Opinion ID: 400072
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Nature of the Proceeding.

Text: 53 While petitioners seem to view the Special Counsel as both public defender for federal employees and the final judge of whistleblowing claims, the Board conceives the Special Counsel more as a prosecutor charged with vindicating the Act's goal of achieving a fair, efficient, and lawfully-conducted Civil Service. The Board thus draws a significant distinction between the purpose of a corrective action proceeding and that of a Chapter 77 appeal. While appeals concern personal employment disputes, the Board argues, the thrust (of corrective action petitions) is toward systemic, not individual problems in the federal merit sytem .... Brief for Respondents at 35, n.17. 54 The Board's analysis of the Special Counsel's role is supported by the language and legislative history of the Act. It is evident on the face of the statute that the Special Counsel may seek to remedy prohibited practices that do not aggrieve any particular employee. See p. 154 supra. Moreover, even in cases initiated by a complaining employee, the Special Counsel can apparently make compromises with the agency involved, seek corrective action short of that requested by the complainant, and, we assume, refuse to pursue the case at all. 41 Quite clearly, then, the duties of the Special Counsel are not equivalent to those of an employees' advocate. 55 Rather, the authors of the CSRA apparently expected the Special Counsel to act as an ombudsman responsible for investigating and prosecuting violations of the Act. 42 The Special Counsel was modeled after the General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) who performs an independent prosecutorial role with respect to employment relations in the private sector. 43 Furthermore, the reports and debates concerning the CSRA are replete with characterizations of the Special Counsel as a prosecutor or watchdog of merit system abuses. 44 In short, if Chapter 77 appeals can be analogized to civil proceedings in which the immediate interests are personal to the litigants, corrective action petitions are comparable to criminal prosecutions designed to vindicate the public interest. 56 On this view of the Act, the principal recourse for individual employees who have suffered cognizable injury from a personnel action is to a Chapter 77 appeal-and not to the office of Special Counsel. But see note 41 supra. There will, of course, be many instances in which the interests of the Special Counsel and of a particular employee converge. An individual improperly discharged for whistleblowing, for example, could presumably seek the assistance of the Special Counsel in a Chapter 77 appeal 45 or forego that route entirely and rely on the Special Counsel to remedy the separation through a corrective action petition. Moreover, the Board may possess authority to merge corrective action and Chapter 77 appeals when they arise from the same set of facts. 46 Even in situations like those posited, however, the roles of the individual employee and the Special Counsel may differ. While the former seeks personal restoration, the latter is fundamentally concerned with the integrity of the merit system. As the Senate Report explained: 57 The Special Counsel should not passively await employee complaints, but rather, vigorously pursue merit system abuses on a systematic basis. He should seek action by the Merit Board to eliminate both individual instances of merit abuse and patterns of prohibited personnel practices. 47 58