Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-1008_1b82.pdf
Page Number: 65.0

Cite as:  603 U. S. ____ (2024) 

19 

JACKSON, J., dissenting 

provisions.

First, repose.  This principle means that, at some point, 
litigation  must  end.  Under  the  majority’s  reading  of  the 
statute,  it  never  will.    Instead  of  putting  a  stop  to  things
after  six  years,  §2401(a)  now  does  nothing  to  prevent 
agency rules from being forever subjected to legal challenge 
by newly formed entities (or, as this case illustrates, by old 
entities  that  can  find  or  create  new  entities  to  graft  onto
their complaint).10 

Second, elimination of stale claims.  The majority forces
courts  and  agencies  to  parse  cold  administrative  records.
Long after the action in question, courts may be ill equipped 
to review decades-old administrative explanations. 

Last, certainty.  As I explain in Part IV, infra, the major-
ity’s approach creates uncertainty for the Government and 
every  entity  that  relies  on  the  Government  to  function. 
Agency rulemaking serves important “notice and predicta-
bility purposes.”  Talk America, Inc. v. Michigan Bell Tele-
phone Co., 564 U. S. 50, 69 (2011) (Scalia, J., concurring).
When  an  administrative  agency  changes  its  own  rules,  it 
follows specific, established processes, so parties have some 
predictability about how the rules of the road might change. 
But when every rule on the books can perpetually be chal-
lenged by any new plaintiff, and is thus subject to limitless
ad hoc amendment, no policy determination can ever be put 
to rest, and certainty about the rules that govern will for-
ever remain elusive. 

—————— 

10 The fact that “courts entertaining later challenges often will be able 
to  rely  on  binding  Supreme  Court  or  circuit  precedent,”  ante,  at  21,  is 
irrelevant.  What we are deciding now is how the statute of limitations 
should be interpreted, and more specifically, whether it makes sense to 
interpret it in a way that is inconsistent with the purpose of such stat-
utes.