Mootness as a Limit on Mandamus Relief in Texas Administrative Contested Cases: Commentary on In re Carlson

I. Introduction

The Supreme Court of Texas’s decision in In re Carlson, No. 24‑0081 (Tex. Apr. 25, 2025), confronts a recurring problem in Texas administrative law: how and when an agency decision becomes “final” for purposes of judicial review, and what happens when inconsistent guidance from state actors leads litigants into procedural traps.

The case arises from Tom and Becky Carlson’s attempt to pursue a takings claim under the Private Real Property Rights Preservation Act (PRPRPA), Chapter 2007 of the Texas Government Code, against the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. The alleged “taking” stems from the Comptroller’s approval of a wind turbine project in Callahan County, which the Carlsons contend diminished the value and use of their property.

Their path to judicial review was derailed when:

The State Office of Administrative Hearings (SOAH) Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) dismissed their PRPRPA contested case as untimely, expressly characterizing the dismissal as a jurisdictional defect.
SOAH’s general counsel then told the Carlsons that the ALJ’s order was not a final decision and that the matter would return to the Comptroller for any “final order” or other post‑hearing steps.
The Comptroller later took the opposite position, insisting that the ALJ’s dismissal was the final, appealable decision and that the Carlsons had forfeited judicial review by not seeking rehearing or timely judicial review from that ALJ order.

Caught between contradictory state pronouncements, the Carlsons sought a writ of mandamus from the Supreme Court of Texas, asking only that the Court compel the Comptroller to issue a final order so they could pursue judicial review in district court under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), Chapter 2001 of the Government Code.

After full merits briefing and oral argument, the State suddenly reversed course. The Comptroller, having long insisted he lacked power to issue a final decision, issued precisely the “final decision” the Carlsons had sought for nearly twenty months. The State then argued that this belated action mooted the mandamus proceeding.

Chief Justice Blacklock, writing for a unanimous Court, agreed: because the Comptroller had now granted all the relief the Carlsons requested in their mandamus petition, no live controversy remained. The Court held it lacked jurisdiction to decide the underlying administrative‑law questions and dismissed the petition as moot, explicitly “without prejudice” to the Carlsons’ ability to seek further relief in the future if necessary.

This commentary explores how In re Carlson fits into Texas law on:

Mandamus jurisdiction over state executive officers.
The doctrine of mootness and the limits of the judicial power.
The interaction of PRPRPA, the APA, and SOAH’s procedural rules governing “contested cases” and finality.
The persistent risk that procedural complexities can deprive Texans of judicial review when they rely on official guidance that later proves inconsistent.

II. Summary of the Opinion

A. Procedural Posture

The Carlsons filed a PRPRPA contested case against the Comptroller at SOAH, alleging a regulatory taking based on approval of a wind project. The SOAH ALJ dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction as untimely under the PRPRPA. The key question—never decided on the merits by the Court—was whether that ALJ dismissal was the final agency decision for purposes of:

motions for rehearing under the APA, and
judicial review in district court under Government Code § 2001.171 and PRPRPA § 2007.025(b).

SOAH’s general counsel told the Carlsons that the ALJ order was not final, that SOAH “only has final decision authority for a very limited number of case types,” and that the matter would return to the Comptroller (the “referring agency”) for any final order. Relying on that direction, the Carlsons awaited the Comptroller’s decision.

The Comptroller, however, later insisted that:

The ALJ order was a “FINAL SOAH” order dismissing for lack of jurisdiction under 1 Tex. Admin. Code § 155.503(d)(1)(A).
Because neither SOAH nor the Comptroller had jurisdiction, the Comptroller could not issue a final decision.
The Carlsons’ only recourse had been to file a timely motion for rehearing directed at the ALJ order under SOAH Rule 155.509(b) and APA Subchapter F.

On that basis, the Comptroller asserted that the time for seeking judicial review had expired and that the Carlsons had forfeited their right to any court review.

The Carlsons then petitioned the Texas Supreme Court for mandamus relief, which, under In re Lester, lies exclusively in that Court when directed at the Comptroller as an “executive officer of the State.” They asked only that the Court compel the Comptroller to issue a final order so they could invoke their statutory right to judicial review.

Following briefing and oral argument, and after the Court had specifically queried the State about resolving the discrepancy between SOAH’s and the Comptroller’s positions, the State informed the Court that, on February 14, 2025, the Comptroller had issued the very “final decision” the Carlsons had sought. The State then asserted the case was moot. The Carlsons agreed that the Comptroller’s action had given them all the relief they sought.

B. Holding

The Court held that:

The Comptroller’s issuance of a final decision afforded the Carlsons all the mandamus relief they requested.
As a result, there was no longer a live justiciable controversy between the parties; their dispute over whether the Comptroller must issue a final order had been extinguished.
The mandamus petition was therefore moot, and the Court lacked jurisdiction to decide it.
The petition was dismissed as moot, “without prejudice to the Carlsons’ ability to again seek relief in this Court if necessary.”

C. Core Principle

The central reaffirmed principle is that the Texas Supreme Court’s judicial power is limited to resolving live controversies. It cannot render advisory opinions or “clarify” ambiguous law in the abstract, even when doing so would provide valuable guidance in a “minefield” of administrative procedure:

“Despite the regrettable lack of clarity in the law that remains in the wake of the government's shifting positions, a court's job is to resolve genuine disputes between parties about their legal rights, not to resolve abstract questions about legal rights when a genuine dispute no longer exists.”

And more explicitly:

“Our desire to resolve ambiguity in the law does not give us the power to do so. Only a genuine controversy between parties gives us that power, the judicial power, which is the power to resolve disputes.”

III. Detailed Analysis

1. Factual and Procedural Background

A. The PRPRPA Contested Case

The Private Real Property Rights Preservation Act (PRPRPA), codified in Chapter 2007 of the Government Code, authorizes property owners to file a “contested case” with a state agency to determine whether a governmental action results in a compensable taking:

“A private real property owner may file a contested case with a state agency to determine whether a governmental action of the state agency results in a taking under this chapter.”
– TEX. GOV’T CODE § 2007.022(a)

These contested cases are expressly made subject to the Texas Administrative Procedure Act (APA), “except to the extent of a conflict”:

“A contested case under this section is subject to Chapter 2001, except to the extent of a conflict with this chapter.”
– § 2007.022(c)

The APA, in turn, affords a right of judicial review of final agency orders in contested cases, generally via:

§ 2001.171 (right to judicial review of a final decision in a contested case), and
§ 2007.025(b) (providing a right of appeal in PRPRPA matters).

In 2022, invoking these provisions, the Carlsons filed a PRPRPA contested case against the Comptroller, contending that his approval of a wind turbine project substantially devalued and interfered with their use of their property.

B. SOAH’s Dismissal for Lack of Jurisdiction

The Comptroller referred the contested case to SOAH for hearing. There, the Comptroller moved to dismiss the case as untimely under the PRPRPA. The SOAH ALJ agreed and dismissed:

“The ALJ concludes Petitioners failed to timely file the contested case in accordance with the requirements of the Act. Therefore, for the reasons stated, the ALJ finds that the Comptroller and/or SOAH do not have jurisdiction … to conduct a contested case hearing in this matter under the provisions of the Act. It is therefore ORDERED that this case is DISMISSED for lack of jurisdiction under 1 Tex. Admin. Code § 155.503(d)(1)(A).”

Section 155.503(d)(1)(A) of the SOAH rules authorizes an ALJ to dismiss a case for lack of jurisdiction by the referring agency:

“The judge may issue an order dismissing a case … [if] the referring agency lacks jurisdiction over the matter.”
– 1 TEX. ADMIN. CODE § 155.503(d)(1)(A) (paraphrased)

The ALJ’s order thus did two things:

Found the contested case untimely under the PRPRPA’s requirements.
Dismissed the matter from SOAH’s docket for lack of jurisdiction by the Comptroller/SOAH.

The critical procedural uncertainty was whether this dismissal functioned:

as a proposal for decision to the Comptroller, to be followed by a formal final order from the agency; or
as SOAH’s own final decision in the disputed matter, triggering immediate APA timelines for motions for rehearing and judicial review.

C. Conflicting Guidance from SOAH and the Comptroller

Seeking clarity, the Carlsons wrote to SOAH, asking whether the ALJ’s order was final and whether any further agency action was anticipated:

“The language in the order appears to be a final decision; that is, there is no language indicating what ALJ Moore expects to subsequently happen in the case. To be clear, there is no language in the ALJ's order reflecting the need for the agency to issue a subsequent order from which the Petitioner might appeal under the APA.”

SOAH’s general counsel responded on June 8, 2023, and explicitly indicated:

The ALJ’s order was not the final decision.
Because the Comptroller’s referrals to SOAH are “PFD cases,” the matter would go back to the Comptroller for any final action.

The response stated:

“I think what you are asking is for guidance on where to go next if you want to continue the dispute. All cases referred by the Comptroller are PFD cases, so the case goes back to the CPA now for any further action, (final order, motion for rehearing, etc.) SOAH only has final decision authority for a very limited number of case types ….”

On that representation, the Carlsons reasonably expected the Comptroller to issue a final decision. When the Comptroller failed to act, they followed up on July 26, 2023, prompting an initial assurance that they would receive an order in “the next couple of days.” But the next day, the Comptroller reversed course:

“After further review and consideration of the assertions made in your July 26 email, we believe they are in error. The ALJ issued a FINAL SOAH ‘Order Granting Motion to Dismiss’ in the Carlson case … This provision authorizes the ALJ to dismiss a case from SOAH's docket because of the ‘lack of jurisdiction over the matter by the referring agency.’ Because our Agency lacks jurisdiction over the matter, there is no justification for issuing an Order or Comptroller decision relating to the Carlson case.”

The Comptroller further asserted:

“Given the unambiguous language set out in the ALJ's Order, we believe an appeal by the Petitioner's would fall under SOAH Rule 155.509(b). This Rule requires the Petitioner's to timely file a Motion for Rehearing of the ALJ's Order under Gov't Code Chapter 2001, Subchapter F.”

When told of SOAH’s contrary view that only the Comptroller could issue a final decision, the Comptroller doubled down: “We are going to stand upon the SOAH Order as issued.”

D. Mandamus in the Supreme Court of Texas

Faced with this dilemma, the Carlsons filed a petition for writ of mandamus directly in the Texas Supreme Court, seeking to compel the Comptroller to issue a final order. They did not ask the Court to decide the merits of their takings claim, only to enforce the statutory structure that, in their view, required the Comptroller to issue a final, reviewable decision.

Under In re Lester, the Supreme Court has exclusive original jurisdiction over mandamus against the Comptroller as an executive state officer. The State did not contest jurisdiction in that sense.

The Court called for full briefing and set the case for oral argument. At argument, the State maintained that:

The SOAH ALJ’s order was the final, appealable order.
The Comptroller could not issue a final decision because it lacked jurisdiction.
The Carlsons had missed the deadline to seek judicial review by relying on SOAH’s contrary guidance.

Because this position conflicted with the SOAH general counsel’s prior email, the Court asked the State to clarify whether SOAH’s and the Comptroller’s positions had been reconciled. The Court expected a letter addressing that question.

E. The Comptroller’s Late “Final Decision” and Mootness

Instead of providing a coordinated legal position, the State informed the Court that, on February 14, 2025—months after briefing and argument—the Comptroller had issued the long‑delayed final decision in the Carlsons’ contested case. The State argued this voluntary action rendered the mandamus petition moot, because the only relief the Carlsons sought had now been granted.

When the Court solicited the Carlsons’ view, they agreed that the Comptroller’s issuance of a final decision had given them all the mandamus relief they had requested. They did not seek to continue the mandamus case solely for the purpose of securing an abstract ruling on administrative finality.

On this record, the Court concluded that the petition was moot and must be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.

2. Statutory and Regulatory Framework

A. PRPRPA: Property Rights and Contested Cases

The PRPRPA aims to protect private property owners from uncompensated regulatory takings by state and local government. It provides a procedural mechanism—a “contested case”—for determining whether a governmental action results in a “taking” under the statute.

Key features relevant here:

§ 2007.022(a): Authorizes a property owner to file a contested case with a state agency to determine whether a governmental action is a taking.
§ 2007.022(c): Makes such contested cases subject to the APA (Chapter 2001) except where there is a conflict with Chapter 2007.
§ 2007.025(b): Provides for a right of appeal from the final determination in such a contested case.

The PRPRPA’s incorporation of the APA means that standard APA concepts—“contested case,” “final decision,” “motion for rehearing,” and “judicial review”—govern unless the PRPRPA expressly provides otherwise. That interlocking framework lies at the heart of the procedural confusion in Carlson.

B. The Texas Administrative Procedure Act (APA)

Chapter 2001 of the Government Code (the APA) establishes uniform procedures for agency adjudications and judicial review. Pertinent aspects include:

Contested Case: A proceeding in which legal rights, duties, or privileges are to be determined after an opportunity for adjudicative hearing.
Final Decision & Motion for Rehearing: For most agencies, a “final decision” is not final for judicial review purposes until:
- a motion for rehearing is filed and overruled (expressly or by operation of law), or
- the time for filing such a motion expires.
Judicial Review (§ 2001.171): A person who has exhausted administrative remedies and is aggrieved by a “final decision” in a contested case is entitled to judicial review.

The difficult question, which the Court did not reach, is how these APA concepts map onto SOAH‑conducted proceedings where:

The referring agency is not itself exercising final decision-making authority at SOAH (as with some agencies that delegate final decision power to SOAH).
The SOAH rules (here, § 155.503(d)(1)(A)) allow ALJs to dismiss cases for lack of jurisdiction.
The referring agency’s jurisdiction is disputed (and is itself the subject of the contested case).

C. SOAH Rules: Dismissal and Final Decision Authority

SOAH’s procedural rules, codified at 1 Tex. Admin. Code Part 7, govern hearings conducted by SOAH ALJs. Pertinent here:

§ 155.503(d)(1)(A): Permits the ALJ to dismiss a case from SOAH’s docket where the referring agency lacks jurisdiction over the matter.
§ 155.509(b): (Referenced by the Comptroller) Relates to motions for rehearing directed to certain ALJ orders under the APA’s judicial review framework.

SOAH’s general counsel told the Carlsons that:

All cases referred by the Comptroller are “PFD cases” (proposal-for-decision cases).
SOAH “only has final decision authority for a very limited number of case types.”
Therefore, the ALJ’s order functioned as a proposed decision, and the contested case would return to the Comptroller for “any further action (final order, motion for rehearing, etc.).”

The Comptroller, however, read SOAH Rule 155.503(d)(1)(A) to mean the ALJ’s dismissal was itself a final SOAH decision triggering the APA’s rehearing and judicial review deadlines—directly contrary to SOAH’s own institutional view.

This unresolved conflict is precisely the “regrettable lack of clarity in the law” the Court recognized but could not address once the case became moot.

3. Precedents Cited and Their Role

A. Mosley v. Texas Health & Human Services Commission, 593 S.W.3d 250 (Tex. 2019)

Chief Justice Blacklock opens the Carlson opinion by invoking his concurring opinion in Mosley, which described “the elaborate minefield of modern administrative procedure” and the difficulty—even for lawyers—of navigating finality and judicial review in agency practice.

In Mosley, a Medicaid recipient had followed the agency’s instructions on how to challenge an adverse decision, only to be told later she had failed to exhaust her administrative remedies and was barred from judicial review. The Court held that due process was violated by that procedural trap:

Mosley vindicated “the due-process claim of a woman who followed the government's instructions ‘only to be informed that in so doing she had failed to exhaust her administrative remedies and was not entitled to judicial review.’”

The parallels to Carlson are substantial:

Both involve individuals attempting to secure review of an adverse administrative decision.
Both involve reliance on official governmental guidance about the proper procedural route to take.
Both reveal how conflicting or misleading agency instructions can imperil the right to judicial review.

While Mosley directly addressed due process in the context of exhaustion of administrative remedies, Carlson never reaches the due‑process merits. Instead, the Court uses Mosley as a cautionary example: Texas administrative procedure remains fraught with procedural pitfalls, and government actors can—and do—issue inconsistent instructions that threaten litigants’ rights to review.

The opinion’s reliance on Mosley thus serves more as contextual framing than as doctrinal support. It underscores the seriousness of the procedural confusion but does not alter the outcome in Carlson, which turns strictly on mootness.

B. In re Lester, 602 S.W.3d 469 (Tex. 2020)

In re Lester is cited in a footnote to confirm the Supreme Court’s exclusive jurisdiction over mandamus proceedings against the Comptroller as an executive officer:

“This Court has exclusive jurisdiction to mandamus the Comptroller, as an executive officer of the State, and thus [a] mandamus action must be filed as an original proceeding here.”
– In re Lester, 602 S.W.3d at 472 (citing TEX. GOV'T CODE § 22.002(c))

In Carlson, this point is undisputed: the Court accepts that if a live mandamus controversy existed, it would have jurisdiction to act. The relevance of Lester is jurisdictional in a structural sense: it confirms why the Carlsons properly came to the Supreme Court, rather than a district court of appeals, when seeking mandamus against the Comptroller.

However, that structural jurisdiction is subject to the separate, more fundamental requirement that a live case or controversy exist. It is this latter dimension of jurisdiction—justiciability—that controls the outcome in Carlson.

C. Texas Department of Family & Protective Services v. N.J., 644 S.W.3d 189 (Tex. 2022)

The Court quotes N.J. for the basic test of mootness in Texas:

“A case is moot when a justiciable controversy no longer exists between the parties or when the parties no longer have a legally cognizable interest in the outcome.”

This succinct formulation encapsulates Texas’s justiciability requirement: courts may adjudicate only live disputes where parties maintain a concrete, legally cognizable stake in the outcome. If intervening acts (such as an agency’s voluntary change in position or rendering of relief) eliminate that stake, the controversy is moot, and courts must dismiss.

In Carlson, once the Comptroller issued the belated final decision and both sides agreed that the issuance had given the Carlsons all the relief they had sought in mandamus, the Court concluded:

No live controversy remained over whether the Comptroller must issue a final order.
The parties no longer had a legally cognizable dispute on that point.
The Court therefore lacked jurisdiction, under N.J. and broader justiciability doctrine, to proceed.

N.J. thus supplies the formal doctrinal hook for the Court’s disposition.

D. Article IV, § 22 of the Texas Constitution (Attorney General Representation)

The opinion also cites Article IV, § 22 of the Texas Constitution, which provides that the Attorney General represents the State in all suits in the Supreme Court where the State is a party. The Court references this provision when noting that it asked the State (through the Attorney General) to reconcile the conflicting positions of SOAH and the Comptroller.

The citation underscores that, as a matter of constitutional structure, the Attorney General speaks for the State before the Supreme Court. When internal State entities (like SOAH and the Comptroller) offer conflicting interpretations of law, the Attorney General is expected to harmonize or choose among them and present a unified legal position.

In Carlson, instead of receiving such a harmonized position, the Court received notice that the Comptroller had mooted the dispute by changing course and issuing the final decision previously claimed to be impossible. This illustrates, indirectly, the Attorney General’s critical coordinating role in avoiding procedural chaos across state entities.

4. The Court’s Legal Reasoning

A. Justiciability and the Limit of Judicial Power

The heart of the Court’s reasoning is classical justiciability: Texas courts, including the Supreme Court, lack authority to:

Render advisory opinions.
Resolve abstract legal questions divorced from a concrete case.
Clarify ambiguous law when no live dispute exists between particular parties.

Chief Justice Blacklock writes:

“A court's job is to resolve genuine disputes between parties about their legal rights, not to resolve abstract questions about legal rights when a genuine dispute no longer exists.”

And again:

“Only a genuine controversy between parties gives us that power, the judicial power, which is the power to resolve disputes.”

This is both a constitutional and institutional point. The Court acknowledges that clarifying the law of administrative finality and PRPRPA/APA interaction would be highly desirable—but insists that courts can only reach such questions in the context of live disputes where their resolution is necessary to decide the case.

B. Application of Mootness Doctrine

The specific application in Carlson proceeds in straightforward steps:

Nature of Relief Sought: The Carlsons’ mandamus petition sought only to compel the Comptroller to issue a final order in their PRPRPA contested case.
Intervening Agency Action: After argument, the Comptroller indeed issued such a final decision.
Parties’ Positions: Both the State and the Carlsons informed the Court that this issuance had provided the full relief requested in mandamus.
No Residual Dispute: There was no remaining disagreement over whether the Comptroller was obliged to issue a final decision—the practical dispute that had prompted mandamus relief.
Mootness: Under N.J., the case was moot because “a justiciable controversy no longer exist[ed]” and the parties no longer had a “legally cognizable interest in the outcome” of the mandamus petition.
Jurisdictional Consequence: Because mootness is a justiciability defect, the Court lacked jurisdiction to proceed and was constitutionally obliged to dismiss the petition.

The Court expressly emphasizes this is a jurisdictional disposition: it is “for lack of jurisdiction,” not a ruling on the merits of the PRPRPA or APA issues.

C. No Advisory Opinion on Administrative Finality

Although the underlying legal question—who issues the final decision and when, in PRPRPA contested cases referred to SOAH—remains pressing, the Court insists its power does not extend to issuing an abstract ruling merely to clarify that ambiguity:

“Resolution of ambiguity in the law is often a welcome consequence, we hope, of our resolution of disputes between parties. But our desire to resolve ambiguity in the law does not give us the power to do so.”

This restraint is especially notable given the Court’s explicit recognition of “the regrettable lack of clarity in the law that remains in the wake of the government’s shifting positions.” The Court essentially tells the bar and the public:

Yes, the law here is unclear.
Yes, this lack of clarity is harmful and has caused real hardship.
But absent a live, uncompensated injury that requires resolution of the legal issue, we cannot speak definitively.

This is a firm reaffirmation of separation‑of‑powers limits: courts do not act as general law‑reform commissions; they resolve concrete disputes.

D. Dismissal Without Prejudice

The Court dismisses the petition “without prejudice to the Carlsons’ ability to again seek relief in this Court if necessary.” This is important:

It preserves the Carlsons’ ability to return on mandamus if the Comptroller’s final decision, or subsequent agency action, again deprives them of judicial review or otherwise violates a clear legal duty.
It also avoids any implication that the Court has decided the merits of the PRPRPA, APA, or due‑process questions—those remain open.

In practical terms, the dismissal without prejudice signals to both parties:

The Court remains available to enforce clear legal duties via mandamus if real controversies re‑emerge.
The present dismissal is purely about the absence of a current, live dispute, not any endorsement of the Comptroller’s past or present legal theories on finality.

5. Impact and Implications

A. Limits on Judicial Clarification of Administrative Law

Perhaps the most consequential aspect of Carlson is what it does not decide. The opinion leaves unresolved:

Whether a SOAH ALJ’s dismissal of a PRPRPA contested case for lack of jurisdiction is:
- a final, appealable SOAH decision, or
- a proposal for decision requiring a final order by the referring agency.
What deadlines apply for motions for rehearing and judicial review in such a scenario.
What due‑process consequences arise when litigants follow official procedural instructions that later prove wrong or inconsistent.

By emphasizing that it cannot resolve these “abstract” questions without a live dispute, the Court highlights a structural limitation: even when the law is dangerously unclear, clarification may have to await a case that is not rendered moot by belated agency action.

B. Incentives for Agency Conduct in Mandamus Cases

Carlson also has practical implications for agency behavior and litigation strategy. Agencies (or the Attorney General representing them) may infer:

That if they grant the specific relief requested in a mandamus petition (e.g., issuing an order, vacating a decision, granting a hearing), they can moot the case and avoid a precedential ruling on broader legal questions.
That issuing such relief late in the process—even after oral argument—is still effective in mooting the case.

This is not unique to Carlson; voluntary cessation mooting a case is common. But in the administrative context, it may:

Delay systemic clarification of procedural rules.
Encourage case‑by‑case, ad hoc resolutions instead of clear, uniform guidance.

On the other side, regulated parties and their counsel will:

Recognize that mandamus can still be an effective tool to force long‑delayed agency action.
But also understand that mandamus may not yield the hoped‑for clarifications if the agency moots the case by conceding at the last minute.

C. Continuing Risk of Procedural Traps

The opinion’s opening comparison to Mosley underscores that Texans remain vulnerable to procedural traps in administrative practice. Carlson shows:

Even well‑advised litigants, who proactively seek written guidance from agencies, can be misled.
Conflicting intra‑governmental views (here, SOAH vs. the Comptroller) can make it practically impossible to know which procedural path will preserve judicial review.
The law governing finality and judicial review in PRPRPA‑related contested cases remains unsettled.

While Mosley addressed such traps via a due‑process analysis, Carlson leaves that route unexplored—primarily because the case was cut off at the mandamus stage. The due‑process implications of agency misdirection in PRPRPA/APA proceedings remain open for future litigation.

D. Signals to the Legislature and Agencies

Although the Court avoids policy‑making, its frank description of “the elaborate minefield of modern administrative procedure” and the “regrettable lack of clarity in the law” may:

Encourage the Legislature to clarify:
- whether, and when, SOAH ALJs’ jurisdictional dismissals are final decisions,
- how PRPRPA and APA timelines interact, and
- what minimum notice or guidance agencies must give litigants regarding finality and appeal rights.
Prompt agencies and SOAH to:
- align and formalize their internal views on final decision authority,
- amend rules or guidance to avoid contradictory instructions, and
- ensure that dismissal orders clearly state whether they are final and what appellate paths and deadlines apply.

Even without a binding holding on these points, the opinion implicitly urges better coordination and clearer rule‑making.

E. Procedural Caution for Practitioners

Although this commentary cannot provide legal advice, Carlson highlights practical dangers for lawyers litigating before Texas agencies:

Do not assume that informal agency communications (e.g., emails from counsel) will be treated as authoritative for finality or exhaustion purposes in later litigation.
When in doubt, consider protective steps:
- filing motions for rehearing directed at any seemingly dispositive ALJ order, and
- preserving multiple potential avenues to judicial review, when legally permissible.
Document all guidance received from agencies, as it may form the factual basis for future due‑process arguments, even if existing precedent does not yet clearly resolve the issue.

The facts in Carlson—an agency first saying an ALJ order is not final, then another arm of the government saying it is final—may recur until the law is expressly clarified by legislation, rule, or a future opinion not mooted by last‑minute agency action.

IV. Complex Concepts Simplified

Several legal terms and doctrines in Carlson can be especially opaque to non‑specialists. This section offers brief, plain‑language explanations.

1. Writ of Mandamus

A writ of mandamus is an extraordinary court order directing a government official (or lower court) to perform a specific legal duty they are required to perform by law. It is not used for ordinary error correction, but when:

a public officer has a clear, ministerial duty (not a discretionary choice), and
no other adequate legal remedy (like a regular appeal) is available.

In Carlson, the Carlsons argued that the Comptroller had a legal duty to issue a final order in their PRPRPA contested case. They sought mandamus to compel that action, not to decide whether a taking had occurred.

2. Mootness

A case is “moot” when there is no longer a meaningful dispute for the court to resolve. Courts decide actual controversies; they do not issue rulings on hypothetical questions or past wrongs that can no longer be remedied.

A case can become moot when:

the parties settle,
a challenged law is repealed, or
the defendant voluntarily provides all the relief the plaintiff sought (as happened in Carlson when the Comptroller finally issued the requested final decision).

In such situations, the court typically must dismiss the case because it no longer has jurisdiction to do anything meaningful.

3. Justiciable Controversy

A “justiciable controversy” is a real, concrete dispute between parties about their legal rights and obligations. To be justiciable:

the dispute must not be hypothetical or speculative,
the parties must be genuinely adverse, and
the court must be able to provide some effective relief.

Without a justiciable controversy, courts in Texas have no authority to act. This is why mootness (the disappearance of a justiciable controversy) is described as a jurisdictional problem.

4. Contested Case

Under the APA, a “contested case” is essentially an administrative trial: a proceeding in which an agency decides the legal rights of specific parties after a hearing. Examples include:

professional license revocations,
utility rate disputes, or
here, a PRPRPA claim about whether agency action has effected a “taking.”

Contested cases usually involve:

notice of the claims,
an opportunity to present evidence and argument, and
a decision based on a record produced at the hearing.

5. Final Order / Final Decision

A “final order” (or “final decision”) in an administrative contested case is the agency’s official, conclusive determination of the dispute. It generally:

resolves all issues before the agency, and
triggers deadlines for filing motions for rehearing and seeking judicial review in court.

Uncertainty about whether an ALJ’s order is final, or whether a separate agency head must issue a final order, can be fatal to judicial review if litigants guess wrong about deadlines. That uncertainty is at the core of Carlson.

6. Proposal for Decision (PFD)

In many agencies, SOAH does not issue the final decision itself. Instead, the ALJ prepares a “proposal for decision” (PFD) that includes findings of fact and conclusions of law and sends it to the referring agency. The agency then:

accepts, rejects, or modifies the PFD, and
issues its own final order, which is the decision subject to judicial review.

SOAH’s general counsel in Carlson indicated that all Comptroller cases are treated as PFD cases, implying that the ALJ’s dismissal should be viewed as a PFD and that the Comptroller must issue the final order. The Comptroller initially disagreed, viewing the ALJ’s order as final in itself.

7. Jurisdiction

“Jurisdiction” is the legal authority to hear and decide a case. In administrative law, jurisdiction questions typically involve:

whether the agency has authority under its statute to consider the subject matter,
whether prerequisites to filing (e.g., deadlines) have been satisfied, and
which body (SOAH vs. the referring agency) has authority to issue a final decision.

In Carlson, the ALJ concluded that the PRPRPA claim was untimely and thus that the Comptroller/SOAH lacked jurisdiction to conduct the contested case. That conclusion itself became the center of the finality dispute—who, if anyone, issues the final decision in a case that allegedly lacks jurisdiction?

V. Conclusion

In re Carlson presents a textbook illustration of the tension between:

the need for clear, reliable rules governing access to judicial review in the “minefield” of modern administrative procedure, and
the constitutional limits on judicial power imposed by justiciability doctrines like mootness.

The Court acknowledges that the law surrounding PRPRPA contested cases, APA finality, and SOAH/agency division of authority is confusing and that this confusion has real consequences for Texans who rely on government guidance about appeals. The comparison to Mosley highlights the potential due‑process stakes when citizens are told to follow one path only to be punished later for not taking another.

Yet the Court adheres strictly to the requirement of a live, justiciable controversy. Once the Comptroller issued the final decision the Carlsons had sought, the dispute over whether mandamus should compel that issuance evaporated. Under Texas Department of Family & Protective Services v. N.J., the case was moot, and the Court’s jurisdiction ended.

In practical terms, Carlson:

Confirms that mandamus can pressure agencies to act, but also that agencies can often moot mandamus cases by voluntarily granting the requested relief, even late in the day.
Leaves unresolved the crucial questions of who issues final decisions in PRPRPA contested cases and when judicial review timelines begin.
Signals a continuing need—for the Legislature, for agencies and SOAH, and for the Attorney General—to clarify and harmonize procedural rules so that Texans can navigate administrative appeals without falling into procedural traps.

The opinion thus stands as both a reaffirmation of constitutional limits on judicial power and a sober reminder that those limits can delay or prevent authoritative clarification of complex areas of administrative law. Until a future case squarely presents the unresolved issues without being mooted by agency action, the “elaborate minefield” of administrative finality in PRPRPA cases remains largely uncharted by binding precedent.