Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/558bv.pdf
Page Number: 256.0

Cite as: 558 U. S. 87 (2009) 

95 

Opinion of the Court 

related  dispute  that  involved  a  legal  question  whether  a 
bankruptcy  court  could  lawfully  conﬁrm  a  debtor’s  Chapter 
11 reorganization plan if the plan relied upon what the debtor 
said  was  a  special  exception  (called  the  “new  value  excep­
tion”)  to  ordinary  creditor  priority  rules.  Id.,  at  19–20. 
The  parties  contested  that  legal  issue  in  the  Bankruptcy 
Court;  they  contested  it  in  an  appeal  of  the  Bankruptcy 
Court’s  order  to  the  Federal  District  Court;  they  contested 
it in a further appeal to the Court of Appeals; and eventually 
they  contested  it  in  this  Court.  Id.,  at  20.  While  the  case 
was pending here, the parties settled their differences in the 
Bankruptcy  Court  (the  court  where  the  case  originated)— 
including  their  differences  on  this  particular  contested  legal 
point.  Ibid.  They  agreed  upon  a  reorganization  plan, 
which  they  said  would  constitute  a  settlement  that  mooted 
the federal case.  Ibid. 

Recognizing  that  the  reorganization  plan  that  the  Bank­
ruptcy Judge conﬁrmed in the case amounted to a settlement 
that  mooted  the  case,  this  Court  did  not  vacate  the  lower 
court’s judgment.  The Court’s reason for leaving the lower 
court’s judgment in place was that mootness was not a result 
of  “the  vagaries  of  circumstance.”  Id.,  at  25.  Rather  the 
party seeking review had “caused the mootness by voluntary 
action.”  Id., at  24 (emphasis added).  By  virtue of  the set­
tlement,  that  party  had  “voluntarily  forfeited  his  legal  rem­
edy by the ordinary processes of appeal or certiorari.”  Id., 
at  25.  Hence,  compared  to  mootness  caused  by  “happen­
stance,”  considerations  of  “equity”  and  “fairness”  tilted 
against vacatur.  Id., at 25–26. 

Applying  these  principles  to  the  case  before  us,  we  con­
clude  that  the  terminations  here  fall  on  the  “happenstance” 
side of the line.  The six individual cases proceeded through 
a  different  court  system  without  any  procedural  link  to  the 
federal case before us.  To our knowledge (and we have ex­
amined the state-court docket sheets), no one in those cases 
raised  the  procedural  question  at  issue  here.  Rather,  the