As а condition of obtaining access to classified information, employees in the Executive Branch are required to sign “nondisclosure agreements” that detail the employees’ obligation of confidentiality and provide for penalties in the event of unauthorizеd disclosure. Two such nondisclosure forms are at issue in this case. One, Standard Form 189, was devised by the Director of the Information Security Oversight Office (DISOO) (now appellee Garfinkel); the other, Form 4193, was created by the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) (now appellee Webster). Both of these forms forbade employees to reveal classified or “classifiable” information to persons not authorized to receive such information, App. 15, 19, and made clear that employees who disclosed information in violation of these аgreements could lose their security clearances, their jobs, or both. Id., at 16, 21. Neither form defined the term “classifiable.” The DISOO eventually promulgated a regulation that defined the term “classifiable” in Form 189 to include only unmarked classified information or unclassified information thаt was “in the process of a classification determination.” Under this regulation, moreover, an employee would violate the nondisclosure agreement by disclosing unclassified information only if that employee “knows, or reasonably should know, that such information is in the process of a classification determination and requires interim protection.” 52 Fed. Reg. 48367 (1987). For those employees who signed Form 4193, however, the DCI did not attempt to define “classifiable.” More than half of the Federal Gov *156 ernment’s civilian and military employees have signed either Form 189 or 4193. Brief for Appellants 5.
Section 630 of the Continuing Resolution for Fiscal Year 1988, Pub. L. 100-202, 101 Stat. 1329-432, enacted by Congress in 1987, prohibited the expenditure of funds in fiscal year 1988 for the implementation or enforcement of Form 189, Form 4193, or any other form that violated one of its fivе subsections.
*
In response to this statute, appellee Garfinkel ordered agencies to cease using Form 189, but several agencies nevertheless required approximately 43,000 employees to sign the form after § 630 was enacted. Brief for Appellants 10. The DCI, in contrast, continued to require employees to sign Form 4193, but attached a paragraph to the form stating that the nondisclosure agreement would
*157
“be implemented and enforced in a manner consistent with” the statute of which § 630 was a part. App. 26-27. Three months after § 630 becаme law, the DCI replaced Form 4193 with Form 4355, which eliminated the term “classifiable.”
National Federation of Federal Employees
v.
United States,
Appellant American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) and several Members of Congress brought the present lawsuit challenging appellees’ use of Forms 189 and 4193 on the ground that they violated §630. They sоught declaratory and injunctive relief that would (1) bar appellees from requiring employees to execute or sign Form 4193 during fiscal year 1988; (2) compel appellees to treat any Form 4193 agreement signed after December 22, 1987 (the effective date of § 630), as void; аnd (3) direct appellees to notify all employees who signed Form 189 or 4193 after December 22, 1987, that these agreements were void and that the terms of such forms signed before that date could not be enforced in fiscal year 1988. App. 10. This lawsuit was consolidated with two othеr cases, brought by the National Federation of Federal Employees and the American Federation of Government Employees, which sought to enjoin the use of Forms 189 and 4193 because, among other things, they violated § 630 and because the term “classifiable” was so vague and overbroad that it inhibited employees’ speech in violation of the First Amendment.
The District Court for the District of Columbia concluded that appellant AFSA had standing to challenge the nondisclosure forms on behalf of its members, but that the Members of Congress lacked standing to сhallenge the use of the forms.
Appellants took a direct appeal from the District Court’s judgment pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1252, and we notеd probable jurisdiction,
Events occurring since the District Court issued its ruling place this case in a light far different from the one in which that court considered it. Since issuing the decision that we now review, the District Court has ruled on the constitutional challenge presented by the cases with which the present one was consolidated, and has decided that the unadorned
*159
term “classifiable” used in Forms 189 and 4193 is unconstitutionally vague. See
National Federation of Federal Employees
v.
United States,
Indeed, appellees urge us to hold the case moot to the extent that it challenges the use of the term “classifiable” in Forms 189 and 4193. Brief for Appellees 31-32. As to current employees who have been notified that the term “classifiable” no longer controls their disclosure of information, the controversy is indeed moot. Appellants emphasize, however, that former employees have not been informed of the switch in terminology; as to them, the contrоversy whether they should have received notice of this change remains alive. Brief for Appellants 20. We decline to decide the merits of appellants’ request for individualized notice to these employees, however, because the questions whether individual nоtice is required by § 630 and whether appellants’ complaint can be read to request such notice for former employees, see *160 Brief for Appellees 32, n. 24 (arguing that it cannot be so read), are questions best addressed in the first instance by the District Court.
A second reason why we remand this case for further proceedings rather than ordering it dismissed is that appellants argue that the definition of “classified information” now supplied by the DISOO, 53 Fed. Reg. 38279 (1988) (to be codified in 32 CFR § 2003.20(h)(3)), does not comply with § 630. They contend that the DISOO’s definition prohibits disclosure of information that an employee reаsonably should have known was classified, whereas subsection (1) of § 630 refers only to information that is “known by the employee” to be classified or in the process of being classified. Brief for Appellants 19-20. In contrast, appellees and the Senate as amicus argue that there is no inconsistency between § 630(1) and this new definition. Brief for Appellees 39-41; Brief for United States Senate as Amicus Curiae 17-18. It appears that, in order to press this issue, appellants would be forced to amend their complaint in order to take into account the new definition of the term “classified.” Brief for Appellees 41. Because the decision whether to allow this amendment is one for the District Court, and because appellants’ argument raises a question of statutory interpretation not touched upon by the District Court, we leave these mаtters for that court to decide in the first instance.
In addition, there remains a question whether the forms comply with subsections (3), (4), and (5) of § 630, dealing with disclosure of classified information to Congress. Both appellants and appellees apparently agree that these subsеctions simply preserve pre-existing rights, rights guaranteed by other statutes and constitutional provisions. Brief for Appellants 38-40; Brief for Appellees 48. The only relief appellants request with respect to this portion of the case is notice to employees informing them that Forms 189 and 4193 did not alter those pre-existing rights. Brief for Appellants 38. No actual instance in which an employee sought *161 to disclose information to Congress, and was prohibited from doing so, has been brought to our attention. There thus exists a substantial possibility that this last portion of thе case is not ripe for decision, and this is exactly the argument pressed by several amici. Brief for American Civil Liberties Union as Amicus Curiae 28-48; Brief for Speaker and Leadership Group of House of Representatives as Amicus Curiae 12-16; Brief for United States Senate as Amicus Curiae 15-21. We are not, however, disposed to decide for ourselves whether this is so. Since the District Court аnalyzed the interaction between §630 and the Executive Branch’s nondisclosure policy only in abbreviated fashion, we do not have the benefit of a lower court’s interpretation of the statute and of Executive policy to help us decide whether the casе is ready for decision or, if it is, to guide our own resolution of the merits. Again, therefore, we return these questions to the District Court to allow it to sort them out in the first instance.
Because part of the controversy has become moot but other parts of it may retain vitality, we vacate the judgment below and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. See,
e. g., United States Dept. of Treasury
v.
Galioto,
The judgment of the District Court for the District of Columbia is vacated, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Notes
Seetion 630 provides:
“No funds appropriated in this or any othеr Act for fiscal year 1988 may be used to implement or enforce the agreements in Standard Forms 189 and 4193 of the Government or any other nondisclosure policy, form or agreement if such policy, form or agreement:
“(1) concerns information other than that specifically marked as classified; or, unmarked but known by the employee to be classified; or, unclassified but known by the employee to be in the process of a classification determination;
“(2) contains the term ‘classifiable’;
“(3) directly or indirectly obstructs, by requirement of prior written authorization, limitation of authоrized disclosure, or otherwise, the right of any individual to petition or communicate with Members of Congress in a secure manner as provided by the rules and procedures of the Congress;
“(4) interferes with the right of the Congress to obtain executive branch information in a secure mаnner as provided by the rules and procedures of the Congress;
“(5) imposes any obligations or invokes any remedies inconsistent with statutory law: Provided, That nothing in this section shall affect the enforcement of those aspects of such nondisclosure policy, form or agreemеnt that do not fall within subsections (1) — (5) of this section.”
Section 630 applied only to fiscal year 1988; however, § 619 of the Treasury, Postal Service and General Government Appropriations Act, 1989, Pub. L. 100-440, 102 Stat. 1756, includes restrictions on expenditures of funds during fiscal year 1989 that are identical to those contained in § 630.