Reno v. Catholic Social Services, Inc., 509 U.S. 43, 30 (1993)

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72

RENO v. CATHOLIC SOCIAL SERVICES, INC.

O'Connor, J., concurring in judgment

Doc. No. 1). That period expired on May 4, 1988, and the District Courts thereafter granted an extension. See App. to Pet. for Cert. 22a-28a, 50a-60a (orders dated June and August 1988). The only issue before us is whether these orders should have been entered. See ante, at 48-49, 52-53. Even if the Court is correct that a plaintiff cannot seek to invalidate an agency's benefit-conferring rule before applying to the agency for the benefit, it is a separate question whether the would-be beneficiary must make the wholly futile gesture of submitting an application when the application period has expired and he is seeking to extend it.

In the instant cases, I do not see why a class member who failed to apply to the INS within the 12-month period lacks a ripe claim to extend the application deadline, now that the period actually has expired. If Congress in the Reform Act had provided for an 18-month application period, and the INS had closed the application period after only 12 months, no one would argue that court orders extending the period for 6 more months should be vacated on ripeness grounds. The orders actually before us are not meaningfully distinguishable. Of course, respondents predicate their argument for extending the period on the invalidity of the INS regulations, see infra, at 75-77, not on a separate statutory provision governing the length of the period, but this difference does not change the ripeness calculus. The "basic rationale" behind our ripeness doctrine "is to prevent the courts, through premature adjudication, from entangling themselves in abstract disagreements," when those "disagreements" are premised on "contingent future events that may not occur as anticipated, or indeed may not occur at all." Union Car-bide, supra, at 580-581 (internal quotation marks omitted). There is no contingency to the closing of the 12-month application period. It is certain that an alien who now applies to the INS for legalization will be denied that benefit because the period has closed. Nor does prudence justify this Court in postponing an alien's claim to extend the period, since that

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