the cheek was drawn did not contain sufficient funds to cover it. However, this fact is not alleged in the complaint.
Appellant submitted to the District Court an affidavit from the Deputy Secretary of State to whom appellee had spoken, disputing appellee’s claim that he had been informed that his name would not be placed on the ballot if his cheek was not honored.
Although the June 6 primary election has passed, the question raised is one “capable of repetition, yet evading review.” Consequently, the case is not moot. Southern Pacific Terminal Co. v. ICC, 219 U. S. 498, 515 (1911); Moore v. Ogilvie, 394 U. S. 814, 816 (1969).
We have granted certiorari in No. 71-6852, Lubin v. Allison, post, p. 964, in order to consider conflicts in holdings regarding the constitutionality of state filing-fee statutes. | What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the treatment the court whose decision the Supreme Court reviewed accorded the decision of the court it reviewed, that is, whether the court below the Supreme Court (typically a federal court of appeals or a state supreme court) affirmed, reversed, remanded, denied or dismissed the decision of the court it reviewed (typically a trial court). Adhere to the language used in the "holding" in the summary of the case on the title page or prior to Part I of the Court's opinion. Exceptions to the literal language are the following: where the Court overrules the lower court, treat this a petition or motion granted; where the court whose decision the Supreme Court is reviewing refuses to enforce or enjoins the decision of the court, tribunal, or agency which it reviewed, treat this as reversed; where the court whose decision the Supreme Court is reviewing enforces the decision of the court, tribunal, or agency which it reviewed, treat this as affirmed; where the court whose decision the Supreme Court is reviewing sets aside the decision of the court, tribunal, or agency which it reviewed, treat this as vacated; if the decision is set aside and remanded, treat it as vacated and remanded. | What treatment did the court whose decision the Supreme Court reviewed accorded the decision of the court it reviewed? | [
"stay, petition, or motion granted",
"affirmed",
"reversed",
"reversed and remanded",
"vacated and remanded",
"affirmed and reversed (or vacated) in part",
"affirmed and reversed (or vacated) in part and remanded",
"vacated",
"petition denied or appeal dismissed",
"modify",
"remand",
"unusual disposition"
] | [
1
] | sc_lcdisposition |
"SANCHEZ-LLAMAS v. OREGON\nCERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF OREGON\nNo. 04-10566.\nArgued March 29(...TRUNCATED) | "What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine t(...TRUNCATED) | What is the issue of the decision? | ["involuntary confession","habeas corpus","plea bargaining: the constitutionality of and/or the circ(...TRUNCATED) | [
32
] | sc_issue_1 |
"HODGSON et al. v. MINNESOTA et al.\nNo. 88-1125.\nArgued November 29, 1989\nDecided June 25, 1990\n(...TRUNCATED) | "What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify wh(...TRUNCATED) | "Consider that the petitioning party lost if the Supreme Court affirmed or dismissed the case, or de(...TRUNCATED) | [
"Yes",
"No"
] | [
1
] | sc_partywinning |
"UNION PACIFIC RAILROAD CO. v. SHEEHAN\nNo. 78-344.\nDecided December 4, 1978\nPer Curiam.\nPetition(...TRUNCATED) | "What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify th(...TRUNCATED) | Who is the petitioner of the case? | ["attorney general of the United States, or his office","specified state board or department of educ(...TRUNCATED) | [
159
] | sc_petitioner |
"MU’MIN v. VIRGINIA\nNo. 90-5193.\nArgued February 20, 1991\nDecided May 30, 1991\nRehnquist, C. J(...TRUNCATED) | "What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify th(...TRUNCATED) | What is the state of the court in which the case originated? | ["Alabama","Alaska","American Samoa","Arizona","Arkansas","California","Colorado","Connecticut","Del(...TRUNCATED) | [
54
] | sc_caseoriginstate |
"UNITED STATES v. URSERY\nNo. 95-345.\nArgued April 17, 1996\nDecided June 24, 1996\nRehnquist, C. J(...TRUNCATED) | "What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify th(...TRUNCATED) | What is the court in which the case originated? | ["U.S. Court of Customs and Patent Appeals","U.S. Court of International Trade","U.S. Court of Claim(...TRUNCATED) | [
71
] | sc_caseorigin |
"SANTA FE INDUSTRIES, INC., et al. v. GREEN et al.\nNo. 75-1753.\nArgued January 18-19, 1977\nDecide(...TRUNCATED) | "What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to identify th(...TRUNCATED) | Who is the respondent of the case? | ["attorney general of the United States, or his office","specified state board or department of educ(...TRUNCATED) | [
165
] | sc_respondent |
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CaselawQA is a benchmark comprising legal classification tasks, drawing from the Supreme Court and Songer Court of Appeals legal databases. The majority of its 10,000 questions are multiple-choice, with 5,000 sourced from each database. The questions are randomly selected from the test sets of the Lawma tasks. From a technical machine learning perspective, these tasks provide highly non-trivial classification problems where even the best models leave much room for improvement. From a substantive legal perspective, efficient solutions to such classification problems have rich and important applications in legal research.
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