Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-5726_5iel.pdf
Page Number: 12.0

Cite as:  596 U. S. ____ (2022) 

9 

Opinion of the Court 

tardy  motions  based  on  factual  errors  as  motions  under 
Rule 60(b)(1).  A denial in either case would then permit the 
litigant  to  appeal  outside  Appellate  Rule  4’s  30-day  time 
limit. 

In any event, the alleged specter of litigation gamesman-
ship  and  strategic  delay  is  overstated.  Rule  60(b)(1)  mo-
tions, like all Rule 60(b) motions, must be made “within a 
reasonable time.”  Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 60(c)(1).  And while 
we have no cause to define the “reasonable time” standard 
here, we note that Courts of Appeals have used it to fore-
stall abusive litigation by denying Rule 60(b)(1) motions al-
leging errors that should have been raised sooner (e.g., in a 
timely  appeal).  See,  e.g.,  Mendez  v.  Republic  Bank,  725 
F. 3d 651, 660 (CA7 2013).

Nor, contrary to Kemp’s protestations, is our interpreta-
tion  inconsistent  with  the  history  of  Rule 60(b).    Kemp
points  out  that  Rule  60(b)(1)  drew  its  text  from  existing
state procedural rules.  See, e.g., Cal. Civ. Proc. Code §473
(Deering 1937).  And he argues that its list of grounds for 
reopening—“ ‘mistake, inadvertence, surprise, and excusa-
ble  neglect’ ”—was  understood  when  Rule  60(b)  was
adopted  to  be  a  “term  of  art”  that  excluded  legal  errors. 
Brief for Petitioner 10.  But while some States interpreted
their rules this way, see, e.g., Lucas v. North Carolina Mut. 
Life Ins. Co., 184 S. C. 119, 120, 191 S. E. 711, 712 (1937) 
(collecting cases), others, like California, did not, see, e.g., 
Mitchell v. California & O. C. S. S. Co., 156 Cal. 576, 578, 
105 P. 590, 592 (1909).  Moreover, at least one leading trea-
tise from the era maintained, consistent with our view, that 
“mistake”  encompassed  legal  errors.    See  3  J.  Moore  &  J. 
Friedman, Moore’s Federal Practice §60.05, p. 3280 (1938).
Although statutory language “obviously transplanted from
another legal source” will often “bring the old soil with it,” 
Taggart v. Lorenzen, 587 U. S. ___, ___ (2019) (slip op., at 5) 
(internal  quotation  marks  and  alterations  omitted),  that