About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline

59 UCLA L. Rev. Discourse 2 (2011)

handle is hein.journals/ucladis59 and id is 1 raw text is: 







Footloose: How to Tame the Tucker Act
Shuffle After United States v. Tohono
Oodham Nation
Craig A. Schwartz


ABSTRACT

The purpose of 28 U.S.C. § 1500, Pendency of claims in other courts, is to force upon
plaintiffs suing the federal government a mutually exclusive election between either the
U.S. Court of Federal Claims (CFC) or other courts, so as to minimize jurisdictional
conflict and to preclude duplicative claims. Under current precedent, the statute strips
the CFC of jurisdiction if the claim before the CFC arose from substantially the same
operative facts as any earlier-filed claim pending in another court. Recently, in United
States v. Tohono O'odham Nation, the U.S. Supreme Court clarified that § 1500 applies
even when the two claims seek different relief.

Going forward, this Article argues that the CFC should distinguish between the two
primary classes of plaintiffs engaged in duplicative litigation before it: (1) Bowen v.
Massachusetts claimants who elect to pursue both money damages in the CFC and
specific relief that happens to be monetary in district court; and (2) regulatory takings
plaintiffs who must file initial Administrative Procedure Act claims in district court
to challenge adverse agency action. Section 1500 should not bar the latter class of
plaintiffs, whose claims are necessarily sequential to preserve a substantial legal right
and therefore are better suited for stay and abeyance. More broadly, Congress should
amend the statute to extend stay and abeyance to duplicative Bowen claims before the
CFC pending their disposition in the other courts. Modern preclusion doctrine would
apply to the stayed claims. Finally, Congress, or the Supreme Court upon hearing a
suitable case, should eliminate a judicially created order-of-filing loophole, which allows
a plaintiff to bypass § 1500 merely by filing in the CFC first.


AUTHOR

J.D., Northwestern University School of Law, 2011; B.A., Haverford College, 2004.
This Article is the outgrowth of my paper, Enough Already: Why the Time Is Right
to Reform 28 U.S.C. § 1500 and Its Jurisprudence, which won the 2010 Court of
Federal Claims Bar Association Law Student Writing Competition. Thank you to
Judge Thomas C. Wheeler, Laura Durity, and Jennifer Everett for exposing me to § 1500
and its jurisdictional impact. Additional thanks to my friends and family for tolerating
numerous conversations about cotton claimants and the Tucker Act Shuffle.


59 UCLA L. REV. Disc. 2 (2011)

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

profiles profiles most