252
Opinion of the Court
§ 158(d), which deals with bankruptcy jurisdiction. CNB responds that nothing in § 158(d) limits § 1292. We agree with CNB.
Bankruptcy appeals are governed for the most part by § 158. This section comprises four subsections, three of which concern us here. Subsection (a) gives the district courts authority to hear appeals from final and interlocutory orders of the bankruptcy courts. The District Court, as we have noted, had jurisdiction under this provision to hear CNB's appeal from the Bankruptcy Court. Subsection (b) permits the judicial council of any circuit to establish a bankruptcy appellate panel to fill the role of the district courts under subsection (a). Subsection (d), which is pivotal in this case, provides:
"The courts of appeals shall have jurisdiction of appeals from all final decisions, judgments, orders, and decrees entered under subsections (a) and (b) of this section."
Neither this subsection nor any other part of § 158 mentions interlocutory orders entered by the district courts in bankruptcy. The parties agree, as they must, that § 158 did not confer jurisdiction on the Court of Appeals.
Germain contends that the Court of Appeals did not have jurisdiction under § 1292 either, for § 158(d), in his view, precludes jurisdiction under § 1292 by negative implication. Ger-main reasons as follows: Although §§ 1291 and 1292 appear to cover the universe of decisions issued by the district courts—with § 1291 conferring jurisdiction over appeals from final decisions of the district courts, and § 1292 conferring jurisdiction over certain interlocutory ones—that cannot in fact be so. If § 1291 did cover all final decisions by a district court, he argues, that section would render § 158(d) super-fluous, since a final decision issued by a district court sitting as a bankruptcy appellate court is still a final decision of a district court. If § 158(d) is to have effect, Germain contends, then that section must be exclusive within its own
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