Court Opinion

ID: 9423441
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:07:48.082743+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:44.317309
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Harlan,
whom Mr. Justice Stewart joins, dissenting.
I had thought it indisputable, first, that a court may not overturn a determination made by an administrative agency upon a question committed to the agency’s judg*452ment unless the determination is “unsupported by substantial evidence,” 1 and, second, that the substantiality of the evidence must be measured through, and only after, an examination of the “whole record.” 2
The Commission has determined, on the basis of 14,327 pages of testimony and exhibits, of “extensive material” 3 submitted after the close of the record by the Secretary of the Interior,4 and of the Commission’s own “general *453knowledge of the Columbia River System,” 31 F. P. C. 247, 277, that the application of Pacific Northwest was “best adapted to a comprehensive plan,” 49 Stat. 842, 16 U. S. C. § 803 (a), of development for this portion of the Columbia River Basin, and that, as a consequence, this site should not now be reserved for later development by the United States.5
The Court of Appeals unanimously concluded that this evidentiary record establishes that “the Commission was amply justified in refusing to recommend federal development and in issuing a license for private con*454struction.” 123 U. S. App. D. C. 209, 217, 358 F. 2d 840, 848. I agree. Doubtless much of the evidence was not, as it was submitted, labeled as pertinent to a determination of the Commission’s responsibilities under § 7 (b), but I had not before understood that evidence marshaled in support of an agency’s finding must, if it is to be credited, have been tidily categorized at the hearing according to the purposes for which it might subsequently be employed.
I can only conclude that the Court, despite its self-serving disclaimer, ante, pp. 450-451, has, in its haste to give force to its own findings of fact on the breeding requirements of anadromous fish '6 and on the likelihood that solar and nuclear power will shortly be alternative sources of supply, substituted its own preferences for the discretion given by Congress to the Federal Power Commission. In particular, it must be emphasized that the Court, alone among the Secretary of the Interior, the Commission, Pacific Northwest, the Washington Public Power Supply System, and the various other intervenors, apparently supposes that no dam at all may now be *455needed at High Mountain Sheep.7 Wherever the right lies on that issue, it need only be said that Congress has entrusted its resolution to the Commission’s informed discretion, and that, on the basis of an ample evidentiary record, the Commission has determined that Pacific Northwest should now be licensed to construct the project.
I would affirm the judgments in both cases substantially for the reasons given in Judge Miller’s opinion below, as amplified by the considerations contained in this opinion.

 Administrative Procedure Act §10 (e), 5 U. S. C. §706 (2)(E) (1964 ed., Supp. II). See also Universal Camera Corp. v. Labor Board, 340 U. S. 474, 488; Jaffe, Judicial Control of Administrative Action 600 et seq. (1965).

 5 U.S. C. §706 (1964 ed., Supp. II).

 31 F. P. C. 247, 275.

 The history of the Secretary’s extraordinary series of belated and apparently indecisive interventions in these proceedings warrants a more complete chronicle than the Court has given. On March 31, 1958, Pacific Northwest applied for a license for the High Mountain Sheep site, and on October 21, 1959, the Commission solicited the views of the Secretary of the Interior. On November 21, 1960, the Secretary replied substantively, and urged that the entire project be postponed, since the available power supply in the region was, in his view, then sufficient. The hearings nonetheless continued. On March 15, 1961, the Secretary wrote once more, first to indicate that he was withdrawing permission for Interior Department employees to testify at. the hearings on questions of the alternative power sources and of the protection of the anadromous fish, and second to suggest that the hearings should be recessed or suspended until the end of 1964, more than three years later. There was, in these various communications, no intimation that federal development of the site was desirable or even appropriate. The hearings concluded on September 12, 1961.
On June 28, 1962, the Secretary suggested, for the first time, that federal development might be suitable; he did not, however, urge that either he or the Commission should immediately seek congressional approval of such a federal project, a precondition to its commencement. Nor did the Secretary intimate that the evidentiary record that had been compiled by the Commission might be incomplete, or request that it be reopened so that he might supple*453ment it. Nonetheless, the Commission sua sponte ordered the parties to respond to the Secretary’s suggestion.
On October 8, 1962, the Examiner completed his recommendations, concluding that Pacific Northwest’s proposal was “best adapted” to the river’s development, in part because federal development could not reasonably be immediately anticipated. The Secretary thereupon sought to intervene out of time, and to file exceptions. He did not request that the record be reopened. His motions were granted, and very extensive exceptions were filed. Oral argument of the exceptions was subsequently heard. Neither in the exceptions nor, apparently, in the oral argument did the Secretary seek to reopen the record to supplement the evidence before the Commission.
The Commission’s decision, rejecting the Secretary’s suggestions, was announced on February 5, 1964. The Secretary sought a rehearing on March 26, 1964, and only then did he ask that the record be reopened. He offered only the most general indications of the evidence he would introduce if his motion were granted. Not surprisingly, the Commission denied the motion, and, after consideration of various “pleadings,” affirmed, with certain minor modifications, its first order. 31 F. P. C. 1051. These actions for review followed. The Secretary, apparently for the first time, announced in his petition to this Court for a writ of certiorari that he was now prepared to seek immediate congressional approval for federal construction of a dam at High Mountain Sheep.

 Section 7 (b) of the Federal Power Act, 49 Stat. 842, 16 U. S. C. § 800 (b), requires the Commission to refuse any application when it concludes that the project should be undertaken by the United States.

 It must be noted that nothing in the terms, purposes, or legislative history of the Anadromous Fish Act of 1965, 79 Stat. 1125, suggests in any way that it was expected to provide the Secretary or this Court with any retroactive “mandate” to overturn the Commission’s judgment. The only pertinent portions of the legislative history are plain and uncontradicted acknowledgments from the Federal Power Commission that the Act would not “have any effect” on its authority. Anadromous Fish, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Fisheries and Wildlife Conservation of the House Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries, 88th Cong., 2d Sess., 45; H. R. Rep. No. 1007, 89th Cong., 1st Sess., 21. Ironically, the Commission twice during the course of those hearings called attention, without any rejoinder from the Secretary, to the High Mountain Sheep project as an illustration of its continuing and earnest concern for the protection of anadromous fish. Hearings, supra, at 45; Report, supra, at 22.

 Contrary to his earlier position, supra, p. 452, the Secretary, as has been noted, now apparently entertains no doubt that the project should be immediately commenced.