On March 2, 2010, the Supreme Court in its unanimous decision reversed the Second Circuit Court of Appeal’s decision on“drive-by” jurisdictional rulings. Consistent with the majority of previous circuit court decisions, the Second Circuit had found federal copyright registration was a subject matter jurisdictional prerequisite for filing suit.
The Supreme Court found federal copyright registration was merely a “claim processing rule” for filing infringement suit, rather than a subject matter jurisdictional requirement. However, it declined to clarify all ambiguity surrounding the registration requirement, in choosing not to to decide the long-standing circuit split on whether having the registration “in hand” is required before filing suit, or rather, if a pending application is sufficient.
Nevertheless, the Court reconciled two lines of cases regarding jurisdiction and statutory construction. It found jurisdiction over unregistered copyrights under the doctrine of “federal question” jurisdiction, and put to rest any notion that the copyright registration prerequisite to filing suit was a “jurisdictional” requirement. No longer may federal circuit courts haphazardly characterize a requirement as jurisdictional, absent a clear statement from Congress, i.e., express statutory language that something is “jurisdictional.”
While this legal distinction was perhaps handed down “under the radar,” the opinion could have far-reaching effects beyond the world of copyright and the universe of intellectual property law. For example, while jurisdictional defects may be challenged at any time (objections to jurisdiction are always timely), one’s right to challenge a defect in connection with a claim processing requirement could be waived by failure to assert early on in litigation.
The Court’s “jurisdictional” v. “non-jurisdictional” dichotomy could ultimately have an impact on your substantive rights in litigation. E.g., If a claim requirement is characterized as “non-jurisdictional,” there is a possibility that a defendant’s failure to raise the issue as a defense at the outset of litigation could thereby waive the right to bring it up in the future.