Opinion ID: 407572
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: jurisdiction

Text: 14 This court's direct review jurisdiction over ICC orders is governed by 28 U.S.C. § 2342 (1976), which states simply: 15 The court of appeals has exclusive jurisdiction to enjoin, set aside, suspend (in whole or in part), or to determine the validity of- 16 (5) all rules, regulations, or final orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission made reviewable by section 2321 of this title. 17 Section 2321, in turn, provides that all proceedings to enjoin or set aside ICC orders shall be brought in the Court of Appeals, (e)xcept as otherwise provided by an Act of Congress   . Id. § 2321(a). The principal exception to jurisdiction in the Court of Appeals is Section 1336(a) of the same title, which states: 18 Except as otherwise provided by Act of Congress, the district courts shall have jurisdiction of any civil action to enforce, in whole or in part, any order of the Interstate Commerce Commission, and to enjoin or suspend, in whole or in part, any order of the Interstate Commerce Commission for the payment of money or the collection of fines, penalties, and forfeitures. 19 Id. § 1336(a); see Aluminum Co. of America v. ICC (Alcoa), 553 F.2d 1268, 1269 (D.C.Cir.1977). 20 This allocation of authority to review ICC orders first appeared in Pub.L.No.93-584, 88 Stat. 1917 (1975), which substituted direct review in the Courts of Appeals for three-judge District Court review of ICC orders other than those for payment of money. The 1975 Act did not expand or contract the jurisdiction of single-judge District Courts, but merely replaced the cumbersome three-judge District Court procedure with the increasingly familiar procedure of direct review in the Courts of Appeals. See Alcoa, supra, 553 F.2d at 1269-1270. Accordingly, this court has jurisdiction over the railroads' petitions for review only if, before 1975, they would have required constitution of a three-judge District Court. Genstar Chemical Ltd. v. ICC, 665 F.2d 1304, 1307 (D.C.Cir.1981), cert. denied sub nom. Nitrochem, Inc. v. ICC, --- U.S. ----, 102 S.Ct. 1750, 72 L.Ed.2d 161 (1982); Alcoa, supra. 12 21 The Supreme Court discussed the pre-1975 question of single-judge versus three-judge District Courts in United States v. ICC, 337 U.S. 426, 69 S.Ct. 1410, 93 L.Ed. 1451 (1949), and ICC v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 383 U.S. 576, 86 S.Ct. 1000, 16 L.Ed.2d 109 (1966). In United States v. ICC the Court held that orders denying damages were reviewable only in a single-judge District Court, because the root of the controversy concerns the payment of money damages, 337 U.S. at 443, 69 S.Ct. at 1419. The Court explained that the purpose of providing three-judge District Court review of certain ICC orders-with an attendant right of direct appeal to the Supreme Court-was expedition of final determination of the validity of certain types of Commission orders. Id. at 441, 69 S.Ct. at 1419. It continued: 22 This expedition was sought for orders of national or widespread interest, such, for example, as railroad rate orders. Congress saw the necessity for an accelerated appellate procedure to prevent railroads from nullifying the effect of such orders in prolonged litigation.    (T)he same expedition necessary in cases affecting the public generally was not necessary in other kinds of cases involving local and isolated questions which arise in the ordinary courts. 23    (O)rders relating merely to the payment of money are not likely to be of sufficient public importance to justify use of the three-judge procedure.    The Urgent Deficiencies Act    indicates the belief of Congress that such orders are not of sufficient public importance to justify the accelerated judicial review procedure. 24 Id. at 441-442, 69 S.Ct. at 1418-19 (emphasis added; footnotes omitted). Where (o)nly the method or amount of payments currently to be made would be affected and (t)here is no danger of temporarily interrupting    service, the Court would not presume that Congress intended the special review procedures to apply. United States v. Griffin, 303 U.S. 226, 234, 58 S.Ct. 601, 605, 82 L.Ed. 764 (1948); see United States v. ICC, supra, 337 U.S. at 442, 69 S.Ct. at 1419 (citing Griffin). 25 In ICC v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., supra, the Court discussed the statutory scheme for review of ICC orders granting reparations. Then, as now, the statute provided two types of actions in which the courts could review ICC orders: actions to enforce orders for payment of money, and actions to enjoin, suspend, or set aside ICC orders. The former were available only to shippers whose claims for damages had been adjudicated and accepted by the ICC, and shippers bringing enforcement actions had the benefit of several important procedural advantages, including choice of venue, the option to seek enforcement in state courts, and a right to attorney fees and costs if their actions were successful. Both shippers and carriers could bring actions to enjoin, suspend, or set aside ICC orders, and in those cases the party adversely affected by the Commission's order chose the forum in which the case would be heard. 26 The Atlantic Coast Line Court held that both the (enforcement) action and the (action to enjoin, etc.) may be heard and determined by a single district judge when the reparation order is not accompanied by a cease-and-desist order. 383 U.S. at 596-597, 86 S.Ct. at 1013. It also stated that if the Commission's reparation order is accompanied by a cease-and-desist order, as it usually will be when the proceeding originates before the Commission and the rates or practices under attack continue in use, the carrier may obtain immediate review of the cease-and-desist order, presumably in a three-judge District Court. Id. at 586, 86 S.Ct. at 1007. But the Court emphasized that, when the ICC had done nothing more than grant a shipper the right to damages, the statutory scheme required that review of the ICC's order could only be had in the court selected by the shipper. Aggrieved carriers could attack the validity of the Commission's order in that forum, and they could join the United States as a party in order to obtain effective review of the Commission's order, but they could not nullify the shippers' rights-to select the forum for review and to receive fees and costs if they prevailed-by filing their own petitions for review in forums of their choice. See id. at 602-603, 86 S.Ct. at 1015-16. 27 Atlantic Coast Line and United States v. ICC compel the conclusion that, over the years, Congress has distinguished between orders relating merely to the payment of money by regulated carriers and other ICC orders (such as cease-and-desist orders or orders setting rates) which generally affect current rates. Federal court review of the first type of order may only be sought in a District Court. The shipper will either have an order for damages that it can seek to enforce in state or federal court, see 49 U.S.C. § 11705(d) (Supp. III 1979), or it will be the party adversely affected by an order denying damages. In both events the shipper initiates the action, and any judgment entered is subject to normal review procedures in the appellate courts and the Supreme Court. The second type of order, on the other hand, is reviewed directly by the United States Court of Appeals, in a circuit chosen by the party adversely affected, shipper or carrier. Because only two levels of judicial review rather than the normal three levels are available, final disposition of cases involving the second type of order is generally swifter than that of cases involving the first type of order. 28 It is important to note where Congress and the Supreme Court have not drawn the line between orders reviewable only in the District Courts and those directly reviewable in the Courts of Appeals. The nature of the ICC's order, not the difficulty, novelty, or general importance of the legal questions raised by the order, controls the question of review jurisdiction. Orders of both types may raise difficult questions of interpretation, whether of broad interest to the general public or affecting only a narrow class of shippers. 13 Congress' judgment that orders relating merely to the payment of money are not likely to be of sufficient public importance to justify direct review in the Courts of Appeals, see United States v. ICC, supra, 337 U.S. at 442, 69 S.Ct. at 1419, is not-nor could it have been meant to be-a precise description. The distinction between ICC orders and the courts in which they must be reviewed in the first instance relates only roughly to the abstract importance of the ICC's determinations. Rather, it reflects the general likelihood that expedited and abbreviated judicial review will be in the interest of the parties involved and the public at large, and it embodies a congressional decision that shippers rather than carriers should be able to select the forum in which reparations orders will be reviewed. 29 Thus in Genstar Chemical Ltd. v. ICC, supra, this court held that, with respect to an ICC reparations proceeding, 30 any public interest in the Commission order or in a ruling in this case that exists only because of their value as precedent is not the sort of widespread interest to which the Supreme Court was referring in United States v. ICC.    F.2d at 1308, aff'g, 491 F.Supp. 391, 395 (D.D.C.1980). Our decision in Genstar is highly relevant to the jurisdictional question in this case. The shipper in Genstar had filed a complaint with the Commission seeking reparations from increased rates it had paid on United States-Canada shipments. The ICC had already held in separate proceedings that the carriers' rate increases were unlawful, but it awarded the shipper damages reflecting only the difference between the rates it had paid and the rates it could lawfully have been charged. In its petition for review the shipper challenged the fundamental remedial powers of the Commission, asserting that it should have received the difference between the rates it paid and the last lawful rates in effect. We held, despite our appreciation of the importance and breadth of the shipper's arguments, that because the ICC's order did nothing more than grant reparations, the Court of Appeals had jurisdiction to consider the petition for review only on appeal from the District Court. See 665 F.2d at 1307-1308. 14 31 The question before us, then, is whether the ICC order at issue in this case is an order merely for the payment of money and thus not within this court's direct review jurisdiction. As with other questions concerning our jurisdiction to review administrative decisions, we must decide this question with reference to the order's practical function and consequences within the agency's statutory and administrative scheme. Cf. Papago Tribal Utility Authority v. FERC, 628 F.2d 235, 239 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 1061, 101 S.Ct. 784, 66 L.Ed.2d 604 (1980) (determination of an order's finality). 32 The ICC's order in this case simply vacates the earlier opinion issued by its Division 2 and states: 33 Complainants should file a rule 95 statement. Interest should be computed on the basis of the average yield of 90-day marketable securities for the week in which the first unlawful charge was paid. 34 364 ICC at 979 (App. 374) (footnote omitted); see note 11 supra and accompanying text. On its face, therefore, the order does nothing more than declare that the railroads are liable to the government for damages and establish a framework for determining the exact amount of the damages. Reference to the complaint of the Department of Energy, the document that initiated these proceedings, confirms that nothing more than the government's right to damages was at issue before the Commission. See pages 690-691 supra; App. 11. The government sought only repayment of special train surcharges assessed against it in the past, and nothing in the record indicates that the railroads continued their practice of including special train requirements in their Section 22 quotations after 1978. Elimination of the special train requirements was the collateral but entirely logical result of the ICC's Special Train Service rulings, affirmed by this court in Consolidated Rail Corp. v. ICC, supra, and it was not compelled by anything in these proceedings. 35 Of course, to reach its decision on the government's request for damages, the ICC had to make three broad rulings of law. First, it had to hold that it had jurisdiction to consider the unreasonableness of Section 22 quotations and award damages based upon them. As the Commission's opinion and the briefs of the parties to this court indicate, that holding required interpretation-essentially for the first time-of a seldom-litigated statutory provision dating back to the original Interstate Commerce Act. The Commission's decision that it does have such jurisdiction, if affirmed by the courts, may well affect a broad range of dealings between regulated carriers and the United States government. Second, the Commission had to hold that the special train charges had been unreasonable. Although this determination was largely governed by the findings of unreasonableness in the Special Train Service cases, it entailed rejecting new arguments raised by the railroads concerning the effect of the government's 35 mph speed limit on train schedules. If the ICC had accepted the railroads' new arguments, the whole issue of special train service for radioactive materials might have been resurrected. Finally, the Commission had to determine whether reparations were appropriate under the equities of the case. At issue was the question whether reparations would ever be appropriate when railroads instituted safety measures in good faith and shippers received the benefit of the measures, even if the additional safety measures were later found too costly. 36 All of these holdings raise issues for judicial review, and their importance extends beyond the proceedings at hand. Yet the Commission reached each point of law exclusively in the context of considering a claim for damages and nothing more, and the Commission did nothing more than determine a right to damages as the result of its inquiry. In terms of the ICC's regulatory scheme, this case in its present posture is indistinguishable from typical reparations cases. The Commission has ordered the complainant before it to file a Rule 95 statement. This procedure is the final step in most damages cases heard by the Commission. See E. Anderson, ICC Practice and Procedure 206-207 (1966). If we were to hold that the Court of Appeals had direct review jurisdiction in this case because of its widespread interest affecting the public generally, 15 we would strip all comprehensible meaning from the statutory provision for District Court review of ICC orders for payment of money. Such an interpretation would reduce a statutory scheme that has evolved over 70 years to a mere suggestion by Congress that the Courts of Appeals let District Courts hear all uninteresting or trivial cases. Furthermore, if railroads could seek Court of Appeals review of legal or policy decisions before the Rule 95 process had been completed, they could effectively defeat the shippers' right to seek enforcement in the court of their choice. 37 Direct review of the reparations orders in the Courts of Appeals is not required to prevent piecemeal or disorderly review of ICC orders. The Interstate Commerce Act provides that all shippers in whose favor an award is made may be joined as plaintiffs in a single District Court action. See 49 U.S.C. § 11705(d)(2) (1976). Nor can the fact that the Commission's jurisdiction has been challenged provide a basis for review in this court, for that would invite carriers to evade the statutory scheme for review of reparations orders by raising frivolous jurisdictional arguments. Jurisdiction is not a magic word that conjures genies from their lamps or transports a case to a different court, chosen by a different party. 38 In sum, we decline to adopt a reading of Sections 1336(a) and 2321(a) that makes our jurisdiction depend on the character or the importance of the legal issues raised by an ICC reparations order. The division of review authority enacted by Congress has meaning only if interpreted in light of the greater likelihood that accelerated judicial review will be useful in cases involving more than mere damage claims and in light of the policy of letting shippers choose a forum when nothing but damages are at issue. Therefore, we follow Genstar and Aloca in focusing on the nature of the relief granted (or denied) by the Commission. Where, as here, the ICC has done nothing more than grant a party or parties the right to damages, the Court of Appeals has no direct review jurisdiction over the order. 39 The petitions for review must be dismissed for want of jurisdiction. All further issues, including any claim that the order in this case is not final for purposes of judicial review, must be raised before a court of competent jurisdiction. 40 So ordered.