Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/18-1501_8n5a.pdf
Page Number: 29

6 

LIU v. SEC 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

“disgorgement” in the Third Restatement, which the major-
ity  cites  in support  of  its  holding,  ante,  at  6,  represents  a
“ ‘novel  extension’ ”  of  equity.    Kansas,  supra,  at  483 
(THOMAS,  J.,  concurring  in  part  and  dissenting  in  part) 
(quoting Roberts, Restitutionary Disgorgement for Oppor-
tunistic Breach of Contract and Mitigation of Damages, 42
Loyola (LA) L. Rev. 131, 134 (2008)).

I  acknowledge  that  this  Court  has  referred  to  disgorge-
ment as an equitable remedy in some of its prior decisions. 
See, e.g., Feltner v. Columbia Pictures Television, Inc., 523 
U. S. 340, 352 (1998).  But these opinions merely referred 
to the term in passing without considering the question in 
depth.  The history is clear: Disgorgement is not a form of
relief that was available in the English Court of Chancery 
at the time of the founding. 

C 
The majority’s treatment of disgorgement as an equitable
remedy threatens great mischief.  The term disgorgement
itself invites abuse because it is a word with no fixed mean-
ing.  The majority sees “parallels” between accounting and
disgorgement, ante, at 2, n. 1, but parallels are by definition 
not the same.  Even if they were, the traditional remedy of 
an accounting—which compels a party to repay profits that 
belong to a plaintiff—has important conceptual limitations 
that disgorgement does not.  An accounting connotes the re-
lationship  between  a  plaintiff  and  a  defendant.    In  the 
words of one scholar, “it is an accounting by A to B.”  Bray,
Fiduciary Remedies, at 454.  But disgorgement connotes no 
relationship  and  so  is  not  naturally  limited  to  net  profits
and compensation of victims.  It simply “is A disgorging.” 
Ibid.    Further,  the  traditional  remedy  of  a  constructive 
trust2 or an equitable lien requires that the “money or prop-

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2 A constructive trust compels a defendant “holding title to property . . . 
to convey it to another on the ground that he would be unjustly enriched