# United States v. Beggerly

> Supreme Court of the United States · June 8, 1998 · 524 U.S. 38

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9433661

## Case

- **Full name:** UNITED STATES v. BEGGERLY Et Al.
- **Court:** Supreme Court of the United States
- **Decided:** June 8, 1998
- **Citations:** 524 U.S. 38; 118 S. Ct. 1862; 141 L. Ed. 2d 32; 1998 U.S. LEXIS 3734
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Stevens
- **Judges:** Rehnquist, Stevens, Souter
- **Cited by:** 543 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- **Yellow flag:** Questioned by United States v. Nagalingam, 114 F. App'x 653 (2004).
- Negative treatments: 4
- Distinguished by: 0
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9433661

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- holding that equitable tolling is not available in a suit brought pursuant to the Quiet Title Act because that statute already effectively allows for equitable tolling by providing that the statute of limitations will not begin to run until the plaintiff "knew or should have k…
- finding that judicially provided equitable tolling was unavailable because the Quiet Title Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2409a, by providing that the 12-year statute of repose will not "begin to run until the plaintiff `knew or should have known of the claim of the United States,' has alre…
- stating that “[o]n the other hand, section 2501 differs from the Irwin statute in that it contains its own tolling provision for persons ‘under legal disability or beyond the seas at the time the claim accrues,’” and concluding that “the matter [whether section 2501 may be tol…
- explaining that a new trial may be granted only where there are “‘injustices which . . . are deemed sufficiently gross to demand a departure’ from rigid adherence to the doctrine of res judicata” (quoting Hazel-Atlas Glass Co. v. Hartford-Empire Co., 322 U.S. 238, 244 (1944))

## Opinion text

Justice Stevens,
with whom Justice Souter joins, concurring.
As the Court correctly observes, the text of the Quiet Title Act, 28 U. S. C. § 2409a(g), expressly allows equitable tolling by providing that the statute of limitations will not begin to run until the plaintiff or the plaintiff’s predecessor “knew or should have known of the claim of the United States.” Because the Beggerlys were aware of the Government’s claim more than 12 years before they filed this action, the Court correctly holds that there is no basis for any additional equitable tolling in this case. We are not confronted with the question whether a doctrine such as fraudulent concealment or equitable estoppel might apply if the Government were guilty of outrageous misconduct that prevented the plaintiff, though frilly aware of the Government’s claim of title, from knowing of her own claim. Those doctrines are distinct from equitable tolling, see 4 C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1056 (Supp. 1998); cf. United States v. Locke, 471 U. S. 84, 94, n. 10 (1985) (referring separately to estoppel and equitable tolling), and conceivably might *50 apply in such an unlikely hypothetical situation. The Court need not (and, therefore, properly does not) address that quite different type of ease. Accordingly, I join the Court’s opinion without reservation.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9433661. Public record. Not legal advice.