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8 

WILKINS v. UNITED STATES 

Opinion of the Court 

95.  Accordingly,  even  if  “a  statute  of  limitations  [was]  a 
condition  on  the  waiver  of  sovereign  immunity  and  thus
must be strictly construed,” this still “d[id] not answer the 
question  whether  equitable  tolling  can  be  applied  to  this
statute of limitations.”  Bowen v. City of New York, 476 U. S. 
467,  479  (1986).    The  Court  instead  analyzed  the  specific 
statutory scheme at issue, with varying results.  Ibid. (cit-
ing Honda v. Clark, 386 U. S. 484 (1967)). 

Block itself reflected the ambivalent nature of time limits 
for  suits  against  the  Government.    Block  recognized  that
“we should not construe such a time-bar provision unduly 
restrictively,” 461 U. S., at 287, which the Court quoted just 
a  few  years  later  in  support  of  the  proposition  that  some
such  limits  are  subject  to  equitable  tolling,  Bowen,  476 
U. S.,  at  479;  see  also  Irwin,  498  U. S.,  at  94.    Similarly, 
while  Block  cautioned  that  exceptions  to  such  time  limits 
will not “be lightly implied,” it did not hold they were cate-
gorically precluded.  461 U. S., at 287.  Block thus acknowl-
edged nothing more than a general proposition, echoed by 
Irwin, that “a condition to the waiver of sovereign immunity 
. . . must be strictly construed.”  Irwin, 498 U. S., at 94.  In 
Irwin, as elsewhere, this did not mean that time limits ac-
companying such waivers are necessarily jurisdictional. 

Next, the Government offers United States v. Mottaz, 476 
U. S. 834 (1986).  Once again, the question presented was 
not  whether  the  Quiet  Title  Act’s  12-year  time  limit  was 
technically jurisdictional.  The Court instead had to decide 
which of two possible statutory time bars applied.  Id., at 
841.  This analysis proceeded in two steps.  First, the Court 
asked  which  of  several  federal  statutes—“the  Quiet  Title 
Act;  the  Allotment  Acts;  [or]  the  Tucker  Act”—was  the 
“source of . . . jurisdiction” based on the nature of the plain-
tiff ’s claim and the relief sought.  Ibid.  (citations omitted).
The  Court  explained  that  the  Quiet  Title  Act  applied  be-
cause it was “ ‘the exclusive means by which adverse claim-