Court Opinion

ID: 9427317
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:20:23.517832+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:06.145653
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Rehnquist,
with whom Mr. Justice Stevens joins, concurring in the judgment.
I can understand the Court’s willingness to reach the merits of this case and thereby remove the doubt which has been cast over this important federal statute. In so doing, however, it ignores established limitations on district court jurisdiction *96as carefully defined in our statutes and cases. Because I believe the preservation of these limitations is in the long run more important to this Court’s jurisprudence than the resolution of any particular case or controversy, however important, I too would reverse the judgment of the District Court, but would do so with instructions to dismiss the complaint for want of jurisdiction. Cf. Montana-Dakota Utilities Co. v. Northwestern Public Service Co., 341 U. S. 246, 249-250 (1951).
Giving the conclusory allegations of appellees’ complaint the most liberal possible reading, they purport to establish only two grounds for the declaratory relief requested.. First, they contend that the Price-Anderson Act deprives them of their property without due process of law in that it irrationally limits the tort recovery otherwise available in the North Carolina courts.1 Second, they contend that the Act works an unconstitutional taking of their property for public use without just compensation. They purport to base District Court jurisdiction upon 28 U. S. C. § 1337 (1976 ed.) which covers “any civil action or proceeding arising under any Act of Congress regulating commerce or protecting trade and commerce against restraints and monopolies.”
I
It is apparent that appellees’ first asserted basis for relief does not state a claim “arising under” the Price-Anderson Act. Their complaint alleges that the operation of the two power plants will cause immediate injury to property within their vicinity. App. 32, ¶ 21. The District Court explicitly found that these injuries “give rise to an immediate right of action for redress. Under the law of North Carolina a right of action arises as soon as a wrongful act has created 'any injury, how*97ever slight/ to the plaintiff.” 431 F. Supp. 203, 221 (WDNC 1977) (citations omitted). This right of action provided by state, not federal, law is the property of which the appellees contend the Act deprives them without due process. Thus, the constitutionality of the Act becomes relevant only if the appellant Duke Power Co; were to invoke the Act as a defense to appellees’ suit for recovery under their North Carolina right of action.
It has long been established that the mere anticipation of a possible federal defense to a state cause of action is not sufficient to invoke the federal-question jurisdiction of the district courts. In Louisville & Nashville R. Co. v. Mottley, 211 U. S. 149 (1908), the plaintiffs sought to compel the specific performance of a contract by which the railroad had. granted them free passes for life. Although their contract was not predicated upon federal law, the plaintiffs contended that federal-question jurisdiction was established by the presence of an Act of Congress forbidding railroads to issue free passes. This Court held that the District Court did not have jurisdiction to consider whether the Act was inapplicable or unconstitutional:
“It is the settled interpretation of these words [‘arising under’], as used in this statute, conferring jurisdiction, that a suit arises under the Constitution and laws of the United States only when the plaintiff’s statement of his own cause of action shows that it is based upon those laws or that Constitution. It is not enough that the plaintiff alleges some anticipated defense to his cause of action and asserts that the defense is invalidated by some provision of the Constitution of the United States. Although such allegations show that very likely, in the course of the litigation, a question under the Constitution would arise, they do not show that the suit, that is, the plaintiff’s original cause of action, arises under the Constitution.” Id., at 152.
*98Just as the underlying claim in Mottley arose under Kentucky contract law, the underlying claim in this case arises under North Carolina tort law. This Court has construed the “arising under” language of 28 U. S. C. § 1337 (1976 ed.) just as it has the similar language of 28 U. S. C. § 1331 (1976 ed.). Peyton v. Railway Express Agency, Inc., 316 U. S. 350, 353 (1942).
Nor does the fact that appellees seek only declaratory relief under the Declaratory Judgment Act, 28 U. S. C. § 2201 (1976 ed.), support a different result. This Court has held that the well-pleaded complaint rule applied in Mottley is fully applicable in cases seeking only declaratory relief, because the Declaratory Judgment Act merely expands the remedies available in the district courts without expanding their jurisdiction. “It would turn into the federal courts a vast current of litigation indubitably arising under State law, in the sense that the right to be vindicated was State-created, if a suit for a declaration of rights could be brought into the federal courts merely because an anticipated defense derived from federal law.” Skelly Oil Co. v. Phillips Petroleum Co., 339 U. S. 667, 673 (1950). See also Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Texaco Inc., 415 U. S. 125 (1974); C. Wright, A. Miller, & E. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure § 3566, pp. 437-438 (1975).2
*99Appellees do not contend that the Price-Anderson Act itself grants to them personal rights which may be vindicated in a federal proceeding. Since the only property rights they assert arise under North Carolina law, the District Court had no jurisdiction to consider whether the setting up of an Act of Congress as a defense against those rights would deny them due process of law under the Fifth Amendment.
Indeed, the Court does not even contend that there is an independent statutory source of jurisdiction over Duke. Ante, at 72 n. 16. It suggests instead that the complaint states a claim against the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, not as a joint tortfeasor under North Carolina law, but as the administrator of an unconstitutional federal statute. The Court’s theory is that the complaint alleges the existence of an implied right of action under the Fifth Amendment to obtain relief against arbitrary federal statutes. It can hardly be said that this theory of the case emerges with crystal clarity from either the complaint or the brief of the appellees.
More importantly, there is no allegation in this complaint that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has taken or will take any unconstitutional action at all. The complaint alleges only that the Commission granted construction permits to *100Duke, and that it will enter into an agreement “to indemnify Duke for any nuclear incident exceeding the amount of $125,000,000 subject to a maximum liability of $560,000,000.” App. 31, ¶ 13. Neither of these actions is alleged to be unconstitutional. The gist of the complaint is the asserted unconstitutionality of 42 U. S. C. § 2210 (e) (1970 ed., Supp. V), which limits Duke’s liability. But this limitation of liability is separate and apart from the indemnity agreement which the Commission is authorized to execute under 42 U. S. C. § 2210 (d) (1970 ed., Supp. Y). The Commission has nothing whatever to do with the administration of the limitation of liability; whatever administration of that statute there is to be is left in the hands of the District Court. 42 U. S. C. §2210 (o) (1970 ed. and Supp. V). The District Court, of course, is not a party to this suit.3
It simply cannot be said that these allegations make out an actual controversy against the Commission. While the Commission may be quite interested in the constitutionality of the statute, that is hardly sufficient to establish a justiciable controversy. Muskrat v. United States, 219 U. S. 346, 361-362 (1911). While appellees may have been damaged by Duke’s decision to construct these plants, there is no “challenged action of the defendant” Commission to which their damage “fairly can be traced.” Simon v. Eastern Ky. Wel*101fare Rights Org., 426 U. S. 26, 41 (1976). If Duke decided to proceed with construction despite a declaration of the statute’s unconstitutionality, there would be nothing that the Commission could do to aid appellees. Where the prospect of effective relief against a defendant depends on the actions of a third party, no justiciable controversy exists against that defendant. Warth v. Seldin, 422 U. S. 490, 505 (1975). In short, appellees’ only conceivable controversy is with Duke, over whom the District Court had no jurisdiction.
II
As appellees themselves describe the second aspect of their complaint, “the central issue is whether in the circumstances of this case, the complete destruction of appellees’ property by a nuclear accident, occurring at one of Duke’s plants, would be a ‘taking’ by the United States, as that term is defined in the Fifth Amendment.” Brief for Appellees 62. This statement makes clear that appellees’ claim arises not under the Price-Anderson Act but under the Fifth Amendment itself. Jurisdiction under § 1337 extends only to actions vindicating rights created by an Act of Congress. Compare Switchmen v. National Mediation Board, 320 U. S. 297, 300 (1943), with General Committee v. Missouri-Kansas-Texas R. Co., 320 U. S. 323, 337 (1943). Since it cannot be maintained that the Price-Anderson Act created appellees’ asserted right to be free from takings for public use without just compensation, it follows that District Court jurisdiction may not be predicated upon § 1337.
The District Court does have jurisdiction to consider claims of taking under the Tucker Act, 28 U. S. C. § 1346 (a) (2) (1976 ed.), where the amount in controversy does not exceed $10,000.4 “But the Act has long been construed as authoriz*102ing only actions for money judgments and not suits for equitable relief against the United States.” Richardson v. Morris, 409 U. S. 464, 465 (1973). It is incontrovertibly established that neither the Court of Claims nor the district courts have jurisdiction under the Tucker Act to issue the sort of declaratory relief granted here. Compare ibid., with United States v. King, 395 U. S. 1 (1969). Thus, the record does not establish any jurisdictional basis upon which the District Court could grant declaratory relief on appellees’ taking claim.
There being no basis for District Court jurisdiction over either of appellees’ claims, its judgment should be reversed and the cause remanded with instructions to dismiss the complaint for want of jurisdiction.

 Appellees have explicitly abandoned their claim based upon the so-called equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment “since in this case any equal protection arguments would be largely duplicative of appellees’ due process arguments.” Brief for Appellees 21 n. 26.

 The Court asserts that its decision today does not undermine the well-pleaded complaint doctrine because of its conclusion “that the complaint is more fairly read as stating a claim against the NRC directly under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment.” Ante, at 69 n. 13. The supposed claim against the Commission arises only under federal law, since the complaint does not allege and the District Court did not find that North Carolina law would provide any remedy against it as a joint tortfeasor. On the Court’s theory of the case, then, it need not decide whether jurisdiction could be obtained over Duke Power under § 1331. Ante, at 72 n. 16. That is a particularly felicitous conclusion from the Court’s point of view, since the complaint does not allege that each member of the plaintiff class has a claim in excess of $10,000 against Duke Power, *99which is a prerequisite to jurisdiction under § 1331. Zahn v. International Paper Co., 414 U. S. 291 (1973).
Despite the Court’s assurances, it is conceivable that the practical effect of today’s decision could be an erosion of the well-pleaded complaint doctrine. Had the plaintiffs in Mottley joined as defendants a federal agency having as ephemeral a relation to the statute challenged there as does the Commission to the statute involved here, the District Court, according to today’s decision, would have had jurisdiction to consider the constitutionality of the statute, even though its judgment would not have been binding against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad. Innumerable federal statutes and regulations affect the daily decisions of private parties, who would undoubtedly appreciate the sort of advisory opinion rendered today on the validity of those provisions. This Court should not encourage the hope that such opinions may be obtained by suing an appropriate federal agency under a claim which verges on the frivolous.

 Appellees’ challenge to the construction permits was rejected in Carolina Environmental Study Group v. United States, 166 U. S. App. D. C. 416, 510 F. 2d 796 (1975). It is true, as the Court remarks, ante, at 81 n. 26, that “absent the execution of such [indemnity] agreements between the NRC and the licensees, the liability-limitation provisions of the Act, to which appellees object, would simply not come into play.” That logical connection, however, does not amount to an allegation that the Commission’s execution of an indemnity agreement is itself unconstitutional. The only federal action challenged by this complaint is a hypothetical district court’s hypothetical invocation of the statute in the event of a hypothetical nuclear accident. In that entire string of hypothetical events, no action of the Commission is alleged to be unconstitutional.

 The Court concludes, ante, at 71 n. 15, although appellees do not so contend, that their taking claim is cognizable under 28 U. S. C. § 1331 (a) (1976 ed.), which grants jurisdiction to the district courts where the suit *102“arises under the Constitution.” The Court cites only the Regional Rail Reorganization Act Cases, 419 U. S. 102 (1974), in support of its conclusion that this claim may be maintained under § 1331. It is, of course, well established that “when questions of jurisdiction have been passed on in prior decisions sub silentio, this Court has never considered itself bound when a subsequent case finally brings the jurisdictional issue before us.” Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U. S. 528, 535 n. 5 (1974). In the Regional Rail Reorganization Act Cases this Court’s opinion did not even cite the statutory basis for jurisdiction, much less consider its validity. To conclude that § 1331 embraces a “taking” claim makes the Tucker Act largely superfluous, cf. United States v. Testan, 424 U. S. 392, 404 (1976), and will permit the district courts to consider claims of over $10,000 which previously could only be litigated in the Court of Claims. Richardson v. Morris, 409 U. S. 464 (1973). Such a significant expansion of the jurisdiction of the district courts should not be accomplished without the benefit of arguments and briefing.