Opinion ID: 170350
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Solicitor opinion letter and administrative deference

Text: Fields relies on a 1942 opinion letter from the Solicitor of the Department of Agriculture concluding inter alia that § 480 precluded the exercise of concurrent jurisdiction as well as exclusive jurisdiction by the United States over national forest lands. Aplt. Reply Br. at 4 & Attach. 2 at 3; see also Aplt. Suppl. Reply Br. at 5-7. Fields insists we owe this opinion Chevron deference. [4] We disagree. Such deference applies when it appears that Congress delegated authority to the agency generally to make rules carrying the force of law, and that the agency interpretation claiming deference was promulgated in the exercise of that authority. United States v. Mead Corp., 533 U.S. 218, 226-27, 121 S.Ct. 2164, 150 L.Ed.2d 292 (2001). These prerequisites are not satisfied here. Agency views expressed in opinion letters lack the force of law and thus do not warrant Chevron deference. Christensen v. Harris County, 529 U.S. 576, 587, 120 S.Ct. 1655, 146 L.Ed.2d 621 (2000). More fundamentally, the proper reach of the federal legislative power, and the jurisdiction it vests in the federal courts, is categorically not a matter of agency judgment: Determining federal court jurisdiction is exclusively the province of the federal courts regardless of what an agency may say. Lindstrom v. United. States, 510 F.3d 1191, 1195 n. 3 (10th Cir.2007) (internal quotation marks omitted). In sum, Fields' reliance on § 480 as a disavowal of federal territorial jurisdiction, permitting only a proprietary interest in national forest lands, is contrary to interpretations of the statute by other circuits and inconsistent with federal criminal jurisprudence as a general matter.