776
Breyer, J., dissenting
itself enforce such an order. See 46 U. S. C. App. § 1712(e). Rather, the Shipping Act says that, to obtain enforcement of an order providing for money damages, the private party beneficiary of the order must obtain a court order. § 1713(d). It adds that, to obtain enforcement of other commission orders, either the private party or the Attorney General must go to court. § 1713(c). It also permits the Commission to seek a court injunction prohibiting any person from violating the Shipping Act. § 1710(g) (1994 ed., Supp. V). And it authorizes the Commission to assess civil penalties (payable to the United States) against a person who fails to obey a Commission order; but to collect the penalties, the Commission, again, must go to court. §§ 1712(a), (c) (1994 ed. and Supp. V).
The upshot is that this case involves a typical Executive Branch agency exercising typical Executive Branch powers seeking to determine whether a particular person has violated federal law. Cf. 2 K. Davis & R. Pierce, Administrative Law Treatise 37-38 (1994) (describing typical agency characteristics); cf. also SEC v. Chenery Corp., 332 U. S. 194 (1947). The particular person in this instance is a state entity, the South Carolina State Ports Authority, and the agency is acting in response to the request of a private individual. But at first blush it is difficult to see why these special circumstances matter. After all, the Constitution created a Federal Government empowered to enact laws that would bind the States and it empowered that Federal Government to enforce those laws against the States. See Knickerbocker Ice Co. v. Stewart, 253 U. S. 149, 160 (1920). It also left private individuals perfectly free to complain to the Federal Government about unlawful state activity, and it left the Federal Government free to take subsequent legal action. Where then can the Court find its constitutional principle—the principle that the Constitution forbids an Executive Branch agency to determine through ordinary adjudicative processes whether such a private complaint is
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