Court Opinion

ID: 9485894
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 11:33:12.368286+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:51:25.640783
License: Public Domain

SILBERMAN, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the denial of rehearing en banc:
The tone of the petition for rehearing is quite offensive. It certainly does not help the court in determining whether to rehear this troubling case. Were the petition filed by a private litigant (or the government), I would vote against a rehearing en banc, as I • have done before, on that ground alone. We treat criminal defendants — particularly those represented by appointed counsel — with special care, so I have tried not to allow the petition’s tone to affect my vote.
It appears that Judge Randolph’s opinion denying rehearing, which in substance is a reply to Judge Edwards’ dissent and which would normally be styled a concurrence to the court’s order, takes the peculiar design it does so as to avoid ostensibly creating a conflict with Judge Randolph’s previous extraordinary statement decrying the court’s “practice” of publishing dissenting and concurring opinions to orders denying rehearing.
Judges who were members of the panel express afterthoughts, or respond to criticism contained in the en banc statements of other judges, or explain what the panel “really” meant.
In my view, denials of rehearing en banc are best followed by silence. They should not serve as the occasion for an exchange of advisory opinions, overtures to the Supreme Court, or press releases.
Independent Ins. Agents of America, Inc. v. Clarke, 965 F.2d 1077, 1080 (D.C.Cir.1992).
I understand why Judge Randolph responded to Judge Edwards’ dissent and do not think his statement is equivalent to a “press release.” That he chose to do so, however, in the form of an opinion of the panel (certainly unusual for our circuit) rather than as a concurring opinion of the full court has, as should be obvious to all, utterly no legal significance in this case. Despite Judge Randolph’s justification for his new opinion, see Judge Randolph’s accompanying statement, it adds not a whit to the prece-dential impact of his first and therefore is functionally indistinguishable from our typical concurring opinions to the full court’s order denying rehearing en banc — which respond to a dissent. Moreover, all concurring opinions — including those written by a judge on a panel to which apparently Judge Randolph does not object — lack precedential force. If, then, there is evil in our long time practice which Judge Randolph condemns (I believe he raises the proverbial tempest in a *563teapot), it adheres as much in his unusual technique.
I gather, however, that it will not be possible for Judge Randolph to devise a way to dissent1 from denials of rehearing en banc. More’s the pity.
RANDOLPH, Circuit Judge:
Despite my brother Silberman’s overtures, I continue to believe, for reasons previously given (Independent Insurance Agents of America, Inc. v. Clarke, 965 F.2d 1077, 1080 (D.C.Cir.1992)), in the unwisdom of issuing statements about a panel’s decision in a ease on the occasion of the court’s refusal to rehear it en banc. However, majority opinions of the panel — the court — denying rehearing petitions are necessarily of a different order. They reflect a decision of the court just as much as the original opinion, are binding on the parties and have precedential effect. See, e.g., Coalition for the Preservation of Hispanic Broadcasting v. FCC, 893 F.2d 1349, 1368 (D.C.Cir.1990), aff'd in part and vacated in part, 931 F.2d 73 (D.C.Cir.) (en banc), cert. denied, — U.S. —, 112 S.Ct. 298, 116 L.Ed.2d 242 (1991); Athens Community Hosp., Inc. v. Schweiker, 743 F.2d 1 (D.C.Cir.1984); In re Dist. No. 1—Pacific Coast Dist., Marine Eng’rs Beneficial Ass’n (AFL-CIO), 723 F.2d 70, 79 (D.C.Cir.1983); Steinberg v. International Criminal Police Org., 672 F.2d 927, 933 (D.C.Cir.1981); Illinois Cities of Bethany v. FERC, 670 F.2d 187 (D.C.Cir.1981).
In Independent Insurance Agents, 965 F.2d at 1080, I quoted Judge Friendly’s view that the practice on en banc denials, so warmly embraced by Judge Silberman, is “dubious.” The great judge made this statement in a case in which, as a member of the panel, he too had denied a petition for rehearing in a written opinion. United States v. New York, N.H. & H.R.R., 276 F.2d 525, 536 (2d Cir.) (per curiam), cert. denied, 362 U.S. 961, 80 S.Ct. 877, 4 L.Ed.2d 876 (1960). I am at a loss to understand why my colleague regards such opinions denying rehearing in the least bit “peculiar.” At any rate, it is surely correct to say of our small exchange: “The world will little note nor long remember what we say here.... ”

. Judge Friendly, upon whose views expressed in United States v. New York, N.H. & H.R.R., 276 F.2d 525, 533 (1960), Judge Randolph patterns his position, actually wrote a concurring opinion (not precedential) to the panel order denying rehearing after he had written the majority opinion. He then also wrote a long statement in which he, inter alia, objected to a judge not on the panel (Judge Clark) writing a dissent from the denial of rehearing. Although Judge Friendly seems to have virtually monopolized the whole volume of the Federal Reporter writing on that case, he did not object in principle to opinions concurring from denials of rehearing (such an opinion would, of course, have agreed with him). So, in that respect, Judge Randolph who condemns concurring and dissenting opinions alike seems to have exceeded his model.