Court Opinion

ID: 9433128
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:39:07.790017+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:39.503538
License: Public Domain

Justice Scalia,
concurring.
I join the opinion of the Court, except insofar as it holds that Williams is a “taxpayer” within the meaning of 26 U.S.C. §§ 6511(a) and 7701(a)(14), see ante, at 534-536. That seems to me unnecessary to the decision, since § 6511(a), an administrative exhaustion provision, has too remote a bearing upon § 1346(a)(1), the jurisdictional provision at issue, to create by implication the significant limitation upon jurisdiction that the Government asserts.
I acknowledge the rule requiring clear statement of waivers of sovereign immunity, see post, at 544 (dissenting opinion), and I agree that the rule applies even to determination of the scope of explicit waivers. See, e. g., United States v. Nordic Village, Inc., 503 U. S. 30, 34 (1992). The rule does not, however, require explicit waivers to be given a meaning that is implausible — which would in my view be the result of restricting the unequivocal language of § 1346(a)(1) by reference to §6511(a). “‘The exemption of the sovereign from suit involves hardship enough where consent has been withheld. We are not to add to its rigor by refinement of construction where consent has been announced.’” United States v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 338 U. S. 366, 383 (1949) (quoting Anderson v. Hayes Constr. Co., 243 N. Y. 140, 147, 153 N. E. 28, 29-30 (1926) (Cardozo, J.)).