Opinion ID: 409093
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: introduction

Text: 11 In reviewing petitioners' request for a writ of mandamus, we are guided by the principles collected and distilled in Bauman v. United States District Court, 557 F.2d 650 (9th Cir. 1977). In Bauman, we expressed our concern over the unprincipled use of the writ as a means of wresting control of litigation from the district courts merely because appellate judges disagree with interlocutory rulings of the district courts or are sympathetic to arguments made in support of petitions. Such unrestrained use of mandamus would undermine the mutual respect that is an indispensable element of the relationship between federal trial and appellate courts and would subvert the policies underlying the finality rule, 28 U.S.C. § 1291, or the carefully limited congressional scheme governing interlocutory appeals .... Id. at 653. 12 In order to confine the use of mandamus to its proper office, we enunciated five general guidelines in Bauman to assist in the determination of whether mandamus is the appropriate remedy in a particular case. The guidelines are: (1) whether the party seeking the writ has no other adequate means, such as direct appeal, to attain the relief he desires; (2) whether the petitioner will be damaged or prejudiced in a way that is not correctable on appeal; (3) whether the district court's order is clearly erroneous as a matter of law; (4) whether the district court's order is an oft repeated error or manifests persistent disregard for the federal rules; and (5) whether the district court's order raises new and important problems or issues of law of first impression. Id. at 654-55. Related considerations include: whether the injury alleged by petitioners, although not correctable on appeal, is the kind that justifies invocation of our mandamus authority; whether the petition presents an issue of law which may repeatedly evade appellate review; and whether there are other compelling factors relating to the efficient and orderly administration of the district courts. 13 As we noted in Bauman, the guidelines are cumulative and may not all point to the same conclusion. Id. at 655. Moreover, all of the guidelines are unlikely to be met in any one case. Some are more relevant to particular categories of cases than others. Certain concepts relating to the traditional use of mandamus are not necessarily applicable in supervisory mandamus cases, or, at the least, are applied differently. The guidelines are not susceptible of mechanical application; they are not meant to supplant reasoned and independent analysis by appellate courts. In sum, the guidelines serve only as a useful starting point, an analytic framework for determinations regarding the propriety of mandamus relief. 14 B. The Availability and Adequacy of Other Relief and the Nature of the Harm Required for Mandamus Relief. 15 The first two criteria articulated in Bauman are designed to insure that mandamus, rather than some other form of relief, is the appropriate remedy. The petitioners must demonstrate that they have no other adequate means of obtaining the relief desired and that they will be damaged in a way not correctable on appeal from final judgment. There is another consideration as well: the injury must be the kind that warrants the invocation of the extraordinary remedy of mandamus. 16 The relief sought by petitioners is a writ directing Judge Muecke to vacate his order of recusal so that the able judge, who has an extensive working knowledge of this complex litigation, may continue to preside over the consolidated pretrial proceedings. Petitioners thus hope to avoid the inevitable costs and delay that would result from the assignment of a new judge, and seek to prevent the loss of Judge Muecke's unique working knowledge of this case. We have already denied petitioners' request to review the order of recusal under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 (direct appeal of collateral order), and 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b) (discretionary interlocutory appeal). 673 F.2d 1020. While we may be free to reconsider that decision, we decline to do so. 17 We do not think it would be proper to reconsider here a decision we so recently announced unless new circumstances had intervened or our earlier decision was indisputably or patently erroneous. Otherwise, we would simply be substituting the views of the individual members of this panel for the judgment of the majority of our colleagues on the panel that heard the matter previously. Therefore, while we are impressed by the well reasoned and persuasive dissent of Judge Boochever, and believe that the views he expressed have substantial merit, we conclude that petitioners' avenues of interlocutory appeal from the recusal order must remain closed. 18 We next consider whether a post-judgment appeal would provide an effective remedy and thus render the exercise of our mandamus authority inappropriate. Although it has been stated that disqualification questions are fully reviewable on appeal after final judgment, In re Corrugated Container Anti-Trust Litigation, 614 F.2d 958, 960-61 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 888, 101 S.Ct. 244, 66 L.Ed.2d 114 (1980), a review of the authorities indicates that a more accurate statement of the law is that an order denying a motion for disqualification is reviewable on appeal after final judgment. See, e.g., Berger v. United States, 255 U.S. 22, 41 S.Ct. 230, 65 L.Ed. 481 (1921); Potashnick v. Port City Construction Co., 609 F.2d 1101 (5th Cir. 1980) cert. denied, 449 U.S. 820, 101 S.Ct. 78, 66 L.Ed.2d 22 (1982); SCA Services v. Morgan, 557 F.2d 110 (7th Cir. 1977); Los Angeles Trust Deed & Mortgage Exchange v. SEC, 285 F.2d 162 (9th Cir. 1960), cert. denied, 366 U.S. 919, 81 S.Ct. 1095, 6 L.Ed.2d 241 (1961); 9 J. Moore, Moore's Federal Practice P 110.13(10) at 187 n.1 (2d ed. 1982); C. Wright, A. Miller & E. Cooper, Federal Practice & Procedure, § 3553 at 384 (1975); Comment, Disqualification For Interest of Lower Federal Judges, 71 Mich.L.Rev. 533, 547 (1973). 19 It is, of course, possible that petitioners could seek to challenge the recusal order after final judgment has been entered, but no such review could prevent the damage that petitioners allege they will suffer or afford effective relief therefrom. Despite the fact that the petitioners may suffer tremendous disruption, unreasonable delay, additional cost, and the loss of Judge Muecke's valuable experience, a post-judgment reversal on appeal could not provide a remedy for those injuries. Moreover, whatever collateral injuries petitioners suffer will have been incurred even if they prevail fully at trial and thus have no right to appeal from the final judgment. 20 Equally important, when a trial judge enters an order granting a motion for disqualification the error, if any, cannot serve as a basis for reversal on appeal. In re Cement Antitrust Litigation, 673 F.2d at 1025. A party cannot ordinarily predicate a claim of prejudicial error on the fact that he was required to try his cause before one judge who was duly qualified to preside rather than another. Prejudicial error does not occur simply because a particular judge fails to handle a case or some other judge does; the mere assignment of a matter to a judge does not affect the outcome of the case. It is the conduct of the judge in conducting the proceeding that gives rise to error which is prejudicial and requires reversal, not the assignment of the case to the judge. 2 Thus, despite the fact that an erroneous order of recusal may cause collateral injury to the party, the error is harmless for purposes of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 61; therefore it does not constitute prejudicial or reversible error. See Hampton v. City of Chicago, 643 F.2d 478, 480 n.7 (7th Cir. 1981); Kelley v. Metropolitan Board of Education, 479 F.2d 810, 811 (6th Cir. 1973) (McCree, J., concurring). 21 We conclude that petitioners have no effective right of appeal and will be damaged in a way not correctable on appeal from final judgment. However, we must also consider the question whether petitioners have alleged the type of injury necessary to justify invocation of the mandamus remedy. In another context we stated that (w)e have consistently rejected petitioners' position that the costs of trying massive civil actions render review after final judgment inadequate. In re Sugar Antitrust Litigation, 559 F.2d 481, 484 (9th Cir. 1977) (denying mandamus relief from an order certifying class). 22 There are, of course, limits to the hardships which litigants will be forced to bear as a result of erroneous interlocutory orders, even in traditional mandamus cases. In Varsic v. United States District Court, 607 F.2d 245 (9th Cir. 1979), we granted a petition for a writ of mandamus where the plaintiff was proceeding in forma pauperis and the district court erroneously transferred his case from the Central District of California to the Southern District of New York. Despite the fact that the transfer order was fully reviewable on appeal after final judgment, we found that plaintiff would suffer peculiar hardship and stated that 23 assuming that Varsic loses in the Southern District of New York, but successfully appeals the transfer order in the Second Circuit, he will again be severely prejudiced. The impact of the inevitable delay which would result from a second trial in the Central District of California following the appeal in the Second Circuit, on a person in his situation, would not be correctable on appeal. 24 Id. at 252 (emphasis added). 25 The principal damage that petitioners contend they will incur as a result of the recusal order is additional cost and unreasonable delay. Although the disruption of the proceedings may not prejudice petitioners to the same degree as the change of venue would have prejudiced Varsic, it appears that the recusal order will significantly impair the progress of this litigation. Nevertheless, we believe that there is a substantial question as to whether petitioners have demonstrated the kind of injury that would be necessary to justify the invocation of our mandamus authority in a traditional mandamus case. 26 Here, however, we are reviewing the petition pursuant to our supervisory mandamus authority. We are concerned with far more than the injury to these particular petitioners; we are concerned, inter alia, with the effect of the challenged order on the operation of the courts. Petitioners contend that the recusal order will have a major disruptive effect on the administration of justice in the district of Arizona or any other district to which the litigation may be transferred. 3 Moreover, they contend that the resolution of the legal question will, for reasons we consider below, add importantly to the efficient operation and administration of the district courts throughout this circuit. Under these circumstances, the degree of injury to petitioners is a less critical factor. We believe that in supervisory mandamus cases, as long as petitioners have demonstrated that they will suffer an actual injury not correctable on appeal, they have satisfied both the injury requirement and the second criterion in the Bauman analysis. 27 B. Oft Repeated Errors, New and Important Issues of Law, and The Need to Supervise the Administration of the Federal Judicial System 28 The fourth and fifth factors noted in Bauman are whether the district court's order is an oft repeated error, or manifests a persistent disregard of the federal rules, and whether the district court's order raises new and important problems or issues of law of first impression. Here, the fourth factor is absent and the fifth factor is indisputably present. It is unlikely that both of these factors would be present where a petition for mandamus presents a single issue, since one of the factors deals with repeated error while the other deals with questions of first impression. 29 While the two factors deal with contrasting situations, each for its own reason may implicate the duty of appellate courts to exercise supervisory control of the district courts in order to insure proper judicial administration. See generally Schlagenhauf v. Holder, 379 U.S. 104, 85 S.Ct. 234, 13 L.Ed.2d 152 (1964); LaBuy v. Howes Leather Co., 352 U.S. 249, 259-60, 77 S.Ct. 309, 315-316, 1 L.Ed.2d 290 (1957) (Supervisory control of District Courts by Court of Appeals is necessary to proper judicial administration in the federal system.); Goldblum v. National Broadcasting Corp., 584 F.2d 904, 906 n.2 (9th Cir. 1978) (mandamus appropriate for the exercise of supervisory control of district courts necessary to proper judicial administration); 9 J. Moore, Moore's Federal Practice P 110.28 at 312 (2d ed. 1982). 30 In the present case, it is the fifth Bauman factor that implicates our supervisory mandamus authority: we are faced with the need to resolve a significant question of first impression where the failure to do so may adversely affect the efficient operation of the district courts. See Schlagenhauf v. Holder, 379 U.S. 104, 111, 85 S.Ct. 234, 239, 13 L.Ed.2d 152 (1969) ((I)ssue of first impression that called for construction of Rule 35 in a new context.... Court of Appeals should have also, under these special circumstances, determined the good cause issue, so as ... to settle new and important problems.); National Right to Work Legal Defense & Education Foundation, Inc. v. Richey, 510 F.2d 1239, 1243 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, 422 U.S. 1008, 95 S.Ct. 2631, 45 L.Ed.2d 671 (1975) (review by mandamus appropriate where the decision will serve to clarify a question that is likely to confront a number of lower court judges in a number of suits before appellate review is possible.); 9 J. Moore, Moore's Federal Practice P 110.28 at 312-13 (2d ed. 1982) (The courts of appeals possess the ... power to supervise the administration of justice by their district courts ... and they may review immediately questions of unusual importance the determination of which are necessary to orderly, even and efficient administration.). 31 Exercise of our supervisory mandamus authority is particularly appropriate when an important question of law would repeatedly evade review because of the collateral nature of the issue. 4 See Colonial Times Inc. v. Gasch, 509 F.2d 517, 524-26 (D.C.Cir.1975). In Colonial Times, the court held that mandamus could issue to correct an error in the discovery order before it. The court noted that the type of issues raised in the case before it, while important to the general course of the litigation, are often collateral to the litigation and thus lost to appellate review in fact if not in theory. Id. at 526. The court stated that mandamus is appropriate when the appellate court is convinced that resolution of an important, undecided issue will forestall future error in trial courts, eliminate uncertainty and add importantly to the efficient administration of justice. Id. at 524. 32 Similarly, in this case, an important question of first impression will evade review unless it is considered under our supervisory mandamus authority. Moreover, that question may continue to evade review in other cases as well. In cases in which district judges recuse themselves, the orders of recusal will be effectively unreviewable on appeal notwithstanding the injuries to the parties and the possible disruption of the orderly administration of the courts. While it is true that an order denying a motion for recusal might at some later time become the subject of an appeal, it would be contrary to the interest of orderly judicial administration to delay resolution of the important question before us in order to await the occurrence of such a possibility. 33 We believe that the petition in this case presents a new and far reaching question of major importance to the district courts, that the question is likely to continue to evade review and that its resolution would add importantly to the efficient and orderly administration of the district courts. The exercise of our supervisory mandamus authority is appropriate under such circumstances. 34 D. The Clearly Erroneous as a Matter of Law Standard 35 Whether Judge Muecke's recusal order is clearly erroneous as a matter of law involves a pure question of statutory construction. The meaning of the clearly erroneous as a matter of law standard of review is elusive at best, but especially so when a question of law of first impression is involved. If a district court were to adopt an interpretation of a statute that squarely contradicted the literal terms and clear intent of the statute, it could readily be said that the interpretation was clearly erroneous. But when a district court is faced with two plausible interpretations of a statute that has not been construed by an appellate court, it would be difficult in one sense to characterize either interpretation as clearly erroneous. Viewed differently, however, if an appellate court were to review the interpretation adopted by the district court and reject it, that particular interpretation could at that point be said to be clearly erroneous. See United States v. Mehrmanesh, 652 F.2d 766, 773 (9th Cir. 1980) (If we decide that the district court was wrong in its reading of (the statute), appellant's right to relief will be 'clear and indisputable'.) (Fletcher, J. dissenting). 5 36 We believe that the test set forth by the Supreme Court for determining when a finding of fact is clearly erroneous is instructive where a question of law is involved as well. In United States v. United States Gypsum Co., 333 U.S. 364, 68 S.Ct. 525, 92 L.Ed. 746 (1948), the Court stated that under Rule 52(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure: 37 (a) finding (of fact) is clearly erroneous when although there is evidence to support (the district court's finding), the reviewing court on the entire evidence is left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed. 38 Id. at 395, 68 S.Ct. at 542. The firm conviction test provides a helpful approach to our efforts to determine when a district court's interpretation of a statute falls under the third Bauman criterion-clearly erroneous as a matter of law as that term is used in mandamus analysis, Bauman, 557 F.2d at 650. Two of our previous decisions suggest that we will characterize a ruling of a district court on a question of law as clearly erroneous only when, after a full review of the authorities, we are firmly convinced that the district court's interpretation was incorrect. 6 39 In Mehrmanesh, we were unable to determine the meaning of the statute simply from an examination of its language. After considering the limited authorities available, we were of the view that the question decided below was a close one. Id. 682 F.2d at 770-71. We were not firmly convinced, either way, as to what the correct result should be. We concluded, therefore, that (w) hether or not the district court's interpretation is ultimately upheld on appeal after final judgment, we cannot now find it to be 'clearly erroneous as a matter of law ....'  Id. (quoting Bauman v. United States District Court, 557 F.2d 650, 660 (9th Cir. 1977)). In Varsic v. United States District Court, 607 F.2d 245 (9th Cir. 1979), we also could not determine the meaning of the statute simply from an examination of the language. There we reviewed the legislative history of an Employee Retirement Income Security Act venue provision, compared its language with the language used in the venue provisions of other statutes, and analyzed cases construing those other provisions. After painstaking analysis of these materials and other questions, we said (w)hile we should be careful in attaching the adverb 'clearly' to erroneous in our hindsight review, we conclude that the test is met here. Id. at 252. 40 In Mehrmanesh we found the question close-we were not firmly convinced of the correct answer. In Varsic, we ultimately were. In line with the firm conviction test, United States Gypsum, for determining whether findings of fact are clearly erroneous, we conclude that: when we are firmly convinced that a district court has erred in deciding a question of law, we may hold that the district court's ruling is clearly erroneous as a matter of law as that term is used in mandamus analysis, Bauman, 557 F.2d at 660. 41 Moreover, we have some doubt that the district court's order need be clearly erroneous in supervisory mandamus cases where the petition raises an important question of law of first impression, the answer to which would have a substantial impact on the administration of the district courts. In cases in which the Supreme Court has reviewed the exercise of supervisory authority by the appellate courts over the district courts, it has not set forth any requirement that the order of the district court be clearly erroneous as a prerequisite to the granting of mandamus relief. See Schlagenhauf v. Holder, 379 U.S. 104, 85 S.Ct. 234, 13 L.Ed.2d 152 (1964); LaBuy v. Howes Leather Co., 352 U.S. 249, 77 S.Ct. 309, 1 L.Ed.2d 290 (1957); see also Note, Supervisory and Advisory Mandamus Under the All Writs Act, 86 Harv.L.Rev. 595, 611, 615 & n.86 (1973) (Schlagenhauf ... left no room in the area of advisory (supervisory) mandamus for a requirement of degree of error). 42 The requirement that the petitioner demonstrate that the order of the district court is clearly erroneous stems from our desire to avoid interference with the district court's control of the litigation before it. In the normal run of cases, it would be counterproductive for appellate courts to interfere when the most that could be claimed is that the district courts have erred in ruling on matters within their jurisdiction. Schlagenhauf, 379 U.S. at 112, 85 S.Ct. at 239 (quoting Parr v. United States, 351 U.S. 513, 520, 76 S.Ct. 912, 917, 100 L.Ed. 1377 (1956)). We are hesitant to declare that a district judge has exceeded his authority 7 unless we are reasonably certain, i.e., firmly convinced, that he has done so. But in supervisory mandamus cases involving questions of law of major importance to the administration of the district courts, the purpose of our review-and the reason for our correcting an error made by a trial judge-is to provide necessary guidance to the district courts and to assist them in their efforts to ensure that the judicial system operates in an orderly and efficient manner. Accordingly, in such cases we see no legitimate reason for refraining from exercising our supervisory authority where we can determine that an error has been made but cannot, for whatever reason, characterize the error as clearly erroneous. 43 Considering the nature of the issue before us, we believe that petitioners would be entitled to a writ were we to be firmly convinced that the district court was incorrect in its interpretation of section 455. Moreover, in light of the fact that the petition presents a question of law of first impression, the resolution of which would have a substantial effect on the orderly and efficient administration of the courts, we might issue the writ even were we simply to conclude that the district court was in error. 8