Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/13-1421_p8k0.pdf
Page Number: 7.0

Cite as:  575 U. S. ____ (2015) 

5 

Opinion of the Court 

III 
The  debtors  do  not  ask  us  to  overrule  Dewsnup,†  but 
instead request that we limit that decision to partially—as
opposed to wholly—underwater liens.  We decline to adopt 
this distinction.  The debtors offer several reasons why we 
should cabin Dewsnup in this manner, but none of them is 
compelling.

To start, the debtors rely on language in Dewsnup stat-
ing  that  the  Court  was  not  addressing  “all  possible  fact 
situations,”  but  was  instead  “allow[ing]  other  facts  to
await their legal resolution on another day.”  Id., at 416– 
417.  But  this  disclaimer  provides  an  insufficient  founda-
tion  for  the  debtors’  proposed  distinction.  Dewsnup  con-
sidered  several  possible  definitions  of  the  term  “secured
claim”  in  §506(d).  See  id.,  at  414–416.    The  definition  it 
settled on—that a claim is “secured” if it is  “secured by a 
lien” and “has been fully allowed pursuant to §502,” id., at 
417—does  not  depend  on  whether  a  lien  is  partially  or
wholly  underwater.  Whatever  the  Court’s  hedging  lan-
guage  meant,  it  does  not  provide  a  reason  to  limit 
Dewsnup in the manner the debtors propose.

The debtors next contend that the term “secured claim” 

—————— 

† From  its  inception,  Dewsnup  v.  Timm,  502  U. S.  410  (1992),  has 
been  the  target  of  criticism.  See,  e.g.,  id.,  at  420–436  (SCALIA,  J., 
dissenting);  In re  Woolsey,  696  F. 3d  1266,  1273–1274,  1278  (CA10 
2012); In re Dever, 164  B. R. 132,  138, 145 (Bkrtcy. Ct.  CD Cal.  1994);
Carlson,  Bifurcation  of  Undersecured  Claims  in  Bankruptcy,  70  Am. 
Bankr. L. J. 1, 12–20 (1996); Ponoroff & Knippenberg, The Immovable
Object  Versus  the  Irresistible  Force:  Rethinking  the  Relationship 
Between Secured Credit and Bankruptcy Policy, 95 Mich. L. Rev. 2234,
2305–2307 (1997); see also Bank of America Nat. Trust and Sav. Assn. 
v.  203  North  LaSalle  Street  Partnership,  526  U. S.  434,  463,  and  n.  3 
(1999)  (THOMAS,  J.,  concurring  in  judgment)  (collecting  cases  and 
observing that “[t]he methodological confusion created by Dewsnup has 
enshrouded  both  the  Courts  of  Appeals  and  . . .  Bankruptcy  Courts”). 
Despite  this  criticism,  the  debtors  have  repeatedly  insisted  that  they 
are not asking us to overrule Dewsnup.