Rigby v. Rasmussen

275 F.2d 861
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
DecidedFebruary 15, 1960
DocketNos. 6170, 6171
StatusPublished
Cited by22 cases

This text of 275 F.2d 861 (Rigby v. Rasmussen) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Rigby v. Rasmussen, 275 F.2d 861 (10th Cir. 1960).

Opinion

MURRAH, Chief Judge.

This is a consolidated appeal from determinations of appellant wheat farmers’ respective “base acreages” for the crop year 1958, as fixed by a local committee, and as reviewed and affirmed by both the local review committee and the trial court. See 7 U.S.C.A. §§ 1334(c), 1363, 1365-1367. In accordance with applicable regulation, 7 C.F.R. § 728.816, each appellant’s 1958 base acreage had been decreased because he had knowingly overplanted in the next prior wheat year. In the trial court and here on appeal, appellants assail the constitutionality and statutory validity of this regulation.

The challenged regulation was promulgated by the Secretary of Agriculture pursuant to 7 U.S.C.A. § 1375(b) to implement the Congressional scheme for national control of wheat production aimed at insuring wheat farmers a fair economic return for their industry. See 7 U.S.C.A. § 1331. Under this statutory scheme, which appellants have not challenged, the Secretary annually sets a national acreage allotment of wheat to be planted, see 7 U.S.C.A. § 1332, which is then apportioned among the states, counties and individual farms. See 7 U.S. C.A. § 1334. With certain adjustments here immaterial, allocations among the states and counties are based on “acreage seeded for the production of wheat” during the preceding ten years, “plus, in applicable years, the acreage diverted under previous agricultural adjustment and conservation programs.” 7 U.S.C.A. § 1334(a) and (b). Allocations among individual farms are made by local committees on the basis of five factors, towit, “past acreage of wheat, tillable acres, crop-rotation practices, type of soil, and topography.” 7 U.S.C.A. § 1334(c). The challenged regulation is the administrative formularization of these statutory factors, and is applied to compute “base acreage” for each farm. The county allotments are distributed among farms proportionately according to their respective base acreages, resulting in a certain planting or acreage allotment for each farm each year.

Congress has provided sanctions to encourage farmers not to overplant their allotments as thus determined. In years when production and market conditions indicate a certain level of oversupply, the Secretary, subject to the approval of affected farmers, places in effect “marketing quotas.” 7 U.S.C.A. §§ 1335, 1336. In such years, farmers who overplant their allotments must pay a cash penalty for wheat produced on the excessive acreage. 7 U.S.C.A. § 1340(2). However, this penalty may be avoided by properly storing the excess or delivering it to the Secretary. 7 U.S.C.A. § 1340(3). The act plainly contemplates that farmers may without penalty overplant, store the excess, and market it in subsequent years when they either underplant or [863]*863sustain a crop failure. 7 U.S.C.A. § 1340 (6). See also recent legislative comment in H.R. No. 1497, U.S.Code Congressional and Administrative News 1958, p. 2308.

The main thrust of appellants’ attack on the regulation is that it does not conform to this statutory scheme and is therefore unconstitutional and invalid. In making such appraisals of regulations it is well to note that the regulation will not be “ * * * annulled unless, in the judgment of the court, it is plainly and palpably inconsistent with law,” i. e., the parent statute. Boske v. Comingore, 177 U.S. 459, 470, 20 S.Ct. 701, 706, 44 L.Ed. 846. In this context, the Supreme Court’s comment on sugar legislation is cogent, though aimed at legislation rather than regulation: “Suffice it to say that since Congress fixed the quotas on a historical basis it is not for this Court to reweigh the relevant factors and, perchance, substitute its notion of expediency and fairness for that of Congress. This is so even though the quotas thus fixed may demonstrably be disadvantageous to certain areas or persons. This Court is not a tribunal for relief from crudities and inequities of complicated experimental economic legislation.” Secretary of Agriculture v. Central Roig Refining Co., 338 U.S. 604, 618, 70 S.Ct. 403, 410, 94 L.Ed. 381.

Specifically, appellants charge that the regulation incorporates extrastatutory matter in its formularization of base acreage. Under the regulation, two of the principal ingredients of base acreage are (1) the average of acres planted in certain prior years, and (2) acres diverted in applicable years if the farm’s allotment in those years was not knowingly exceeded. The amount of this credit for acreage diverted on a given farm is the difference between the allotment and the base. Thus, if a farmer knowingly overplants his allotment, as in each appellant’s case, his acreage history for that year will be decreased to the extent that he underplanted his base acreage. Appellants complain that consideration here of acreage diverted is improper since it is not among the five statutory factors for allocations among farms.

To begin with, we are faced with the certainty that Congress intended acreage previously planted to be one of the determinants of farm allotments.1 ****But obviously, if acreage planted was used with no adjustment for acreage diverted, those farmers who reduced their planting to comply with their allotments would be penalized by subsequent reductions in their allotments. Since allotments would be futile if compliance were thus discouraged, the Secretary was faced with the necessity of going outside the five statutory factors in order to establish a workable program, and this he did. Acreage diverted, the factor thus supplied, is as we have seen, one of the statutory factors in state and county allocations. So while the Secretary did go outside the five statutory factors, he remained within the immediate statutory framework.2 Certainly this much improvisation in order to properly implement Congressional policies is warranted.

This also answers appellants’ contention that the regulation invades the exclusive legislative prerogative to impose penalties. For while it is doubtless true that a regulation may not impose penalties in the absence of statutory authorization, it is also true that a regulation is valid, though it affects some persons adversely, if the adverse effect is necessary to properly implement expressed Congressional purposes. See L. P. Steuart & Bro. v. Bowles, 322 U.S. 398, 64 S.Ct. 1097, 88 L.Ed. 1350. The challenged regulation concededly has the ef[864]*864feet of penalization by reduction of allotment, which is not statutorily authorized. But as we have said, the regulation reflects the Secretary’s best efforts to honor the provisions of the statutes as then written, while achieving a result in accord with the statutory scheme, and that is enough.

But appellants would have us believe that penalization of overplanting is contrary to the true purpose of the statutory scheme, which they say is aimed solely at the control of marketing and not at planting, relying on Rigby v. Mitchell, D.C., 152 F.Supp. 492. We cannot agree with such a characterization of the law. The loss of price support hinges on plant-ting rather than marketing, 7 U.S.C.A. §§ 1441, 1428(b), and even the “marketing penalty” is geared to acreage overplanted. 7 U.S.C.A. § 1340.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Olsen & Co. v. Securities & Exchange Commission
546 F. Supp. 272 (D. Utah, 1982)
Topaz Beryllium Co. v. United States
479 F. Supp. 309 (D. Utah, 1979)
Stuyvesant Ins. Co. v. Dist. Dir., INS, USD of Jus.
407 F. Supp. 1200 (N.D. Illinois, 1975)
Garvey v. Freeman
263 F. Supp. 579 (D. Colorado, 1967)
S. B. Allen v. W. Lewis David
334 F.2d 592 (Fifth Circuit, 1964)
Malone v. Graves
332 F.2d 100 (Tenth Circuit, 1964)
Jilka v. Saline County, Kansas
330 F.2d 73 (Tenth Circuit, 1964)
Jilka v. Saline County
330 F.2d 73 (Tenth Circuit, 1964)
Mervin Gajewski v. United States
327 F.2d 239 (Eighth Circuit, 1964)
Morrow v. Clayton
326 F.2d 36 (Tenth Circuit, 1963)
Paul v. United States
222 F. Supp. 102 (E.D. North Carolina, 1963)
James Weir v. United States
310 F.2d 149 (Eighth Circuit, 1962)
Albemarle Paper Mfg. Co. v. Renegotiation Board
35 T.C. 438 (U.S. Tax Court, 1960)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
275 F.2d 861, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rigby-v-rasmussen-ca10-1960.