Court Opinion

ID: 9488116
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:36:53.805556+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:42.338822
License: Public Domain

SENTELLE, Circuit Judge,
dissenting, with whom SILBERMAN, WILLIAMS, and HENDERSON, Circuit Judges, join:
Much disagreement arises from semantics. How one reacts to an issue is greatly influenced by how one phrases the issue. Indeed, how one regards the resolution of an issue of public policy may be in part determined by whether one perceives the framer of legislation or legislative regulation as responding to one problem or a series. One writer, addressing legislative-objective questions in the context of equal protection law, has noted that the division of legislative purpose into single, simplified goals, each considered separately, could provide apparent support for a misleading conclusion that the legislation in question is overinelusive or underinelusive as to each step taken separately when the legislation might evidence a perfectly rational approach to “[t]he legislature’s overall pur-pose_” Robert F. Nagel, Note, Legislative Purpose Rationality and Equal Protection, 82 Yale L.J. 123, 127 (1972). Otherwise put, “[C]ourts sometimes ignore the clear import of a statute’s terms to formulate a fictional statutory goal to which the terms are not rationally related.” Id. at 154.
Similarly, in First Amendment Pickering analysis, whether a regulation survives the balance “between the interests of the [employee], as a citizen” on the one hand and promotion of “the efficiency of the public services [the agency] performs through its employees,” on the other, Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U.S. 563, 568, 88 S.Ct. 1731, 1734-35, 20 L.Ed.2d 811 (1968), may depend on how the Court’s expression of the purpose behind the regulation divides or groups the problems addressed by the agency. In striking down the regulations before us, the majority rejects as both underinelu-sive and overinelusive the regulations as directed to the goals of protecting against an appearance of impropriety and the threat to their integrity created by government employees’ use of public office for private gain. I suggest that a different reaction may be triggered by a different phrasing of the problems addressed by the agencies in their issuance of the regulations.
Ask first: “Should an employee traveling to deliver an official speech on behalf of an agency have to bear his own expenses?” I suggest the ready answer is, “No, the agency should reimburse him.”
If the question is next asked, “If an agency is sending an employee to travel to a remote location to deliver an official speech beneficial to both the agency and to a private entity represented in the employee’s audience, is it irrational for the agency to benefit the public fisc by accepting from the private entity payment for some or all of the employee’s expenses?” Again, I suggest the ready answer is, “No, it is perfectly rational for an agency acting for the mutual benefit of the taxpayers and a private entity to accept reimbursement from the private entity.”
Next question: “Should a federal employee who wishes to, on his own time, and for his own reasons, travel to speak to a private group and deliver unofficial speech not on behalf of his agency, but about subjects which make his appearance valuable because of his relation to the agency, be reimbursed by the agency for his expenses?” Again, I think the answer to that question is, “No.”
*100Next question: “Should an employee be able to enrich himself by reason of his government service in ways which could divide his loyalty to the taxpayer-supported entity to which he answers?” Again, the ready answer is, “No.”
Finally: “Is the ability to travel free to the places of one’s own choosing a form of enrichment?” My answer would be, “Yes.”
Thus viewed, I think the commonsense analysis of the goals addressed by the regulations before us is that they are not only rational, but perfectly proper. Given that understanding of the goals, I then submit that the Pickering balance establishes that the limited burden placed on the speech rights of the employees involved is constitutional. Certainly reasonable persons might differ on the proper phrasing of the issues, as on the result. But the ability to differ from an agency does not imply the propriety of a court setting aside that agency’s reasoned decisions. I submit for the reasons already stated that the regulations represent a reasoned judgment, and for the reasons below, I suggest that they represent a legally sound one.
LEGAL ANALYSIS
A. The Framework
As the majority rightly declares, Pickering v. Board of Education provides the framework for determining the validity of this regulation of public employee speech. In applying Pickering, we must “arrive at a balance between the interest of the [employee], as a citizen, in commenting upon matters of public concern and the interest of the State, as an employer, in promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees.” Pickering, 391 U.S. at 568, 88 S.Ct. at 1734-35. Undeniably, the majority is correct that government employees generally, and those bringing this action specifically, have an interest in commenting on the workings of the agency wherein they are employed, and the concerns they address at least sometimes rise to the status of “public concern,” in Pickering terms. See Connick v. Myers, 461 U.S. 138, 146, 103 S.Ct. 1684, 1689-90, 75 L.Ed.2d 708 (1983). Also, even conceding that the restriction of reimbursement imposes a “significant burden on expressive activity,” United States v. National Treasury Employees Union (“NTEU’), — U.S. -, -, 115 S.Ct. 1003, 1014, 130 L.Ed.2d 964 (1995), these burdens may be outweighed by legitimate government interests. See Pickering, 391 U.S. at 568, 88 S.Ct. at 1734-35.
On the government’s side of the scale rests the “undeniably powerful” interest of the government in preventing the actual or apparent misuse of government position or power. NTEU, — U.S. at-, 115 S.Ct. at 1016. Although I thus generally agree with the majority as to the nature of the balance we are striking, I disagree as to the relative weight on each side in Pickering terms.
B. The Government’s Interest and the Tailoring of the Regulation
In advancing the OGE regulation, 5 C.F.R. § 2635.807(a) (1994), and the GSA regulations, 41 C.F.R. § 304-1.3(a) (1994), the agencies served a facially legitimate government interest. As the majority notes, “ap-pellees [have] urged primarily that the regulations represent an attempt to ‘protect against the appearance of impropriety in the actions of their employees.’ ” Maj. op. at 94 (quoting Sanjour v. EPA, 786 F.Supp. 1033, 1037 (D.D.C.1992)). As the majority further notes, this claim proceeds from the proposition that when “a government employee accepts travel expense reimbursement from a private party the employee may, to the general public, appear beholden to the private interest and prone to provide illicit regulatory ‘favors’ in return.” Maj. op. at 94. Without casting aspersions on the individual ap-pellees before us, it is not impossible that this appearance might blend into reality. That is, some government employees, upon receiving payments from private interests might consciously or unconsciously shape their official conduct in ways beneficial to those private interests. It is traditional learning that “[n]o man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other.” Matthew 6:24 (King *101James Version). When an employee is paid for his speech and expressive conduct by two “masters,” his loyalty is similarly divided.
Protecting against this division and the appearance of the same is a governmental interest recognized as legitimate by the Supreme Court in NTEU. See — U.S. at -, 115 S.Ct. at 1018. Indeed, the NTEU Court recognized that the courts have an “obligation to defer to considered congressional judgments about matters such as appearances of impropriety.” Id. Given the ability of Congress to make limited delegation of its legislative decisions to appropriate regulatory agencies, Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 843-44, 104 S.Ct. 2778, 2781-83, 81 L.Ed.2d 694 (1984), I would assume the same deference applies to cases of regulatory agencies, such as OGE and GSA, acting within their designated realm, and as well to ethics offices of employing agencies such as EPA acting to supervise their employees. With or without that deference, the regulations before us will pass their first test, that is, the service of a legitimate governmental interest, unless something in the NTEU analysis renders that interest or the regulation’s service of the interest illegitimate. Nothing does.
In fashioning its remedy for the unconstitutionality of the statute in NTEU, the Supreme Court implied that regulation of remuneration for employee speech could be upheld provided there was a proper “nexus between the speaker’s official duties and either the subject matter of the speaker’s expression or the identity of the payor.” — U.S. at -, 115 S.Ct. at 1019. In that case, the Court struck down the remedy crafted by this court not because the government may not limit its employees’ speech where such a nexus exists, but rather because the congressional ban had not limited the speech affected to that having such a nexus and because we had gone beyond our role in redefining the nexus for Congress. Id. at-, 115 S.Ct. at 1018-19. In this ease, the regulation on its face confines the affected speech to that having such a nexus, specifically forbidding employees from “reeeiv[ing] compensation” from nongovernmental sources only “for teaching, speaking, or writing that relates to the employee’s official duties.” 5 C.F.R. § 2635.807(a) (1994) (emphasis added).
The regulations, then, serve a legitimate governmental purpose and should be upheld unless the interests of the appellees outweigh the governmental interest served, or insufficient tailoring causes them to violate the First Amendment by being invalidly overin-clusive or underinclusive to serve purported interests of the government.
C. Underinclusive?
The majority brands the regulations as underinclusive because of the distinction drawn between “official” appearances (for which reimbursement may be accepted) and “unofficial” appearances (for which it may not).1 I would submit that this distinction must be drawn for the regulations to exist at all. Even the majority does not challenge the ability of the government itself to reimburse its employees for their official travel. It is difficult to see how any agency, especially one with the public educational mission of the Environmental Protection Agency, could function without that power. Given its charter, and the reality of necessary travel expenses, it is impossible to dispute the proposition that the government may reimburse its employees for the expenses of travel undertaken.
For appellant and the majority, the difficulty arises with the regulatory decision advanced by GSA in 41 C.F.R. § 304-1.3(a) and as applied by the EPA in permitting reimbursement by private entities of the travel expenses of employees making “official” appearances but not “unofficial” appearances. The majority deems this differing treatment to constitute underinclusiveness, in the view that “reimbursement for ‘official’ employee *102appearances — giv[es] rise to precisely the harm that supposedly motivated [the government] to adopt the regulations.” Maj. op. at 95. This is accurate only if the governmental objective — that is, the harm to be prevented — is the one defined by the majority. More accurately viewed, however, that harm exists where an employee profits from the use of his governmental position to serve his personal ends, by accommodating third-party interests external and potentially adverse to the agency. The same danger of harm does not exist where the employee is making an “official” appearance as defined in the regulations.
The OGE regulations specify that:
An employee is prohibited by the standards of conduct from receiving compensation, including travel expenses, for speaking or writing on subject matter that focuses specifically on his official duties or on the responsibilities, policies and programs of his employing agency.
5 C.F.R. § 2636.202(b) (1994). This regulation, on its face, serves the purpose of preventing personal profit from an official position. The EPA Ethics Advisory we considered in the panel opinion, EPA Ethics Advisory 91-1 at 3 (April 2, 1991), narrowly construed that regulation to prohibit travel expense reimbursement only for “not official” appearances, while exempting “official” travel where “required prior approvals” had been obtained. Under the more recently enhanced guidance of the General Services Administration regulation, an agency is permitted “to accept payment from a non-Federal source (or authorize an employee to receive such payment on its behalf) with respect to attendance of the employee at a meeting or similar function which the employee has been authorized to attend in an official capacity on behalf of the employing agency.” 41 C.F.R. § 304-1.3(a) (1994).
Thus, the danger that the employee will profit by receiving travel he desires in addition to his governmental salary is policed by the agency in the case of official travel. The employee is not, in that instance, traveling for his own ends or profiting by making a trip chosen by himself to meet with associates of his own choosing. Rather, in that case he is traveling to be about the business of his only master, the Environmental Protection Agency.
Any further danger of improper benefit to an agency employee while doing the business of the government — illustrated by the lavish accommodations described in the majority’s opinion, see Maj. Op. at 95, is more apparent than real, given the actual nature of the reimbursement allowable. GSA’s regulation specifies that the agency may “accept payment from a non-Federal source (or authorized employee to receive such benefit on its behalf),” 41 C.F.R. § 304-1.3(a), only where the reimbursement of the agency for the employee’s travel survives the conflict of interest analysis dictated by 41 C.F.R. § 304-1.5(a). That safeguard regulation requires an authorized agency official to conduct such an analysis, including but not limited to an examination of six enumerated factors designed to support a decision that the reimbursement
shall not be accepted if the authorized agency official determines that acceptance under the circumstances would cause a reasonable person with knowledge of all the facts relevant to a particular case to question the integrity of agency programs or operations.
41 C.F.R. § 304-1.5(a). A major factor in that determination is “[t]he monetary value and character of travel benefits offered by the non-Federal source.” 41 C.F.R. § 304-1.5(a)(6). Thus, the propriety of lavish accommodations must be considered by the agency in accepting reimbursement. So literally is the agency in control of the decision to accept reimbursement that payment (other than payment in kind)
shall be by check or similar instrument made payable to the agency. Any such payment received by the employee on behalf of the agency for his/her travel and/or that of the accompanying spouse is accepted on behalf of the agency and is to be submitted as soon as practicable for credit to the agency appropriation applicable to such expenses.
41 C.F.R. § 304-1.6(a) (emphasis added).
In short, when the agency’s objective is viewed as part of a “big picture” instead of *103through the majority’s tightly refracted assumption that a regulation can serve only a single objective, it is not underinclusive. It has in fact a tight “fit” with its objective. Granted, the regulations result in different treatment for expenses incurred in employee-chosen unofficial travel as opposed to agency-sanctioned official travel. But as it is accepted Equal Protection Clause jurisprudence that “the Constitution does not require things which are different in fact ... to be treated in law as though they were the same,” Tigner v. Texas, 310 U.S. 141, 147, 60 S.Ct. 879, 882, 84 L.Ed. 1124 (1940), the same logic must apply in the case of an underinclu-siveness analysis of expressive activity restriction. The law does not require that regulations include all things, only like things.2
The provision for an agency receiving reimbursement for the cost of its employee’s official travel is especially fitting in the case of the EPA. The EPA operates under a statutory charter contemplating “that each person should enjoy a healthful environment and that each person has a responsibility to contribute to the preservation and enhancement of the environment.” 42 U.S.C. § 4331(c) (1988) (emphasis added). In pursuit of this broad goal, EPA acts to implement policy derived in the first instance by the Council on Environmental Quality, a council authorized expressly by statute to “accept reimbursements from any private, nonprofit organization or from any department, agency, or instrumentality of the Federal government, any State, or local government, for reasonable travel expenses incurred by an officer or employee of the Council in connection with his attendance at any conference, seminar, or similar meeting conducted for the benefit of the Council.” 42 U.S.C. § 4346a.
In other contexts, Congress has reminded the EPA of its duty to operate jointly with both educational and other private sector interests. Congress has expressly provided that:
The Federal Government, acting through the coordinated efforts of its agencies and with the leadership of the Environmental Protection Agency, should work with local ... educational and environmental organizations, noncommercial educational broadcasting entities, and private sector interests to develop programs to provide increased emphasis and financial resources for the purpose of attracting students into environmental engineering and assisting them in pursuing the programs to complete the advanced technical education required to provide effective problem solving capabilities for complex environmental issues.
20 U.S.C. § 5501(a)(9) (1988). Fundamental government tenets of efficiency and propriety dictate that it is always a legitimate government objective to attempt to prevent the reality and appearance of conflicts of interest by government employees while at the same time protecting the public fisc. Given the EPA’s special role in overseeing the joint responsibilities of the public and private sectors in protecting the environment, it would seem especially appropriate that, in the carrying out of that official business, the government might tap private resources for reimbursement of its costs in providing travel expense reimbursement to its employees. Since the agency does not bear the same obligation as to the unofficial travel of its employees, its goals are not met by reimbursement of an obligation it never incurred in the first place.
D. Overinclusiveness?
The majority also suggests that the regulations are invalid by reasons of overinclusiveness. I am not certain why. The majority *104premises the overinclusiveness section of its opinion on the inarguable proposition that “the government’s interest in restricting speech must be balanced against the interests of the employee and the public in the entire category of speech potentially suppressed.” Maj. Op. at 97 (citing NTEU, — U.S. at -, 115 S.Ct. at 1014). To that end, the majority concludes, and I do not disagree, that “the courts must consider whether the challenged statute or regulation is tailored to address the harm that the government allegedly aims to protect.” Id. (citing, for comparison, Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491 U.S. 781, 799, 109 S.Ct. 2746, 2758, 105 L.Ed.2d 661 (1989)).
The majority then does not explain how the instant regulations transgress these principles, other than to assert that “the extraordinary reach of the challenged regulations places a heavy justificatory burden on the government_” Maj. Op. at 97. In support of this otherwise unexplained proposition, the majority cites NTEU. Granted, that opinion struck down the statutory hono-raria ban of the Ethics Reform Act of 1989, 5 U.S.C. § 101 et seq. (1988 Supp. V), as over-inclusive. However, as I noted above, it did so in an opinion that expressly stated that this court’s prior remedy to that overinclu-siveness had been “itself arguably overinclu-sive.” NTEU, — U.S. at -, 115 S.Ct. at 1018. In identifying the arguable overinclu-siveness of our remedy, the Supreme Court pointed out that our injunction against enforcement of the statute “prohibits enforcement of the statute even when an obvious nexus exists between the employee’s job and either the subject matter of his or her expression or the interest of the person paying for it.” NTEU, — U.S. at -, 115 S.Ct. at 1018. Here the agencies have designed regulations applying only where such “an obvious nexus exists between the employee’s job and ... the subject matter of his or her expression_” The majority has not explained what it is about these regulations that leaves them still overinclusive when that nexus requirement is met. Nor do I see that flaw. I therefore would uphold the regulations against the challenged overinclusiveness.
E. “Threat of Censorship”
At the heart of the appellant’s challenge to these regulations and the majority’s adoption of that challenge is a fear that the agency, in distinguishing between appearances which it will sanction as “official” and those from which it will withhold that blessing, may be exercising a viewpoint-based censorship designed to prevent employees from exercising their right to speak out on matters of public concern, and thereby depriving the public of its right to hear these informed viewpoints.
Granted, it may be that the agency is enforcing the regulations in a discriminatory manner amounting to censorship. If that is the case, then the courts are open to an individual challenge to the agency’s application of the statute to them. Indeed, such a challenge now pends in the district court. This leads to another instance of semantic disagreement between the majority and me. The majority spends several pages of its analysis on the proposition that my opinion for the panel and the district judge’s opinion for the trial court erroneously described the remaining challenge in the district court an “as applied” challenge. Perhaps our styling is not strictly in compliance with the phrase “as-applied challenge” in a term of art sense. Nonetheless, the fact remains that under the rubric of “selective enforcement” or “selective prosecution,” count VI of the complaint alleges that the regulations are being applied to the plaintiff/appellants “in violation of the laws and Constitution of the United States.”
The factual underpinnings of count VI are by precise incorporation the same factual allegations that underpin the facial First Amendment challenge. Thus, whether or not the pending count is styled an “as-applied” First Amendment challenge, it challenges the constitutionality of the regulations as applied to the plaintiff/appellants on the basis that the selection of them as targets constitutes a violation of their First Amendment rights. I do not know why in this day of notice pleading it makes any difference to the majority that the count is styled “a selective enforcement and selective prosecution of the plaintiffs” rather than an “as-applied” challenge. The question of whether these *105regulations are being or have been unconstitutionally applied to these plaintiffs is currently before the trial court.
I suggest that the challenge to the application of the regulations, however styled, is the proper place to determine whether censorship of their First Amendment activities is occurring. As the Supreme Court noted in NTEU, “although the occasional case requires us to entertain a facial challenge in order to vindicate a party's right not to be bound by an unconstitutional statute, we neither want nor need to provide relief to non-parties when a narrower remedy will fully protect the litigants.” — U.S. at -, 115 S.Ct. at 1018 (citations omitted).
CONCLUSION
Congress, as well as the agencies to which Congress delegates its legislative authority, “may impose restraints on the job-related speech of public employees that would be plainly unconstitutional if applied to the public at large.” NTEU, — U.S. at -, 115 S.Ct. at 1012; See Chevron v. NRDC, 467 U.S. at 843-44, 104 S.Ct. at 2781-82. In this case, EPA and GSA have imposed a lawful restriction on the work-related speech of EPA employees. The regulations at issue, when properly viewed in light of legitimate governmental objectives of furthering efficiency and avoiding appearances of impropriety, are neither overinelusive nor underin-clusive. They simply mandate that an EPA employee serve but one master while at the same time protecting the public fisc. The majority’s attempt to confine this case within the narrow purview of NTEU should fail for the reasons expressed by the Supreme Court therein. That which the NTEU honoraria ban lacked, i.e., a requirement that the regulated speech be connected to the employee’s official duties, saves the regulations here.

. The majority suggests that the regulations here would prevent a speaker from communicating with a potential audience not only by forbidding the recovery of travel expenses, but also of equipment costs. See Maj. Op. at 94 n. 11. From the face of the regulations, they prohibit only the receipt of "compensation, including travel expenses....” 5 C.F.R. § 2636.202(b) (emphasis added).

. The majority describes my analysis of the government interest as "freshly minted,” Maj. Op. at 98, and as "conjured by the dissent.” To the contrary, I am looking at the same government justification offered from the beginning and noted by the majority: "Appellees [have] urged primarily that the regulations represent an attempt to 'protect against the appearance of impropriety the actions of their employees.' " Maj. Op. at 94 (quoting Sanjour v. EPA, 786 F.Supp. 1033, 1037 (D.D.C.1992)). That I read that goal as protected by the challenged regulations taken in conjunction with the government's other travel regulations renders my description of the government’s goals no more freshly minted than the majority's characterization of the same governmental interest.