Do affidavits from members of an environmental organization asserting recreational use of lands 'in the vicinity' of a challenged agency action, together with a challenge to the agency's entire 'land withdrawal review program,' establish standing to seek judicial review under Section 702 of the Administrative Procedure Act?

The National Wildlife Federation (respondent) sued the Department of the Interior, the Secretary of the Interior, and the Director of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in 1985, challenging the BLM's administration of what the complaint called its 'land withdrawal review program.' Under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (FLPMA), the BLM reviews public land withdrawals and classifications, revokes some withdrawals, and reclassifies lands, actions that can open land to mining. The Federation alleged violations of FLPMA, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), and the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), including failures to revise land use plans, submit recommendations on withdrawals, consider multiple uses, provide public notice, and prepare environmental impact statements. The complaint attached a schedule of specific land-status determinations listed in the Federal Register since 1981. To show injury, the Federation relied on affidavits from members Peggy Kay Peterson and Richard Erman, who claimed their recreational use and aesthetic enjoyment of federal lands 'in the vicinity of' South Pass-Green Mountain, Wyoming, and the Grand Canyon, Arizona Strip, and Kaibab National Forest area, respectively, were adversely affected. The BLM orders at issue opened roughly 4,500 acres in the Wyoming area, within a region of about two million acres, and affected the Arizona Strip, an area of about 5.5 million acres.

The Federation filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in 1985. In December 1985, the District Court granted a preliminary injunction barring the Government from altering any withdrawal, classification, or designation in effect on January 1, 1981, and denied the Government's Rule 12(b) motion to dismiss for lack of standing. The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit affirmed both orders, finding the Peterson and Erman affidavits sufficient to survive a motion to dismiss, and later denied rehearing. On remand, the Government moved for summary judgment under Rule 56, again contesting standing. The Federation submitted four additional member affidavits after the hearing, in response to the District Court's request for supplemental briefing on standing. The District Court rejected them as untimely, found the Peterson and Erman affidavits insufficient, vacated the injunction, and granted summary judgment for the Government. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding the original affidavits sufficient, the supplemental affidavits wrongly excluded, and that standing to challenge individual decisions conferred standing to challenge the entire program. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.

(Scalia, J.)

No. The Federation's affidavits did not establish its right to judicial review under Section 702 of the APA, and the Court of Appeals erred in holding otherwise.

Section 702 requires a plaintiff to identify an 'agency action' that affects him and to show he is 'adversely affected or aggrieved' within the meaning of a relevant statute, meaning his injury falls within the 'zone of interests' the statute protects. Clarke v. Securities Industry Assn., 479 U.S. 388 (1987). Recreational and aesthetic interests fall within the zone of interests of FLPMA and NEPA. The question is whether the affidavits showed those interests were actually affected.

At summary judgment, Rule 56(e) requires the nonmoving party to set forth specific facts showing a genuine issue for trial; general allegations suffice only at the pleading stage. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317 (1986). Averments that a member uses unspecified portions of an immense tract 'in the vicinity' of a challenged action, only part of which is affected by mining, do not meet that standard. A court may not 'presume' the missing facts, because that would convert Rule 56 into a circular exercise. United States v. SCRAP, 412 U.S. 669 (1973), involved a motion to dismiss on the pleadings and is inapposite.

The 'land withdrawal review program' is not an 'agency action,' much less a 'final agency action' under Section 704. It is a name for the continuing, constantly changing operations of the BLM, comprising roughly 1,250 individual classification terminations and withdrawal revocations. A plaintiff must challenge a particular agency action that harms him; wholesale programmatic improvement cannot be sought by court decree. The individual orders, which function as rules of general applicability, may not even be ripe for review until further agency action more immediately harms the plaintiff.

The District Court also did not abuse its discretion in rejecting the supplemental affidavits. They were untimely under Rules 56(c) and 6(d), and Rule 6(b) permits late filings only on motion and a showing of excusable neglect, which the Federation never made.

Finally, the Greenwalt affidavit, claiming impaired ability to inform the public, fails because it identifies no particular agency action as the source of injury.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed.

Dissent (Blackmun, J., joined by Brennan, J., Marshall, J., and Stevens, J.) The Peterson and Erman affidavits, read with the rest of the record, were sufficient to create a genuine issue of fact on the Federation's injury and to defeat summary judgment. The affidavits were precise enough for BLM officials to identify the specific termination orders at issue, and the agency itself described the opened region as the 'South Pass-Green Mountain area.' Peterson's claim of adverse effect is 'meaningless, or perjurious' unless it refers to lands affected by mining, and reading an affidavit as a whole differs from presuming unstated facts. The District Court also abused its discretion in refusing the supplemental affidavits. The Federation had been repeatedly assured by the District Court and Court of Appeals that its showing sufficed, the hearing notice gave no warning that standing was open to reconsideration, the affidavits were filed with court-requested supplemental briefing when the Government had ample time to respond, and the Government suffered no prejudice. Rule 6(b) confers discretion that should be exercised pragmatically, consistent with Rule 1's directive to secure the just determination of every action, and litigation of this magnitude should not be aborted on technical grounds. The dissent agrees in general outline with the majority's discussion of programmatic relief, but whether the BLM's actions constitute a challengeable policy goes to the scope of relief and should be addressed on remand. The majority responds that the Federation's request to supplement the record was not a proper Rule 6(b) motion, being buried in a footnote of a memorandum, and that the District Court was not compelled to treat it as one.