# Office of Personnel Management v. Richmond > Supreme Court of the United States · August 13, 1990 · 496 U.S. 414 URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9432060 ## Case - **Full name:** Office of Personnel Management v. Richmond - **Court:** Supreme Court of the United States - **Decided:** August 13, 1990 - **Citations:** 496 U.S. 414; 110 S. Ct. 2465; 110 L. Ed. 2d 387; 1990 U.S. LEXIS 3004 - **Precedential status:** Published - **Opinion:** Concurrence by White - **Judges:** Kennedy, Rehnquist, White, Blackmun, O'Connor, Scalia, Stevens, Marshall, Brennan - **Cited by:** 1,121 later opinions in the Frix Law Library ## Citator (automated) - No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases. - Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9432060 ## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction) - stating, that, 7 "[d]espite the clarity of these earlier decisions [finding no equitable estoppel against the Government], dicta in our more recent cases have suggested the possibility that there might be some situation in which estoppel against the Government could be appropr… - stating, that, “[d]e-spite the clarity of these earlier decisions [finding no equitable estoppel against the Government], dicta in our more recent cases have suggested the possibility that there might be some situation in which estoppel against the Government could be appropri… - recognizing that the Court’s position has historically been for equitable estoppel not to lie against the federal government as it lies against private litigants and while not closing the possibility of applying it against the government under certain circumstances, the Court … - holding that payments of money from the federal treasury are limited by the Appropriations Clause to those authorized by statute, and that erroneous advice given by a government employee to a claimant for benefits cannot estop the government from denying benefits not otherwise… - holding that erroneous advice given to a federal employee by OPM personnel did not create an estoppel when finding to the contrary would violate the principle "that payments of money from the Federal Treasury are limited to those authorized by statute." ## Opinion text Justice White, with whom Justice Blackmun joins, concurring. I agree that the Government may not be estopped in cases such as this one and therefore join the opinion and judgment of the Court. I write separately to note two limitations to the Court’s decision. First, the Court wisely does not decide that the Government may not be estopped under any circumstances. Ante, at 423. In my view, the case principally relied on by respondent, United States v. Pennsylvania Industrial Chemical Corp., 411 U. S. 655 (1973) (PICCO), may well have been decided on the basis of estoppel. But there is a world of difference between PICCO and this case: In PICCO, the courts were asked to prevent the Government from exercising its lawful discretionary authority in a particular case whereas here the courts have been asked to require the Executive Branch to violate a congressional stat *435 ute. The Executive Branch does not have the dispensing power on its own, see Kendall v. United States ex rel. Stokes, 12 Pet. 524, 613 (1838), and should not be granted such a power by judicial authorization. Second, although the Court states that “[a]ny exercise of a power granted by the Constitution to one of the other branches of Government is limited by a valid reservation of congressional control over funds in the Treasury,” ante, at 425, the Court does not state that statutory restrictions on appropriations may never fall even if they violate a command of the Constitution such as the Just Compensation Clause, cf. Jacobs v. United States, 290 U. S. 13 (1933), or if they encroach on the powers reserved to another branch of the Federal Government. Although Knote v. United States, 95 U. S. 149, 154 (1877), held that the President’s pardon power did not extend to the appropriation of moneys in the Treasury without authorization by law for the benefit of pardoned criminals, it did not hold that Congress could impair the President’s pardon power by denying him appropriations for pen and paper. --- Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9432060. Public record. Not legal advice.