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2  CAMERON v. EMW WOMEN’S SURGICAL CENTER, P. S. C. 

Syllabus 

days later, the attorney general moved to withdraw as counsel for the 
secretary and to intervene as a party on the Commonwealth’s behalf.  
The secretary did not oppose that motion, but respondents did.  The 
attorney general also filed a petition for rehearing en banc within the 
14-day deadline for an existing party to seek rehearing.  The Sixth Cir-
cuit  denied  the  attorney  general’s  motion  to  intervene.    This  Court 
granted  certiorari  limited  to  the  question  whether  the  Sixth  Circuit 
should have permitted the attorney general to intervene. 

Held: The Court of Appeals erred in denying the attorney general’s mo-

tion to intervene.  Pp. 4–13. 

(a) This Court has jurisdiction to consider whether the attorney gen-
eral’s motion to intervene should have been granted notwithstanding 
respondents’  contention  that  the  motion  was  jurisdictionally  barred.  
See Arbaugh v. Y & H Corp., 546 U. S. 500, 506.   Respondents concede 
that  a  court  of  appeals  generally  has  jurisdiction  to  consider  a  non-
party’s motion to intervene in a pending appeal.  But respondents as-
sert that a narrow subset of non-parties—those bound by the district 
court judgment—must file a timely notice of appeal to obtain appellate 
review and may not circumvent applicable jurisdictional time limits by 
filing a motion to intervene after the deadline for filing a notice of ap-
peal has passed.  Applying this theory, respondents contend that be-
cause the attorney general could have filed a notice of appeal but failed 
to  do so  within  the  time allowed  by  law, his  motion  for intervention 
should  be  treated  like  an  untimely  notice  of  appeal  over  which  the 
Sixth Circuit lacked jurisdiction.  Pp. 4–7. 

(1)  No provision of law limits the jurisdiction of the courts of ap-
peals to entertain a motion for intervention filed by a non-party in this 
way, even assuming that party can be bound by the judgment that is 
appealed.  Unless clear from its language, a statute or rule does not 
impose a jurisdictional requirement.  Henderson v. Shinseki, 562 U. S. 
428, 439.  Here, respondents cite no provision that deprives a court of 
appeals of jurisdiction in the way they suggest, and no such supporting 
language can be found in 28 U. S. C. §2107, Federal Rules of Appellate 
Procedure 3 and 4, or any other provision of law.  Pp. 5–6. 

(2) This Court refuses to adopt what would essentially be a cate-
gorical  claims-processing  rule  barring  consideration  of  the  attorney 
general’s motion.  When a non-party enters into an agreement to be 
bound by a judgment in accordance with the agreement’s terms, it is 
hard to see why the non-party should be precluded from seeking inter-
vention on appeal if the agreement preserves that opportunity.  Here, 
the attorney general reserved “all rights, claims, and defenses . . . in 
any appeals arising out of this action.”  That easily covers the right to 
seek rehearing en banc and the right to file a petition for a writ of cer-
tiorari.  And that agreement makes clear that the judgment to which