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VERMONT AGENCY OF NATURAL RESOURCES v.
UNITED STATES ex rel. STEVENS
Opinion of the Court

and virtual coincidence of scope makes it possible, and indeed
appropriate, to decide the statutory issue ﬁrst. We there-
fore begin (and will end) with the statutory question.

The relevant provision of the FCA, 31 U. S. C. § 3729(a),
subjects to liability “[a]ny person” who, inter alia, “know-
ingly presents, or causes to be presented, to an ofﬁcer or
employee of the United States Government .
. a false
or fraudulent claim for payment or approval.” We must
apply to this text our longstanding interpretive presumption
that “person” does not include the sovereign. See United
States v. Cooper Corp., 312 U. S. 600, 604 (1941); United
States v. Mine Workers, 330 U. S. 258, 275 (1947).9 The

.

9 The dissent claims that, “[a]lthough general statutory references to
‘persons’ are not normally construed to apply to the enacting sover-
eign, when Congress uses that word in federal statutes enforceable by the
Federal Government or by a federal agency, it applies to States and state
agencies as well as to private individuals and corporations.” Post, at 790
(citation omitted). The dissent cites three cases in support of this asser-
tion. None of them, however, involved a statutory provision authorizing
private suit against a State. California v. United States, 320 U. S. 577
(1944), disregarded the presumption in a case brought against a State
by the Federal Government (and under a statutory provision authoriz-
ing suit only by the Federal Government). See id., at 585–586. United
States v. California, 297 U. S. 175 (1936), found the presumption over-
come in similar circumstances—and with regard to a statute that used not
the word “person,” but rather the phrase “common carrier.” See id., at
186–187. And Georgia v. Evans, 316 U. S. 159 (1942), held that the pre-
sumption was overcome when, if a State were not regarded as a “person”
for purposes of bringing an action under § 7 of the Sherman Act, it would
be left “without any redress for injuries resulting from practices outlawed
by that Act.”

Id., at 162.

The dissent contends that “[t]he reason for presuming that an enacting
sovereign does not intend to authorize litigation against itself simply
does not apply to federal statutes that apply equally to state agencies and
private entities.” Post, at 798. That is true enough, but in the Ameri-
can system there is a different reason, equally valid. While the States do
not have the immunity against federally authorized suit that international
law has traditionally accorded foreign sovereigns, see National City Bank
of N. Y. v. Republic of China, 348 U. S. 356, 358–359 (1955), they are sover-
eigns nonetheless, and both comity and respect for our federal system