Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 849

529US3

Unit: $U59

[09-26-01 12:32:42] PAGES PGT: OPIN

774

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

Poller v. Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc., 368 U. S.
464, 465 (1962); Automatic Radio Mfg. Co. v. Hazeltine Re-
search, Inc., 339 U. S. 827, 829 (1950); Hubbard v. Tod, 171
U. S. 474, 475 (1898)—and also suits by subrogees, who have
been described as “equitable assign[ees],” L. Simpson, Law
of Suretyship 205 (1950); see, e. g., Vimar Seguros y Rease-
guros, S. A. v. M/V Sky Reefer, 515 U. S. 528, 531 (1995);
Musick, Peeler & Garrett v. Employers Ins. of Wausau,
508 U. S. 286, 288 (1993). We conclude, therefore, that the
United States’ injury in fact sufﬁces to confer standing on
respondent Stevens.

We are conﬁrmed in this conclusion by the long tradition
of qui tam actions in England and the American Colonies.
That history is particularly relevant to the constitutional
standing inquiry since, as we have said elsewhere, Article
III’s restriction of the judicial power to “Cases” and “Con-
troversies” is properly understood to mean “cases and con-
troversies of the sort traditionally amenable to, and resolved
by, the judicial process.” Steel Co., 523 U. S., at 102; see
also Coleman v. Miller, 307 U. S. 433, 460 (1939) (opinion of
Frankfurter, J.) (the Constitution established that “[j]udi-
cial power could come into play only in matters that were
the traditional concern of the courts at Westminster and
only if they arose in ways that to the expert feel of lawyers
constituted ‘Cases’ or ‘Controversies’ ”).

Qui tam actions appear to have originated around the
end of the 13th century, when private individuals who had
suffered injury began bringing actions in the royal courts
on both their own and the Crown’s behalf. See, e. g., Prior
of Lewes v. De Holt (1300), reprinted in 48 Selden Soci-
ety 198 (1931). Suit in this dual capacity was a device for
getting their private claims into the respected royal courts,
which generally entertained only matters involving the
Crown’s interests. See Milsom, Trespass from Henry III to
Edward III, Part III: More Special Writs and Conclusions,