Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/524bv.pdf
Page Number: 224.0

524US1

Unit: $U81

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Cite as: 524 U. S. 156 (1998)

179

Breyer, J., dissenting

example, the National Government, or a State, has engaged
in excessive tax withholding, it does not refund the inter-
est earned between the time of withholding and the issu-
ance of a refund. For any number of reasons unrelated to
the recognition or nonrecognition of a generalized prop-
erty right in interest, but tied to the questions of takings
and compensation, it seems unlikely that such withholding
practices would violate the Fifth Amendment. Neverthe-
less, the Court’s abstract ruling may encourage claims of just
this sort.

To avoid the dangers of abstraction, I would therefore
vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand for
If, however, the
plenary Fifth Amendment consideration.
property interest question is to be considered in the abstract,
I would recast it and answer it as Justice Breyer has done
in his own dissenting opinion, which I join.

Justice Breyer, with whom Justice Stevens, Jus-

tice Souter, and Justice Ginsburg join, dissenting.

The question presented is whether “interest earned on
client trust funds,” which would “not earn interest” in the
absence of a special “IOLTA program,” amounts to a “prop-
erty interest of the client or lawyer” for purposes of the
Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause. Brief for Petitioners i;
Brief for Respondents i; see U. S. Const., Amdt. 5 (“nor
shall private property be taken for public use, without just
compensation”).

The question presented is premised on four assumptions:
First, that lawyers sometimes hold small amounts of clients’
funds for short periods of time; second, that because of fed-
eral tax and banking rules and regulations, such funds nor-
mally could not earn interest during that time; third, that
state Interest on Lawyers Trust Account (IOLTA) rules re-
quire lawyers to place such funds in a special account where,
mixed with other funds, they will earn interest; and fourth,
that IOLTA rules require that interest earned on these funds