Cite as: 529 U. S. 765 (2000)
Opinion of the Court
In sum, we believe that various features of the FCA, both as originally enacted and as amended, far from providing the requisite affirmative indications that the term "person" included States for purposes of qui tam liability, indicate quite the contrary. Our conclusion is buttressed by two other considerations that we think it unnecessary to discuss at any length: first, "the ordinary rule of statutory construction" that "if Congress intends to alter the usual constitutional balance between States and the Federal Government, it must make its intention to do so unmistakably clear in the language of the statute," Will, 491 U. S., at 65 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted); see also Gregory v. Ashcroft, 501 U. S. 452, 460-461 (1991); United States v. Bass, 404 U. S. 336, 349 (1971), and second, the doctrine that statutes should be construed so as to avoid difficult constitutional questions. We of course express no view on the question whether an action in federal court by a qui tam relator against a State would run afoul of the Eleventh Amendment, but we note that there is "a serious doubt" on that score. Ashwander v. TVA, 297 U. S. 288, 348 (1936) (Brandeis, J., concurring) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).18
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We hold that a private individual has standing to bring suit in federal court on behalf of the United States under the False Claims Act, 31 U. S. C. §§ 3729-3733, but that the
at 585, and Evans, 316 U. S., at 160. In addition to being inapposite because they did not authorize suits against States by private parties, see n. 9, supra, the definitions of "person" in the statutes at issue in those cases were not as detailed as that of the PFCRA, and set forth what the term "person" included, rather than, as the PFCRA does, what the term "person" "means," see 31 U. S. C. § 3801(a)(6) (emphasis added).
18 Although the dissent concludes that States can be "persons" for purposes of commencing an FCA qui tam action under § 3730(b), see post, at 794-795, we need not resolve that question here, and therefore leave it open.
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