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The Tucker Act gives the Court of Federal Claims power to decide certain claims against the federal government that would otherwise be barred by sovereign immunity. Such claims must be filed within six years after they accrue. The Court will decide if this limit is jurisdictional (meaning the court lacks the power to hear any claims filed after six years) or whether it is merely a claim-processing rule (meaning failure to file on time is simply an affirmative defense).
PREVIEW of United States Supreme Court Cases, pages 76-80. © 2007 American Bar Association.
Claim-processing rules tell a claimant how and when to file a claim. Jurisdiction-granting rules tell a court if it has authority-subject matter jurisdiction and personal jurisdiction-over a claim and the parties so it can render and enforce judgment. Some rules have characteristics of both claim-processing and jurisdiction-granting. Still others are easily mischaracterized and misapplied.
In a string of recent decisions, the Court recognized this confusion and misuse and suggested a need to demarcate these rules: "[c]larity would be facilitated if courts and litigants used the label 'jurisdictional' not for claim-processing rules, but only for prescriptions delineating the classes of cases (subject matter jurisdiction) and the persons (personal jurisdiction) falling within a court's adjudicatory authority." Kontrick v. Ryan, 540 U.S. 443, 456 (2004) (emphasis added). These cases hold that failure to follow a claim-processing rule merely provides a waivable defense to a claim. If a claim-processing rule is not met and neither party objects, there is no impact on the court's authority to hear the case. However, failure to follow a jurisdiction-granting rule is fatal to the court's authority to hear a claim-and the parties or the court (sua sponte on its own imitative) may raise a subject matter jurisdiction failure at any stage of litigation-including, for the first time, on appeal. Thus, how a particular rule is characterized can be deal-breaking.
The Tucker Act was passed in 1887. It was named after John Randolph Tucker of Virginia, who introduced it as an alternative to other measures the House Judiciary Committee considered for claims against the federal government. The act waives the federal government's sovereign immunity in cases involving contracts and certain constitutional claims, including unjust takings claims under the Fifth...