Court Opinion

ID: 9464068
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 23:24:39.707195+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:26.955681
License: Public Domain

WILKEY, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
I concur with Judge Leventhal’s opinion for the majority in regard to parts I and II.A. I respectfully dissent in regard to part II.B, the question of timing, “whether, in order to give effect to the public hearing section of the Act, a hearing is a necessary precondition to any advance acquisition otherwise authorized by the Act.”1
There are two valid reasons for prospective purchases (advanced acquisition) from the revolving highway fund: (1) to relieve individual hardship of prospective sellers when a well founded belief exists that a projected highway will take a certain route, and yet the actual implementation of the purchases has not begun; and (2) to protect the government (taxpayers) by purchasing in advance of the public decision, thus avoiding speculative price increases, which is simply good business-like management of government property. Prospective purchasing thus is a highly necessary authority for the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) to have — and to be able to exercise effectively.
This power on which the disputed regulations are based was granted by statute in 1956. The authority was not taken away by the 1968 changes enacted by Congress, however you may read the letter of the Secretary of Transportation and the Senate Committee report. Neither Executive Branch comments, “understandings” etc., nor Congressional committee reports repeal laws; the power once granted by statute is there until taken away by statute. The majority opinion points to no language in the 1968 legislation which does this.
It is thoroughly impractical and ineffective to telegraph the likely highway routes by public hearings, for then the power of prospective purchasing simply becomes a nullity. There is nothing prospective about it, and the benefits due the taxpayer by the wise employment of government funds before prices become inflated is lost.
The opposing consideration is, of course, that “advance acquisitions will subjectively undermine the effectiveness of subsequent public hearings and environmental analy-ses.”2 Obviously this is an important factor, and to the majority, the decisive consideration.
Of course I recognize the impact of the acquisition of right of way in advance by prospective purchasing, both the financial bias and the psychological tilt toward the ultimate decision which results. Probably the psychological twisting of the ultimate decision toward the right of way prospectively acquired is even greater than the financial bias involved. The financial bias can be cured by the resale of the land acquired and the purchase of other right of way. Yet the asserted bias by route purchase is a matter of degree. In Gage v. Atomic Energy Commission,3 this court pointed out that all decisions preliminarily made influence the ultimate decision on site or route location. However, such influence is a matter of degree; some decisions influence the ultimate decisions more than' oth*241ers, a matter which must be evaluated in any individual case.
My position is simply that the task of balancing, and hopefully reconciling, two or more desirable goals, each of which has been authorized by statute, is not primarily the task of this court. A little judicial modesty would become us here.
First, it should be up to the responsible agency, the Federal Highway Administration, to implement the regulations by making prospective purchases without previous public environmental hearings in those instances in which the agency deems this action necessary. Certainly many, perhaps nearly all, purchases will be made after full consideration and public hearing on the environmental issues.
We have nothing in the way of a record on this point, and so until it is shown otherwise, I would believe that the responsible government agents would make prospective purchases with some consideration of the environmental impact, and that prospective purchases with only inadequate consideration of the environmental impact will turn out to be infrequently made.
Second, if the officials responsible for the employment of the highway revolving fund abuse their power to make prospective purchases, then we may anticipate that loud complaints will be registered with Congress. It will then be up to Congress to hold hearings and determine if, on the overall record of prospective purchases made and their ultimate environmental impact, there has been abuse of this authority to make prospective purchases, which unquestionably was granted by the 1956 legislation. If such turns out to be the case, then Congress can change the rule and deny completely or more carefully restrict the exercise of such prospective purchase power. Surely the judgment of Congress on this question, after holding the type of hearings on the facts of the situation which a court would find difficult to hold — certainly this appellate court — should reach a more just result than we can today, de hors any factual experience record whatever.
The power granted by the 1956 statute and the regulation to make prospective purchases in some instances will mean less environmental consideration given to the highway routes than would otherwise be desired. Whether this is desirable or undesirable seems to me to be a balancing judgment which Congress might have made at the time of enacting the 1968 changes, but on the record certainly did not make by repealing the 1956 authority to make prospective purchases, no matter what some testimony before a committee or a committee report said. It may well be that the power of prospective purchase of highway right of way, which to be effective usually must be without public hearings, is a power the government should have if it is exercised reasonably.
In my opinion, the way to determine whether this power is exercised reasonably, and thus should be continued, is not for an appellate court in advance to assume that the power will be abused, and therefore to require a public hearing before the power of prospective purchasing, is exercised, which would as a practical matter negate all benefits to be derived from prospective purchasing. Such a holding is not only based on an assumption of abuse of power, but also makes the policy choice in favor of environmental considerations, irrespective of other advantages to the government which are unquestionably found in prospective purchasing, duly authorized by statute.
I think it inappropriate for this Court to make this public policy judgment on the balance of valid competing considerations in the face of the authority granted by Congress in the 1956 Act; I would think it appropriate for Congress itself to make such a judgment as to which values it finds uppermost, balancing the environmental considerations in the statutes which it has enacted with the power of prospective purchasing which Congress also has authorized and has not repealed.

. Maj.op. 182 U.S.App.D.C.-, 561 F.2d 236.

. Maj.op. 182 U.S.App.D.C.-, 561 F.2d 236.

. 156 U.S.App.D.C. 231, 479 F.2d 1214, 1219, n.17 (1973).