Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 841.0

529US3

Unit: $U59

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766

VERMONT AGENCY OF NATURAL RESOURCES v.
UNITED STATES ex rel. STEVENS
Syllabus

ing a partial assignment of the Government’s damages claim, the United
States’ injury in fact sufﬁces to confer standing on Stevens. This con-
clusion is conﬁrmed by the long tradition of qui tam actions in England
and the American Colonies, which conclusively demonstrates that such
actions were “cases and controversies of the sort traditionally amena-
ble to, and resolved by, the judicial process.” Steel Co. v. Citizens for
Better Environment, 523 U. S. 83, 102. Pp. 771–778.

(b) The FCA does not subject a State (or state agency) to liability in
a federal-court suit by a private individual on behalf of the United
States. Such a State or agency is not a “person” subject to qui tam
liability under § 3729(a). The Court’s longstanding interpretive pre-
sumption that “person” does not include the sovereign applies to the
text of § 3729(a). Although not a hard and fast rule of exclusion, the
presumption may be disregarded only upon some afﬁrmative showing
of statutory intent to the contrary. As the historical context makes
clear, various features of the FCA, both as originally enacted and as
amended, far from providing the requisite afﬁrmative indications that
the term “person” included States for purposes of qui tam liability, in-
dicate quite the contrary. This conclusion is buttressed by the ordi-
nary rule of statutory construction that if Congress intends to alter
the usual constitutional balance between States and the Federal Gov-
ernment, it must make its intention to do so unmistakably clear in the
statute’s language, and by the doctrine that statutes should be con-
strued so as to avoid difﬁcult constitutional questions. The Court ex-
presses no view as to whether an action in federal court by a qui tam
relator against a State would run afoul of the Eleventh Amendment,
but notes that there is “a serious doubt” on that score. Ashwander v.
TVA, 297 U. S. 288, 348. Pp. 778–787.

162 F. 3d 195, reversed.

Scalia, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehnquist,
C. J., and O’Connor, Kennedy, Thomas, and Breyer, JJ.,
joined.
Breyer, J., ﬁled a concurring statement, post, p. 788. Ginsburg, J., ﬁled
an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which Breyer, J., joined, post,
p. 788. Stevens, J., ﬁled a dissenting opinion,
in which Souter, J.,
joined, post, p. 789.

J. Wallace Malley, Jr., Deputy Attorney General of Ver-
mont, argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the
briefs were William H. Sorrell, Attorney General, Bridget
C. Asay, Mark J. Di Stefano, and Wendy Morgan, Assistant