794 VERMONT AGENCY OF NATURAL RESOURCES v.
UNITED STATES ex rel. STEVENS Stevens, J., dissenting
Indeed, a few federal courts had accepted jurisdiction in qui tam cases brought by the States—thus indicating their view that States were included among the "persons" who may bring qui tam actions as relators under § 3730(b)(1). See United States ex rel. Woodard v. Country View Care Center, Inc., 797 F. 2d 888 (CA10 1986); United States ex rel. Wisconsin v. Dean, 729 F. 2d 1100 (CA7 1984); see also United States ex rel. Hartigan v. Palumbo Bros., Inc., 797 F. Supp. 624 (ND Ill. 1992). Not only do these cases express the view of those federal judges who thought a State could be a "person" under § 3730(b)(1), but the cases also demonstrate that the States considered themselves to be statutory "persons." In fact, in the Dean case, the United States filed a statement with the court explicitly stating its view that "[t]he State is a proper relator." 729 F. 2d, at 1103, n. 2. And when the Seventh Circuit in that case dismissed Wisconsin's qui tam claim on grounds unrelated to the definition
that the Senate's understanding was based on an analogy rather than on controlling precedent.
Petitioner further argues that the text of the FCA as it was originally enacted in 1863 could not have included States as "persons," and therefore the Senate's understanding of the pre-1986 Act was erroneous. See also ante, at 778. Assuming for argument's sake that the Senate incorrectly ascertained what Congress meant in 1863, petitioner's argument is beside the point. The term "person" in § 3729(a) that we are interpreting today was enacted by the 1986 Congress, not by the 1863 Congress. See 100 Stat. 3153 (deleting entirely the previously existing introductory clause in § 3729, including the phrase "[a] person not a member of an armed force of the United States" and replacing it with the new phrase "[a]ny person"). Therefore, even if the 1986 Congress were mistaken about what a previous Legislature had meant by the word "person," it clearly expressed its own view that when the 1986 Congress itself enacted the word "person" (and not merely the word "any" as the Court insists, ante, at 783, n. 12), it meant the reference to include States. There is not the least bit of contradiction (as the Court suggests, ibid.) in one Congress informing itself of the general understanding of a statutory term it enacts based on its own (perhaps erroneous) understanding of what a past Congress thought the term meant.
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