Opinion ID: 1436710
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the sierra club's right to judicial review

Text: Relying on the Supreme Court's decision in Cort v. Ash, 422 U.S. 66, 95 S.Ct. 2080, 45 L.Ed.2d 26 (1975), and Cort's progeny, the District contends that [t]he Sierra Club may not maintain this action because there is no private right of action for alleged violations of the Recycling Act. We do not agree. Distilled to its essence, the Sierra Club's complaint seeks equitable relief from adverse and allegedly unlawful action by a public officer. Specifically, according to the Sierra Club, the DCRL requires the District to provide curbside collection of recyclables, and the suspension of curbside collection contravenes this statutory mandate. It is the District's position that, even if the DPW violated the DCRL in this regard, the Superior Court lacks authority to do anything about it. This contention cannot be reconciled with the applicable precedents or with the sound reasons of policy that underlie them.
As the Supreme Court explained, almost a century ago, in American Sch. of Magnetic Healing v. McAnnulty, 187 U.S. 94, 23 S.Ct. 33, 47 L.Ed. 90 (1902), courts must have power in a proper proceeding to grant relief. Otherwise, the individual is left to the absolutely uncontrolled and arbitrary action of a public and administrative officer, whose action is unauthorized by any law and is in violation of the rights of the individual. Id. at 110, 23 S.Ct. at 39 (emphasis added); see also Abdullah v. Roach, 668 A.2d 801, 807 n. 9 (D.C.1995) (quoting McAnnulty ). Accordingly, [t]he actions of government agencies are normally presumed to be subject to judicial review unless [the legislature] has precluded review or a court would have no law to apply to test the legality of the agency's actions. Simpson v. District of Columbia Office of Human Rights, 597 A.2d 392, 398 (D.C.1991) (quoting Carlin v. McKean, 262 U.S.App.D.C. 212, 214, 823 F.2d 620, 622 (1987), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 1046, 108 S.Ct. 784, 98 L.Ed.2d 870 (1988)). As Judge Ferren has written, [t]he strong presumption favoring judicial review of agency action reflects a recognition that review is essential to promoting agency responsiveness to legislative mandates.... [U]nreviewability gives the executive a standing invitation to disregard... statutory requirements .... People's Counsel v. Public Serv. Comm'n of the District of Columbia, 474 A.2d 1274, 1278 n. 2 (D.C.1984) (concurring opinion) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). [3] [O]nly upon a showing of `clear and convincing evidence' of a contrary legislative intent should the courts restrict access to judicial review. Abbott Labs. v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 136, 141, 87 S.Ct. 1507, 1511, 18 L.Ed.2d 681 (1967) (citations omitted). The authority of courts to grant relief from unlawful agency action existed at common law, and it was merely reinforced (and not created) by the federal Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. §§ 701 et seq. (1994), and similar local enactments. See Abbott Labs., supra, 387 U.S. at 140, 87 S.Ct. at 1511. The presumption of reviewability is not the product of enacted law, it is common law. 5 KENNETH C. DAVIS, ADMINISTRATIVE LAW TREATISE § 28.1, at 254 (2d ed. 1984); see also Abdullah, supra, 668 A.2d at 807-08 (citing DAVIS). There are two principal exceptions to the presumption of judicial reviewability. First, the legislature may commit the challenged action entirely to agency discretion. Second, it may preclude review, explicitly or implicitly, by statute. See, e.g., Heckler v. Chaney, 470 U.S. 821, 828, 105 S.Ct. 1649, 1654, 84 L.Ed.2d 714 (1985). Neither of these exceptions applies here. A legislative intention to commit an action entirely to agency discretion  a very narrow exception to the governing presumption  may properly be inferred only in those rare instances where statutes are drawn in such broad terms that in a given case there is no law to apply. Citizens to Preserve Overton Park v. Volpe, 401 U.S. 402, 410, 91 S.Ct. 814, 820-21, 28 L.Ed.2d 136 (1971) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). [4] In this case, the statute requires the Mayor to provide collection services, see D.C.Code § 6-3407(d), and the Mayor's acts or omissions can readily be evaluated by reference to that obligation. Furthermore, nothing in the DCRL explicitly or implicitly precludes judicial review. See, e.g., Briscoe v. Bell, 432 U.S. 404, 413, 97 S.Ct. 2428, 2433-34, 53 L.Ed.2d 439 (1977) (requiring a clear showing of preclusion); Simpson, supra, 597 A.2d at 398. The presumption thus stands unrebutted. We have held that the Superior Court may entertain claims for equitable relief from allegedly unlawful action by public officials pursuant to D.C.Code § 11-921(a)(6) (1995), which vests that court with jurisdiction over any civil action or other matter, at law or in equity, brought in the District of Columbia. See, e.g., Speyer v. Barry, 588 A.2d 1147, 1159-60 (D.C.1991), and authorities there cited; Abdullah, supra, 668 A.2d at 807. The availability of review by this court of agency decisions in contested cases  those in which trial-type proceedings are required at the agency level  does not preclude judicial review in other matters, because [a]ny party aggrieved by an agency's decision may initiate an appropriate equitable action in the Superior Court to seek redress. Capitol Hill Restoration Soc'y v. Moore, 410 A.2d 184, 188 (D.C.1979).
We do not agree with the District's contention that Cort v. Ash, supra , provides the proper analytical framework for determining whether the Sierra Club may maintain this action. Judicial reviewability of agency action does not depend on the creation of a private right of action in the statute sought to be enforced. Japan Whaling Ass'n v. American Cetacean Soc'y, 478 U.S. 221, 230-31 n. 4, 106 S.Ct. 2860, 2866-67 n. 4, 92 L.Ed.2d 166 (1986). On the contrary, as Judge (now Justice) Breyer explained for the court in N.A.A.C.P. v. Secretary of Hous. & Urban Dev., 817 F.2d 149 (1st Cir.1987), it is difficult to understand why a court would ever hold that Congress, in enacting a statute that creates federal obligations, has implicitly created a private right of action against the federal government, for there is hardly ever any need for Congress to do so. That is because federal action is nearly always reviewable for conformity with statutory obligations without any such private right of action. Id. at 152 (emphasis in original) (citing, inter alia, Abbott Labs., supra, 387 U.S. at 140, 87 S.Ct. at 1511; McAnnulty, supra, 187 U.S. at 110, 23 S.Ct. at 39, and 5 DAVIS, supra, § 28.1, at 254-56). Given the availability of judicial review of agency action pursuant to McAnnulty and its progeny and to the federal APA, the court in N.A.A.C.P. thought it not surprising that cases discussing a private right of action implied from a federal statute do not involve a right of action against the federal government. Rather, they typically involve statutes that impose obligations upon a nonfederal person (a private entity or a nonfederal agency of government). The statute typically provides that the federal government will enforce the obligations against the nonfederal person. The private right of action issue is whether Congress meant to give an injured person a right himself to enforce the federal statute directly against the nonfederal person or whether the injured person can do no more than ask the federal government to enforce the statute. N.A.A.C.P., supra, 817 F.2d at 152 (emphasis in original). [5] Judge Breyer's reasoning in N.A.A.C.P. that no private right of action is necessary to obtain judicial review of agency action is directly applicable here. The Sierra Club alleged in its complaint that District officials violated specific statutory mandates by terminating the recycling program. It invoked the general equitable jurisdiction of the Superior Court, and sought equitable relief requiring the District to comply with the law. In this regard, this case is indistinguishable from N.A.A.C.P. [6] The District contends that Kelly v. Parents United, 641 A.2d 159 (D.C.), modified on other grounds, 648 A.2d 675 (D.C.1994), in which this court applied Cort v. Ash analysis to a suit alleging adverse and unlawful agency action, precludes this court from rejecting that analysis here. In Kelly, however, both parties assumed in their submissions that Cort v. Ash provided the correct legal framework. No party invoked, and the court did not consider, either the presumption of reviewability of agency action or the Superior Court's authority to entertain suits for equitable relief where a party has alleged that such agency action was unlawful. As we recently had occasion to reiterate in Murphy v. McCloud, 650 A.2d 202 (D.C.1994), [t]he rule of stare decisis is never properly invoked unless in the decision put forward as precedent the judicial mind has been applied to and passed upon the precise question. Id. at 205 (quoting Fletcher v. Scott, 277 N.W. 270, 272 (Minn. 1938) (citations omitted)). Questions which merely lurk in the record, neither brought to the attention of the court nor ruled upon, are not to be considered as having been so decided as to constitute precedents. Id. (quoting Webster v. Fall, 266 U.S. 507, 511, 45 S.Ct. 148, 149, 69 L.Ed. 411 (1925)); see also Thompson v. United States, 546 A.2d 414, 423 n. 14 (D.C.1988) (quoting Webster ). A point of law merely assumed in an opinion, not discussed, is not authoritative. Murphy, supra, 650 A.2d at 205 (quoting In re Stegall, 865 F.2d 140, 142 (7th Cir.1989)). This is especially true with respect to jurisdictional issues, for when questions of jurisdiction have been passed on in prior decisions sub silentio, this court has never considered itself bound when a subsequent case finally brings the jurisdictional issue before us. Id. (quoting Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U.S. 528, 533-35 n. 5, 94 S.Ct. 1372, 1377 n. 5, 39 L.Ed.2d 577 (1974)). At most, the question whether the mode of analysis set forth in Cort v. Ash applies to suits alleging unlawful governmental conduct lurk[ed] in the record in Parents United. The parties and the court assumed that Cort applied. Nobody challenged that assumption, and the judicial mind did not apply itself to the issue or pass upon it. Under these circumstances, Parents United is not controlling.
The District also relies on Gonzalez v. United States I.N.S., 867 F.2d 1108 (8th Cir. 1989), as support for the proposition that Cort v. Ash applies. In Gonzalez, an incarcerated alien, who was serving a sentence for possession of heroin with intent to distribute it, filed a petition for a writ of mandamus to compel the Attorney General to bring a prompt deportation proceeding against him while he was in the custody of prison authorities. Id. at 1108-09. The alien sought, in effect, to be deported during his term of incarceration, rather than after its completion. The court, invoking Cort v. Ash , held that a statute then providing that deportation proceedings shall be brought as expeditiously as possible did not create an implied right of action in favor of imprisoned aliens. Id. at 1109-10. Gonzalez and the decisions which have adopted its reasoning, [7] however, differ materially from the present case. The determination whether and when to institute enforcement proceedings against a specific individual is a core executive responsibility which may reasonably be viewed as having been committed to agency discretion so as to preclude substantive judicial review. See note 3, supra. The Sierra Club, on the other hand, is not asking the court to compel the District to institute enforcement proceedings against anyone. Rather, it seeks injunctive relief requiring DPW to collect recyclables as contemplated in the DCRL. In any event, in Gonzalez and its progeny, as in Parents United, the courts did not address the question, which at most lurk[ed] in the record, whether Cort v. Ash analysis applied at all. In Soler v. Scott, 942 F.2d 597 (9th Cir.1991), vacated as moot sub nom. Sivley v. Soler, 506 U.S. 969, 113 S.Ct. 454, 121 L.Ed.2d 364 (1992), the court did directly deal with that issue and held, on facts similar to those in Gonzalez, that the Cort model did not apply: The district court's conclusion that Soler's claim depends upon the existence of an implied private right of action under Section 701 was mistaken. When a petitioner seeks to compel agency action unlawfully withheld or unreasonably delayed, 5 U.S.C. § 706(1), it is not necessary to determine whether the underlying statute creates a private right of action. The `right of action' in such cases is expressly created by the Administrative Procedure Act.... A separate indication of congressional intent to make agency action reviewable under the APA is not necessary; instead, the rule is that the cause of action for review of such action is available absent some clear and convincing evidence of legislative intention to preclude review. Japan Whaling, 478 U.S. at 231 n. 4, 106 S.Ct. at 2866 n. 4. See also Sierra Club v. Peterson, 705 F.2d 1475, 1478-79 (9th Cir.1983). Id. at 604 (alteration in original); see also Hernandez-Avalos v. I.N.S., 50 F.3d 842, 846-47 (10th Cir.1995). [8] The federal APA does not apply to this case but, as we have previously noted at page 358, supra, the right to judicial review existed at common law prior to the APA's enactment, and the Superior Court's civil action jurisdiction authorizes such review. See page 358-359, supra. Accordingly, we agree with the court's reasoning in Soler and the other authorities cited, and now turn to the merits of the Sierra Club's claim. [9]