Court Opinion

ID: 9462837
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:51:26.037118+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:48.651162
License: Public Domain

IRVING R. KAUFMAN, Chief Judge,
dissenting, with whom GURFEIN, Circuit Judge, concurs:
I concur fully in my brother Oakes’s scholarly opinion. I should like, however, to add the following thoughts.
Constitutional provisions, such as the “case or controversy” requirement of Article III, are not magic talismans, whose import is as immutable as the law of ancient Media and Persia. Rather, the words of the Constitution to a large extent derive their meaning from the perceived needs, desires and expectations of society.
It is legitimate — and, indeed, desirable— to view constitutional commandments, such as the standing requirement, as flexible and evolving over time.1 The proper approach *610may best be shown by very briefly reviewing the courts’ construction of other constitutional provisions, where this process is more obvious. The First Amendment guarantee of freedom of religion, for example, was, when drafted in 1789, almost certainly intended to refer exclusively to the worship of God.2 But today the concept of religion has been expanded to protect, under some circumstances at least, not only the worship of a divinity or the refusal to recognize a divinity, but also some, if not all, deeply held moral convictions.3 Similarly, the First Amendment meaning of “speech” has come to include silent protest.4 And the definition of “search”, as used in the Fourth Amendment, has in recent years been expanded beyond the physical intrusion which concerned the Framers,5 to encompass electronic eavesdropping.6
This expansive reading of the provisions of the Bill of Rights may plausibly be viewed as a process — which some argue has not reached its limit — by which courts have extended the protection accorded individual autonomy.7 A similar process may be discerned in the interpretation of the shibboleths of standing: “case or controversy”, and its corollary, “injury in fact”. The past decade has seen a dramatic lowering of the barriers imposed by standing requirements to challenges to administrative action. Perhaps not by change, this movement toward broader standing has coincided with a spectacular increase in the size, scope and power of the bureaucracy of the executive branch — which has, some argue, heightened the need for judicial oversight. During these years, the archaic “legal interest” requirement of Tennessee Elec. Power Co. v. TVA, 306 U.S. 118, 59 S.Ct. 366, 83 L.Ed. 543 (1939) has been abolished, Assoc. of Data Processing Service Org. v. Camp, 397 U.S. 150, 90 S.Ct. 827, 25 L.Ed.2d 184 (1970). Standing to challenge administrative orders has been given to competitors, id., and to consumers, Office of Communication v. FCC, 123 U.S.App.D.C. 328, 359 F.2d 994 (per Burger, J., 1966), and a showing of economic injury is no longer required. U. S. v. SCRAP, 412 U.S. 669, 93 S.Ct. 2405, 37 L.Ed.2d 254 (1973).
As this trend makes clear, judicial review is, today viewed as a legitimate means of ensuring that agencies observe congression*611al mandates.8 The case before us cannot be viewed in isolation from this trend.
Obviously, I do not suggest that we read the Art. Ill standing requirement out of existence, or that courts indulge in rendering what Justice Holmes once called “mere declaration[s] in the air.” 9 Nor, of course, do I urge that we ignore recent decisions of the Supreme Court, such as Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975). But I do counsel against wooden application of the Warth precedent to an entirely different setting, and against extension of that holding to cover a situation which, as Judge Oakes’s opinion demonstrates, is sharply distinguishable. Such an expansive reading of Warth unnecessarily (and without explanation) flies in the face of the recent trend favoring judicial oversight of the burgeoning administrative bureaucracy.
Under the majority’s decision, it is unlikely that there could ever be a plaintiff who will be allowed access to the courts to challenge HUD’s abdication of its congressionally-imposed duty.10 Such a result may be logical, and even desirable, in a controversy more appropriately resolved by the political process. See U. S. v. Richardson, 418 U.S. 166, 179, 94 S.Ct. 2940, 41 L.Ed.2d 678 (1974). But it is to be shunned in cases like this one which, in my brother Oakes’s words, fall “well within the traditional model of judicial review.”

. The words of Chief Justice Warren, referring to the Eighth Amendment in Trop v. Dulles, 356 U.S. 86, 100-01, 78 S.Ct. 590, 598, 2 L.Ed.2d 630 (1958), are informative:
*610[T]he words of the Amendment are not precise, and . . . their scope is not static. The Amendment must draw its meaning from the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society. '

. This may be seen by examination of various colonial documents advocating religious freedom. The 1772 Rights of the Colonists, for example, espoused freedom of religion because of its concern with “various attempts which have been made and are now making, to establish an American Episcopate.” The Bill of Rights: A Documentary History of 210 (Chelsea House, 1971). And the first document to protect freedom of religion, the Maryland Toleration Act of 1649, declared that it dealt with “matters concerning Religion and the honor of God” and granted freedom only to those “professing to beleive [sic] in Jesus Christ.” Id. at 91, 93 (emphasis added). Of perhaps even greater significance, the Senate eliminated the words “nor shall the rights of conscience be infringed” from the First Amendment. Id. at 1146.

. See, e. g., U. S. v. Seeger, 380 U.S. 163, 85 S.Ct. 850, 13 L.Ed.2d 733 (1965); Welsh v. U. S. 398 U.S. 333, 90 S.Ct. 1792, 26 L.Ed.2d 308 (1970); U. S. v. Sisson, 297 F.Supp. 902 (D.Mass.1969) (Wyzanski, J.), appeal dismissed for want of jurisdiction, 399 U.S. 267, 90 S.Ct. 2117, 26 L.Ed.2d 608 (1970). Although Seeger and Welsh theoretically rested upon interpretations of the Selective Service statutes, the Seeger Court stated that a different holding would “classify different religious beliefs, exempting some and excluding others”, thus presumably violating the guarantee of equal protection. 380 U.S. at 176, 85 S.Ct. at 859 (emphasis added).

. See, e. g., Brown v. Louisiana, 383 U.S. 131, 86 S.Ct. 719, 15 L.Ed.2d 637 (1966).

. The Colonial tracts were concerned with the “insolence” of British officers who would “enter our houses, search, insult and seize at pleasure.” The Bill of Rights: A Documentary History, supra n. 2, at 488-89.

. Compare Katz v. U. S., 389 U.S. 347, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967) with Olmstead v. U. S., 277 U.S. 438, 48 S.Ct. 564, 72 L.Ed. 944 (1928).

. Cf. Henkin, Privacy and Autonomy, 74 Colum.L.Rev. 1410 (1974).

. In contrast, as Judge Oakes’s opinion points out, the taxpayers or citizens whose suits were thwarted by such cases as U. S. v. Richardson, 418 U.S. 166, 94 S.Ct. 2940, 41 L.Ed.2d 678 (1974), Schlesinger v. Reservist Committee to Stop the War, 418 U.S. 208, 94 S.Ct. 2925, 41 L.Ed.2d 706 (1974), as well as Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975) , sought to have the courts intervene in areas in which
the subject matter is committed to the surveillance of Congress, and ultimately to the political process.
Richardson, supra, 418 U.S. at 179, 94 S.Ct. 2940.

. Giles v. Harris, 189 U.S. 475, 486, 23 S.Ct. 639, 48 L.Ed. 909 (1903).

. It is possible, however, that, even under the majority decision, an inner city near a town receiving a HUD grant may have standing to challenge the grant. Indeed, a town which unsuccessfully applied for a grant might, by analogy with those cases granting competitor standing, be allowed to sue.