Opinion ID: 491627
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Status of Threatened Injury in Standing Law

Text: 23 When a claim arises under Sec. 702 of the APA, we must determine whether plaintiffs are adversely affected or aggrieved by agency action within the meaning of a relevant statute. In other words, plaintiffs must show that the challenged action ha[s] caused them injury in fact and that the injury is to an interest arguably within the zone of interests to be protected or regulated by the statutes that the agencies were claimed to have violated. Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727, 733, 92 S.Ct. 1361, 1365, 31 L.Ed.2d 636 (1972) (internal quotations omitted). Although the analysis of whether a plaintiff is aggrieved within the meaning of Sec. 702 and whether he has alleged a case or controversy under Article III of the Constitution are, and should be, analytically distinct questions, the Supreme Court has interpreted both Sec. 702 and the Constitution as requiring plaintiffs to show that they are personally injured by the challenged action and that their injury is caused by that action. See, e.g., Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 102 S.Ct. 752, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982) (discussion of Article III); Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 96 SCt. 1917, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976) (suit under the APA, discussion nonetheless of the Constitution); Sierra Club (APA). The personal injury may be actual or threatened. Valley Forge, 454 U.S. at 472, 102 S.Ct. at 758-59 (internal quotation omitted). Although the mere threat of an injury might at first glance appear not to render a party aggrieved by agency action, and may seem noncognizable in a judicial system given jurisdiction over only cases or controversies, the Supreme Court has accommodated allegations of threatened injury in two settings. 24 The first setting involves cases in which the plaintiff alleges that governmental action will be taken directly against him. In the context of preenforcement review of agency action, the Court has inquired whether the challenged regulation would certainly apply to behavior in which the plaintiff intends to engage. Compare Abbott Laboratories v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 136, 87 S.Ct. 1507, 18 L.Ed.2d 681 (1967), with Toilet Goods Association v. Gardner, 387 U.S. 167, 87 S.Ct. 1530, 18 L.Ed.2d 704 (1967) and National Latino Media Coalition v. FCC, 816 F.2d 785 (D.C.Cir.1987). Similarly, [w]hen contesting the constitutionality of a criminal statute, a plaintiff may seek a declaratory judgment if he has alleged an intention to engage in a course of conduct arguably affected with a constitutional interest, but proscribed by statute, and there exists a credible threat of prosecution thereunder.... Babbitt v. United Farm Workers, 442 U.S. 289, 298, 99 S.Ct. 2301, 2309, 60 L.Ed.2d 895 (1979) (internal quotation omitted). Furthermore, the Court has refused to allow suits seeking injunctive relief to bar unconstitutional governmental practices unless the plaintiff can show that the governmental entity in question has a policy authorizing the unconstitutional practices to which he has credibly alleged he would again be subject. See, e.g., O'Shea v. Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 94 S.Ct. 669, 38 L.Ed.2d 674 (1974). In all these cases involving claims of threatened injury emanating directly from governmental conduct, the Court has assessed the likelihood that the clash between the government and the plaintiff will in fact occur. 25 The other setting comprises cases in which the government acts directly against a third party, whose expected response in turn will injure the plaintiff. The standing question in these three-party 7 cases frequently turns not on the existence of personal injury but rather on so-called causation issues, i.e., whether the third party's decision is sufficiently dependent upon the governmental action that plaintiff's injury is fairly traceable to that action and is likely to be redressed by an order binding the government. See, e.g., Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 104 S.Ct. 3315, 82 L.Ed.2d 556 (1984); Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 96 S.Ct. 1917, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976); Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975). When personal injury is at issue in a three-party case, it usually depends upon how likely it is that the third party's response to the challenged governmental action will injure the plaintiff at all. 26 In a pair of environmental lawsuits directly relevant to today's case, the Supreme Court has explained how a plaintiff may show threatened personal injury in a three-party setting. When the plaintiff in Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727, 92 S.Ct. 1361, 31 L.Ed.2d 636 (1972), argued that the government's decision to permit private development of a national game refuge would injure its general interest in the conservation of national parks, the Court denied standing, finding that [t]he Sierra Club failed to allege that it or its members would be affected in any of their activities or pastimes by the ... development. Id. at 735, 92 S.Ct. at 1366. The successful plaintiff in United States v. SCRAP, 412 U.S. 669, 93 S.Ct. 2405, 37 L.Ed.2d 254 (1973), on the other hand, alleged that its members' use of natural resources surrounding the Washington Metropolitan area, id. at 678, 93 S.Ct. at 2411, would be injured by a chain of third-party responses to an ICC rate decision. Thus, cases like Sierra Club and SCRAP parallel in the three-party context the search for likelihood of injury that governs standing law in the two-party context. In both settings, the Court attempts to predict what the government's and/or third party's actions will be and requires a credible allegation that the plaintiff's course of behavior will be harmed by the carrying out of those actions. 27 To sum up, whether an allegation of threatened injury suffices for standing turns on the likelihood of the occurrence of that injury. In a two-party case, a court can simply determine whether a governmental law, rule, or policy will be applied to the plaintiff's planned conduct. In a three-party case, the court must ascertain whether the third party's response to governmental action will, likewise, affect the plaintiff's intended behavior. Where the alleged injury involves access to land in a three-party case, as in Sierra Club, SCRAP, and the case at bar, the judgment regarding likelihood of injury turns on whether the plaintiff's future conduct will occur in the same location as the third party's response to the challenged governmental action. Otherwise, the threat of injury would be too amorphous or uncertain; it would be no greater for the plaintiff than for any person simply opposed to the governmental action in question. In short, the issue in each case is whether the plaintiff has put forward enough facts to show that his intended behavior will be injured as a direct or indirect result of the challenged governmental action. 8 28 As we discuss in detail below, although it is clear that additional lands will be transferred out of federal hands as a result of the challenged policy, plaintiffs have not pointed to any specific lands that they wish to use that will be so transferred. Hence, they are unable to show a sufficient threat of injury to bring them into line with the applicable precedents.B. Whether Plaintiffs Have Standing in This Case 29 Many of plaintiffs' members have visited and will visit many federal lands throughout Alaska for recreational and study purposes. See Plaintiffs' Answers & Objections to Intervenor-Defendant Alaska Federation of Natives' First Set of Interrogatories, J.A. at 62-74, Rec. No. 29; Deposition of David McCargo (Sierra Club member), J.A. at 140-61, Rec. No. 48; Deposition of Jack Hession (Sierra Club member), J.A. at 78-139, Rec. Nos. 49, 53; Deposition of David Spencer (Sierra Club member), J.A. at 162, Rec. No. 51. However, plaintiffs are unable to name any specific lands that they intend to visit that either have been or will be shifted from federal to state or native ownership. Defendants argue that this failure to name a specific site of injury condemns plaintiffs' suit; additionally, they contend that it may be many years hence before either the state or the natives go over their original ASA and ANCSA limits and enter into possession of extra lands due to the BLM policy at issue today.
30 The District Court agreed with defendants' argument that the effect of the new allocation policy will not be felt in the immediate future, holding that BLM's new policy will not cause any injury until such time that the State and Native Corporations acquire title ... to at least one acre more than allotted by statute. J.A. at 11. Although we ultimately hold that plaintiffs have not proved standing on this record because they have failed to name a specific situs of injury, we deem it necessary to the guidance of the District Court on remand to point out the error of its conclusion that the injury will not occur until one acre more than the initially granted sum is conveyed. 31 a. State. To understand fully the effect of the new policy on the state's allotment, we must examine an additional argument raised by the state. Alaska contends that since 43 U.S.C. Sec. 1635(o ) permits it to take conveyance on CSU lands (refuges, forests, etc.) only if it had selected such lands prior to December 2, 1980, the new policy, promulgated after that date, will not alter the particular CSU lands ultimately conveyed to the state. Alaska explains that even though ownership of non-CSU federal lands (the BLM lands) may be transferred as a result of the policy, plaintiffs do not allege injury from the possible diminishment of the BLM lands, but only from the supposed decrease in CSU lands. Therefore, any additional conveyances to the state pursuant to the challenged policy will come from the BLM lands and will not injure plaintiffs. 32 This argument fails for two reasons. First, plaintiffs do not allege that their injury stems only from the effect of the challenged policy on CSU lands. Plaintiffs' complaint avers that their members use the public lands in Alaska, the federal public lands. J.A. at 29-30, Rec. No. 1. Plaintiffs' answer to an interrogatory regarding which lands they had visited includes references such as National forests and adjacent lands in Southeast Alaska. J.A. at 67-68, Rec. No. 29 (emphasis added). Thus, it appears that plaintiffs' threatened injury derives from the additional conveyance of BLM lands as well as CSU lands, and that Alaska's argument about the fixed status of CSU selections is therefore irrelevant. See Pl.Br. at 20 ([Plaintiffs' members] have also conducted [various travel and recreational] activities on unreserved federal lands [i.e., BLM lands].). 33 Second, Alaska's argument ignores the significant effects of overselection and prioritization on the future of the natural resources that plaintiffs seek to conserve for their recreational use. Section 1635(f) of 43 U.S.C. provides Alaska with a Right to overselect, permitting the state to select lands exceeding by not more than 25 per centum in total area the amount of State entitlement which has not been patented or tentatively approved under each grant or confirmation of lands to the State contained in the Alaska Statehood Act or other law. If its selections under a particular grant exceed such remaining entitlement, then the state is required to list all selections for that grant which have not been tentatively approved in desired priority order of conveyance, ... except that the State may alter such priorities prior to receipt of tentative approval. 34 The existence vel non of submerged lands within selected but unconveyed areas may well affect the state's prioritization--and, ultimately, conveyance--decisions. For example, assume that before the new policy the state had ranked first on its priority list a selected but unconveyed portion of the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge, and had ranked second on that list an identically sized selected but unconveyed portion of the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge. Assume further the existence of a large number of submerged lands in the Kenai but not the Yukon portion. The new policy would likely influence the state to alter the priorities of these two portions, because by taking the Kenai portion first it would be charged for fewer acres than if it took the Yukon portion, while actually receiving the same number of acres as if it took the Yukon portion. Thus, the new policy may well affect which CSU lands remain in federal hands and which shift over to state ownership. 35 The overselection and prioritization scheme also explains why plaintiffs need not necessarily wait until the new policy assures the state or natives one acre more than the statutorily granted amount. New prioritizations may take place well before that date, and any injury due to those new prioritizations would not occur but for the new policy. Although we need not decide today whether the reordering of priorities would injure plaintiffs at the time of the selection shift, the resulting conveyance, or the actual denial of access, we do reject the District Court's view that injury can only occur when the total number of acres exceeds the statutorily granted limit. 36 b. Natives. Our analysis is similar with regard to the effect of the new policy on the native allotment. Native overselection and prioritization are provided by regulation. 43 C.F.R. Secs. 2651.4(f) & 2652.3(f) (1986). While it is not clear from these regulations whether or not the natives may shift their priorities (but see infra ), even stronger evidence exists than in the case of the state to show the current effect of the challenged policy with regard to the natives. Plaintiffs have submitted copies of twenty-two letters from the BLM Branch of ANCSA Adjudication informing various native village corporations of the precise number of additional acres they are entitled to as a result of the challenged policy. 9 A summary of one of these letters reveals that the new submerged lands policy is already affecting native acreage allotments. 37 BLM wrote to Atmautluak Limited (a native village corporation) on September 23, 1985, to inform it of the new policy regarding the surveying of submerged lands, and of the specific effect of the policy on Atmautluak's selections. Atmautluak's statutory entitlement is 92,160 acres. It had received conveyance of 83,013 acres, and therefore was owed 9,147 acres. BLM credited Atmautluak, however, as a result of the new policy, with 14,835.03additional acres due to submerged lands contained within the 83,013 acres already conveyed. Thus, Atmautluak's remaining entitlement was calculated (with some minor adjustments) at approximately 24,000 acres. Next, BLM listed the lands that would be conveyed off Atmautluak's priority selection list to reach the statutory ceiling. BLM then informed Atmautluak that it was free to change its priorities. 38 This and similar letters to other villages reveal that BLM is moving rapidly to implement the challenged policy. By informing the various native corporations that their already conveyed acreage contains submerged lands for which they are to receive credits in the form of additional lands, BLM has removed any tint of speculativeness regarding the effect of the policy on the native allotment. (We observe also that these letters indicate that BLM apparently construes its regulations to permit alteration of the natives' priority lists, thus making the native situation with regard to overselection and prioritization identical to that of the state.) Any harm to plaintiffs that results from these letters implementing the new policy would not occur but for the policy; as with reprioritizations, the injury would occur when the letters do their damage with regard to specific lands, and this could well happen before extra acres over the statutorily granted limit are affected.
39 Although the new policy is currently being implemented, plaintiffs have not been able to point to any specific land that they intend to use that has been affected by the policy. That is, although both the state and the natives may be currently making prioritization shifts due to the policy, and although the natives have been authorized to make new selections due to the policy, there is no evidence in the record that identifies any specific land that is both affected by the policy and intended for the use of plaintiffs' members. In fact, there is no evidence in the record reflecting the specific location of any new prioritizations, selections, conveyances, or denials of access as a result of the policy. This is not to say that such responses to the new policy have not occurred; we simply do not know whether or not they have. This deficiency in the record may stem from the District Court's denial of plaintiffs' discovery request, a denial we ultimately find to be an abuse of discretion. Plaintiffs, however, argue for discovery only in the alternative; they maintain also that the record as it now stands provides sufficient evidence of personal injury to give them standing. 40 We disagree. Sierra Club and SCRAP teach that when an alleged injury involves the use and enjoyment of land, it is not enough that plaintiffs have a generalized interest in preserving such use and enjoyment. Rather, plaintiffs must allege that they or their members will suffer particularized injury from being denied the use and enjoyment of the land. Plaintiffs say that the new policy in this case will result in fewer public lands, that they use and enjoy various public lands throughout the state, and therefore that they are threatened with injury. This syllogism, however, is not complete, for it is possible that none of the public lands affected by the new policy will be ones that plaintiffs use and enjoy. This absence of specificity regarding location dooms plaintiffs' claim of threatened injury. As we have discussed above, in order to show sufficient likelihood of injury, a plaintiff must adduce facts that reveal how his planned behavior will be injured by the challenged governmental action and third-party response. Where the claimed injury involves access to land, the required showing involves the specification of the land that the plaintiff intends to use that the challenged action will affect. Otherwise, we cannot be certain enough that the plaintiff will himself be among the injured. 41 In this case, plaintiffs have shown through their complaint, answers to interrogatories, and deposition testimony, that their members use and intend to use various specified federal public lands throughout Alaska. Plaintiffs have also submitted letters from BLM to specific native tribes regarding credited acreage due to the new policy; since ANCSA and its implementing regulations require that native selections be contiguous, see 43 U.S.C. Sec. 1611(a)(2) & 43 C.F.R. Sec. 2651.4(b) (1986), plaintiffs can state with certainty that the credited acres must come from lands abutting existing native holdings. But plaintiffs' proof proceeds no further; since they do not know which of the many possible abutting lands will actually be affected by the new policy, plaintiffs cannot tell us whether or not the lands they intend to use are among them. This lack of specificity, thus, prevents plaintiffs from showing a sufficient likelihood of personal injury. 42 The distinction in SCRAP between the levels of specificity required to withstand a motion to dismiss and a motion for summary judgment is central to our conclusion. In SCRAP, the Court found that a complaint should not have been dismissed for lack of standing even though plaintiff had alleged injury only due to its members' use and enjoyment of natural resources surrounding the Washington Metropolitan area. 412 U.S. at 678, 93 S.Ct. at 2411. The Court held that despite its lack of specificity, this allegation was enough to survive a motion to dismiss. The main thrust of the SCRAP opinion, however, was to distinguish Sierra Club, in which plaintiff had alleged a truly generalized interest in conservation and the environment. Plaintiff's allegation in SCRAP that its members actually used and enjoyed the natural resources in question brought it within the personal injury circumscription that the Court had delineated in Sierra Club. But in a critical footnote, the SCRAP Court acknowledged that on a motion for summary judgment plaintiff might have had to show injury with greater specificity, i.e., to name the specific forests that it uses and enjoys that would be affected by the challenged action. Id. at 689-90 n. 15, 93 S.Ct. at 2417 n. 15. And the Court has since reiterated that SCRAP indeed might have come out differently had it been decided on a motion for summary judgment. Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 45 n. 25, 96 S.Ct. 1917, 1927 n. 25, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976). In sum, while a motion to dismiss may be decided on the pleadings alone, construed liberally in favor of the plaintiff, a motion for summary judgment by definition entails an opportunity for a supplementation of the record, and accordingly a greater showing is demanded of the plaintiff. See Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 2552-53, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986) (emphasis added) (Rule 56(c) mandates the entry of summary judgment, after adequate time for discovery and upon motion, against a party who fails to make a showing sufficient to establish the existence of an element essential to that party's case, and on which that party will bear the burden of proof at trial.). 10 43 In this case, the District Court had before it defendants' motion to dismiss and cross-motions for summary judgment. The court's accompanying memorandum opinion, however, clarifies that it was looking beyond the pleadings. After noting that SCRAP had been decided on a motion to dismiss and might have been decided differently on a motion for summary judgment, see supra, the District Court concluded that [h]aving motions for summary judgment before us and submissions outside the pleadings from the parties, we are not so limited in our inquiry. J.A. at 14. Therefore, plaintiffs' failure to show specificity of location condemns their standing case. However, the District Court's protective order denying discovery may have deprived plaintiffs of critical information that might have bolstered their case. Thus, we ultimately hold below that the District Court should not have denied plaintiffs' discovery requests specifically targeted at information pertinent to standing and granted defendants' motion for summary judgment.
44 Plaintiffs lack standing due to the absence of specific evidence of personal injury. Because, however, the District Court also held that causation was absent, and because the causation issue will again arise if plaintiffs on remand can supplement the record through additional discovery so as to show personal injury, we find it advisable to correct the District Court's causation holding. 45 For standing to exist under either Sec. 702 of the APA or the Constitution, personal injury must be  'fairly' traceable to the challenged action, and relief from the injury must be 'likely' to follow from a favorable decision. Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 751, 104 S.Ct. 3315, 3324, 82 L.Ed.2d 556 (1984). See also Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 96 S.Ct. 1917, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976); Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975). While the personal injury inquiry focuses on concrete facts about harm to the plaintiff, causation questions concern the directness of the link between the defendant's challenged action and the alleged injury, and focus on the incentive structure to which the intervening third party, who directly causes the injury, is responding. If the third party's conduct is sufficiently dependent upon the incentives provided by the defendant's action, then the resultant injury will be fairly traceable to that action and a court order binding the defendant will likely cure the plaintiff's harm. 46 These quite separate personal injury and causation inquiries have unfortunately gotten mixed up in this case. The District Court held that the alleged injury could not be fairly traced to the new policy because it is uncertain whether the new policy will actually lead to decreased public access to formerly federal lands. This uncertainty, the District Court explained, is due to an entire chain of events that must occur before plaintiffs are harmed, such as BLM determinations regarding credited acreage and nonnavigability, state and native selections and conveyances, and subsequent privatization. J.A. at 15-17. Additionally, the District Court held that the alleged injury would not likely be remedied by a reinstatement of the old measurement policy, because plaintiffs must rely upon an assumption that injury to their interests is less likely to occur under federal ownership. J.A. at 17. 47 On appeal, the parties have followed the District Court's lead and argued over whether public access rights are likely to shift with shifting land ownership, focusing on differences between state and federal law, historical instances of native assertions of private ownership, and more general notions of property rights. Pl.Br. at 36-41, Fed.Appellees Br. at 11-15, Calista Corp.Br. at 15-18, Alaska Br. at 34-38, Alaska Federation of Natives Br. at 29-38, Pl.Rep.Br. at 15-19. However, the likelihood of injury, whether or not that likelihood depends upon a single event or a chain of events, is properly a concern of the personal injury inquiry, not the causation inquiry (although whether relief is likely to follow remains, of course, a causation question). Thus, whether state or native ownership is more likely to injure plaintiffs than federal ownership is a factor to be taken into account when determining whether plaintiffs have made a sufficient showing of threatened personal injury. 48 If plaintiffs do make such a showing, however, the causation question will properly concern only whether plaintiffs' injury at the hands of the state or the natives is dependent upon the new BLM policy, or is instead the result of independent incentives governing the state's or the natives' decisionmaking process. We think the answer here is clear. Even though the state and the natives may have to take many factors into account in deciding what to do with newly acquired land, the new BLM policy that gave them legal ownership of that land in the first place will always be the primary factor enabling ultimate privatization. In other words, the natural consequence of a policy that transfers land ownership is to transfer the privileges that attend such ownership as well, which include, first and foremost, the power to control the use and enjoyment of land. Thus, any injury from impaired use and enjoyment of transferred land will be fairly traceable to the policy that triggered such a transfer. Similarly, a court order reinstating the old submerged lands chargeability policy would be likely to redress any injury to plaintiffs, because the land in question would no longer be available for state or native ownership and concomitant assertion of ownership rights. 11 III. OTHER CLAIMS 49 Apart from alleging that the challenged policy violates ASA and ANCSA, plaintiffs contend that BLM should have prepared an environmental impact statement (EIS), that BLM should have prepared an environmental assessment (EA) to determine whether to prepare an EIS, and that the decision regarding chargeability of submerged lands violated the APA because no opportunity for notice and comment was afforded interested members of the public. Additionally, plaintiffs challenge the District Court's denial of their motion to amend the complaint and their discovery requests. A. NEPA Claims 50 The District Court opinion addressed neither the merits of plaintiffs' National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) claims (preparation of the EIS and EA) nor their standing to raise such claims. J.A. at 1-19. On remand, the District Court should address these issues.