Opinion ID: 782158
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: South Dakota

Text: 41 We turn our attention first to the injunction entered by the South Dakota District Court. The Court enjoined the Corps from releasing water from either Lake Oahe or Lake Francis Case. The State of South Dakota claimed that it was entitled to this relief on three grounds. First, it alleged that the Flood Control Act requires the Corps to act so as to maximize all interests on the River, including recreation. Second, the State argues that it is entitled to relief because the Corps is judicially estopped to favor navigation over recreation. Finally, South Dakota maintains that the Corps acted arbitrarily and capriciously in favoring navigation over recreation. We hold that none of these arguments is likely to succeed on the merits. 42 South Dakota argues that the Flood Control Act requires the Corps to maximize the benefits of the River, including fish-and-wildlife benefits. 5 This argument is not based upon the text of the statute, but instead upon the Act's legislative history. Senate Document 247 states that the plan will secure the maximum benefits for flood control, irrigation, navigation, power, domestic and sanitary purposes, wildlife, and recreation. S. Doc. No. 247, at 5; see also H.R. Doc. No. 475, at 29 (the comprehensive plan would ... provide for the most efficient utilization of the waters of the Missouri River Basin for all purposes, including irrigation, navigation, power, domestic and sanitary purposes, wildlife, and recreation.); id. at 3 (When completed the basin plan will be operated for maximum multiple purpose use.). Moreover, Senate Document 191, which represented one of the original competing views, included a provision that stated that during the spawning season every effort will be made to maintain as constant a pool level as possible. S. Doc. No. 191, 78th Cong., 2d Sess. 211 (1944). South Dakota maintains that the sum total of this legislative history compels the Corps to balance the interests each year so as to maximize each category of benefits, and that courts can review the annual operating plans to ensure that they do indeed maximize the benefits. 43 We reject this argument. South Dakota's proffered standard — whether the Corps's management of the River maximizes the benefits to all interests — is not the kind of standard that courts regularly employ in reviewing agency action. As a general rule, courts defer to agency policy decisions because it is not a court's function to substitute [its] judgment for that of the agency. Aman & Mayton, Administrative Law § 13.10.2 (1993). Under South Dakota's proffered standard the Corps's actions would receive no deference and the courts could be called upon to review every decision that the Corps makes, no matter how minute. Although Congress could give the courts the power to engage in such searching review, we do not believe that the portions of the Flood Control Act's legislative history to which South Dakota directs this Court are sufficient to achieve such a radical shift from the normal standard of review. Indeed, the statements that South Dakota points to are merely general statements of policy goals. They are not phrased as limitations on the Corps's discretion. Given that this argument finds no support in the text of the statute, and given the vagueness of the legislative history on the matter, we refuse to apply South Dakota's proffered standard. Courts are simply not empowered to review every decision of the Corps to ensure that it maximizes the benefits of the River for all interests. Indeed, such a standard would be impossible to meet, anyway. In times of drought it is not possible for both navigation and fishery benefits to be maximized. Something has to give. 44 South Dakota next argues that judicial estoppel requires the Corps to give equal consideration to recreation and other interests including navigation. This argument is based upon an agreement reached in previous litigation in Montana. There, South Dakota maintains, the Corps agreed to give all interests, including recreation, equal consideration in the management of the River — as opposed to giving flood control, navigation, or other interests priority over recreation — until the revision of the Master Manual was complete. Even assuming that the elements of judicial estoppel were met in this case, 6 the only thing that the Corps agreed to was that it would give all interests equal consideration. S.D. Brief at 27 (citing the ruling in a previous suit that gave rise to the judicial estoppel claim). Equal consideration does not mean equal results. In this case, South Dakota has presented no evidence that the Corps did not give equal consideration to recreation; only that in the end, the Corps decided to lower one reservoir per year during a drought to maintain navigation. This result could easily arise from the Corps's giving equal consideration to each interest. Indeed, the Corps maintains that it considered the interests of recreation equally. Testimony of Lawrence Cieslak, App. at 823 ([I]n the Annual Operating Plan we are giving equal consideration to all of the project purposes in trying to meet the operation objectives.) The Corps concluded that it does not need to hold the water level at every reservoir constant every year to allow recreational activities to flourish. The evidence before the Corps indicated that a good fish spawn once every four to five years is sufficient to maintain the fisheries of each reservoir. Master Manual Section 9-31. According to this conclusion, then, the Corps can lower each reservoir on a rotating basis (one per year) and still maintain the fish stock in the reservoirs. Given this fact, the Corps's decision to lower one reservoir per year during a drought simply does not provide any proof that the Corps was not giving recreation equal consideration. South Dakota is unlikely to succeed on its judicial-estoppel theory. 45 Finally, we must consider whether the Corps's decision to lower Lake Oahe in the Spring of 2002 to maintain downstream navigation was arbitrary and capricious. See 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A). To make this finding the court must consider whether the decision was based on a consideration of the relevant factors and whether there has been a clear error of judgment. Although this inquiry into the facts is to be searching and careful, the ultimate standard of review is a narrow one. The court is not empowered to substitute its judgment for that of the agency. Overton Park, 401 U.S. at 416, 91 S.Ct. 814 (citations omitted). To pass scrutiny, [t]he agency must articulate a rational connection between the facts found and the choice made. Bowman Transp., Inc. v. Arkansas-Best Freight System, Inc., 419 U.S. 281, 288, 95 S.Ct. 438, 42 L.Ed.2d 447 (1974) (internal quotations omitted). This standard of review gives great deference to the policy decisions made by the agency and does not allow a court to overturn an agency action merely because the court would have acted differently; a court may find an action to be arbitrary and capricious only when there is no rational basis for the policy choice. 46 The policy choice that South Dakota is challenging is not arbitrary and capricious. The Corps provided a rational basis for its decision to lower one reservoir per year during drought conditions. The Corps had evidence that every reservoir did not need to have a good spawn each year to maintain the fish stocks. Thus, so long as each reservoir's water level was not lowered every year, the fish stocks in the reservoirs would not be irreparably harmed. The Corps decided to alternate the harm among the reservoirs, maintaining the water level at all but one reservoir each year. This plan would presumably allow each reservoir to have a fruitful spawn five out of every six years even in the worst drought conditions. This plan was eminently rational. South Dakota's efforts to increase the rainbow smelt stock during the Spring of 2002 do not make the plan irrational. South Dakota knew that Lake Oahe's water level had not been lowered in 2001, and that it was thus among the candidates to be lowered in 2002. Moreover, if Lake Oahe had been lowered as planned in 2002, it presumably would not be lowered in 2003, which would allow for a fruitful spawn this year. The Corps's policy was not irrational when written and did not become irrational in the Spring of 2002 because of South Dakota's efforts on Lake Oahe. South Dakota, therefore, is not likely to succeed on its theory that the Corps acted arbitrarily and capriciously. 47 Because none of South Dakota's theories for relief is likely to succeed on the merits, it was not entitled to a preliminary injunction. We therefore reverse the preliminary injunction entered in the South Dakota District Court and remand the case to that Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.