Cite as: 522 U. S. 156 (1997)
Syllabus
encompasses cases "arising under the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States," § 1331, and an action satisfies this requirement when the plaintiff's well-pleaded complaint raises issues of federal law, Metropolitan Life Ins. Co. v. Taylor, 481 U. S. 58, 63. ICS' state court complaints raised a number of such issues in the form of various federal constitutional challenges to the Landmarks and Designation Ordinances, and to the manner in which the Commission conducted its proceedings. Once the case was removed, ICS' state law claims were properly before the District Court under the supplemental jurisdiction statute. That statute provides, "in any civil action of which the district courts have original jurisdiction, the[y] shall have supplemental jurisdiction over all other claims that . . . form part of the same case or controversy." § 1367(a). Here, ICS' state law claims are legal "claims" in the sense that that term is generally used to denote a judicially cognizable cause of action, and they and the federal claims derive from a common nucleus of operative fact, see Mine Workers v. Gibbs, 383 U. S. 715, 725. Pp. 163-166.
(b) ICS' argument that the District Court lacked jurisdiction because its complaints contained state law claims requiring deferential, on-the-record review of the Commission's decisions stems from the erroneous premise that those claims must be "civil actions" within the federal courts' "original jurisdiction" under § 1441(a) for removal purposes. Because this is a federal question case, the District Court's original jurisdiction derives not from ICS' state law claims, but from its federal claims, which satisfy § 1441(a)'s requirements. Having thus established federal jurisdiction, the relevant inquiry respecting the accompanying state claims is whether they fall within a district court's supplemental jurisdiction, and that inquiry turns on whether they satisfy § 1367(a)'s requirements. ICS' proposed approach would effectively read the supplemental jurisdiction statute out of the books: The whole point of supplemental jurisdiction is to allow the district courts to exercise pendent jurisdiction over claims as to which original jurisdiction is lacking. Pp. 166-168.
(c) This Court also disagrees with ICS' reasoning to the extent ICS means to suggest that a claim involving deferential review of a local administrative decision can never be "so related to claims . . . within . . . original jurisdiction that [it] form[s] part of the same case or controversy" for purposes of supplemental jurisdiction under § 1367(a). While Congress could establish an exception to supplemental jurisdiction for such claims, the statute, as written, bears no such construction, as it confers jurisdiction without reference to the nature of review. Nor do Chicago, R. I. & P. R. Co. v. Stude, 346 U. S. 574, 581, and Horton v.
157
Page: Index Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007