Opinion ID: 488513
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: jurisdiction

Text: 16 In the proceedings below, the government's attorneys argued that the District Court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over the plaintiffs' claims, and, rather remarkably, counsel succeeded in persuading the trial court to agree. Summarized briefly, the government's argument was that the District Court's federal question jurisdiction did not extend to the subject matter of the plaintiffs' action, because it involved a labor-management dispute governed by the exclusive jurisdictional provisions of the Civil Service Reform Act [of 1978] (CSRA), Pub.L. No. 95-454, 92 Stat. 1111 (codified as amended in 5 U.S.C. Sec. 1201 et seq. (1982 & Supp. III 1985)). Therefore, the government contended, the plaintiffs' claims could be heard only by the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA) or the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), subject to judicial review by a federal appellate court. Memorandum in Support of Defendants' Motion to Dismiss and in Opposition to Plaintiffs' Motion for Preliminary Injunction, Record Doc. No. 9, at 10. 17 On appeal, counsel conceded in open court that the government had no legal basis for making this argument; unfortunately, this concession came too late to avoid the expenditure of judicial efforts and energy that were needlessly wasted on a theory that is completely baseless. To discourage any future litigant who might have the effrontery to engage the District Court with this discredited theory of subject matter jurisdiction, we briefly review the law of this circuit for what we trust will be the last time. 18 In dismissing this action for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, the District Court accepted the government's argument that federal court jurisdiction was barred by the Supreme Court's holding in Bush v. Lucas, 462 U.S. 367, 103 S.Ct. 2404, 76 L.Ed.2d 648 (1983). As we held in Doe v. United States Department of Justice, 753 F.2d 1092 (D.C.Cir.1985), and as the government now concedes, Bush is inapposite. In Bush, the Supreme Court declined to create a damages remedy to supplement the statutory remedies available to federal employees for redressing past violations of their constitutional rights. In contrast, this court has expressly held that Bush does not affect the traditional and well-settled authority of federal courts to enjoin unconstitutional government actions: 19 Bush held only that where civil servants enjoy meaningful and constitutionally adequate statutory remedies for first amendment violations, federal courts should not imply an additional Bivens-type damages remedy under the constitution. The Bush holding in no way affects the scope of constitutional rights, and nothing in Bush or any other Court opinion casts doubt on the presumed availability of federal equitable relief against federal officials for committing constitutional violations. 20 Id. at 1109 n. 17 (citations omitted) (emphasis in original). Our other decisions both before and after Bush have made it absolutely clear that civilian federal employees may seek to enjoin government actions that violate their constitutional rights. See Hubbard v. United States Envtl. Protection Agency, 809 F.2d 1, 10 (D.C.Cir.1986), rehearing en banc granted on other grounds, 809 F.2d 15 (D.C.Cir.1987); Spagnola v. Mathis, 809 F.2d 16, 23 n. 8, 25 (D.C.Cir.1986), rehearing en banc granted on other grounds, 809 F.2d 40 (D.C.Cir.1987); id. at 38-39 (Silberman, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part); Cutts v. Fowler, 692 F.2d 138, 139-40 (D.C.Cir.1982). 21 Having conceded the error of its ways, the government now suggests weakly, and only on appeal, that there might be an argument for requiring exhaustion of administrative remedies as a prudential matter in this case. We reject this suggestion for three reasons. First, the argument was not raised in the District Court, and ordinarily we will not entertain legal theories raised for the first time on appeal. See District of Columbia v. Air Florida, Inc., 750 F.2d 1077, 1084-85 (D.C.Cir.1984). Second, even if we did consider the argument to be timely, our decision in Andrade v. Lauer, 729 F.2d 1475, 1484 (D.C.Cir.1984), suggests that exhaustion is unnecessary with respect to the constitutional claims asserted here. 6 Third, the government concedes that the administrative mechanism will leave many of the affected employees remediless. A FLRA proceeding, focused on the duty to bargain, will not resolve issues concerning the legality of the drug testing program. 7 The other route of administrative appeal, proceedings before the MSPB, will be unavailable to employees who test negative and who therefore incur no adverse personnel actions, as well as to employees whose positive test results lead to personnel actions, such as transfers, which are not adverse and which are therefore not appealable to the MSPB. 8 22 We also reject as legal error the District Court's suggestion that prospective injunctive relief is somehow barred by the availability of the damages remedy authorized in Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388, 91 S.Ct. 1999, 29 L.Ed.2d 619 (1971), to redress violations of the Fourth Amendment rights of the employees who test negative or who are subjected to personnel actions that are not administratively appealable. Weinberger, 640 F.Supp. at 654. Even if we assume the availability of a retroactive Bivens remedy against the individual government officials involved in the drug testing program, 9 it simply does not follow that prospective equitable relief against the agency is therefore barred, and there is no authority even suggesting that such a bar exists. The absence of authority for the District Court's proposition is hardly surprising. In the first place, the two remedies are simply not equivalent. The damages remedy penalizes an individual government official for his or her past wrongs; it does not purport to affect the agency itself, nor does it enjoin any future actions by the agency or its officers. The availability of a Bivens remedy for a particular wrong simply cannot--and was never intended to--protect an individual who is threatened with future deprivation of a constitutional right. A Bivens remedy does not require proof that the federal officer was acting within the dictates of official agency policy or practice; Bivens is expressly applicable to any federal agent acting under color of his authority. 403 U.S. at 389, 91 S.Ct. at 2001 (emphasis added). Likewise, the awarding of a Bivens remedy does not compel the government to alter its policies or practices. In contrast, that is the precise function of prospective injunctive relief. 10 23 We therefore hold that the District Court's federal question jurisdiction extends to the subject matter of this dispute, 11 and that the court has the power to grant the equitable relief requested. Accordingly, we reverse the court's dismissal of the appellants' complaint and vacate its denial of the motion for a preliminary injunction, and we remand the case to the trial court for a determination on the merits consistent with the principles outlined below.