Opinion ID: 1926173
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Systemic NegligenceJusticiability

Text: Apart from the negligence alleged on the part of Headly and Singh, petitioners averred that MANG lacked sufficient supplies of night vision goggles to provide them to all members during blackout conditions, that MANG did not provide training in the use of night vision goggles, and that it did not have in place an adequate medical evacuation plan for its exercises. Those deficiencies, they claim, also constitute negligence on the part of MANG. Unlike the specific negligence charged to the drivers, however, this form of alleged negligence was alleged to be direct and systemic. It concerns policies and procedures. [5] The State raised two, somewhat overlapping, defenses to this aspect of the claimnon-justiciability and intra-military immunity. The former posits that military training and provisioning are matters committed to the Legislative and Executive Branches of the government and therefore constitute political questions that are rarely proper subjects for judicial intervention. The intra-military immunity doctrine proceeds from Feres v. United States, 340 U.S. 135, 71 S.Ct. 153, 95 L.Ed. 152 (1950), and its progeny and appears, as currently postulated, to be based principally on the public policy notion that suits by soldiers for injuries arising out of military operationsthat are incident to military serviceare detrimental to the internal disciplinary structure and should not be allowed. More fundamentally, Feres bars such claims because they are the `type [s] of claims that, if generally permitted, would involve the judiciary in sensitive military affairs at the expense of military discipline and effectiveness.' United States v. Johnson, 481 U.S. 681, 690, 107 S.Ct. 2063, 2069, 95 L.Ed.2d 648, 658 (1987) (quoting United States v. Shearer, 473 U.S. 52, 59, 105 S.Ct. 3039, 3043, 87 L.Ed.2d 38, 45 (1985)) (emphasis in original). Courts have viewed the Feres doctrine as tantamount to a limitation of subject matter jurisdiction. Stauber v. Cline, 837 F.2d 395, 399 (9th Cir. 1988), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 817, 109 S.Ct. 55, 102 L.Ed.2d 33 (1988). See also Smith v. United States, 196 F.3d 774, 776 n. 1 (7th Cir.1999), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 120 S.Ct. 1676, 146 L.Ed.2d 485 (2000); Fleming v. United States Postal Service, 186 F.3d 697, 699 (6th Cir.1999); Brown v. United States, 151 F.3d 800, 803-04 (8th Cir.1998); Bowen v. Oistead, 125 F.3d 800, 803-04 (9th Cir.1997), cert. denied, 524 U.S. 938, 118 S.Ct. 2343, 141 L.Ed.2d 714 (1998); Wake v. United States, 89 F.3d 53, 57 (2d Cir.1996); Schoemer v. United States, 59 F.3d 26, 30 (5th Cir.1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 989, 116 S.Ct. 519, 133 L.Ed.2d 427 (1995); Madsen v. United States ex. rel. United States Army, Corps of Engineers, 841 F.2d 1011, 1012 (10th Cir.1987); Del Rio v. United States, 833 F.2d 282, 285-86 (11th Cir.1987) (treating the Feres doctrine as jurisdictional and regarding a motion to dismiss based on Feres as challenging subject matter jurisdiction). Both of these doctrines are well-accepted as a matter of Federal law. Not surprisingly, the State jurisprudence is more scant. The State, in this case, urges that we apply the Federal law, either on the basis of preemption or as a matter of State policy. It raises the concern that State courts have not been authorized and are really not competent to second-guess military decisions made by military personnel, including decisions regarding the equipping and training of troops, and that, if they proceed to do so, through the application of State tort law, the uniformity and integrity of the military command structure will be imperiled. Petitioners respond that the non-justiciability doctrine does not apply to an action for money damages and that Feres represents an act of judicial legislation that Maryland should not follow. We agree with the State that this aspect of petitioners' action is non-justiciable, and we therefore need not address the issue of intra-military immunity. [6] In deciding whether a claim is justiciable, the court must determine, first, whether the claim presented and the relief sought are of the type which admit of judicial resolution, and, second, whether the structure of government renders the issue presented a `political question'that is, a question which is not justiciable in federal [or State] court because of the separation of powers provided by the Constitution. Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 516-17, 89 S.Ct. 1944, 1961, 23 L.Ed.2d 491, 514 (1969); Lamb v. Hammond, 308 Md. 286, 293, 518 A.2d 1057, 1060 (1987). In judging the first element, the court must determine whether the `duty asserted can be judicially identified and its breach judicially determined, and whether protection for the right asserted can be judicially molded.' Powell, 395 U.S. at 517, 89 S.Ct. at 1961, 23 L.Ed.2d at 514 (quoting Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 198, 82 S.Ct. 691, 700, 7 L.Ed.2d 663, 674 (1962)); see also Lamb, 308 Md. at 293, 518 A.2d at 1060. The second element, taken from Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. at 217, 82 S.Ct. at 710, 7 L.Ed.2d at 686, involves whether there is a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of the issue to a coordinate political department; or a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving it; or the impossibility of deciding without an initial policy determination of a kind clearly for nonjudicial discretion; or the impossibility of a court's undertaking independent resolution without expressing lack of the respect due coordinate branches of government; or an unusual need for unquestioning adherence to a political decision already made; or the potentiality of embarrassment from multifarious pronouncements by various departments on one question. See Powell, 395 U.S. at 518, 89 S.Ct. at 1962, 23 L.Ed.2d at 515; Lamb, 308 Md. at 293-94, 518 A.2d at 1060. The Supreme Court first applied the justiciability doctrine in the context of a military decision in Orloff v. Willoughby, 345 U.S. 83, 73 S.Ct. 534, 97 L.Ed. 842 (1953). A physician had been drafted into the Army under a law specifically allowing the drafting of physicians, but, because of some lingering loyalty concerns, he was not commissioned as an officer, as most physicians were, and was not immediately assigned medical duties. He filed an action for Federal habeas corpus to require the Army either to commission him as an officer and assign him medical duties or to discharge him. Although the case was arguably moot by the time it reached the Supreme Court, the Court chose to address the justiciability issue raised by the Government. The Court concluded that the Judiciary had no authority to order that Orloff be commissioned, that he be assigned to medical duties, or that he be discharged. The power and duty to commission officers was vested by Congress in the President, and, [w]hatever control courts have exerted over tenure or compensation under an appointment, they have never assumed by any process to control the appointing power either in civilian or military positions. Id. at 90, 73 S.Ct. at 538, 97 L.Ed. at 848. With respect to duty assignment, the Court acknowledged that the Army may, in some instances, be guilty of discrimination, favoritism or other objectionable handling of men, but concluded that judges are not given the task of running the Army. Id. at 93, 73 S.Ct. at 540, 97 L.Ed. at 849. The Court continued: The military constitutes a specialized community governed by a separate discipline from that of the civilian. Orderly government requires that the judiciary be as scrupulous not to interfere with legitimate Army matters as the Army must be scrupulous not to intervene in judicial matters. While the courts have found occasion to determine whether one has been lawfully inducted and is therefore within the jurisdiction of the Army and subject to its orders, we have found no case where this Court has assumed to revise duty orders as to one lawfully in the service. Id. at 94, 73 S.Ct. at 540, 97 L.Ed. at 849. With respect to Orloff's alternative request for discharge, the Court, in the same vein, concluded that, because he was not held in the Army unlawfully and the Court cannot go into the discriminatory character of his orders, there was no basis for ordering his discharge. Id. at 94, 73 S.Ct. at 540, 97 L.Ed. at 850. The Supreme Court returned to this issue in Gilligan v. Morgan, 413 U.S. 1, 93 S.Ct. 2440, 37 L.Ed.2d 407 (1973). In the aftermath of the tragic confrontation between students at Kent State University and the Ohio National Guard, students at Kent State sued to restrain the Governor of Ohio from prematurely ordering National Guard troops to duty in civil disorders and to restrain leaders of the National Guard from future violations of the students' Constitutional rights. At issue at the Supreme Court level was an order of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals remanding the case for a factual determination of whether there was a pattern of training, weaponry, and orders in the Ohio National Guard that made inevitable the unnecessary use of fatal force in suppressing civilian disorders. The Court noted that the case was not one in which damages were sought for the injuries sustained in the earlier confrontation or in which an injunction was sought to restrain specified and imminently threatened unlawful action, but rather was a request for a judicial evaluation of the appropriateness of the `training, weaponry and orders' of the Ohio National Guard. Id. at 5-6, 93 S.Ct. at 2443, 37 L.Ed.2d at 413. Noting that the Guard was an essential reserve component of the Armed Forces of the United States, available with regular forces in time of war, the Court declared that the kind of intervention sought by the students would embrace critical areas of responsibility vested by the Constitution in the Legislative and Executive Branches of the Government. Id. at 7, 93 S.Ct. at 2444, 37 L.Ed.2d at 413-14. It explained: It would be difficult to think of a clearer example of the type of governmental action that was intended by the Constitution to be left to the political branches directly responsibleas the Judicial Branch is notto the electoral process. Moreover, it is difficult to conceive of an area of governmental activity in which the courts have less competence. The complex, subtle, and professional decisions as to the composition, training, equipping, and control of a military force are essentially professional military judgments, subject always to civilian control of the Legislative and Executive Branches. The ultimate responsibility for these decisions is appropriately vested in branches of the government which are periodically subject to electoral accountability. It is this power of oversight and control of military force by elected representatives and officials which underlies our entire constitutional system.... Id. at 10, 93 S.Ct. at 2446, 37 L.Ed.2d at 415-16. The Court ended its Opinion with the caveat that we neither hold nor imply that the conduct of the National Guard is always beyond judicial review or that there may not be accountability in a judicial forum for violations of law or for specific unlawful conduct by military personnel, whether by way of damages or injunctive relief, but only that those kinds of questions were not presented in the case before it. Id. at 11-12, 93 S.Ct. at 2446-47, 37 L.Ed.2d at 416. The Court applied the language, and the doctrine, from Orloff and Gilligan in Chappell v. Wallace, 462 U.S. 296, 103 S.Ct. 2362, 76 L.Ed.2d 586 (1983). Chappell was an action by several enlisted men aboard a naval vessel against their superior officers for declaratory and injunctive relief and money damages, alleging that the defendants failed to assign them desirable duties, gave them low performance evaluations, and imposed unusually severe penalties because of their minority race. In holding that their claim was not justiciable, the Court recounted from Orloff that judges are not given the task of running the Army (or Navy), and confirmed the holding of Gilligan that Congress's power over the militia would be impermissibly compromised by a suit seeking to have a Federal District Court examine the `pattern of training, weaponry and orders' of a State's National Guard. Id. at 301-02, 103 S.Ct. at 2366, 76 L.Ed.2d at 592. Once again recognizing the unique role of the military and the fact that perhaps in no other area has the Court accorded Congress greater deference, id. at 301, 103 S.Ct. at 2366, 76 L.Ed.2d at 591 (quoting Rostker v. Goldberg, 453 U.S. 57, 64-65, 101 S.Ct. 2646, 2651, 69 L.Ed.2d 478, 486 (1981)), the Court refused to apply to military personnel its holding in Bivens v. Six Unknown Fed. Narcotics Agents, 403 U.S. 388, 91 S.Ct. 1999, 29 L.Ed.2d 619 (1971), that damages could be awarded for Constitutional violations committed by Federal employees. Petitioners' contention that this doctrine does not apply to suits for money damages is inaccurate. As noted, Chappell involved a claim for money damages. So did Tiffany v. United States, 931 F.2d 271 (4th Cir.1991), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 1030, 112 S.Ct. 867, 116 L.Ed.2d 773 (1992) and Aktepe v. United States, 105 F.3d 1400 (11th Cir.1997), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 1045, 118 S.Ct. 685, 139 L.Ed.2d 632 (1998). Tiffany arose from a mid-air collision between a private aircraft and an Air Force interceptor that was detached to investigate the private craft's intrusion into an air defense identification zone. As a result of the collision, the private craft crashed into the sea with total loss of life. The estates of the pilot and some of the passengers, claiming negligence on the part of the Air Force, sued for damages. Holding the claims non-justiciable, the court noted that [t]he decisions whether and under what circumstance to employ military force are constitutionally reserved for the executive and legislative branches. Tiffany, 931 F.2d at 277. Aktepe arose out of a NATO naval exercise, during which the crew on a U.S. aircraft carrier launched two armed missiles at a participating Turkish ship. Three hundred Turkish sailors injured in the ensuing explosion, claiming negligence, sued the United States for money damages. Holding the claims non-justiciable, the court noted that [t]he Supreme Court has generally declined to reach the merits of cases requiring review of military decisions, particularly when those cases challenged the institutional functioning of the military in areas such as personnel, discipline, and training. Aktepe, 105 F.3d at 1403. Citing Gilligan, the court further observed that the Constitution reserves to the legislative and executive branches responsibility for developing military training procedures that will ensure the combat effectiveness of our fighting forces. Id. The framework that spawned the justiciability doctrine at the Federal level operates as well at the State level. Comparable to the Federal Constitutional assignment to Congress of the power to raise and support armies, make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces, and provide for the organizing, arming, and disciplining of the militia, Article IX, § 1 of the Maryland Constitution provides that [t]he General Assembly shall make, from time to time, such provision for organizing, equipping and disciplining the Militia, as the exigency may require, and pass such Laws to promote Volunteer Militia organizations as may afford them effectual encouragement. Executive authority over the militia is provided for in Article II, § 8 of the Constitution, which makes the Governor the commander-in-chief of the land and naval forces of the State and authorizes him or her to call out the militia to repel invasions, suppress insurrections, and enforce the execution of the laws. The General Assembly has exercised its authority under Article IX and enacted comprehensive laws, codified in Article 65 of the Code, governing the militia. In § 10, it has placed the Adjutant General in control of the Military Department of the State, and subordinate only to the Governor in matters pertaining to said department. Section 12 provides that the general appropriations for the militia shall be applied exclusively to the expenses of the office of the Adjutant General and to the maintenance and equipment and for the general efficiency of the organized militia of this State and specifies that [n]o purchases shall be made, debts incurred or money expended except by the direct authority of the Adjutant General. Section 14 complements that authority by prohibiting any officer of the militia from incurring any expense whatever to be paid by the State, except such as authorized in this article, without first obtaining the authority of the Adjutant General. This Constitutional and statutory structure places responsibility for the training and equipping of MANG and its personnel squarely and exclusively with the Legislative and Executive branches of the State government. Although, as the Supreme Court made clear in Gilligan, that placement does not withdraw all conduct by MANG and its personnel from judicial scrutiny, it certainly does place significant limits on that scrutiny, especially in the absence of any legislation clearly authorizing judicial scrutiny. For purposes of this case, it will suffice to hold that it is not within the province of the Judiciary, whether through actions for declaratory or injunctive relief or through actions for money damages, to determine how many night vision goggles should have been purchased, or who should have received them, or what kind of training MANG troops should have had with respect to them, or how medical evacuation teams should have been organized and equipped. Harking back to some of the basic elements of the justiciability doctrine enunciated in Powell and Lamb, there is, in regard to the issues before us, not only a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of [those issues] to a coordinate political department but a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving them without expressing lack of the respect due coordinate branches of government. Powell, 395 U.S. at 518, 89 S.Ct. at 1962, 23 L.Ed.2d at 515 (quoting Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. at 217, 82 S.Ct. at 710, 7 L.Ed.2d at 686); see also Lamb, 308 Md. at 293, 518 A.2d at 1060. Common law negligence is founded upon the existence of a duty and the breach of that duty. To resolve this aspect of petitioners' claim, a judge or jury would be required to determine whether MANG was negligent in not utilizing its available resources to obtain a sufficient number of night vision goggles, or in not properly allocating among its troops the goggles it had, or in failing to train Headly and Singh in the use of such goggles, or in assigning the untrained Headly and Singh to night maneuvers, or in not having a more effective medical evacuation plan. To make those determinations, however, the judge or jury would, or might, have to decide how many night vision goggles should have been acquired, what priority their acquisition had over other equipment or resources needed by MANG, how the goggles should have been allocated, how much and what kind of training should have been provided and when it should have been provided, whether military personnel who have not been adequately trained (adequate in the minds of the judge or jurors) can properly be assigned to night maneuvers and, if so, in what circumstances, and what kind of medical evacuation plan and facilities should have been available. Apart from the questionable competence of a lay judge or jury to determine those issues, any attempt to determine them would constitute a substantial interference with the authority and discretion vested in the other two branches of government. [7] JUDGMENT OF CIRCUIT COURT FOR MONTGOMERY COUNTY AFFIRMED, WITH COSTS.