Opinion ID: 481978
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Severability of the Unconstitutional Legislative Veto Provision in Section 1013

Text: 19 The appellants concede, as they must, that the legislative veto provision in section 1013 is unconstitutional under the Supreme Court's decision in Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha, 462 U.S. 919, 103 S.Ct. 2764, 77 L.Ed.2d 317 (1983). The sole question for decision is whether that unconstitutional provision is severable from the remainder of section 1013, which ostensibly authorizes the President to defer congressional appropriations for a period not exceeding one fiscal year. 20 Recently, in Alaska Airlines, Inc. v. Donovan, 766 F.2d 1550 (D.C.Cir.1985), cert. granted, --- U.S. ----, 106 S.Ct. 1259, 89 L.Ed.2d 569 (1986), this circuit had occasion to consider the test for determining when an invalid statutory provision will be found severable from the otherwise valid portions of the statute. In that case, we read the Supreme Court's decision in Chadha as establishing a presumption in favor of severability if what remained after severance of the unconstitutional provision would be fully operable as law. Id. at 1560. 15 That presumption could be overcome, however, by strong evidence indicating that Congress would not have enacted the statute had it known it could not include the unconstitutional provision. Id. 16 In this respect, we recognized that the question of severability was ultimately one of congressional intent. While a court was to presume severability, and attempt to save as much of the statute as [it could], the ultimate inquiry was whether Congress would have preferred [the] statute[ ], after severance of the legislative veto provision[ ], to no statute[ ] at all. Id. (quoting Gulf Oil Corp. v. Dyke, 734 F.2d 797, 804 (Temp.Emer.Ct.App.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 852, 105 S.Ct. 173, 83 L.Ed.2d 108 (1984)). 21 In the instant case, we assume without deciding that section 1013 is operable in the absence of its legislative veto provision. However, even assuming the statute is operable, on the record in this case we must affirm the District Court's judgment on congressional intent, i.e., that Congress would not have enacted section 1013 had it known that the legislative veto provision was unconstitutional. Indeed, to the extent that section 1013 is operable absent the legislative veto provision, it operates in a manner wholly inconsistent with the intent of Congress in enacting deferral legislation. We therefore hold that the unconstitutional legislative veto provision in section 1013 is inseverable from that portion of the statute conferring deferral authority on the President.
22 We assume for purposes of our severability analysis that section 1013 is in a purely technical sense operable even without a legislative veto provision. As noted earlier, however, the ultimate inquiry in a severability case is not whether the statute may somehow continue to function after excision of the invalid portion, but rather whether it continues to function in a manner consistent with congressional intent. Phrased differently, the question is whether Congress would have intended the statute to operate even in the absence of the invalid provision, or whether it would have preferred no statute at all. In the instant case, the conclusion is inescapable that Congress would have preferred no statute at all to a statute that conferred unchecked deferral authority on the President. 23 As the District Court observed and catalogued, the ICA was passed at a time when Congress was united in its furor over presidential impoundments and intent on reasserting its control over the budgetary process. 634 F.Supp. at 1454-58. Although the Senate and House initially differed over the precise means for reasserting congressional prerogatives, 17 the legislation that eventually emerged from Congress contained several strong measures expressly designed to limit the President's ability to impound funds appropriated by Congress. For permanent impoundments (or rescissions), Congress adopted the Senate approach, which required prior legislative approval of proposed impoundments. See 2 U.S.C. Sec. 683 (1982). For temporary impoundments (or deferrals), Congress adopted the House approach, which allowed impoundments to become effective without prior approval if neither House of Congress passed a resolution disapproving the impoundment. See 2 U.S.C. Sec. 684 (1982). Importantly, Congress also amended the Anti-Deficiency Act to preclude the President from relying on that Act as authority for implementing policy impoundments. 18 24 It is abundantly clear from both the statute and its legislative history that the overriding purpose of the deferral provision was to permit either House of Congress to veto any deferral proposed by the President--particularly policy deferrals. The title of the statute itself--Disapproval of proposed deferrals of budget authority --makes it plain that Congress was preoccupied with assuring for itself a ready means of disapproving proposed deferrals. The House Report accompanying H.R. 7130--from which the deferral provision was drawn--expressly states that the basic purpose of the bill was to provide each House an opportunity to veto an impoundment. H.R.REP. NO. 658, 93d Cong., 1st Sess. 43, reprinted in 1974 U.S. CODE CONG. & ADMIN.NEWS 3462, 3488. The Conference Committee Report also emphasizes that the bill was designed to provide Congress with an effective system of impoundment control. S.CONF.REP. NO. 924, 93d Cong., 2d Sess. 49, 76-78, reprinted in 1974 U.S.CODE CONG. & ADMIN.NEWS 3462, 3591, 3616-18. 25 When the numerous statements of individual legislators urging the passage of legislation to control presidential impoundments are also considered, the evidence is incontrovertible that the basic purpose of section 1013 was to provide each House of Congress with a veto power over deferrals. Yet, the appellants would have us hold that Congress, had it foreseen Chadha, would nevertheless have gone ahead and enacted section 1013 without a legislative veto provision. As difficult (and precarious) as it may be at times to reconstruct what a particular Congress might have done had it been apprised of a particular set of facts, we refuse to entertain this remarkable proposition. As the District Court aptly noted, the raison d'etre  of the entire legislative effort was to assert control over presidential impoundments. 634 F.Supp. at 1454. It is simply untenable to suggest that a Congress precluded from achieving this goal would have turned around and ceded to the President the very power it was determined to curtail. 26 In this respect, this case is the complete converse of Alaska Airlines, Inc. v. Donovan, 766 F.2d 1550 (D.C.Cir.1985), cert. granted, --- U.S. ----, 106 S.Ct. 1259, 89 L.Ed.2d 569 (1986), where we held that an unconstitutional legislative veto provision contained in section 43(f) of the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, 49 U.S.C. Sec. 1552(f) (1982), was severable from that portion of the statute authorizing the Secretary of Labor to issue regulations necessary to administer an employee protection program. Here, rather than adding the legislative veto provision as somewhat of an afterthought, as in Alaska Airlines, Congress focused almost exclusively on the means for asserting control over presidential impoundments. 19 The conclusion is thus inescapable that Congress would not have enacted section 1013 had it known that it could not exercise control over deferrals by means of a legislative veto. 27 The appellants argue vigorously that the opposite conclusion is compelled by the distinction drawn in the Act between rescissions and deferrals. As noted earlier, the original bill passed by the House would have permitted both rescissions and deferrals to go into effect automatically, subject of course to a legislative veto. See note 17 supra. The House Report explained that the Committee favored a legislative veto mechanism because 28 [i]n the normal process of apportionment, the executive branch necessarily withholds funds on hundreds of occasions during the course of a fiscal year. If Congress adopts a procedure requiring it to approve every necessary impoundment, its legislative process would be disrupted by the flood of approvals that would be required for the normal and orderly operation of the government. The negative mechanism provided in H.R. 7130 will permit Congress to focus on critical and important matters, and save it from submersion in a sea of trivial ones. 29 H.R.REP. NO. 658, 93d Cong., 1st Sess. 41, reprinted in 1974 U.S.CODE CONG. & ADMIN.NEWS 3462, 3486-87. In the final analysis, however, the House approach prevailed only for deferrals; for rescissions, Congress adopted the Senate approach, which required prior congressional approval before a rescission could go into effect. According to the appellants, this distinction is critical, for it demonstrates that Congress' intent in enacting section 1013 was to render deferrals presumptively valid. Brief of Defendants-Appellants at 31-33. Because Congress did not want to trouble itself by approving deferrals in advance, they argue, Congress would have authorized the President to implement deferrals even had it known that it could not maintain oversight over those deferrals by means of a legislative veto. 30 This argument completely misreads the above-quoted passage and is completely at odds with Congress' expressed intention to control rather than authorize presidential deferrals. First, the quoted passage plainly speaks to trivial, everyday programmatic deferrals. It is these trivial impoundments relating to the normal and orderly operation of the government that Congress expected to present little controversy. Congress most certainly did not mean to suggest that impoundments designed to negate congressional budgetary policies would be presumptively valid. It is precisely this sort of impoundment that Congress was determined to forestall. 31 Second, the quoted passage proves only that Congress preferred a system in which it need not enact legislation approving deferrals because it could easily disapprove them by the relatively simple expedient of the one-House veto. Nowhere in the legislative history is there the slightest suggestion that the President be given statutory authority to defer funds without the possible check of at least a one-House veto. Indeed, the House Report completely refutes the notion that Congress would have granted the President statutory authority to implement deferrals, thereby forcing itself to reenact an appropriations bill each time it disapproved of a deferral: 32 [The one-House veto] is suggested on the ground that the impoundment situation established by the bill involves a presumption against the President's refusing to carry out the terms of an already considered and enacted statute. To make Congress go through a procedure involving agreement between the two Houses on an already settled matter would be to require both, in effect, to reconfirm what they have already decided. 33 H.R.REP. NO. 658, 93d Cong., 1st Sess. 42, reprinted in 1974 U.S.CODE CONG. & ADMIN.NEWS 3462, 3487 (emphasis added). Yet, a finding of severability would create a presumption in favor of deferrals and require Congress to legislate a second time in order to effectuate its budgetary policies. We cannot conceive of a result more contrary to congressional intent. 34 The appellants further argue that Congress' more permissive treatment of deferrals suggests that the congressional furor over impoundments was principally a dissatisfaction with rescissions. Brief of Defendants-Appellants at 37-39. Again, this contention has absolutely no basis in the legislative history. Although Congress certainly distinguished between rescissions and deferrals, it spoke in general terms of the need to control impoundments, which it defined as withholding or delaying the expenditure or obligation of budget authority ... and the termination of authorized projects or activities for which appropriations have been made. H.R.REP. NO. 658, 93d Cong., 1st Sess. 52, reprinted in U.S.CODE CONG. & ADMIN.NEWS 3462, 3497 (emphasis added). 20 The appellants can point to nothing in the legislative history to suggest that members of Congress were disturbed with rescissions but tolerant of deferrals. Indeed, to the extent that Congress expressed any tolerance of deferrals at all, it was referring to routine programmatic deferrals, not policy deferrals. Id. at 42, 1974 U.S.CODE CONG. & ADMIN.NEWS at 3488 ([T]he Committee recognizes that a brief delay in expending or obligating funds may sometimes be legitimately necessary for purely administrative reasons.). 21 35 We cannot emphasize enough in this context the critical distinction between programmatic and policy deferrals. As the appellants concede, see Brief of Defendants-Appellants at 33, our holding in this case will not impair the President's ability to implement routine programmatic deferrals. When Congress amended the Anti-Deficiency Act in the ICA, it did not disturb the President's authority to impound funds for purely administrative purposes. See note 18 supra. Thus, the President may still invoke the Anti-Deficiency Act as authority for implementing programmatic deferrals. By amending the Anti-Deficiency Act, however, Congress intended to foreclose the President from relying on that Act as separate statutory authority for policy deferrals. Congress intended to permit policy deferrals only under section 1013, and only if it could ensure itself a ready means of overturning policy deferrals with which it disagreed. Had Congress known it could not employ such a mechanism, it most assuredly would not have nullified its own amendment to the Anti-Deficiency Act by creating new statutory authority for policy deferrals. 36 Finally, the appellants contend that if we invalidate section 1013 in its entirety, we must also strike down the ICA's other deferral-related provision--i.e., Congress' amendment to the Anti-Deficiency Act. Brief of Defendants-Appellants at 57. We find this argument to be wholly specious. As noted earlier, a court's duty in a severability case is to preserve as much of the statute as it can consistent with congressional intent. We are unable to preserve section 1013 absent its legislative veto provision because to do so would produce a result wholly contrary to that intended by Congress. The amendment to the Anti-Deficiency Act, in contrast, is fully consistent with the expressed intent of Congress to control presidential impoundments. Thus, there is absolutely no basis for overturning Congress' amendment to the Anti-Deficiency Act.