Anderson v. United States Department of Agriculture et al

Filing 12

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER, re: Motion to Dismiss (doc.6). The parties shall have 30 days to submit their supplemental briefings to the Court. Signed by Judge J. Phil Gilbert on 9/21/2017. (jdh)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
MARK ANDERSON,
Plaintiff,
v.

Case No. 3:17-cv-531-JPG-RJD

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF
AGRICULTURE and FARM SERVICE
AGENCY and its employees, servants, and
agents acting on its behalf,
Defendants.
MEMORANDUM & ORDER
This matter comes before the Court on the Government’s Motion to Dismiss. (Doc. 6.)
The Government argues that the Court should dismiss all of Plaintiff’s claims (1) pursuant to
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, stemming from
the Government’s alleged sovereign immunity to Plaintiff’s claims, and (2) pursuant to Rule
12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. The Court must first decide
the jurisdictional 12(b)(1) issue before it can reach the 12(b)(6) issue on the merits. Bell v. Hood,
327 U.S. 678, 682 (1946). The Court requests additional briefing on the 12(b)(1) sovereign
immunity issue in light of the Seventh Circuit’s opinion in Blagojevich v. Gates, 519 F.3d 370,
371 (7th Cir. 2008):
The district court's justification for raising this subject on its own is
that every court must ensure the presence of subject-matter
jurisdiction, whether or not the parties agree that the case is
properly in federal court. That's true enough, but we have held that
sovereign immunity does not diminish a court's subject-matter
jurisdiction. See United States v. Cook County, 167 F.3d 381 (7th
Cir.1999). The ability of governments to waive the benefit of
sovereign immunity demonstrates that the doctrine is nonjurisdictional, see Lapides v. University of Georgia, 535 U.S. 613,
122 S.Ct. 1640, 152 L.Ed.2d 806 (2002), for real jurisdictional

limits can't be waived. Sovereign immunity concerns the remedy
rather than adjudicatory competence.
The specific question before the parties in this supplemental briefing is whether sovereign
immunity is a bar to subject-matter jurisdiction—and therefore appropriate for dismissal under
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1)—or whether sovereign immunity concerns the remedy
and is therefore not within the purview of 12(b)(1). The parties shall have 30 days to submit their
supplemental briefings to the Court.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
DATED: September 21, 2017
s/ J. Phil Gilbert
J. PHIL GILBERT
DISTRICT JUDGE