OCTOBER TERM, 1997
Syllabus
FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION
v. AKINS ET AL.
CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
No. 96-1590. Argued January 14, 1998-Decided June 1, 1998
The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 (FECA) seeks to remedy
corruption of the political process. As relevant here, it imposes
extensive recordkeeping and disclosure requirements upon "political
committee[s]," which include
"any committee, club,
association or other group of persons which receives" more than
$1,000 in "contributions" or "which makes" more than $1,000 in
"expenditures" in any given year, 2 U. S. C. §431(4)(A) (emphasis
added), "for the purpose of influencing any election for Federal
office," §§ 431(8)(A)(i), (9)(A)(i). Assistance given to help a
particular candidate will not count toward the $1,000 "expenditure"
ceiling if it takes the form of a "communication" by a "membership
organization or corporation" "to its members" -as long as the
organization is not "organized primarily for the purpose of
influencing [any individual's] nomination ... or election." §
431(9)(B)(iii). Respondents, voters with views often opposed to
those of the American Israel Public Mfairs Committee (AIPAC), filed
a compliant with petitioner Federal Election Commission (FE C),
asking the FEC to find that AIPAC had violated FECA and, among
other things, to order AIPAC to make public the information that
FECA demands of political committees. In dismissing the complaint,
the FEC found that AIPAC's communications fell outside FECA's
membership communications exception. Nonetheless, it concluded,
AIPAC was not a "political committee" because, as an issue-oriented
lobbying organization, its major purpose was not the nomination or
election of candidates. The District Court granted the FEC summary
judgment when it reviewed the determination, but the en banc Court
of Appeals reversed on the ground that the FEC's major purpose test
improperly interpreted FECA's definition of a political committee.
The case presents this Court with two questions: (1) whether
respondents had standing to challenge the FEC's decision, and (2)
whether an organization falls outside FECA's definition of a
"political committee" because "its major purpose" is not "the
nomination or election of candidates."
Held:
1. Respondents, as voters seeking information to which they
believe FECA entitles them, have standing to challenge the FEC's
decision not to bring an enforcement action. Pp. 19-26.
12
Syllabus
(a) Respondents satisfy prudential standing requirements. FECA
specifically provides that "[a]ny person" who believes FECA has
been violated may file a complaint with the FEC, §437g(a)(1), and
that "[a]ny party aggrieved" by an FEC order dismissing such
party's complaint may seek district court review of the dismissal,
§ 437g(a)(8)(A). History associates the word "aggrieved" with a
congressional intent to cast the standing net broadly-beyond the
common-law interests and substantive statutory rights upon which
"prudential" standing traditionally rested.
E. g.,
FCC v.
Sanders Brothers Radio Station, 309 U. S. 470. Moreover,
respondents' asserted injury-their failure to obtain relevant
information-is injury of a kind that FECA seeks to address.
Pp.19-20.
(b) Respondents also satisfy constitutional standing
requirements.
Their inability to obtain information that, they claim, FECA
requires AIPAC to make public meets the genuine "injury in fact"
requirement that helps assure that the court will adjudicate "[a]
concrete, living contest between adversaries."
Coleman v.
Miller, 307 U.
S. 433, 460 (Frankfurter, J., dissenting).
United States
v.
Richardson, 418 U. S. 166,
distinguished. The fact that the harm at issue is widely shared
does not deprive Congress of constitutional power to authorize its
vindication in the federal courts where the harm is concrete. See
Public Citizen v.
Department of Justice, 491 U. S. 440, 449-450.
The informational injury here, directly related to voting, the most
basic of political rights, is sufficiently concrete. Respondents
have also satisfied the remaining two constitutional standing
requirements: The harm asserted is "fairly traceable" to the FEC's
decision not to issue its complaint, and the courts in this case
can "redress" that injury. Pp. 20-25.
(c) Finally, FECA explicitly indicates a congressional intent to
alter the traditional view that agency enforcement decisions are
not subject to judicial review.
Heckler v.
Chaney,
470 U. S. 821,
832, distinguished. P. 26.
2. Because of the unusual and complex circumstances in which the
case arises, the second question presented cannot be addressed
here, and the case must be remanded. After the FEC determined that
many persons belonging to AIPAC were not "members" under FEC
regulations, the Court of Appeals overturned those regulations in
another case, in part because it thought they defined membership
organizations too narrowly in light of an organization's First
Amendment right to communicate with its members. The FEC's new
"membership organization" rules could significantly affect the
interpretative issue presented by Question Two. Thus, the FEC
should proceed to determine whether or not AIPAC's expenditures
qualify as "membership communications" under the new rules, and
thereby fall outside the scope of "expendi-
13
tures" that could qualify it as a "political committee." If it
decides that the communications here do not qualify, then the lower
courts can still evaluate the significance of the communicative
context in which the case arises. If, on the other hand, it decides
that they do qualify, the matter will become moot. Pp. 26-29.
101 F.3d
731, vacated and remanded.
BREYER, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which
REHNQUIST, C. J., and STEVENS, KENNEDY, SOUTER, and GINSBURG, JJ.,
joined. SCALIA, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which O'CONNOR
and THOMAS, JJ., joined,
post, p. 29.
Solicitor General Waxman argued the cause for the United States.
With him on the briefs were Acting Solicitor General Dellinger,
Malcolm L. Stewart, Lawrence M. Noble, Richard B. Bader, and David
Kolker.
Daniel M. Schember argued the cause for respondents.
With him on the brief was
Abdeen Jabara.*
JUSTICE BREYER delivered the opinion of the Court.
The Federal Election Commission (FEC) has determined that the
American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AlP AC) is not a
"political committee" as defined by the Federal Election Campaign
Act of 1971 (FECA or Act), 86 Stat. 11, as amended, 2 U. S. C. §
431(4), and, for that reason, the FEC has refused to require AIPAC
to make disclosures regarding its membership, contributions, and
expenditures that FECA would otherwise require. We hold that
respondents, a group of voters, have standing to challenge the
*Briefs of
amici curiae urging reversal were filed for
the American Civil Liberties Union et al. by
Joel M. Gora,
Steven R. Shapiro, and
Arthur N. Eisenberg; and for the
National Right to Life Committee, Inc., by
James Bopp,
Jr.
A. Stephen Hut, Jr., Roger M. Witten, Jeffrey P. Singdahlsen,
and Donald J. Simon filed a brief for Common Cause as amicus curiae
urging affirmance.
Briefs of
amici curiae were filed for the American Israel
Public Affairs Committee by
Theodore B. Olson, Mel Levine,
Thomas G.
Hungar, and
Philip Friedman; and for
the Brennan Center for Justice by
Burt Neuborne.
14
Commission's determination in court, and we remand this case for
further proceedings.
I
In light of our disposition of this case, we believe it
necessary to describe its procedural background in some detail. As
commonly understood, the FECA seeks to remedy any actual or
perceived corruption of the political process in several important
ways. The Act imposes limits upon the amounts that individuals,
corporations, "political committees" (including political action
committees), and political parties can contribute to a candidate
for federal political office. §§ 441a(a), 441a(b), 441b. The Act
also imposes limits on the amount these individuals or entities can
spend in coordination with a candidate. (It treats these
expenditures as "contributions to" a candidate for purposes of the
Act.) § 441a(a)(7)(B)(i). As originally written, the Act set limits
upon the total amount that a candidate could spend of his own
money, and upon the amounts that other individuals, corporations,
and "political committees" could spend independent of a
candidate-though the Court found that certain of these
last-mentioned limitations violated the First Amendment.
Buckley v.
Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 39-59 (1976)
(per curiam); Federal Election Comm'n v.
National
Conservative Political Action Comm., 470 U. S. 480, 497
(1985); cf.
Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Comm. v.
Federal Election Comm'n, 518 U. S. 604, 613-619
(1996) (opinion of BREYER, J.).
This case concerns requirements in the Act that extend beyond
these better-known contribution and expenditure limitations. In
particular, the Act imposes extensive recordkeeping and disclosure
requirements upon groups that fall within the Act's definition of a
"political committee." Those groups must register with the FEC,
appoint a treasurer, keep names and addresses of contributors,
track the amount and purpose of disbursements, and file complex
FEC
15
reports that include lists of donors giving in excess of $200
per year (often, these donors may be the group's members),
contributions, expenditures, and any other disbursements
irrespective of their purposes. §§ 432-434.
The Act's use of the word "political committee" calls to mind
the term "political action committee," or "PAC," a term that
normally refers to organizations that corporations or trade unions
might establish for the purpose of making contributions or
expenditures that the Act would otherwise prohibit. See §§
431(4)(B), 441b. But, in fact, the Act's term "political committee"
has a much broader scope. The Act states that a "political
committee" includes
"any committee, club, association or
other group of persons which receives" more than $1,000 in
"contributions" or "which makes" more than $1,000 in "expenditures"
in any given year. § 431(4)(A) (emphasis added).
This broad definition, however, is less universally encompassing
than at first it may seem, for later definitional subsections limit
its scope. The Act defines the key terms "contribution" and
"expenditure" as covering only those contributions and expenditures
that are made "for the purpose of influencing any election for
Federal office." §§ 431(8)(A)(i), (9)(A)(i). Moreover, the Act sets
forth detailed categories of disbursements, loans, and
assistancein-kind that do not count as a "contribution" or an
"expenditure," even when made for election-related purposes. §§
431(8)(B), (9)(B). In particular, assistance given to help a
candidate will not count toward the $1,000 "expenditure" ceiling
that qualifies an organization as a "political committee" if it
takes the form of a "communication" by an organization "to its
members"-as long as the organization at issue is a "membership
organization or corporation" and it is not "organized primarily for
the purpose of influencing the nomination ... or electio[n] of any
individual." § 431(9)(B)(iii).
This case arises out of an effort by respondents, a group of
voters with views often opposed to those of AlP AC, to
16
persuade the FEC to treat AIPAC as a "political committee."
Respondents filed a complaint with the FEC, stating that AIPAC had
made more than $1,000 in qualifying "expenditures" per year, and
thereby became a "political committee." 1 Record, Exh. B, p. 4.
They added that AlP AC had violated the FEC provisions requiring
"political committee[sJ" to register and to make public the
information about members, contributions, and expenditures to which
we have just referred.
Id., at 2, 9-17. Respondents also
claimed that AIPAC had violated § 441b of FECA, which prohibits
corporate campaign "contribution[sJ" and "expenditure[sJ."
Id., at 2, 16-17. They asked the FEC to find that AIPAC had
violated the Act, and, among other things, to order AlP AC to make
public the information that FECA demands of a "political
committee."
Id., at 33-34.
AIPAC asked the FEC to dismiss the complaint. AIPAC described
itself as an issue-oriented organization that seeks to maintain
friendship and promote goodwill between the United States and
Israel. App. 120; see also Brief for AIPAC as
Amicus Curiae
(AIPAC Brief) 1,3. AIPAC conceded that it lobbies elected officials
and disseminates information about candidates for public office.
App. 43, 120; see also AlP AC Brief 6. But in responding to the §
441b charge, AlP AC denied that it had made the kinds of
"expenditures" that matter for FECA purposes (i.
e., the
kinds of electionrelated expenditures that corporations cannot
make, and which count as the kind of expenditures that, when they
exceed $1,000, qualify a group as a "political committee").
To put the matter more specifically: AlP AC focused on certain
"expenditures" that respondents had claimed were election related,
such as the costs of meetings with candidates, the introduction of
AlP AC members to candidates, and the distribution of candidate
position papers. AlP AC said that its spending on such activities,
even if election related, fell within a relevant exception. They
amounted, said AlP AC,
17
to communications by a membership organization with its members,
App. 164-166, which the Act exempts from its definition of
"expenditures," § 431(9)(B)(iii). In AIPAC's view, these
communications therefore did not violate § 441b's corporate
expenditure prohibition. 2 Record, Doc. No. 19, pp. 2-6. (And, if
AlP AC was right, those expenditures would not count toward the
$1,000 ceiling on "expenditures" that might transform an ordinary
issue-related group into a "political committee." § 431(4).)
The FEC's General Counsel concluded that, between 1983 and 1988,
AlP AC had indeed funded communications of the sort described. The
General Counsel said that those expenditures were campaign related,
in that they amounted to advocating the election or defeat of
particular candidates. App. 106-108. He added that these
expenditures were "likely to have crossed the $1,000 threshold."
Id., at 146. At the same time, the FEC closed the door to
AlP AC's invocation of the "communications" exception. The FEC said
that, although it was a "close question," these expenditures were
not membership communications, because that exception applies to a
membership organization's communications with its members, and most
of the persons who belonged to AlP AC did not qualify as "members"
for purposes of the Act. App. to Pet. for Cert. 97a-98a; see also
App. 170-173. Still, given the closeness of the issue, the FEC
exercised its discretion and decided not to proceed further with
respect to the claimed "corporate contribution" violation. App. to
Pet. for Cert. 98a.
The FEC's determination that many of the persons who belonged to
AIPAC were not "members" effectively foreclosed any claim that AlP
AC's communications did not count as "expenditures" for purposes of
determining whether it was a "political committee." Since AIPAC's
activities fell outside the "membership communications" exception,
AlP AC could not invoke that exception as a way of escaping
18
the scope of the Act's term "political committee" and the Act's
disclosure provisions, which that definition triggers.
The FEC nonetheless held that AlP AC was not subject to the
disclosure requirements, but for a different reason. In the FEC's
view, the Act's definition of "political committee" includes only
those organizations that have as a "major purpose" the nomination
or election of candidates. Cf.
Buckley v.
Valeo, 424
U. S., at 79. AIPAC, it added, was fundamentally an issue-oriented
lobbying organization, not a campaign-related organization, and
hence AIPAC fell outside the definition of a "political committee"
regardless. App. 146. The FEC consequently dismissed respondents'
complaint.
Respondents filed a petition in Federal District Court seeking
review of the FEC's determination dismissing their complaint. See
§§ 437g(a)(8)(A), 437g(a)(8)(C). The District Court granted summary
judgment for the FEC, and a divided panel of the Court of Appeals
affirmed.
66 F.3d
348 (CADC 1995). The en banc Court of Appeals reversed,
however, on the ground that the FEC's "major purpose" test
improperly interpreted the Act's definition of a "political
committee."
101 F.3d
731 (CADC 1997). We granted the FEC's petition for certiorari,
which contained the following two questions:
"1. Whether respondents had standing to challenge the Federal
Election Commission's decision not to bring an enforcement action
in this case.
"2. Whether an organization that spends more than $1,000 on
contributions or coordinated expenditures in a calendar year, but
is neither controlled by a candidate nor has its major purpose the
nomination or election of candidates, is a 'political committee'
within the meaning of the [Act]." Brief for Petitioner I.
We shall answer the first of these questions, but not the
second.
19
II
The Solicitor General argues that respondents lack standing to
challenge the FEC's decision not to proceed against AlP AC. He
claims that they have failed to satisfy the "prudential" standing
requirements upon which this Court has insisted. See,
e. g.,
National Credit Union Admin. v.
First Nat. Bank &
Trust Co., 522
U. S. 479, 488 (1998)
(NCUA); Association of Data Processing
Service Organizations, Inc. v.
Camp, 397 U. S. 150, 153 (1970)
(Data Processing). He adds that respondents have not shown
that they "suffe[r] injury in fact," that their injury is "fairly
traceable" to the FEC's decision, or that a judicial decision in
their favor would "redres[s]" the injury.
E. g., Bennett v.
Spear, 520 U. S. 154, 162 (1997) (internal quotation marks
omitted);
Lujan v.
Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U. S. 555, 560-561
(1992). In his view, respondents' District Court petition
consequently failed to meet Article Ill's demand for a "case" or
"controversy."
We do not agree with the FEC's "prudential standing" claim.
Congress has specifically provided in FECA that "[a]ny person who
believes a violation of this Act ... has occurred, may file a
complaint with the Commission." § 437g(a)(1). It has added that
"[a]ny party aggrieved by an order of the Commission dismissing a
complaint filed by such party ... may file a petition" in district
court seeking review of that dismissal. § 437g(a)(8)(A). History
associates the word "aggrieved" with a congressional intent to cast
the standing net broadly-beyond the common-law interests and
substantive statutory rights upon which "prudential" standing
traditionally rested.
Scripps-Howard Radio, Inc. v.
FCC, 316 U. S.
4 (1942);
FCC v.
Sanders Brothers Radio Station,
309 U. S. 470
(1940);
Office of Communication of the United Church of
Christ v.
FCC, 359 F.2d
994 (CADC 1966) (Burger, J.);
Associated Industries of New
York State v.
Ickes, 134 F.2d 694 (CA2 1943) (Frank,
J.). Cf. Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U. S. C. § 702 (stating
that those "suf-
20
fering legal wrong" or "adversely affected or aggrieved ...
within the meaning of a relevant statute" may seek judicial review
of agency action).
Moreover, prudential standing is satisfied when the injury
asserted by a plaintiff" 'arguably [falls] within the zone of
interests to be protected or regulated by the statute ... in
question.'"
NCUA, supra, at 488 (quoting
Data Processing,
supra, at 153). The injury of which respondents complaintheir
failure to obtain relevant information-is injury of a kind that
FECA seeks to address.
Buckley, supra, at 6667 ("political
committees" must disclose contributors and disbursements to help
voters understand who provides which candidates with financial
support). We have found nothing in the Act that suggests Congress
intended to exclude voters from the benefits of these provisions,
or otherwise to restrict standing, say, to political parties,
candidates, or their committees.
Given the language of the statute and the nature of the injury,
we conclude that Congress, intending to protect voters such as
respondents from suffering the kind of injury here at issue,
intended to authorize this kind of suit. Consequently, respondents
satisfy "prudential" standing requirements. Cf.
Raines v.
Byrd, 521 U.
S. 811, 820, n. 3 (1997) (explicit grant of authority to bring
suit "eliminates any prudential standing limitations and
significantly lessens the risk of unwanted conflict with the
Legislative Branch").
Nor do we agree with the FEC or the dissent that Congress lacks
the constitutional power to authorize federal courts to adjudicate
this lawsuit. Article III, of course, limits Congress' grant of
judicial power to "cases" or "controversies." That limitation means
that respondents must show, among other things, an "injury in fact"
-a requirement that helps assure that courts will not "pass upon
... abstract, intellectual problems," but adjudicate "concrete,
living contestes] between adversaries."
Coleman v.
Miller, 307 U.
S. 433, 460 (1939) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting); see also
Bennett,
21
supra, at 167;
Lujan, supra, at 560-561. In our
view, respondents here have suffered a genuine "injury in
fact."
The "injury in fact" that respondents have suffered consists of
their inability to obtain information-lists of AlP AC donors (who
are, according to AIPAC, its members), and campaign-related
contributions and expenditures-that, on respondents' view of the
law, the statute requires that AlP AC make public. There is no
reason to doubt their claim that the information would help them
(and others to whom they would communicate it) to evaluate
candidates for public office, especially candidates who received
assistance from AlP AC, and to evaluate the role that AlP AC's
financial assistance might play in a specific election.
Respondents' injury consequently seems concrete and particular.
Indeed, this Court has previously held that a plaintiff suffers an
"injury in fact" when the plaintiff fails to obtain information
which must be publicly disclosed pursuant to a statute.
Public
Citizen v.
Department of Justice, 491 U. S. 440, 449 (1989)
(failure to obtain information subject to disclosure under Federal
Advisory Committee Act "constitutes a sufficiently distinct injury
to provide standing to sue"). See also
Havens Realty Corp.
v.
Coleman, 455 U. S. 363, 373-374
(1982) (deprivation of information about housing availability
constitutes "specific injury" permitting standing).
The dissent refers to
United States v.
Richardson,
418 U. S. 166 (1974), a case in which a plaintiff sought
information (details of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
expenditures) to which, he said, the Constitution's Accounts
Clause, Art. I, § 9, cl. 7, entitled him. The Court held that the
plaintiff there lacked Article III standing. 418 U. S., at 179-180.
The dissent says that
Richardson and this case are
"indistinguishable."
Post, at 34. But as the parties' briefs
suggest-for they do not mention
Richardson-that case does
not control the outcome here.
Richardson's plaintiff claimed that a statute permitting
the CIA to keep its expenditures nonpublic violated the Ac-
22
counts Clause, which requires that "a regular Statement and
Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money shall
be published from time to time." 418 U. S., at 167-169. The Court
held that the plaintiff lacked standing because there was "no
'logical nexus' between the [plaintiff's] asserted status of
taxpayer and the claimed failure of the Congress to require the
Executive to supply a more detailed report of the [CIA's]
expenditures."
Id., at 175; see also
id., at 174
(quoting
Flast v.
Cohen, 392 U. S. 83, 102 (1968),
for the proposition that in "taxpayer standing" cases, there must
be "'a logical nexus between the status asserted and the claim
sought to be adjudicated' ").
In this case, however, the "logical nexus" inquiry is not
relevant. Here, there is no constitutional provision requiring the
demonstration of the "nexus" the Court believed must be shown in
Richardson and
Flast. Rather, there is a statute
which, as we previously pointed out,
supra, at 19-20, does
seek to protect individuals such as respondents from the kind of
harm they say they have suffered, i.
e., failing to receive
particular information about campaign-related activities. Cf.
Richardson, 418 U. S., at 178, n. 11.
The fact that the Court in
Richardson focused upon
taxpayer standing, id., at 171-178, not voter standing, places that
case at still a greater distance from the case before us. We are
not suggesting, as the dissent implies,
post, at 32-34, that
Richardson would have come out differently if only the
plaintiff had asserted his standing to sue as a voter, rather than
as a taxpayer. Faced with such an assertion, the
Richardson
Court would simply have had to consider whether "the Framers ...
ever imagined that
general directives [of the Constitution]
... would be subject to enforcement by anindividual citizen." 418
U. S., at 178, n. 11 (emphasis added). But since that answer (like
the answer to whether there was taxpayer standing in
Richardson) would have rested in significant part upon the
Court's view of the Accounts Clause, it still would not control our
answer in this case. All this is
23
to say that the legal logic which critically determined
Richardson's outcome is beside the point here.
The FEC's strongest argument is its contention that this lawsuit
involves only a "generalized grievance." (Indeed, if
Richardson is relevant at all, it is because of its broad
discussion of
this matter, see
id., at 176-178, not
its basic rationale.) The FEC points out that respondents' asserted
harm (their failure to obtain information) is one which is "'shared
in substantially equal measure by all or a large class of
citizens.'" Brief for Petitioner 28 (quoting
Warth v.
Seldin, 422 U.
S. 490, 499 (1975)). This Court, the FEC adds, has often said
that "generalized grievance[s]" are not the kinds of harms that
confer standing. Brief for Petitioner 28; see also
Lujan,
504 U. S., at 573-574;
Allen v.
Wright, 468 U. S. 737, 755-756
(1984);
Valley Forge Christian College v.
Americans
United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U. S. 464, 475-479
(1982);
Richardson, supra, at 176-178;
Frothingham v.
Mellon, decided with
Massachusetts v.
Mellon,
262 U. S. 447,
487 (1923);
Ex parte Levitt, 302 U. S. 633, 634 (1937)
(per curiam). Whether styled as a constitutional or
prudential limit on standing, the Court has sometimes determined
that where large numbers of Americans suffer alike, the political
process, rather than the judicial process, may provide the more
appropriate remedy for a widely shared grievance.
Warth,
supra, at 500;
Schlesinger v.
Reservists Comm. to
Stop the War, 418
U. S. 208, 222 (1974);
Richardson, 418 U. S., at 179;
id., at 188-189 (Powell, J., concurring); see also
Flast,
supra, at 131 (Harlan, J., dissenting).
The kind of judicial language to which the FEC points, however,
invariably appears in cases where the harm at issue is not only
widely shared, but is also of an abstract and indefinite nature-for
example, harm to the "common concern for obedience to law."
L.
Singer &
Sons v.
Union Pacific R. Co.,
311 U. S. 295,
303 (1940); see also
Allen, supra, at 754;
Schlesinger,
supra, at 217. Cf.
Lujan, supra, at 572-578 (injury to
interest in seeing that certain procedures are fol-
24
lowed not normally sufficient by itself to confer standing);
Frothingham, supra, at 488 (party may not merely assert that
"he suffers in some indefinite way in common with people
generally");
Perkins v.
Lukens Steel Co., 310 U. S. 113, 125 (1940)
(plaintiffs lack standing because they have failed to show injury
to "a particular right of their own, as distinguished from the
public's interest in the administration of the law"). The abstract
nature of the harm-for example, injury to the interest in seeing
that the law is obeyed-deprives the case of the concrete
specificity that characterized those controversies which were "the
traditional concern of the courts at Westminster,"
Coleman,
307 U. S., at 460 (Frankfurter, J., dissenting); and which today
prevents a plaintiff from obtaining what would, in effect, amount
to an advisory opinion. Cf.
Aetna Life Ins. Co. v.
Haworth, 300 U. S. 227, 240-241 (1937).
Often the fact that an interest is abstract and the fact that it
is widely shared go hand in hand. But their association is not
invariable, and where a harm is concrete, though widely shared, the
Court has found "injury in fact." See
Public Citizen, 491 U.
S., at 449-450 ("The fact that other citizens or groups of citizens
might make the same complaint after unsuccessfully demanding
disclosure ... does not lessen [their] asserted injury"). Thus the
fact that a political forum may be more readily available where an
injury is widely shared (while counseling against, say,
interpreting a statute as conferring standing) does not, by itself,
automatically disqualify an interest for Article III purposes. Such
an interest, where sufficiently concrete, may count as an "injury
in fact." This conclusion seems particularly obvious where (to use
a hypothetical example) large numbers of individuals suffer the
same common-law injury (say, a widespread mass tort), or where
large numbers of voters suffer interference with voting rights
conferred by law. Cf.
Lujan, supra, at
572; Shaw v.
Hunt, 517 U.
S. 899, 905 (1996). We conclude that, similarly, the
informational injury at issue here, di-
25
rectly related to voting, the most basic of political rights, is
sufficiently concrete and specific such that the fact that it is
widely shared does not deprive Congress of constitutional power to
authorize its vindication in the federal courts.
Respondents have also satisfied the remaining two constitutional
standing requirements. The harm asserted is "fairly traceable" to
the FEC's decision about which respondents complain. Of course, as
the FEC points out, Brief for Petitioner 29-31, it is possible that
even had the FEC agreed with respondents' view of the law, it would
still have decided in the exercise of its discretion not to require
AlP AC to produce the information. Cf. App. to Pet. for Cert. 98a
(deciding to exercise prosecutorial discretion, see
Heckler
v.
Chaney, 470
U. S. 821 (1985), and "take no further action" on § 441b
allegation against AIPAC). But that fact does not destroy Article
III "causation," for we cannot know that the FEC would have
exercised its prosecutorial discretion in this way. Agencies often
have discretion about whether or not to take a particular action.
Yet those adversely affected by a discretionary agency decision
generally have standing to complain that the agency based its
decision upon an improper legal ground. See,
e. g., Abbott
Laboratories v.
Gardner, 387 U. S. 136, 140 (1967)
(discussing presumption of reviewability of agency action);
Citizens to Preserve Overton Park, Inc. v.
Volpe,
401 U. S. 402,
410 (1971). If a reviewing court agrees that the agency
misinterpreted the law, it will set aside the agency's action and
remand the case-even though the agency (like a new jury after a
mistrial) might later, in the exercise of its lawful discretion,
reach the same result for a different reason.
SEC v.
Chenery Corp., 318 U. S. 80 (1943). Thus
respondents' "injury in fact" is "fairly traceable" to the FEC's
decision not to issue its complaint, even though the FEC might
reach the same result exercising its discretionary powers lawfully.
For similar reasons, the courts in this case can "redress"
respondents' "injury in fact."
26
Finally, the FEC argues that we should deny respondents standing
because this case involves an agency's decision not to undertake an
enforcement action-an area generally not subject to judicial
review. Brief for Petitioner 23, 29. In
Heckler, this Court
noted that agency enforcement decisions "ha[ve] traditionally been
'committed to agency discretion,'" and concluded that Congress did
not intend to alter that tradition in enacting the AP A. 470 U. S.,
at 832; cf. 5 U. S. C. § 701(a) (courts will not review agency
actions where "statutes preclude judicial review," or where the
"agency action is committed to agency discretion by law"). We deal
here with a statute that explicitly indicates the contrary.
In sum, respondents, as voters, have satisfied both prudential
and constitutional standing requirements. They may bring this
petition for a declaration that the FEC's dismissal of their
complaint was unlawful. See 2 U. S. C. § 437 g(a)(8) (A).
III
The second question presented in the FEC's petition for
certiorari is whether an organization that otherwise satisfies the
Act's definition of a "political committee," and thus is subject to
its disclosure requirements, nonetheless falls outside that
definition because "its major purpose" is not "the nomination or
election of candidates." The question arises because this Court, in
Buckley, said:
"To fulfill the purposes of the Act [the term 'political
committee'] need only encompass organizations that are under the
control of a candidate or the major purpose of which is the
nomination or election of a candidate." 424 U. S., at 79.
The Court reiterated in Federal Election Comm'n v. Massachusetts
Citizens for Life, Inc.,
479 U. S. 238, 252, n. 6
(1986):
"[A]n entity subject to regulation as a 'political committee'
under the Act is one that is either 'under the control
27
of a candidate or the major purpose of which is the nomination
or election of a candidate.'"
The FEC here interpreted this language as narrowing the scope of
the statutory term "political committee," wherever applied. And, as
we have said, the FEC's General Counsel found that AlP AC fell
outside that definition because the nomination or election of a
candidate was not AlP AC's "major purpose." App. 146.
The en banc Court of Appeals disagreed with the FEC.
It read this Court's narrowing construction of the term
"political committee" as turning on the First Amendment problems
presented by regulation of "independent expenditures" (i.
e., "an expenditure by a person expressly advocating the
election or defeat of a clearly identified candidate which is made
without cooperation or consultation with any candidate," §
431(17)). 101 F. 3d, at 741. The Court of Appeals concluded that
the language in this Court's prior decisions narrowing the
definition of "political committee" did not apply where the special
First Amendment "independent expenditure" problem did not exist.
Id., at 742-743.
The Solicitor General argues that this Court's narrowing
definition of "political committee" applies not simply in the
context of independent expenditures, but across the board. We
cannot squarely address that matter, however, because of the
unusual and complex circumstances in which this case arises. As we
previously mentioned,
supra, at 16-17, the FEC considered a
related question, namely, whether AlPAC was exempt from § 441b's
prohibition of corporate campaign expenditures, on the grounds that
the so-called "expenditures" involved only AlP AC's communications
with its members. The FEC held that the statute's exception to the
"expenditure" definition for communications by a "membership
organization" did not apply because many of the persons who
belonged to AlPAC were not "members" as defined by FEC regulation.
The FEC acknowledged, however, that this was a "close question."
App. to Pet. for Cert. 98a; see also App.
28
144-146, 170-171. In particular, the FEC thought that many of
the persons who belonged to AlP AC lacked sufficient control of the
organization's policies to qualify as "members" for purposes of the
Act.
A few months later, however, the Court of Appeals overturned the
FEC's regulations defining "members," in part because that court
thought the regulations defined membership organizations too
narrowly in light of an organization's "First Amendment right to
communicate with its 'members.'"
Chamber of Commerce v.
Federal Election Comm'n, 69 F.3d
600, 605
(CADC 1995). The FEC has subsequently issued
proposed rules redefining "members." Under these rules, it is quite
possible that many of the persons who belong to AIPAC would be
considered "members." If so, the communications here at issue
apparently would not count as the kind of "expenditures" that can
turn an organization into a "political committee," and AlP AC would
fall outside the definition for that reason, rather than because of
the "major purpose" test. 62 Fed. Reg. 66832 (1997) (proposed 11
CFR pts. 100 and 114).
The consequence for our consideration of Question Two now is
that the FEC's new rules defining "membership organization" could
significantly affect the interpretive issue presented by this
question. If the Court of Appeals is right in saying that this
Court's narrowing interpretation of "political committee" in
Buckley reflected First Amendment concerns, 101 F. 3d, at
741, then whether the "membership communications" exception is
interpreted broadly or narrowly could affect our evaluation of the
Court of Appeals' claim that there is no constitutionally driven
need to apply
Buckley's narrowing interpretation in this
context. The scope of the "membership communications" exception
could also affect our evaluation of the Solicitor General's related
argument that First Amendment concerns (reflected in
Buck
ley's narrowing interpretation) are present whenever the Act
requires disclosure. In any event, it is difficult to decide
the
29
basic issue that Question Two presents without considering the
special communicative nature of the "expenditures" here at issue,
cf.
United States v.
CIO, 335 U. S. 106, 121 (1948)
(describing relation between membership communications and
constitutionally protected rights of association). And, a
considered determination of the scope of the statutory exemption
that Congress enacted to address membership communications would
helpfully inform our consideration of the "major purpose" test.
The upshot, in our view, is that we should permit the FEC to
address, in the first instance, the issue presented by Question
Two. We can thereby take advantage of the relevant agency's
expertise, by allowing it to develop a more precise rule that may
dispose of this case, or at a minimum, will aid the Court in
reaching a more informed conclusion. In our view, the FEC should
proceed to determine whether or not AlP AC's expenditures qualify
as "membership communications," and thereby fall outside the scope
of "expenditures" that could qualify it as a "political committee."
If the FEC decides that despite its new rules, the communications
here do not qualify for this exception, then the lower courts, in
reconsidering respondents' arguments, can still evaluate the
significance of the communicative context in which the case arises.
If, on the other hand, the FEC decides that AlP AC's activities
fall within the "membership communications" exception, the matter
will become moot.
For these reasons, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is
vacated, and the case is remanded for further proceedings
consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
JUSTICE SCALIA, with whom JUSTICE O'CONNOR and JUSTICE THOMAS
join, dissenting.
The provision of law at issue in this case is an extraordinary
one, conferring upon a private person the ability to bring an
Executive agency into court to compel its enforce-
30
ment of the law against a third party. Despite its liberality,
the Administrative Procedure Act does not allow such suits, since
enforcement action is traditionally deemed "committed to agency
discretion by law." 5 U. s. C. § 701(a)(2);
Heckler v.
Chaney, 470 U.
S. 821, 827-835 (1985). If provisions such as the present one
were commonplace, the role of the Executive Branch in our system of
separated and equilibrated powers would be greatly reduced, and
that of the Judiciary greatly expanded.
Because this provision is so extraordinary, we should be
particularly careful not to expand it beyond its fair meaning. In
my view the Court's opinion does that. Indeed, it expands the
meaning beyond what the Constitution permits.
I
It is clear that the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 (FECA
or Act) does not intend that
all persons filing complaints
with the Federal Election Commission have the right to seek
judicial review of the rejection of their complaints. This is
evident from the fact that the Act permits a complaint to be filed
by "[a]ny
person who believes a violation of this Act ...
has occurred," 2 U. S. C. § 437g(a)(1) (emphasis added), but
accords a right to judicial relief only to "[a]ny
party
aggrieved by an order of the Commission dismissing a complaint
filed by such party," § 437 g(a)(8)(A) (emphasis added). The
interpretation that the Court gives the latter provision deprives
it of almost all its limiting force.
Any voter can sue to
compel the agency to require registration of an entity as a
political committee, even though the "aggrievement" consists of
nothing more than the deprivation of access to information whose
public availability would have been one of the consequences of
registration.
This seems to me too much of a stretch. It should be borne in
mind that the agency action complained of here is not the refusal
to make available information in its possession that the Act
requires to be disclosed. A person de-
31
manding provision of information that the law requires the
agency to furnish-one demanding compliance with the Freedom of
Information Act or the Federal Advisory Committee Act, for
example-can reasonably be described as being "aggrieved" by the
agency's refusal to provide it. What the respondents complain of in
this suit, however, is not the refusal to provide information, but
the refusal (for an allegedly improper reason) to commence an
agency enforcement action against a third person. That refusal
itself plainly does not render respondents "aggrieved"
within the meaning of the Act, for in that case there would have
been no reason for the Act to differentiate between "person" in
subsection (a)(l) and "party aggrieved" in subsection (a)(8).
Respondents claim that each of them is elevated to the special
status of a "party aggrieved" by the fact that the requested
enforcement action (if it was successful) would have had the
effect, among others, of placing certain information in the
agency's possession, where respondents, along with everyone else in
the world, would have had access to it. It seems to me most
unlikely that the failure to produce that
effect-both a
secondary consequence of what respondents immediately seek,
and a consequence that affects respondents no more and with
no greater particularity than it affects virtually the entire
population-would have been meant to set apart each respondent as a
"party aggrieved" (as opposed to just a rejected complainant)
within the meaning of the statute.
This conclusion is strengthened by the fact that this
citizen-suit provision was enacted two years after this Court's
decision in
United States v.
Richardson, 418 U. S. 166 (1974),
which, as I shall discuss at greater length below, gave Congress
every reason to believe that a voter's interest in information
helpful to his exercise of the franchise was
constitutionally
inadequate to confer standing.
Richardson had said that
a plaintiff's complaint that the Government was unlawfully
depriving him of information he needed to
32
"properly fulfill his obligations as a member of the electorate
in voting" was "surely the kind of a generalized grievance" that
does not state an Article III case or controversy.
I d., at
176.
And finally, a narrower reading of "party aggrieved" is
supported by the doctrine of constitutional doubt, which counsels
us to interpret statutes, if possible, in such fashion as to avoid
grave constitutional questions. See
United States ex rel.
Attorney General v.
Delaware &
Hudson Co.,
213 U. S. 366,
408 (1909);
Edward J.
DeBartolo Corp. v.
Florida
Gulf Coast Building &
Constr. Trades Council,
485 U. S. 568,
575 (1988). As I proceed to discuss, it is my view that the Court's
entertainment of the present suit violates Article III. Even if one
disagrees with that judgment, however, it is clear from
Richardson that the question is a close one, so that the
statute ought not be interpreted to present it.
II
In
Richardson, we dismissed for lack of standing a suit
whose "aggrievement" was precisely the "aggrievement" respondents
assert here: the Government's unlawful refusal to place information
within the public domain. The only difference, in fact, is that the
aggrievement there was more direct, since the Government already
had the information within its possession, whereas here respondents
seek enforcement action that will bring information within the
Government's possession and
then require the information to
be made public. The plaintiff in
Richardson challenged the
Government's failure to disclose the expenditures of the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA), in alleged violation of the
constitutional requirement, Art. I, § 9, cl. 7, that "a regular
Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all
public Money shall be published from time to time." We held that
such a claim was a nonjusticiable "generalized grievance" because
"the impact on [plaintiff] is plainly undif-
33
ferentiated and common to all members of the public." 418 U. S.,
at 176-177 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted).
It was alleged in
Richardson that the Government had
denied a right conferred by the Constitution, whereas respondents
here assert a right conferred by statute-but of course "there is
absolutely no basis for making the Article III inquiry turn on the
source of the asserted right."
Lujan v.
Defenders of
Wildlife, 504 U.
S. 555, 576 (1992). The Court today distinguishes
Richardson on a different basisa basis that reduces it from
a landmark constitutional holding to a curio. According to the
Court,
"Richardson focused upon taxpayer standing, ... not
voter standing."
Ante, at 22. In addition to being a silly
distinction, given the weighty governmental purpose underlying the
"generalized grievance" prohibition-viz., to avoid "something in
the nature of an Athenian democracy or a New England town meeting
to oversee the conduct of the National Government by means of
lawsuits in federal courts," 418 U. S., at 179this is also a
distinction that the Court in
Richardson went out of its way
explicitly to eliminate. It is true enough that the narrow question
presented in
Richardson was "'[w]hether a federal taxpayer
has standing,'" id., at 167, n. 1. But the
Richardson Court
did not hold only, as the Court today suggests, that the plaintiff
failed to qualify for the exception to the rule of no taxpayer
standing established by the "logical nexus" test of
Flast v.
Cohen, 392 U.
S. 83 (1968). * The plaintiff's complaint in
Richardson
had also alleged that he was" 'a member of the electorate,'" 418 U.
S., at 167, n. 1, and he asserted injury in that capacity as
well.
*That holding was inescapable since, as the Court made clear in
another case handed down the same day, "the
Flast nexus test
is not applicable where the taxing and spending power is not
challenged" (as in
Richardson it was not).
Schlesinger v.
Reservists Comm. to Stop the War,
418 U. S. 208,
225, n. 15 (1974).
34
The
Richardson opinion treated that as fairly included
within the taxpayer-standing question, or at least as plainly
indistinguishable from it:
"The respondent's claim is that without detailed information on
CIA expenditures-and hence its activitieshe cannot intelligently
follow the actions of Congress or the Executive, nor can he
properly fulfill his obligations as a member of the electorate in
voting for candidates seeking national office.
"This is surely the kind of a generalized grievance described
in both Frothingham and Flast since the impact on him is
plainly undifferentiated and common to all members of the public."
Id., at 176-177 (citations and internal quotation marks
omitted) (emphasis added).
If
Richardson left voter standing unaffected, one must
marvel at the unaccustomed ineptitude of the American Civil
Liberties Union Foundation, which litigated
Richardson, in
not immediately refiling with an explicit voter-standing
allegation. Fairly read, and applying a fair understanding of its
important purposes,
Richardson is indistinguishable from the
present case.
The Court's opinion asserts that our language disapproving
generalized grievances "invariably appears in cases where the harm
at issue is not only widely shared, but is also of an abstract and
indefinite nature."
Ante, at 23. "Often," the Court says,
"the fact that an interest is abstract and the fact that it is
widely shared go hand in hand. But their association is not
invariable, and where a harm is concrete, though widely shared, the
Court has found 'injury in fact.'"
Ante, at 24. If that is
so-if concrete generalized grievances (like concrete particularized
grievances) are OK, and abstract generalized grievances (like
abstract particularized grievances) are bad-one must wonder why we
ever
developed the superfluous distinction between
generalized and particularized grievances at all. But of course the
Court is
35
wrong to think that generalized grievances have only concerned
us when they are abstract. One need go no further than
Richardson to prove that-unless the Court believes that
deprivation of information is an abstract injury, in which event
this case could be disposed of on that much broader ground.
What is noticeably lacking in the Court's discussion of our
generalized-grievance jurisprudence is all reference to two words
that have figured in it prominently: "particularized" and
"undifferentiated." See
Richardson, supra, at 177;
Lujan, 504 U. S., at 560, and n. 1. "Particularized" means
that "the injury must affect the plaintiff in a personal and
individual way."
Id., at 560, n. 1. If the effect is
"undifferentiated and common to all members of the public,"
Richardson, supra, at 177 (internal quotation marks and
citations omitted), the plaintiff has a "generalized grievance"
that must be pursued by political, rather than judicial, means.
These terms explain why it is a gross oversimplification to reduce
the concept of a generalized grievance to nothing more than "the
fact that [the grievance] is widely shared,"
ante, at 25,
thereby enabling the concept to be dismissed as a standing
principle by such examples as "large numbers of individuals
suffer[ing] the same common-law injury (say, a widespread mass
tort), or ... large numbers of voters suffer[ing] interference with
voting rights conferred by law,"
ante, at 24. The
exemplified injuries are widely shared, to be sure, but each
individual suffers a particularized and differentiated harm. One
tort victim suffers a burnt leg, another a burnt arm-or even if
both suffer burnt arms they are
different arms. One voter
suffers the deprivation of
his franchise, another the
deprivation of
hers. With the generalized grievance, on the
other hand, the injury or deprivation is not only widely shared but
it is
undifferentiated. The harm caused to Mr. Richardson by
the alleged disregard of the Statement-of-Accounts Clause was
precisely the same as the harm caused to everyone else:
unavailability of a de-
36
scription of CIA expenditures. Just as the (more indirect) harm
caused to Mr. Akins by the allegedly unlawful failure to enforce
FECA is precisely the same as the harm caused to everyone else:
unavailability of a description of AIPAC's activities.
The Constitution's line of demarcation between the Executive
power and the judicial power presupposes a common understanding of
the type of interest needed to sustain a "case or controversy"
against the Executive in the courts. A system in which the
citizenry at large could sue to compel Executive compliance with
the law would be a system in which the courts, rather than the
President, are given the primary responsibility to "take Care that
the Laws be faithfully executed," Art. II, § 3. We do not have such
a system because the common understanding of the interest necessary
to sustain suit has included the requirement, affirmed in
Richardson, that the complained-of injury be particularized
and differentiated, rather than common to all the electorate. When
the Executive can be directed by the courts, at the instance of any
voter, to remedy a deprivation that affects the entire electorate
in precisely the same way-and particularly when that deprivation
(here, the unavailability of information) is one inseverable part
of a larger enforcement scheme-there has occurred a shift of
political responsibility to a branch designed not to protect the
public at large but to protect individual rights. "To permit
Congress to convert the undifferentiated public interest in
executive officers' compliance with the law into an 'individual
right' vindicable in the courts is to permit Congress to transfer
from the President to the courts the Chief Executive's most
important constitutional duty .... "
Lujan, supra, at 577.
If to day's decision is correct, it is within the power of Congress
to authorize any interested person to manage (through the courts)
the Executive's enforcement of any law that includes a requirement
for the filing and public availability of a piece of paper.
37
This is not the system we have had, and is not the system we
should desire.
***
Because this statute should not be interpreted to confer upon
the entire electorate the power to invoke judicial direction of
prosecutions, and because if it is so interpreted the statute
unconstitutionally transfers from the Executive to the courts the
responsibility to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed,"
Art. II, § 3, I respectfully dissent.
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