Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-859new_kjfm.pdf
Page Number: 25.0

20 

SEC v. JARKESY 

Opinion of the Court 

(some internal quotation marks omitted); see id., at 43–50. 
A survey of English cases showed that “actions to recover 
. . . fraudulent transfers were often brought at law in late
18th-century England.”  Id., at 43.  The remedy the trustee
sought was also one “traditionally provided by law courts.” 
Id., at 49.  Fraudulent conveyance actions were thus “quin-
tessentially suits at common law.”  Id., at 56. 

We  also  considered  whether  these  actions  were  “closely 
intertwined” with the bankruptcy regime.  Id., at 54.  Some 
bankruptcy  claims,  such  as  “creditors’  hierarchically  or-
dered claims to a pro rata share of the bankruptcy res,” id., 
at 56, are highly interdependent and require coordination. 
Resolving such claims fairly is only possible if they are all
submitted at once to a single adjudicator.  Otherwise, par-
ties with lower priority claims can rush to the courthouse 
to seek payment before higher priority claims exhaust the
estate, and an orderly disposition of a bankruptcy is impos-
sible.  Other claims, though, can be brought in standalone 
suits, because they are neither prioritized nor subordinated
to related claims.  Since fraudulent conveyance actions fall 
into  that  latter  category,  we  concluded  that  these  actions 
were not “closely intertwined” with the bankruptcy process. 
Id., at 54.  We also noted that Congress had already author-
ized jury trials for certain bankruptcy matters, demonstrat-
ing that jury trials were not generally “incompatible” with 
the overall regime.  Id., at 61–62 (internal quotation marks 
omitted).

We accordingly concluded that fraudulent conveyance ac-
tions were akin to “suits at common law” and were not in-
separable from the bankruptcy process.  Id., at 54, 56.  The 
public rights exception therefore did not apply, and a jury 
was required. 

3 
Granfinanciera effectively decides this case.  Even when 
an  action  “originate[s]  in  a  newly  fashioned  regulatory