Court Opinion

ID: 9431004
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:31:06.474096+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:26.671298
License: Public Domain

Justice Blackmun,
concurring.
I join the Court’s opinion and its judgment. I do so, however, with less than full assurance and satisfaction.
There are three reasons for my concern. The first is the consequent element of further delay in the decision on the merits in a case that has roots already more than four decades old. The issue on the merits probably will be back in this Court once again months or years hence. The second is that the statute the Court is forced to construe in this case is not a model of legislative craftsmanship. Surely, Congress is able to make its intent more evident than in the language it has utilized here. It is to be hoped that Congress will look at the problem it has created and will set forth in precise terms its conclusion as to jurisdiction of federal appellate courts in mixed-claims cases of this kind.
My third reason is an administrative one. I am somewhat surprised and concerned over the fact that the Chief Judge of the Federal Circuit was designated to sit on this appeal. The jurisdictional issue, on which the case presently goes off, involves the jurisdiction of his own court as against that of the District of Columbia Circuit. In concluding to dissent, as he had every right to do — and as the Court today vindicates —the Chief Judge was forced to take a position favoring his own court’s jurisdiction. The “appearance” is troubling. I wonder why what must have been a measure of embarrass*77ment for the Chief Judge was not avoided by refraining to assign him, or any other judge from the “opposite” court, to sit on this case. Unless the designation was purposeful (in order to have a panel with views of judges of both courts), one must observe that the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit had a complement of other judges from which to fill the third seat on the three-judge panel.