Sentencing guidelines abstention

• Author: Dawinder S. Sidhu
• Position: Supreme Court Fellow, U.S.
• Pages: 405-446

SENTENCING GUIDELINES ABSTENTION

Dawinder S. Sidhu*

ABSTRACT

The U.S. Sentencing Guidelines remain the starting point and anchor for every

sentence that federal judges impose on criminal defendants. As such, the

Guidelines are a critical component of the American criminal justice system. The

Supreme Court has categorically refused, however, to resolve circuit splits

involving the Guidelines, leaving a significant gap in the coherent and fair

administration of criminal justice. It has done so even while acknowledging the

existence of a clear split, conceding that denying certiorari will perpetuate dras-

tic sentencing disparities, and knowing that the U.S. Sentencing Commission, the

agency responsible for amending the Guidelines, lacked a quorum to address any

splits.

This Article highlights and critiques this practice, called sentencing guidelines

abstention. It provides an overview of federal sentencing, describes the purported

basis for the Court’s forbearance, and argues (1) that the Court’s precedent at

most supports abstention only when the Commission is the middle of amending

the guideline provision giving rise to the split and there is an alternative basis

for the decision, and (2) that any abstention is inconsistent with the Court’s role

and rules, congressional intent, administrative law principles, and the practical

realities of the Commission’s amendment process.

The overarching ambition of this Article is to ensure that the Court assumes its

role of resolving Guidelines splits, provides uniformity to the federal judiciary,

and contributes thereby to the development of a reasoned criminal justice system.

INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 406

I. A BRIEF HISTORY OF FEDERAL SENTENCING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 409

A. Pre-Guidelines Federal Sentencing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 410

B. Federal Sentencing from 1987 to the Present . . . . . . . . . . . . . 411

II. SENTENCING ABSTENTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413

A. The Origins of Sentencing Abstention: Braxton v. United States . . 414

* Supreme Court Fellow, U.S. Sentencing Commission (2013-14); Special Assistant to the Chair of the U.S.

Sentencing Commission (2016). This Article is written in my individual capacity and does not reflect the views

of the Commission. I thank Rachel Barkow, Doug Berman, Rusty Burress, Kathleen Grilli, Shon Hopwood,

Steve Leckar, Brent Newton, and Kyle Singhal, for helpful conversations, comments, and support; Kelsey

Robinson for excellent research assistance, particularly as to the Appendix; and the staff of the American

Criminal Law Review, particularly Tara Mahesh and Victoria Sheber, for working with me and improving the

quality and readability of this piece. I remain responsible for all errors. I dedicate this Article to Rusty Burress,

who passed away in 2022. Rusty was a long-standing member of the Commission’s professional staff and is the

kindest public servant I have ever met. © 2023, Dawinder S. Sidhu.

405

B. Braxton’s Progeny . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 417

III. THE CASE AGAINST SENTENCING GUIDELINES ABSTENTION . . . . . . . . . . 421

A. Sentencing Guidelines Abstention Stems from a Misreading of

Braxton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 421

1. Braxton Applies Only During the Pendency of the

Commission’s Amendment Process. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422

2. Braxton Applies Only When an Alternative Decisional

Basis Exists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422

3. Any Discussion of Sentencing Guidelines Abstention Is

Dicta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423

B. Sentencing Guidelines Abstention Is Inconsistent with the

Functions of the Supreme Court . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423

1. Sentencing Abstention Is Inconsistent with the Court’s

Rules and Its Role in the Federal Judiciary . . . . . . . . . . . 423

2. Sentencing Abstention Is Inconsistent with the Court’s Role

in Formulating Sound Criminal Justice Policy . . . . . . . . . 426

C. Sentencing Abstention Is Inconsistent with Congressional Intent

and with Administrative Law Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 428

1. Assuming that Congress Intended for the Commission to

Be an Extension of Congress, the Court Does Not Abstain

Vis-a

`-vis Congress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 429

2. Assuming the Commission Is Treated as an Administrative

Agency, the Court Does Not Abstain Vis-a

`-vis

Administrative Agencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431

3. Even Assuming that the Commission Is Unlike Congress or

an Administrative Agency, There Is No Basis for the Court

to Abstain Vis-a

`-vis the Commission. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432

D. The Sentencing Commission Is Incapable of Timely Resolving

Circuit Splits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 434

1. The Commission Often Lacks a Quorum Necessary to

Resolve Any Disputes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 434

2. Even with a Quorum, It Could Take the Commission Years to

Resolve a Split . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 435

CONCLUSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 438

APPENDIX: THE SOLICITOR GENERAL’S USE OF SENTENCING ABSTENTION IN

BRIEFS IN OPPOSITION TO BLOCK CERTIORARI GRANTS IN GUIDELINE SPLITS . . . 439

INTRODUCTION

“The most important thing we do . . . is not doing,” Justice Louis Brandeis once

said.

1

This principle of judicial forbearance is reflected in several foundational

1. Melvin I. Urofsky, The Brandeis-Frankfurter Conversations, 1985 SUP. CT. REV. 299, 313 (1985); ALEXANDER

M. BICKEL, THE LEAST DANGEROUS BRANCH: THE SUPREME COURT AT THE BAR OF POLITICS 71 (1962).

406 AMERICAN CRIMINAL LAW REVIEW [Vol. 60:405

legal doctrines, including standing,

2

exhaustion,

3

and estoppel.

4

Another, absten-

tion, generally occurs when a federal court forgoes consideration of a case over

which it possesses jurisdiction to avoid a clash with parallel state judicial or admin-

istrative proceedings.

5

This Article identifies and critiques the existence of the abstention doctrine in

the criminal justice context: the Supreme Court’s categorical refusal to resolve

conflicts among the federal circuit courts on the meaning of the U.S.

Sentencing Guidelines (the “Guidelines”). The U.S. Sentencing Commission

(the “Commission”) is the administrative agency responsible for promulgating

and amending the Guidelines.

6

The Court has declined review in Guidelines

cases on the theory that the Commission instead should resolve these splits.

7

This theory is wrong. At most, the Court’s precedent supports abstention only

when the Commission is the middle of amending the guideline provision giving

rise to the split and there is an alternative basis for the decision.

8

Abstention may

not be appropriate in any circumstance, as it is inconsistent with the Court’s role

and rules, congressional intent, administrative law principles, and the practical

realities of the Commission’s amendment process.

9

This issue matters. The Court has left a gaping hole in the exercise of its certio-

rari power—thereby denying the system the benefits of coherence and uniformity

—in a major area of law. The Guidelines remain the starting point and anchor for

every federal sentence that is imposed across the country.

10

Over 1.9 million

defendants have been sentenced under the Guidelines.

11

More than 3,300 appeals

involving the Guidelines are filed every year.

12

And yet these appeals are categori-

cally shut out from Supreme Court review regardless of merit. As the Solicitor

General recognized, it has become the Court’s “usual practice” to decline “review

of issues that the Commission may address.”

13

2. See Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560 (1992).

3. See Huffman v. Pursue, Ltd., 420 U.S. 592, 608–11 (1975).

4. See Allen v. McCurry, 449 U.S. 90, 94–96 (1980).

5. See Colo. River Water Conservation Dist. v. United States, 424 U.S. 800, 814–17 (1976) (discussing the

circumstances in which abstention is appropriate).

6. See infra Part I (surveying federal sentencing, covering both the era of uncoordinated sentencing that

existed prior to the creation of the Commission and the current period governed by the Guidelines).

7. See infra Part II (introducing the concept of sentencing guidelines abstention by demonstrating that the

Court has refused to address circuit splits involving the Guidelines).

8. See infra Part III.A.

9. See infra Part III.B–D.

10. See Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38, 49 (2007); Peugh v. United States, 569 U.S. 530, 541 (2013);

Molina-Martinez v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 1338, 1349 (2016).

11. See U.S. SENT’G COMM’N, FEDERAL SENTENCING: THE BASICS 7 (2020) [hereinafter FEDERAL

SENTENCING: THE BASICS].

12. See U.S. SENT’G COMM’N, 2019 ANNUAL REPORT AND SOURCEBOOK OF FEDERAL SENTENCING STATISTICS

180–82 tbl. A-2 (2019) [hereinafter 2019 ANNUAL REPORT OF FEDERAL SENTENCING STATISTICS] (reporting

3,347 federal appeals of the original sentence in Fiscal Year 2019).

13. Brief for the United States in Opposition at 20–21, Jarvis v. United States, 142 S. Ct. 760 (2022) (No. 21-

568) (Mem.) (first citing Bryant v. United States, 142 S. Ct. 583 (2021) (Mem.); then citing Wiggins v. United

2023] SENTENCING GUIDELINES ABSTENTION 407