United States v. Gaubert, 499 U.S. 315 (1991)

JUSTICE SCALIA, concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.

I concur in the judgment and in much of the opinion of the Court. I write separately because I do not think it necessary to analyze individually each of the particular actions challenged by Gaubert, nor do I think an individualized analysis necessarily leads to the results the Court obtains.

I

The so-called discretionary function exception to the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) does not protect all governmental activities involving an element of choice. Berkovitz v. United States, 486 U.S. 531, 536-537 (1988). The choice must be "grounded in social, economic, [or] political policy," United States v. Varig Airlines, 467 U.S. 797, 814 (1984), or, more briefly, must represent a "policy judgment," Berkovitz, 486 U.S. at 537. Unfortunately, lower courts have had difficulty in applying this test.

The Court of Appeals in this case concluded that a choice involves policy judgment (in the relevant sense) if it is made at a planning, rather than an operational, level within the agency. 885 F.2d 1284, 1287 (1989). I agree with the Court that this is wrong. I think, however, that the level at which the decision is made is often relevant to the discretionary function inquiry, since the answer to that inquiry turns on both the subject matter and the office of the decisionmaker. In my view, a choice is shielded from liability by the discretionary function exception if the choice is, under the particular circumstances, one that ought to be informed by considerations of social, economic, or political policy, and is made by an officer whose official responsibilities include assessment of those considerations.

This test, by looking not only to the decision but also to the officer who made it, recognizes that there is something to the planning vs. operational dichotomy -- though the "something" is not precisely what the Court of Appeals believed. Ordinarily, an employee working at the operational level is not responsible for policy decisions, even though policy considerations may be highly relevant to his actions. The dock foreman’s decision to store bags of fertilizer in a highly compact fashion is not protected by this exception because, even if he carefully calculated considerations of cost to the government versus safety, it was not his responsibility to ponder such things; the Secretary of Agriculture’s decision to the same effect is protected, because weighing those considerations is his task. Cf. Dalehite v. United States, 346 U.S. 15 (1953). In Indian Towing Co. v. United States, 350 U.S. 61 (1956), the United States was held liable for, among other things, the failure of Coast Guard maintenance personnel adequately to inspect electrical equipment in a lighthouse; though there could conceivably be policy reasons for conducting only superficial inspections, the decisions had been made by the maintenance personnel, and it was assuredly not their responsibility to ponder such things. This same factor explains why it is universally acknowledged that the discretionary function exception never protects against liability for the negligence of a vehicle driver. See ante at 325, n. 7. The need for expedition vs. the need for safety may well represent a policy choice, cf. Dalehite, supra, but the government does not expect its drivers to make that choice on a case-by-case basis.

Moreover, not only is it necessary for application of the discretionary function exception that the decisionmaker be an official who possesses the relevant policy responsibility, but also the decisionmaker’s close identification with policymaking can be strong evidence that the other half of the test is met -- i.e., that the subject matter of the decision is one that ought to be informed by policy considerations. I am much more inclined to believe, for example, that the manner of storing fertilizer raises economic policy concerns if the decision on that subject has been reserved to the Secretary of Agriculture himself. That it is proper to take the level of the decisionmaker into account is supported by the phrase of the FTCA immediately preceding the discretionary function exception, which excludes governmental liability for acts taken, "exercising due care, in the execution of a . . . regulation, whether or not such . . . regulation be valid." We have taken this to mean that regulations "[can] not be attacked by claimants under the Act." Dalehite, 346 U.S. at 42. This immunity represents an absolute statutory presumption, so to speak, that all regulations involve policy judgments that must not be interfered with. I think there is a similar presumption, though not an absolute one, that decisions reserved to policymaking levels involve such judgments -- and the higher the policymaking level, the stronger the presumption.

II

Turning to the facts of the present case, I find it difficult to say that the particular activities of which Gaubert complains are necessarily discretionary functions, so that a motion to dismiss could properly be granted on that ground. To take but one example, Gaubert alleges that the regulators acted negligently in selecting consultants to advise the bank. The Court argues that such a decision, even though taken in the course of "day-to-day" management, surely involves an element of choice. But that answers only the first half of the Berkovitz inquiry. It remains to be determined whether the choice is of a policymaking nature. Perhaps one can imagine a relatively high-level government official, authorized generally to manage the bank in such fashion as to further applicable government policies, who hires consultants and other employees with those policy objectives in mind. The discretionary function exception arguably would protect such a hiring choice. But one may also imagine a federal officer of relatively low level, authorized to hire a bank consultant by applying ordinary standards of business judgment, and not authorized to consider matters of government policy in the process. That hiring decision would not be protected by the discretionary function exception, even though some element of choice is involved.

I do not think it advances the argument to observe, ante at 333, that

[t]here are no allegations that the regulators gave anything other than the kind of advice that was within the purview of the policies behind the statutes.

An official may act "within the purview" of the relevant policy without himself making policy decisions -- in which case, if the action is negligent (and was not specifically mandated by the relevant policy, see Dalehite, 346 U.S. at 36), the discretionary function exception does not bar United States liability. Contrariwise, action "outside the purview" of the relevant policy does not necessarily fail to qualify for the discretionary function defense. If the action involves policy discretion, and the officer is authorized to exercise that discretion, the defense applies even if the discretion has been exercised erroneously, so as to frustrate the relevant policy. See 28 U.S.C. § 2680(a) (discretionary function exception applies "whether or not the discretion involved be abused."). In other words, action "within the purview" of the relevant policy is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for invoking the discretionary function exception.

The present case comes to us on a motion to dismiss. Lacking any sort of factual record, we can do little more than speculate as to whether the officers here exercised policymaking responsibility with respect to the individual acts in question. Without more, the motion would have to be denied. I think, however, that the Court’s conclusion to the contrary is properly reached under a slightly different approach. The alleged misdeeds complained of here were not actually committed by federal officers. Rather, federal officers "recommended" that such actions be taken, making it clear that, if the recommendations were not followed the bank would be seized and operated directly by the regulators. In effect, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board (FHLBB) imposed the advice which Gaubert challenges as a condition of allowing the bank to remain independent. But surely the decision whether or not to take over a bank is a policy-based decision to which liability may not attach -- a decision that ought to be influenced by considerations of "social, economic, [or] political policy," Varig Airlines, 467 U.S. at 814, and that, in the nature of things, can only be made by FHLBB officers responsible for weighing such considerations. I think a corollary is that setting the conditions under which the FHLBB will or will not take over a bank is an exercise of policymaking discretion. By establishing such a list of conditions, as was done here, the Board in effect announces guidelines pursuant to which it will exercise its discretionary function of taking over the bank. Establishing guidelines for the exercise of a discretionary function is unquestionably a discretionary function. Thus, without resort to item-by-item analysis, I would find each of Gaubert’s challenges barred by the discretionary function exception.