Rule 12(b)(1)

Rule 12(b)(1) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provides for dismissal of lawsuit in federal court based on lack of subject-matter jurisdiction.

A motion under this rule can be made at any time, as subject matter jurisdiction can and should be raised at any stage of litigation, including for the first time on appeal.

Precedents

Standard of Review

Rule 12(b)(1) requires dismissal if the court “lacks the statutory or constitutional power to adjudicate the case.” Home Builders Ass’n of Miss., Inc. v. City of Madison, 143 F.3d 1006, 1010 (5th Cir. 1998).

The party asserting jurisdiction bears the burden of proof. Howery v. Allstate Ins. Co., 243 F.3d 912, 916 (5th Cir. 2001). Federal courts have jurisdiction over a claim between parties only if the plaintiff presents an actual case or controversy. U.S. Const. art. III, § 2, cl. 1; Okpalobi v. Foster, 244 F.3d 405, 425 (5th Cir. 2001).

“The many doctrines that have fleshed out that ‘actual controversy’ requirement—standing, mootness, ripeness, political question, and the like—are ‘founded in concern about the proper—and properly limited—role of the courts in a democratic society.’” Roark & Hardee LP v. City of Austin, 522 F.3d 533, 541–42 (5th Cir. 2008) (quoting Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 750 (1984)).

To test whether the party asserting jurisdiction has met its burden, a court may rely upon “(1) the complaint alone; (2) the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts evidenced in the record; or (3) the complaint supplemented by undisputed facts plus the court’s resolution of disputed facts.” Barrera–Montenegro v. United States, 74 F.3d 657, 659 (5th Cir. 1996). When standing is challenged in a motion to dismiss, the court “must ‘accept as true all material allegations of the complaint and ... construe the complaint in favor of the complaining party.’” Ass’n of Am. Physicians & Surgeons v. Tex. Med. Bd., 627 F.3d 547, 550 (5th Cir. 2010) (quoting Pennell v. City of San Jose, 438 U.S. 1, 7 (1988)).

Mootness

A case is dismissed under Rule 12(b)(1) if it is found to be moot.

“Under Article III of the Constitution, federal courts may adjudicate only actual, ongoing cases or controversies” and do not have “the power ‘to decide questions that cannot affect the rights of litigants in the case before them.’” Lewis v. Cont’l Bank Corp., 494 U.S. 472, 477 (1990) (quoting North Carolina v. Rice, 404 U.S. 244, 246 (1971)).

“To qualify as a case fit for federal-court adjudication, ‘an actual controversy must be extant at all stages of review, not merely at the time the complaint is filed.’” Arizonans for Off. Eng. v. Arizona, 520 U.S. 43, 67 (1997) (quoting Preiser v. Newkirk, 422 U.S. 395, 401 (1975)). “A case becomes moot—and therefore no longer a ‘Case’ or ‘Controversy’ for purposes of Article III—when the issues presented are no longer ‘live’ or the parties lack a legally cognizable interest in the outcome.” Already, LLC v. Nike, Inc., 568 U.S. 85, 91 (2013) (quotation omitted).

In other words, “[m]ootness applies when intervening circumstances render the court no longer capable of providing meaningful relief to the plaintiff.” Ctr. for Biological Diversity, Inc. v. BP Am. Prod. Co., 704 F.3d 413, 425 (5th Cir. 2013). Courts may “assume without deciding that standing exists in order to analyze mootness.” Friends of the Earth, Inc., 528 U.S. at 180 (citing Arizonans for Off. Eng., 520 U.S. at 66–67).

Amawi v. Paxton, 956 F.3d 816, 819, 821 (5th Cir. 2020) (dismissing an appeal as moot when a statutory amendment “provided the plaintiffs the very relief their lawsuit sought”).