dissenting:
This is a remarkable case that has at its genesis a jurisdictional dispute between the Federal Reserve Board and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). After several rounds of briefing in which we put various questions to the “government,” we have before us a range of possible judicial responses. The majority unfortunately has chosen the worst possible course of decision, an erroneous one that does considerable damage to fundamental principles of administrative law. The majority’s opinion — declaring unlawful the Board’s attempt to apply the Douglas Amendment to the Bank Holding Company Act, 12 U.S.C. § 1842(d), to SouthTrust Corporation’s “relocation” into Georgia — is reminiscent for Civil War buffs of Sherman’s march through Georgia. Principles of administrative law are brushed aside like Johnston and Hood’s army. Our precedents are overturned like Georgia plantations. And both petitioner Synovus Financial Corporation’s and the Board’s residual legal positions, not actually placed at issue and therefore properly viewed as noncombatants in this litigation, are treated like the civilians of Atlanta.
At the outset, I think it important to expand on the majority’s description of the background to this case. When South-Trust originally applied to the Comptroller seeking to relocate the main office of SouthTrust National Bank (STNB) from Phenix City, Alabama, to Columbus, Georgia, it proposed to retain STNB’s former main office and two existing branches in Russell County, Alabama, as branches of the relocated bank. The State of Georgia opposed SouthTrust’s OCC application in part on the ground that the proposed transaction would violate Georgia’s policy against interstate branching, see Ga.Code Ann. § 7-l-621(d)(l), and, hence, the McFadden Act, 12 U.S.C. § 36. Apparently in response to Georgia’s opposition, South-Trust amended its OCC application, saying that it would not keep its former main office as a branch and would “dispose” of the Alabama branches and that the assets of these entities would be transferred “to another entity in Alabama.” Georgia then withdrew its opposition to SouthTrust’s OCC application.
Two months later, SouthTrust also filed (under protest) an application with the *438Board to relocate STNB. That application indicated SouthTrust’s intention to “form a de novo bank to simultaneously purchase substantially all of the existing assets and all of the deposits of [STNB]” — a reference to the SouthTrust Bank of Russell County (Russell County Bank), an Alabama bank that SouthTrust proposed to organize. Alabama subsequently approved the new bank’s charter, and SouthTrust applied to the Board for approval of SouthTrust’s acquisition of it. After reviewing submissions from SouthTrust, the State of Georgia, and Synovus, and after the OCC approved the relocation of STNB, the Board approved both the relocation of STNB and SouthTrust’s acquisition of the Russell County Bank, referring to the latter as an “integral and necessary element” of the proposed relocation. SouthTrust Corp., 75 Fed.Res.Bull. 516, 518 (1986).
SouthTrust acknowledges in its brief that the Russell County Bank did not ultimately acquire substantially all of STNB’s assets, as SouthTrust had repeatedly represented to the Board that it would. South-Trust restructured the transaction, transferring the great majority of STNB’s banking assets to Columbus, Georgia (apparently in response to the Comptroller’s conditioning its approval of the relocation on substantial assets and liabilities remaining with STNB in Georgia after the relocation). When the smoke cleared, SouthTrust had managed to establish what looks to all the world like a full service banking operation in Georgia.
As the case was first presented to us by Synovus, the primary issue was whether the Board properly applied the Douglas Amendment in approving the relocation of STNB from Alabama to Georgia. The Douglas Amendment prohibits the Board from approving an application for an acquisition across state lines unless the acquisition is “specifically authorized by the statute laws of the State in which [the acquired] bank is located, by language to that effect and not merely by implication.” 12 U.S.C. § 1842(d) (emphasis added). Synovus argued with great force, supported rather confusingly by the State of Georgia, that Georgia law could not possibly be read as explicitly authorizing the transaction.1 SouthTrust intervened in the action. It supported the Board’s interpretation of Georgia law and its application of the Douglas Amendment but alternatively challenged the Board’s authority over the transaction on the ground that the move into Georgia was not an “acquisition” under the Bank Holding Company Act but rather only a relocation of SouthTrust’s main office.
In 1975 when SouthTrust originally acquired STNB (then the First Bank of Russell County, a state-chartered bank that SouthTrust converted into a national bank and renamed STNB in 1987), it is undisputed that the Board’s approval was required, and it was given. At that point SouthTrust apparently gave no indication of any subsequent plans to move its main office across the border into Georgia, and, therefore, that issue was not addressed in the Board’s order. In 1985, however, the OCC asserted general authority under the National Bank Act, see 12 U.S.C. § 30(b), to authorize national banks to move their main offices up to 30 miles — even across state lines. See Decision of the Comptroller of the Currency on the Application of Mark Twain Bank, Nat’l Ass’n, Independence, Missouri, to Relocate its Main Office to Overland Park, Kansas, reprinted in Fed. Banking L.Rep. [CCH] 1186,180 (1985). That is really the casus belli in this jurisdictional war between the Comptroller and the Board, of which SouthTrust’s effort to move into Georgia is only one battle. The Board, in response to the Comptroller, issued in the same year a regulation to the effect that its approvals of acquisitions of banks under the Bank Holding Company *439Act — including prior approvals — were subject to the continuing condition that the acquired bank not attempt to move to another state after the acquisition was completed. See 12 C.F.R. § 225.144. It was this regulation that the Board relied upon to insist that SouthTrust seek the Board’s approval before moving STNB’s main office, notwithstanding the Comptroller’s blessing.
SouthTrust’s alternative argument, as in-tervenor, challenged the Board’s regulation as exceeding the Board’s authority under the Bank Holding Company Act. South-Trust argues that whatever authority the Board may have had to condition South-Trust’s acquisition of STNB when it approved that acquisition in 1975, the Board did not have continuing authority to prevent the relocation of STNB’s main office more than a decade later. According to SouthTrust, the Comptroller enjoys authority under the National Bank Act to permit the relocation of a main office of a national bank within 30 miles, even across state lines, and the Board is powerless to object.
The Board (and Synovus) objected strenuously to SouthTrust’s alternative argument, claiming that SouthTrust, as the beneficiary of the Board’s order, was not aggrieved and therefore could not challenge the Board’s authority to issue its regulation. It was also argued that SouthTrust as an intervenor could not raise a new issue (that is, an issue not presented to this court by any other party) after the time to file a petition for review had passed.
The Board’s brief was filed by, among other persons, an Assistant Attorney General. At oral argument, however, it became apparent that the Justice Department had not taken a position as between the Board and the Comptroller, and, therefore, that the Comptroller’s position was not represented. We asked for the Comptroller’s views in a supplemental brief after oral argument.2 After several extensions of time, the Justice Department filed a supplemental brief in the name of the “United States,” stating that “[njeither the Board nor the Comptroller will submit a separate brief.”
The government contended that the Board, in its decision approving the relocation of STNB and the acquisition of Russell County Bank, incorrectly construed the Douglas Amendment to impose an implicit condition on Board approvals of acquisitions against the holding company subsequently moving the acquired bank across state lines, “such that violation of this condition would require a new application” (emphasis added). That is, according to the government, the Board erred in concluding that “the original approval granted by the Board to SouthTrust to acquire STNB” in 1975 was limited to SouthTrust’s owning and operating STNB in Alabama and that any subsequent relocation of STNB to another state would “require[] additional Board approval.” The government took pains to explain that a different question would be presented if the Board had asserted authority to impose “an explicit interstate condition” at the time of its original approval of SouthTrust’s acquisition of STNB. Nor did the government address the validity of section 225.144, saying that it would also be a different case “if the Board had chosen another means to enforce its asserted implicit condition ..., such as a cease and desist order, to prevent an evasion of the [Bank Holding Company] Act” (emphasis added). Section 225.144 rests in part on the Board’s statutory authority to prevent evasions of the Bank Holding Company Act, see 12 U.S.C. § 1844(b); 12 C.F.R. § 225.144(k), and, according to the government, a cease and desist order would afford procedural protections not available if the Board simply holds a prior approval invalid. In other words, the government did not directly contest the regulation establishing the Board’s authority under the Douglas Amendment over relocations of holding companies’ subsidiary banks. Rather, it limited its objection to the procedure the Board employed to enforce its interpretation of the Douglas Amendment in this case.
Accordingly, the government did not assert that the Douglas Amendment’s language dealing with “acquisitions” could not extend to a relocation, nor did the government argue that no implied conditions could attach to a Board approval of an acquisition under any circumstances. Indeed, the government pointed out in a footnote that the Solicitor General was simultaneously (that day) seeking certiorari in MCorp Financial, Inc. v. Board of Governors, 900 F.2d 852 (5th Cir.1990), rev’d in relevant part, — U.S. -, 112 S.Ct. 459, 116 L.Ed.2d 358 (1991), in which the Fifth Circuit disapproved the Board’s similar position that bank holding companies are sub*440ject to a condition implicit in all approvals of bank acquisitions requiring bank holding companies to serve as continuous “source[s] of strength” to their subsidiary banks, that is, that the Board can require holding companies to provide financial support to their subsidiaries. Id. at 860. In MCorp the Board had asserted its authority to enforce such an implied condition in part under 12 U.S.C. § 1844(b).3 Finally, the government emphasized that there was no need for us to reach all of the issues outlined in its brief. It particularly urged us not to attempt to resolve the regulatory “turf” dispute between the Board and the Comptroller (which was apparently moderating), pointing out that no one had appealed to us the Comptroller’s order permitting SouthTrust to move its headquarters.
Faced with this extraordinary brief from the United States, which was quite different in its position from anything we had seen previously from any party — and to which the Board had apparently agreed not to respond — we issued a show cause order asking why, if we found it necessary to reach the issue of the Board’s continuing authority over SouthTrust’s relocation of its main office, we should not remand the case to the Board. The United States responded that, in that event, we should indeed remand to the Board with directions to reconsider the issue of the Board’s authority. The government pointed out that the Board should be given an opportunity to consider the “ramifications” of the position set forth in the United States’ supplemental brief because the Board is the agency to which Congress delegated the implementation of the Bank Holding Company Act and to which, of course, we owe deference as to the interpretation of that Act. The government further observed that the Board might take other steps to carry out the policy of the Douglas Amendment, and, moreover, had available in this case an alternative theory of jurisdiction raised by Synovus in its reply brief but not yet considered by the Board: that the Board’s “undisputed jurisdiction over SouthTrust’s acquisition of the SouthTrust Bank of Russell County,” the Alabama bank established to assume STNB’s assets, might give the Board authority to apply the Douglas Amendment to the move into Georgia as part of an integrated transaction. The government gently suggested that it would be inappropriate for us to decide that issue as well because the Board had not addressed it.
At that point, we had before us numerous questions, but surely the most important was whether or not we should determine whether the Board had authority over this transaction. I think the answer, for a number of reasons, is clearly no: we should not decide this issue on this record at this time. I would remand the case to the Board without opinion.
II.
It seems common ground (in a case where there is precious little) that in order for us to reach the intervenor’s alternative authority argument, we must conclude that SouthTrust is “aggrieved” by the Board's order. Under 12 U.S.C. § 1848, “[a]ny party aggrieved by an order of the Board” under the Bank Holding Company Act may seek judicial review. Although intervenors need not always show aggrievement, see, e.g., International Union, UAW, Local 283 v. Scofield, 382 U.S. 205, 86 S.Ct. 373, 15 L.Ed.2d 272 (1965), when an intervénor seeks to raise an issue not raised by any other party in the case, it must demonstrate injury to itself, or the concrete adverseness necessary for Article III jurisdiction does not exist.
SouthTrust, however, is in high clover; it has successfully moved its main office across the border into Georgia, and, from what we can determine, is operating there. It is doing so with the Board’s blessing and approval. SouthTrust has not claimed that the Board did not give it everything it wished; how then, can it possibly be thought that SouthTrust is aggrieved by the Board’s order? As this court has recently reiterated, “[i]t is the general rule that a party may not appeal from a disposition in its favor.” Showtime Networks Inc. v. FCC, 932 F.2d 1, 4 (D.C.Cir.1991); see also United States Office of Personnel Management v. FLRA, 905 F.2d 430, 435 (D.C.Cir.1990) (Silberman, J., concurring) (parties successful before the agency did not become aggrieved until the agency *441changed its position after a second remand from the court).
We have explicitly held that an inter-venor who receives approval of a requested application from the Board is not a party aggrieved merely because it wishes also to challenge the Board’s authority over the transaction. See National Ass’n of Casualty & Sur. Agents v. Board of Governors, 856 F.2d 282, 284 n. 1 (D.C.Cir.1988), cert. denied, 490 U.S. 1090, 109 S.Ct. 2430, 104 L.Ed.2d 987 (1989) (NASCA). SouthTrust suggested that NASCA might be distinguishable because there we affirmed the Board’s rationale for approving the transaction, see id. at 286-91, whereas here, if we agreed with Synovus that the Board botched the application of the Douglas Amendment (because Georgia law was at best ambiguous), we should, as a matter of judicial economy, take up SouthTrust’s alternative authority argument. This is so because at that point — almost like a springing use — SouthTrust would be aggrieved by the Board’s order. This logic assumes, of course, that the Board would necessarily turn around and disapprove the relocation if we rejected the Board’s interpretation of Georgia law, and it is on the basis of this assumption that SouthTrust claims injury before us.
I doubt this kind of assumption is ever called for, since it requires us to anticipate agency action, which is quite inappropriate for a federal court to do. See SEC v. Chenery Corp., 318 U.S. 80, 87-88, 63 S.Ct. 454, 459, 87 L.Ed. 626 (1943). In this case, however, after the extraordinary post-argument briefing, which leaves us quite unsure whether and under what theory the Board would attempt on remand to assert authority over this transaction, such an assumption seems at least speculative and more likely far-fetched. Nevertheless, the majority’s assertion that “[i]f we were to agree that the Board’s view of Georgia law was wrong, we would needlessly prolong this extended controversy by sending the case back to the Board only to have it return to us on SouthTrust’s petition after the Board exercised its disputed authority to block the relocation,” Maj.Op. at 433-34, is based on this dubious assumption.
Remarkably, however, the majority does not proceed under SouthTrust’s own theory of aggrievement, because the majority does not decide the question whether the Board erred in construing Georgia law under the Douglas Amendment. SouthTrust’s theory is put to the side almost as an unwelcome distraction. The majority instead discovers a ground for SouthTrust’s aggrievement that apparently did not occur to South-Trust — an injury, in other words, that SouthTrust unknowingly suffered.
As the majority puts it, “[i]t now appears that SouthTrust’s victory before the Board was illusory ... [because t]he Board’s final order was expressly conditioned on South-Trust obtaining ‘necessary approvals from the Georgia Commissioner of Banking and Finance under the Georgia interstate banking statute regarding [STNB].’ ” Maj.Op. at 432 (quoting J.A. at 3). After examining Synovus’ reply brief (a most unusual document from which to glean SouthTrust’s standing), the majority concludes that if this court affirms the Board, it is likely that Georgia will require an application from SouthTrust and will deny it. See Maj.Op. at 432. Putting aside the extraordinary nature of a suggestion that a party is injured for a reason that is not apparent to the party, cf. FW/PBS, Inc. v. Dallas, 493 U.S. 215, 231, 110 S.Ct. 596, 608, 107 L.Ed.2d 603 (1990) (“[I]t is the burden of the ‘party who seeks the exercise of jurisdiction in his favor’ ... ‘clearly to allege facts demonstrating that he is a proper party to invoke judicial resolution of the dispute.’ ” (citations omitted)), the majority’s analysis seems quite muddled to me.
As an initial matter, I think the majority misstates Georgia’s position. For whatever reason (the record suggests conflicts between divisions of the Georgia government, a situation not unusual in these bank regulatory cases, see, e.g., NASCA, 856 F.2d at 290), Georgia was content to argue originally that the transaction was not specifically permitted by Georgia law so that the Board could not approve the transaction under the Douglas Amendment. Georgia has still not squarely stated whether it would necessarily invalidate this transaction. The Board’s position, of course, preserves various options for the State of Georgia. And we certainly cannot anticipate which option the State will pursue. Indeed, if Georgia wishes affirmatively to prevent SouthTrust’s entry under Georgia law, I cannot see why the Board’s approval of the transaction is of any significance at all. Whether or not the Board expressly conditioned its approval on SouthTrust also obtaining approval from the Georgia authorities, Georgia certainly retained its power to object to the transaction. See 12 U.S.C. § 1846 (“No provision of this Chap*442ter shall be construed as preventing any State from exercising such powers and jurisdiction which it now has or may hereafter have with respect to companies, banks, bank holding companies, and subsidiaries thereof.”); Lewis v. BT Invest. Managers, Inc., 447 U.S. 27, 49, 100 S.Ct. 2009, 2022, 64 L.Ed.2d 702 (1980) (stating that section 1846 “was intended to preserve existing state regulations of bank holding companies”). Since the Board conditioned its approval on Georgia’s authority to object, it appears that the Board’s order left Georgia as free to act — certainly vis-a-vis the Board — as if the Board had never exercised authority over the proposed transaction in the first place. Essentially, all the Board did was tell the world (and in particular the Comptroller) that it had authority over the transaction and then did not really exercise it (in the actual case, too cute by half). For that reason, presumably, the majority suggests that SouthTrust will be injured not by the Board’s order, but by an order of this court affirming the Board’s order. The statute, however, requires SouthTrust to be aggrieved by the Board’s order before it bestows jurisdiction on this court to hear SouthTrust’s claim. Under the majority’s theory, SouthTrust could just as well claim it is aggrieved under section 225.144 by my prospective dissent.
I freely admit, as should be apparent, that I do not understand the majority’s reasoning setting forth the nature of SouthTrust’s injury or aggrievement, but I am even more at a loss to comprehend the next few paragraphs of its opinion, see Maj.Op. at 432-34, which seem to set forth a new theory of federal appellate review of administrative agency decisions, a theory which equates such review with appeals from a district court and which, if followed, would mean the elimination of numerous administrative law and separation of powers doctrines. All of this is to no avail, it seems, because the principle that a successful party lacks standing to appeal applies to those who receive favorable district court judgments as well as to those who prevail before agencies. See Deposit Guaranty Nat’l Bank v. Roper, 445 U.S. 326, 333, 100 S.Ct. 1166, 1171, 63 L.Ed.2d 427 (1980) (“A party who receives all that he has sought [from the district court] generally is not aggrieved by the judgment affording the relief and cannot appeal from it.”).
The essence of the majority’s reason for reaching and deciding the question of the Board’s authority is its view that whether or not SouthTrust is “aggrieved” under the statute, it makes sense to permit South-Trust to raise the authority issue because SouthTrust is not an “intermeddler.” Maj. Op. at 433. Perhaps — but are we not bound by section 1848 and by the Constitution to determine first whether SouthTrust is aggrieved before listening to its claim? 4
III.
Wholly apart from the question whether SouthTrust is “aggrieved,” SouthTrust is indisputably an intervenor, and as an inter-venor, it is well-settled that SouthTrust may not raise an issue raised by no other party before this court. Every other circuit that has addressed the question has held that an intervenor cannot raise new issues in an administrative review proceeding without filing a separate petition for review. See United Gas Pipe Line Co. v. FERC, 824 F.2d 417, 435 (5th Cir.1987); Illinois Bell Tel. Co. v. FCC, 740 F.2d 465, 477 (7th Cir.1984); Bath Iron Works Corp. v. White, 584 F.2d 569, 573 n. 2 (1st Cir.1978).5 The majority, however, relies on *443California Public Broadcasting Forum v. FCC, 752 F.2d 670 (D.C.Cir.1985) (CPBF), where we (in language that was unnecessary to our disposition of the case because we struck the intervenor’s brief) rejected this view.6 See id. at 683 & n. 10. Subsequent to our decision in CPBF, however, in Illinois Bell Telephone Co. v. FCC, 911 F.2d 776 (D.C.Cir.1990), we held that “[a]n intervening party may join issue only on a matter that has been brought before the court by another party.” Id. at 786.
The majority would distinguish Illinois Bell primarily because here the issue the intervenor would raise “is ‘an essential’ predicate to the question whether the Board properly interpreted Georgia law.” Maj.Op. at 434 (quoting Vance v. Terrazas, 444 U.S. 252, 258 n. 5, 100 S.Ct. 540, 544 n. 5, 62 L.Ed.2d 461 (1980) (interpreting Supreme Court rules of practice)). I think that by “essential predicate” the majority means simply that if the Board’s authority over the transaction had been raised by a petitioner, we would logically have reached that issue first — but it was not. If the issue had not been raised at all, we surely would not consider it sua sponte; it does not bear on our jurisdiction.
The majority also asserts that our holding in Illinois Bell was prudential, not jurisdictional, and should not be applied categorically. See Maj.Op. at 434. That proposition is certainly not apparent from an examination of the Illinois Bell opinion. We explained, as the reason for the rule, that “[otherwise, the time limitations for filing a petition for review ... could easily be circumvented through the device of intervention.” Illinois Bell, 911 F.2d at 786. Time limitations on petitions for review are, of course, jurisdictional. See INS v. Pangilinan, 486 U.S. 875, 883-85, 108 S.Ct. 2210, 2215-16, 100 L.Ed.2d 882 (1988). Thus, in Simmons v. ICC, 716 F.2d 40 (D.C.Cir.1983), we dismissed for lack of jurisdiction an intervenor that was required to show an independent jurisdictional basis (in order to continue an appeal; the petitioner in that case had been dismissed on different jurisdictional grounds), since the inter-venor had failed to comply with the statutory deadline for filing petitions for review — a requirement that “ ‘is jurisdictional in nature, and may not be enlarged or altered by the courts.’ ” Id. at 46 (quoting Natural Resources Defense Council v. NRC, 666 F.2d 595, 602 (D.C.Cir.1981)); accord Process Gas Consumers Group v. FERC, 912 F.2d 511, 514-15 (D.C.Cir.1990) (per curiam); Alabama Power Co. v. ICC, 852 F.2d 1361, 1366-68 (D.C.Cir.1988). The rule applied in Illinois Bell is jurisdictional for the same reason. The majority in this case, as it does with respect to NASCA, therefore appears to me simply to run over our most direct precedent.
As a policy matter, the majority argues that a “categorical[ ]” application of the rule applied in all other circuits that have considered the issue, as well as by this court in Illinois Bell, “would lead to absurd results” because a prevailing party such as SouthTrust has no particular incentive to file a petition for review unless the losing party does. Maj.Op. at 434. Therefore, if we were to adhere to our Illinois Bell holding, our docket would be cluttered with “protective” petitions filed by parties like SouthTrust. Implicit in the majority’s reasoning, it should be noted, is its concession that SouthTrust was not actually aggrieved by the Board’s order. The problem the majority foresees, after all, is only relevant with respect to parties who have won before the agency but would like to raise an alternative winning argument before the court. Unlike an appeal from the district court (which the majority continually confuses with review of agency action), however, we cannot consider an argument not relied-on by the agency. See Chenery, 318 U.S. at 87-88, 63 S.Ct. at 459. And even in a case such as this, where the Board rejected SouthTrust’s authority argument, we cannot, as I have said above, anticipate the agency’s next step. To do so interferes with the agency’s primary deci-*444sionmaking authority and trenches on separation of powers.
I rather doubt that we have seen many “protective” petitions since our Illinois Bell decision or that the other circuits following the rule have either. And I cannot imagine why we should be concerned with a cluttered docket composed of petitions that were only filed for protective reasons and would be dropped if no other party petitioned for review. The majority’s “non-categorical” approach, by contrast, promises a good deal of confusion, because litigants will not know when an intervenor can succeed in bringing a new claim before the court. Under the majority’s rule, inter-venors planning both to support and to challenge agency decisions can conceal their intentions, thereby frustrating the agency’s efforts to mount a complete defense.
In any event, even if the majority is correct that under CPBF we have discretion to decide whether to entertain South-Trust’s authority argument, it is hard for me to imagine a case where prudence would point more strongly towards restraint.7 After all, the Board, as the government has pointed out, has not even responded to the government’s interpretation of the Douglas Amendment, and it remains unclear whether the Board, following a remand from this court, would reassert its authority over the relocation of STNB at all. Cf. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. v. Dole, 802 F.2d 474, 479 (D.C.Cir.1986) (under ripeness doctrine a court may “properly deem a matter unfit for resolution if ... ‘further administrative action is needed to clarify the agency’s position,’ ... or ... resolution of the dispute is likely to prove unnecessary.” (quoting Action Alliance of Senior Citizens v. Heckler, 789 F.2d 931, 940 (D.C.Cir.1986)) (other citations omitted)), cert. denied, 480 U.S. 951, 107 S.Ct. 1616, 94 L.Ed.2d 800 (1987). In the meantime, SouthTrust, who, as inter-venor, supported the Board’s order — and only alternatively challenged the Board’s authority — is operating in Georgia facing no immediate threat from the Board. Cf. id. at 479-80 (“[F]or an institutional interest in deferral to be outweighed, postponing review must impose a hardship on the complaining party that is immediate, direct, and significant.... ‘The mere potential for future injury,’ moreover, is not enough.” (quoting Alascam, Inc. v. FCC, 727 F.2d 1212, 1217 (D.C.Cir.1984)) (emphasis in original)).
IV.
Nevertheless, the majority, like a heat-seeking missile (which even Sherman did not have), has zoomed by and through all obstacles that I believe dictate restraint to decide whether the Board has authority over the transaction that resulted in South-Trust’s move of its main office across the Georgia line. I think this issue is difficult and that there is a good deal more to say about it than does the majority — as witness, the Supreme Court’s grant of certio-rari in MCorp. The United States, in its supplemental brief, is not entirely convincing in distinguishing from this case its support for the Board’s implied condition authority in MCorp, in which the Board asserted the authority to require bank holding companies to provide financial support to subsidiary banks under an implied condition on the Board’s acquisition approval. The implied condition against subsequent interstate relocations at issue here could be thought even easier to justify than the “source of strength” condition involved in MCorp. A continuing condition against re-locations is much less open-ended than a condition that allows the Board sometime in the future to require the holding company to provide the acquired subsidiary with some unspecified amount of capital. Still, as I have indicated, I do not think it appropriate to attempt to resolve the question.
Not only does the majority determine the issue, it explicitly relies on the Comptrol*445ler’s authority to approve the relocation of bank main offices under the National Bank Act, one of the many questions that the government asked us not to reach. To rub salt in Synovus’ wounds, the majority actually goes so far as to decide the question that Synovus raised — but the Board has never decided — that is, whether the Board has authority over the whole transaction, including the move of STNB into Georgia, because of its authority over the acquisition of the newly established Russell County Bank, which, it will be recalled, the Board described as “an integral and necessary element” of the relocation. The majority decides this issue, notwithstanding that the United States urged that we remand rather than reach the authority issue in part because this alternative ground for the Board’s authority might be available.
Finally, just so there cannot be a breath of life left to the Board’s (and Synovus’) position, the majority gratuitously holds that the Board cannot attempt to regulate this transaction as an evasion of the Douglas Amendment, which was one of the stab utory sources of authority upon which the Board rested its regulation. To be sure, the majority is correct that the Board found that SouthTrust did not intend to evade the Douglas Amendment, see Maj. Op. at 436-37, but that does not foreclose the Board from determining that reloca-tions for some period after approval of an acquisition are, by law, evasions of the Douglas Amendment regardless of subjective intent.
Accordingly, I would remand the case to the Board without opinion,8 and, therefore, respectfully dissent.
ORDER
March 27, 1992.
Before: MIKVA, Chief Judge, WALD, EDWARDS, RUTH B. GINSBURG, SILBERMAN, BUCKLEY, WILLIAMS, D.H. GINSBURG, SENTELLE, HENDERSON, and RANDOLPH, Circuit Judges.Petitioner’s Suggestion for Rehearing En Banc and the responses thereto have been circulated to the full Court. No member of the Court requested the taking of a vote thereon. Upon consideration of the foregoing, it is
ORDERED, by the Court en banc, that the suggestion is denied.
Separate statement filed by Circuit Judge SILBERMAN, with whom Circuit Judge WILLIAMS and Circuit Judge D.H. GINSBURG join, concurring in the denial of rehearing en banc.
SILBERMAN, Circuit Judge, with whom Circuit Judge WILLIAMS and Circuit Judge D.H. GINSBURG join, concurring in the denial of rehearing en banc:
Petitioner argues that the panel opinion is in conflict with our own cases on two issues of considerable importance. First, the panel permitted an intervenor to raise a claim — that the Federal Reserve Board lacked legal authority over the transaction — that was not otherwise put in issue and that was raised after the time for a petition for review had expired. That result would appear to conflict with this court’s recent opinion in Illinois Bell Telephone Co. v. FCC, 911 F.2d 776 (D.C.Cir.1990), which held that “[a]n intervening party may join issue only on a matter that has been brought before the court by another party,” id. at 786, as well as with the decision of every other circuit that has addressed this situation, see United Gas Pipe Line Co. v. FERC, 824 F.2d 417, 435 (5th Cir.1987); Illinois Bell Tel. Co. v. FCC, 740 F.2d 465, 477 (7th Cir.1984); Bath Iron Works Corp. v. White, 584 F.2d 569, 573 n. 2 (1st Cir.1978). Relying on arguably unnecessary language from an earlier case, California Public Broadcasting Forum v. FCC, 752 F.2d 670, 683 & n. 10 (D.C.Cir.1985), the panel modified the jurisdictional rule established by Illinois Bell and adopted a “flexible approach” that may well create uncertainty whenever an intervenor attempts to bring a new claim before the court. Cf. Lamprecht v. FCC, No. 88-1395, slip op. at 14, 1992 WL 27168 (D.C.Cir. Feb. 19, 1992) (reading Synovus to permit interveners to raise new issues only “in extraordinary cases”). Second, the panel’s determination that the inter-*446venor was aggrieved under the Bank Holding Company Act, 12 U.S.C. § 1848, notwithstanding its victory before the Board, appears in conflict with our holding in National Association of Casualty & Surety Agents v. Board of Governors, 856 F.2d 282, 284 n.l (D.C.Cir.1988) (intervenor whose application had been approved by the Board could not challenge the Board’s order because it was not aggrieved), cert. denied, 490 U.S. 1090, 109 S.Ct. 2430, 104 L.Ed.2d 987 (1989), and in tension with the well-settled rule that prevailing parties cannot appeal decisions in their favor. See, e.g., Showtime Networks Inc. v. FCC, 932 F.2d 1, 4 (D.C.Cir.1991).
The government, however, tells us that the Board, in an unrelated case, has reconsidered its authority over bank relocation transactions and has determined that, “except in the case of an evasion of the [Bank Holding Company] Act, the Board will no longer require an application under the Act by a bank holding company that plans to relocate a subsidiary bank across a state line.... The Board also decided to rescind its policy statement (12 C.F.R. § 225.144) that states an application is required in such circumstances.” There is not much substance left, then, to the dispute that gave rise to this controversy. Cf. Athridge v. Quigg, 852 F.2d 621, 623 n. 3 (D.C.Cir.1988) (per curiam) (challenge to soon-to-be-abolished regulation survives mootness inquiry while regulation remains in effect). Thus, despite the serious claims petitioner raises, the case is not en banc worthy. The government, which surely would be the party most interested in these issues generically, wishes to reserve its position on the questions presented in the rehearing petition for another case, and so should the court.
. It does not seem that the Georgia "Regional Interstate Banking” statute, Ga.Code Ann. § 7-1-620 to -626, specifically authorizes the STNB relocation. The statute allows a "Southern Region bank holding company" such as South-Trust to “acquire ... a Georgia bank” under certain specified conditions, id. § 7-l-621(a)(3), but "no ... Southern Region bank holding company may ... [d]irectly or indirectly acquire a Georgia bank unless such bank has been in existence and continuously operated as a bank for a period of five years or more prior to the date of application [for approval],” id. § 7-1-621(d)(2). Putting aside the question whether the term "acquire" can ever be construed to encompass relocations, the transaction at issue in this case certainly did not involve the acquisition of "a Georgia bank.” The statute defines "Georgia bank" as a bank "having banking offices located only in [Georgia],” id. § 7-1-620(7), and STNB was operating in Alabama, not Georgia, when SouthTrust sought approval for the transaction. Furthermore, section 7-1-621(d)(2) may be read to require the acquiree bank to have operated "as a bank" in Georgia for at least five years prior to the acquisition, a requirement STNB obviously did not fulfill. Whatever the intent of the Georgia legislature, the Douglas Amendment’s requirement of specific authorization does not appear to have been satisfied.
. In a separate statement I requested that the administration take the same position that it would take in the Supreme Court if the case were there.
. In MCorp, the Board also supported its "source of strength” regulation under the Financial Institutions Supervisory Act, see 12 U.S.C. § 1818(b), which authorizes the Board to begin cease and desist proceedings against a bank holding company that engages in “an unsafe or unsound practice." MCorp, 900 F.2d at 862-63. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the entire action, but, deciding that the district court lacked jurisdiction, did not reach the merits of MCorp’s challenge to the regulation. See Board of Governors v. MCorp Financial, Inc., — U.S. -, 112 S.Ct. 459, 116 L.Ed.2d 358 (1991).
. Even were the majority correct that the procedural rules governing intervention — Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 15(d) and D.C.Circuit Rule 11 — do not prohibit us from reaching SouthTrust’s claim, those rules obviously would not render Article III any less applicable. But our local rules do not encourage intervenors to raise claims such as SouthTrust's, as the majority implies. See Maj.Op. at 432-34. D.C.Circuit Rule 11 directs intervenors in their briefs to focus on points or arguments not made by the party the intervenor supports. See D.C.Cir.R. 11(e)(2). New arguments, which the rule encourages, are not the same as new issues, which the rule plainly forbids. See id. ("[The inter-venor’s brief] shall avoid repetition of facts or legal arguments made in the principal (appellant/petitioner or appellee/respondent) brief, and shall focus on points not made or adequately elaborated upon in the principal brief although relevant to the issues before this Court." (emphasis added)).
. The majority’s misplaced reliance on the principles governing review of district court judgments is unavailing here, for it is equally well-settled that, as a general rule, a party already before the court as an appellee cannot raise a new challenge to the judgment without filing a separate cross-appeal. See Morley Constr. Co. v. Maryland Casualty Co., 300 U.S. 185, 191, 57 S.Ct. 325, 328, 81 L.Ed. 593 (1937) ("Without a cross-appeal, an appellee may 'urge in support of a decree any matter appearing in the *443record’.... What he may not do in the absence of a cross-appeal is to attack the decree_” (quoting United. States v. American Ry. Express Co., 265 U.S. 425, 435, 44 S.Ct. 560, 564, 68 L.Ed. 1087 (1924))). But see Spann v. Colonial Village, Inc., 899 F.2d 24, 32-33 (D.C.Cir.) (finding the confusing procedural posture of a case to constitute "exceptional circumstances” excusing a party’s failure to file a cross-appeal), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 111 S.Ct. 509, 112 L.Ed.2d 521 (1990).
. The other cases on which the majority relies are inapposite. Spann recognized a limited exception for unusual procedural circumstances not present here, see Spann, 899 F.2d at 32-33, and, in any event, was not an agency review case. In New South Media Corp. v. FCC, 644 F.2d 37 (D.C.Cir.1981) (per curiam), it is not clear whether the intervenor, like SouthTrust, sought to raise issues different from those already before the court.
. Even under CPBF it seems inappropriate for us to address SouthTrust’s alternative claim. CPBF requires that for the reviewing court to reach a new issue presented by an intervenor after the deadline for filing a petition for review has passed, the other parties must have adequate notice of the intervenor’s intention to raise that issue, see CPBF, 752 F.2d at 683 — a requirement the majority ignores. Although it declined to define adequate notice, the CPBF court found the notice given in that case insufficient because the intervenor's notice of intervention did not clearly indicate that new issues would be raised. See id. To be sure, in our case the Board was ultimately permitted to file a reply brief in response to SouthTrust's authority arguments. But SouthTrust's notice of intervention, which simply stated that "the interests of SouthTrust and the Board are not coincident in all respects," provided at best only the vaguest hint that SouthTrust intended to challenge the Board's authority.
. I see no need to decide the issue originally raised by Synovus — whether the Board correctly interpreted Georgia law as specifically authorizing the proposed transaction — because it is unclear whether the Board on remand would seek to exercise jurisdiction over the transaction under any theory.