Thomas, J., dissenting
The majority suggests that Irwin stands for the proposition that a condition on a waiver of sovereign immunity must be strictly construed, but then goes on to argue that it is not necessarily jurisdictional. Ante, at 8. However, our decision in United States v. Williams, 514 U. S. 527 (1995), decided five years after Irwin, demonstrates that statutes of limitations in suits brought against the United States are no less jurisdictional now than they were before Irwin. In Williams, the Court cited Dalm’s holding that failure to file a claim against the Government for a federal tax refund within the statute-of-limitations period operates as a jurisdictional bar to suit, and the Court reaffirmed that a statute of limitations “narrow[s] the waiver of sovereign immunity.” 514 U. S., at 534, n. 7 (citing 494 U. S., at 602).[1] Irwin, thus, does not disrupt this Court’s long held understanding that conditions on waivers of sovereign immunity are presumptively jurisdictional.
II
Regardless of whether conditions on waivers of sovereign immunity remain jurisdictional post-Irwin, we have said that, where the Court has offered a “definitive earlier interpretation” of a statutory time bar as jurisdictional, we will continue to treat it as jurisdictional unless and until Congress directs otherwise. John R. Sand & Gravel Co. v. United States, 552 U. S. 130, 137–138 (2008); see also United States v. Kwai Fun Wong, 575 U. S. 402, 416 (2015)
- ↑ I have previously noted that Irwin “does perhaps narrow the scope of the sovereign immunity canon.” Scarborough v. Principi, 541 U. S. 401, 426 (2004) (dissenting opinion). But, it “does so only in limited circumstances,” such as “where the Government is made subject to suit to the same extent and in the same manner as private parties are.” Ibid. (emphasis added). This is not one of those circumstances. The Quiet Title Act’s framework exclusively governs actions to quiet title against the United States. And, it includes a number of conditions favorable to the Federal Government that would not apply in traditional quiet title actions among private litigants.
