UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE v. TAX ANALYSTS

Legal Principle at Issue

Whether the Freedom of Information Act requires the Tax Division at the Department of Justice to disclose copies of federal district court decisions and final orders of litigating tax cases in its possession, even though those decisions originated in the judicial branch and are publicly available from the courts?

Action

Affirmed (includes modified). Petitioning party did not receive a favorable disposition.

Facts/Syllabus

The Tax Division of the Department of Justice represents the federal government in nearly all civil tax cases in the district courts, the courts of appeals, and the Claims Court, and receives copies of all opinions and orders issued by those courts in such cases. Respondent Tax Analysts publishes a weekly magazine, Tax Notes, which reports on legislative, judicial, and regulatory developments in the field of federal taxation to a readership largely composed of tax attorneys, accountants, and economists. As one of its regular features, Tax Notes provides summaries of recent federal court decisions on tax issues and, as a supplement to the magazine, the full texts of these decisions in microfiche form. 

After the DOJ denied its request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to make available all district court tax opinions and final orders received by the Tax Division in a certain period, Tax Analysts appealed administratively. While the appeal was pending, Tax Analysts agreed to withdraw its request in return for access to the DOJ's weekly log of federal court tax cases. Eventually, however, Tax Analysts became frustrated with the process of obtaining copies of decisions from district court clerks and initiated a series of new FOIA requests for copies of all district court opinions and final orders identified in the Tax Division's weekly logs. The DOJ denied these requests and, on administrative appeal, sustained the denial. 

Respondent Tax Analysts then filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, seeking to compel the DOJ to provide access to district court decisions received by the Tax Division. The district court granted the DOJ's motion to dismiss the complaint. The court reasoned that the decisions sought had not been "improperly withheld" because they were already available from their primary source, the district courts. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed, holding the decisions were "improperly withheld" and were "agency records" for purposes of the FOIA.