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Understanding Legal Claims Against the Federal Government: Causes and Consequences of Sovereign Immunity

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Understanding Legal Claims Against the Federal Government: Causes and Consequences of Sovereign Immunity Understanding Legal Claims Against the Federal Government: Causes and Consequences of Sovereign Immunity by Daniel Guenther 2013 Senior Thesis Department of Political Science Washington University in St. Louis Thesis Advisor: Dr. Randall Calvert Guenther i Understanding Legal Claims Against the Federal Government: Causes and Consequences of Sovereign Immunity Daniel Guenther Washington University in St. Louis Table of Contents Table of Contents ........................................................................................................................ i Preface ...................................................................................................................................... iv Introduction ................................................................................................................................1 Primer: Defining a tort in general ............................................................................................7 Primer: Defining Sovereign Immunity .....................................................................................7 Primer: What Sovereign Immunity is Not ................................................................................9 Mandamus ...........................................................................................................................9 Injunction ........................................................................................................................... 10 Habeas Corpus ................................................................................................................... 10 Quick Reference Timeline ..................................................................................................... 11 Chapter 1: Early Conceptions of Sovereign Immunity ............................................................... 12 1.1 English Conceptions of Sovereign Immunity ................................................................... 13 Hobbes’ Leviathan (1651) .................................................................................................. 13 Blackstone (1765) .............................................................................................................. 14 What Sovereign Immunity Actually Meant ........................................................................ 17 English Common Law in the Colonies ............................................................................... 18 1.2 American Interpretations of English Common Law ......................................................... 19 Alexander Hamilton, Federalist 81 (1788) .......................................................................... 19 Justice Joseph Story (1833) ................................................................................................ 20 Early Court Cases .............................................................................................................. 21 A Lone Dissenter: St. George Tucker (1803) ...................................................................... 22 1.3 Explaining Sovereign Immunity within the American Republic ....................................... 23 The Appropriations Clause Argument ................................................................................ 24 i Guenther ii The Fiscal Crisis Argument ................................................................................................ 25 Chapter 2: Private Bills ............................................................................................................. 27 2.1 Congressional Committees for Private Bills ..................................................................... 29 2.2 A Politicized Process ....................................................................................................... 30 2.3 Fraudulent Claims ........................................................................................................... 31 2.4 Time Consumption and Opportunity Cost ........................................................................ 31 2.5 Direct Costs ..................................................................................................................... 33 2.6 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 34 Chapter 3: Dealing with Private Bills through Bureaucracy ....................................................... 35 3.1 An Executive Branch Approach: The Invalid Pension Act (1792) .................................... 35 3.2 A Legislative Approach: Advisory Court of Claims (1855) .............................................. 38 3.3 The Independent Court of Claims (1863) ......................................................................... 44 3.4 Identity Crisis: A Century of Uncertainty......................................................................... 46 3.5 A Theory on the Source of the Court of Claims Conflict: Delegation Dilemmas .............. 52 The Congressional Dilemma .............................................................................................. 52 The Unknown Bounds of the Judicial Power ...................................................................... 55 Chapter 4: Developing the District Court Remedy for Torts ...................................................... 59 4.1 Legislative Context .......................................................................................................... 59 Increasing Court of Claims Jurisdiction .............................................................................. 59 Increasing District Court Jurisdiction ................................................................................. 60 Increased availability of settlements ................................................................................... 61 4.2 Towards a Federal Tort Claims Bill ................................................................................. 62 Early Attempts ................................................................................................................... 62 4.3 Final Passage: The 1946 Law .......................................................................................... 66 The Legislative Reorganization Act ................................................................................... 66 Chapter 5: Operation of the Federal Tort Claims Act ................................................................. 69 5.1 Procedure to Filing an FTCA Claim ................................................................................ 69 5.2 Commencement and Adjudication of a Suit ..................................................................... 69 5.3 Exceptions to the FTCA .................................................................................................. 70 Statutory Exceptions .......................................................................................................... 70 Discretionary Function Exception ...................................................................................... 71 ii Guenther iii Feres Doctrine .................................................................................................................... 74 5.4 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 75 Chapter 6: Reasons for Abandoning Sovereign Immunity ......................................................... 77 6.1 The Altruism Theory ....................................................................................................... 77 6.2 The Private Bill Relief Theory ......................................................................................... 79 6.3 The Changing Norms, or the “Liability Explosion” Thesis............................................... 80 6.4 The Credible Commitment Theory .................................................................................. 82 6.5 The Prevalence of Government Theory ............................................................................ 83 6.5 The Maturation of the Federal Judiciary Theory .............................................................. 84 Chapter 7: Democracy and the Political Economy of Sovereign Immunity ................................ 88 7.1 Flawed Defenses ............................................................................................................. 90 7.2 The Problem of Social Cost ............................................................................................. 91 7.3 Differentiating the Government from the Firm ................................................................. 92 7.4 Finding Sovereign Immunity’s Place in a Liberal Democracy .......................................... 93 Cases Cited ........................................................................................................................ 96 Works Cited ....................................................................................................................... 97 Appendix 1 ...................................................................................................................... 102 Appendix 2 Example from Coase’s “Social Cost” ............................................................ 103 iii Guenther iv Preface I would like to thank first and foremost my thesis advisor Dr. Randall Calvert. This thesis arose from conversations that began in March of 2011. Those conversations turned
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