Accardi Doctrine Definition: An agency must abide by its own regulations. Named after the Supreme Court decision from which the doctrine was developed, US ex rel Accardi. In Nader, Justice of the United States Court of Appeal, 4th District, wrote: "[T]he Accardi doctrine ... provides that when an agency fails to follow its own procedures or regulations, that agency's actions are generally invalid." In Richardson, Justice Smith wrote: "The Accardi doctrine stands for the unremarkable proposition that an agency must abide by its own regulations. Thus, an agency's failure to afford an individual procedural safeguards required under its own regulations may result in the invalidation of the ultimate administrative determination." REFERENCES: Duhaime, Lloyd, Duhaime's Legal Dictionary Duhaime, Lloyd, Duhaime's Legal Citations & Abbreviations Nader v. Blair, 549 F. 3d 953 (US Court of Appeals, 4th Circuit, 2008) Richardson v. Joslin, 501 F. 3d 415 (2007) Thomas v. District of Columbia Government, 580 F. Supp. 2d 142 (2008) United States ex rel. Accardi v. Shaughnessy, 347 U.S. 260 (1954) Categories & Topics: Company, Associations and Commercial Law Dictionary Find you are constantly looking up definitions? Try our search provider (works in most modern browsers) If you find an error or omission in Duhaime's Legal Dictionary, or if you have legal term suggestion, we'd love to hear from you!