Opinion ID: 176166
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Majority's Decision is Inconsistent with the Overarching Purpose of the FTCA

Text: The majority's conclusion also is inconsistent with the broad and just purpose of the Federal Tort Claims Act, which is to compensate the victims of negligence in the conduct of governmental activities in circumstances like unto those in which a private person would be liable and not to leave just treatment to the caprice and legislative burden of individual private laws. Indian Towing Co., 350 U.S. at 68-69, 76 S.Ct. 122; see also 28 U.S.C. § 1346(b)(1). It would be wrong to apply the discretionary function exception in a case where . . . [the government's] judgment would be no different than a judgment made by a private individual not to take certain measures to ensure the safety of visitors. Faber, 56 F.3d at 1125. A private landowner in the Corps' position would have had to consider the exact same factors the Corps did when deciding to delay replacing the warning signs. This is exactly the kind of scenario that Congress intended to be covered by the FTCA. See Dalehite v. United States, 346 U.S. 15, 28, 73 S.Ct. 956, 97 L.Ed. 1427 (1953) (Uppermost in the collective mind of Congress were the ordinary common-law torts.), partially overruled on other grounds by Rayonier Inc. v. United States, 352 U.S. 315, 77 S.Ct. 374, 1 L.Ed.2d 354 (1957). [4] The discretionary function exception marks the boundary between those situations where the government is acting in its legislative or regulatory capacity and those where it is acting as any private person might. See Varig Airlines, 467 U.S. at 813-14, 104 S.Ct. 2755; Dalehite, 346 U.S. at 27-28, 73 S.Ct. 956. By preserving sovereign immunity for the former category of government actions, the exception prevent[s] judicial `second-guessing' of legislative and administrative decisions grounded in social, economic, and political policy through the medium of an action in tort. Varig Airlines, 467 U.S. at 814, 104 S.Ct. 2755. If this suit were to proceed, the district court would not usurp the Corps as supervisor and regulator of the Daguerre Point Dam. The Corps would still have responsibility for deciding how to run the dam, what hazards warrant safety precautions, and what those safety precautions should entail. But having made that decision, it would then be left for the court to determine whether the Corps was obeying applicable laws, its own rules and safety plans, and the common law. Dalehite, 346 U.S. at 34, 73 S.Ct. 956 (The `discretion' protected by the section is not that of the judgea power to decide within the limits of positive rules of law subject to judicial review.). This sort of second-guessing is not the kind prohibited by the discretionary function exception, it is the kind that a court must undertake in any garden variety tort case. The discretionary function exception does not apply to Mrs. Bailey's suit.