42
Opinion of the Court
of limitations, which begins to run from the date the plaintiff knows or should have known about the claim of the United States. 28 U. S. C. § 2409a(g). The Court of Appeals noted that respondents knew about the Government's claim for more than 12 years before it filed this suit, but concluded that the 12-year statute was subject to equitable tolling and should be tolled in this case.
Satisfied as to its jurisdiction, the Court of Appeals then addressed the merits. Relying on the Boudreau grant, the court concluded that the "United States has no legitimate claim to the land [and that] the validity of the Beggerlys' title is a legal certainty." 114 F. 3d, at 489. It therefore vacated the settlement agreement and remanded the case to the District Court with instructions that it enter judgment quieting title in favor of respondents. One judge dissented. We granted certiorari, 522 U. S. 1038 (1998), and now reverse.
The Government's primary contention is that the Court of Appeals erred in concluding that it had jurisdiction over respondents' 1994 suit. It first attacks the lower court's conclusion that jurisdiction was established because the suit was an "independent action" within the meaning of Rule 60(b). The Government argues that an "independent action" must be supported by an independent source of jurisdiction, and, in the case of a suit against the United States, an independent waiver of sovereign immunity. Whereas the District Court had jurisdiction over the original Adams litigation because the United States was the plaintiff, 28 U. S. C. § 1345, there was no statutory basis for the Beggerlys' 1994 action, and the District Court was therefore correct to have dismissed it.
We think the Government's position is inconsistent with the history and language of Rule 60(b). Prior to the 1937 adoption of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the availability of relief from a judgment or order turned on whether the court was still in the same "term" in which the challenged judgment was entered. If it was, the judge "had ple-
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