Opinion ID: 352543
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Reviewability of Constitutional Questions

Text: 16 Ralpho claims, inter alia, that the Commission's putative reliance on evidence to which he had neither access nor opportunity to address violates the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. At the outset, we note that whatever the merit of this position, that constitutional provision binds the Commission and Ralpho is entitled to demand its protections. 65 We are mindful that Article IV of the Constitution confers upon Congress broad power 66 to make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory . . . belonging to the United States, 67 and that the extent to which that power may be used to deny constitutional safeguards to those not within the United States but under its dominion is a matter of some controversy. 68 We need not in this case choose among the conflicting interpretations of Congress' Article IV powers, however, because even under the most restrictive standard 69 it is settled that there cannot exist under the American flag any governmental authority untrammeled by the requirements of due process of law . . . . 70 Of course, the United States does not hold the Trust Territory in fee simple, as it were, but rather as a trustee; 71 yet this is irrelevant to the question. That the United States is answerable to the United Nations for its treatment of the Micronesians does not give Congress greater leeway to disregard the fundamental rights and liberties of a people as much American subjects as those in other American territories. 72 We thus find the actions of the United States in the Trust Territories constrained by due process. 17 The question, then, is whether the Micronesian Claims Act suffers a court to hearken to Ralpho's due process complaint. Important tenets adjure needless determination of constitutional issues 73 and, as a corollary, command interpretation of legislation to avoid constitutional doubts as well as constitutional encounters if it is fairly susceptible of such a construction. 74 These admonitions are to be observed when a statute is advanced to outlaw judicial review of action trenching on constitutional rights, as the Supreme Court's holding in Johnson v. Robison 75 demonstrates. There challenge was made to the facial validity of a veterans' benefit statute, and the Government urged that judicial consideration of the statute's constitutionality was barred by a provision 76 purporting to render all administrative decisions under the statute final and unreviewable. The Court noted that a construction of the finality provision that foreclosed inquiry into the constitutionality of the challenged legislation would raise serious question as to the constitutionality of the finality provision itself. 77 Consequently, the Court looked to see whether Congress intended an interpretation of such dubious validity. Finding no  'clear and convincing' evidence of congressional intent (as is) required by this Court before a statute will be construed to restrict access to judicial review of constitutional questions, 78 the Court construed the statute to permit judicial inquiry into its consonance with the Constitution. 79 18 In our case, Ralpho claims not that the Micronesian Claims Act is unconstitutional, but that the Commission's action under it denied him due process of law. This difference is urged by the Commission as a distinction. 80 But if legislation by Congress purporting to prevent judicial review of the constitutionality of its own actions is itself constitutionally suspect, legislation that frees an administrative agency from judicial scrutiny of its adherence to the dictates of the Constitution must pose grave constitutional questions as well. Not only is it daring to suggest that Congress, though subject to the checks and balances of the Constitution, may create a subordinate body free from those constraints; it also beggars the imagination to suggest that judicial review might be less crucial to assuring the integrity of administrative action than it is to make certain that Congress will operate within its proper sphere. 81 If the courts are disabled from requiring administrative officials to act constitutionally, it is difficult to see who would perform that function. We say that a statute purporting to foreclose judicial redress of constitutional violations allegedly perpetrated by an administrative agency must be construed in accordance with the standards articulated in Johnson v. Robison. 82 19 We must, then, ascertain whether Congress intended the finality provision of the Micronesian Claims Act to cut off judicial review of constitutional claims. A reading of the legislative history of the Act discloses that if Congress took such a drastic step, it did so with marked silence as to its purpose. The first several bills introduced to implement the 1969 Japanese-American agreement to compensate the Micronesians dealt only with presecure claims. These bills tracked previous foreign-claims legislation, 83 in most particulars, but contained no language restricting review. 84 Two later versions appended to the presecure-claims provisions a second title empowering the Commission to settle and pay post-secure claims arising up to July 1, 1951. That title contained a proviso that any such settlements . . . and any such payments . . . under the authority of this title  shall be final. 85 Only in the very last version of the bill was that language, still appearing in Title II, extended to cover Title I presecure claims. 86 The extension was mentioned only once in several days of hearings; 87 it was recited but not explained in the House committee report; 88 and it was never mentioned during the floor debates. 89 20 The only expressions that might suggest a legislative preference for administrative finality were those directed to a fear that the Commission might create posh sinecures by drawing out its work in perpetuum. 90 This was addressed, however, by another provision of the statute instructing the Commission to wind up its affairs within three years. 91 We will not assume that Congress courted a constitutional confrontation merely to facilitate Commission adherence to its timetable, which is, as we note elsewhere, directory in any event. 92 Our position is the more solidly buttressed by clear evidence of congressional concern for the due process rights of claimants under the Act. 93 Consistently with our duty to avoid a reading of the statute that brings it into potential conflict with the Constitution, 94 we hold that challenges of constitutional stature impugning action by the Micronesian Claims Commission are cognizable in the federal courts. 21