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REHNQUIST, J., dissenting in part

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not unduly denigrated. Yet, here, the EEOC did not file its action in the District Court until February 22, 1974, almost three years after the formal filing of the charge. Since this is clearly outside the state limitations period, I would hold the action barred, unless the EEOC is to be considered to be suing on behalf of the United States in its sovereign capacity, a matter to which I now turn.

Insofar as the EEOC seeks to recover backpay for individuals, it stands in the shoes of the individuals, and represents them in a suit the individuals would otherwise be entitled to bring, 42 U. S. C. § 2000e-5 (f) (1) (1970 ed., Supp. V). Not only is the United States itself not a party to the suit, but the EEOC is vindicating a right which a private party was entitled to vindicate in his own right. Cf. Alexander v. Gardner-Denver Co., supra, at 45. Since the United States is not suing in its sovereign capacity, there is no reason to exempt these suits from the general application of state limitations statutes. The scope of the relevant inquiry

5 While I agree that it is impossible to read 42 U. S. C. § 2000e−5 (f) (1) (1970 ed., Supp. V) as a time limitation on the EEOC's right to bring suit, the existence of that limitations period on the individual's right to bring suit is not without significance. I can perceive of no reason, and the legislative debates suggest none, why the private party's right to sue is cut off 90 days after it is given, unless it is intended as a form of a limitations period. Yet, if Congress was concerned with a limitations period when the suit could be brought by the complaining party, it suggests that the Court is wrong in asserting that "the benchmark, for purposes of a statute of limitations" is simply the "commencement of the proceeding before the administrative body." Ante, at 372. It also leads me to conclude that there is no reason not to allow the normal presumption to operate in this case, by limiting the EEOC's right of action by the most analogous state limitations period. Cf. Auto Workers v. Hoosier Cardinal Corp., 383 U. S. 696, 704 (1966). I see nothing which affirmatively rebuts the longstanding doctrine that "the silence of Congress has been interpreted to mean that it is federal policy to adopt the local law of limitation." Holmberg v. Armbrecht, 327 U. S. 392, 395 (1946).

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was formed by this Court in United States v. Beebe, 127 U. S. 338, 344 (1888):

"The principle that the United States are not bound by any statute of limitations, nor barred by any laches of their officers, however gross, in a suit brought by them as a sovereign Government to enforce a public right, or to assert a public interest, is established past all controversy or doubt. United States v. Nashville &c. Railway Company, 118 U. S. 120, 125, and cases there cited. But this case stands upon a different footing, and presents a different question. The question is, Are these defences available to the defendant in a case where the Government, although a nominal complainant party, has no real interest in the litigation, but has allowed its name to be used therein for the sole benefit of a private person?"

As this has been interpreted, the decisive fact which excepts the general applicability of these statutes is that the United States is suing to enforce "its rights." United States v. Summerlin, 310 U. S. 414, 416 (1940) (emphasis added); see also United States v. Nashville, C. & St. L. R. Co., 118 U. S. 120, 125 (1886); United States v. Des Moines Navigation & R. Co., 142 U. S. 510, 538-539 (1892); United States v. Bell Telephone Co., 167 U. S. 224, 264-265 (1897); French Republic v. Saratoga Vichy Co., 191 U. S. 427, 438 (1903). In Beebe itself, the Court acknowledged that "[t]he Government is charged with the duty . . . to protect [the public domain] from trespass and unlawful appropriation 127 U. S., at 342. See also Moran v. Horsky, 178 U. S. 205, 213 (1900). Yet this "interest" was not sufficient to make it a suit by the sovereign, unbounded by a limitations period. While the Government may be interested in the vindication of the policies enunciated in Title VII, cf. Franks v. Bowman Transportation Co., 424 U. S. 747, 778 n. 40 (1976)-as,

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presumably, it would be interested in vindicating the policies expressed in all congressional enactments-that is not the decisive fact. It is not "interest," but whether the sovereign is suing to recover in its own right. Since here the suit is to recover backpay for an individual that could have brought her own suit, it is impossible to think that the EEOC was suing in the sovereign capacity of the United States. Cf. United States v. Beebe, supra, at 346. Rather, it is suing as a conduit for the recovery of sums due an individual citizen rather than the public treasury. The Court does not suggest otherwise.

The conclusion should be no different when we turn to the issue of injunctive relief. The decisive fact remains the same: The sovereign is not suing to redress "its" injury, rather it is seeking relief that the complaining individual otherwise would have been entitled to seek. While injunctive relief may appear more "broad based," it nonetheless is redress for individuals. The United States gains nothing tangible as a result of the suit. It does, to be sure, vindicate a congressional policy by seeking to enjoin practices proscribed by Title VII, but, it bears repeating, presumably the Government vindicates some congressional policy whenever it sues. That, then, cannot be the test, for it would exalt form (who brings the suit) over substance (whom the suit directly benefits). For these reasons, I am unable to agree with the Ninth Circuit that because the EEOC promotes public policy by its prayer for injunctive relief, it therefore "seeks to vindicate rights belonging to the United States as sovereign," 535 F. 2d 533, 537. This reason does not adequately distinguish a prayer for injunctive relief from a prayer by the EEOC for backpay for individuals.

The EEOC is only entitled to bring suit after a complaint has been filed with it. Normally, therefore, it brings suit only after a complaining individual has filed a charge with it. "Individual grievants usually ini

REHNQUIST, J., dissenting in part

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Since I believe that the EEOC's suit is barred by the running of the statute of limitations in Cal. Code Civ. Proc. Ann. § 340 (3) (West Supp. 1977), I respectfully dissent.

the Commission's investigatory and conciliatory procedures. Alexander v. Gardner-Denver Co., 415 U. S., at 45. While the 1972 amendments allow members of the EEOC to file charges, 42 U. S. C. § 2000e-5 (b) (1970 ed., Supp. V), this is not the normal method of initiating suit. Alexander, supra, at 45. Since this case does not involve the situation where the complaining individual is not the allegedly aggrieved party, I do not need to deal with the question of whether a different result would follow when the EEOC brings suit upon a complaint initiated by one of its members.

Syllabus

UNITED AIRLINES, INC. v. McDONALD

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT

No. 76-545. Argued March 29, 1977-Decided June 20, 1977 Claiming that petitioner United Airlines had violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by requiring stewardesses, though not stewards, to remain unmarried as an employment condition, one Romasanta, a stewardess who had been discharged by petitioner because of her marriage, brought this Title VII suit as a class action on behalf of herself and all other United stewardesses discharged because of the no-marriage rule. The District Court ruled that only those stewardesses who upon discharge because of marriage had filed charges under either a fair employment statute or United's collective-bargaining agreement constituted the class, and because that class was too small to satisfy the numerosity requirement of Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23 (a) (1), the court granted United's motion to strike the complaint's class allegations, but allowed 12 married stewardesses who had protested their discharge to intervene as additional parties plaintiff. The District Court certified for appeal its order striking the class allegations, but the Court of Appeals declined to accept the interlocutory appeal. The litigation proceeded as a joint suit on behalf of the original and intervening plaintiffs, and the District Court ultimately determined that the plaintiffs were entitled to reinstatement and backpay and, following agreement by the parties on the amounts to be awarded each plaintiff, the court entered a judgment of dismissal. After learning of the Romasanta judgment and that despite their earlier attempt to do so the plaintiffs in that case did not plan to appeal the order denying class certification, respondent, a former United stewardess who had been discharged on account of the no-marriage rule and was thus a putative member of the Romasanta class and who had not filed charges or a grievance, filed, 18 days after the judgment (and therefore within the applicable appeal period) a motion to intervene for the purpose of appealing the adverse class determination order. The District Court denied intervention, from which denial as well as the denial of class certification respondent appealed. The Court of Appeals reversed on the intervention denial as well as on the refusal to certify the class described in Romasanta's complaint a class consisting of all United stewardesses discharged

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