SCOTUS Squashes Equitable Tolling for Disability Compensation Claims (by Augusten Lupianez, Intern at Delaware Law School Veterans Law Clinic)

Adolfo Arellano’s journey to the Supreme Court finally ended on January 23, 2023. After years of trying to obtain retroactive benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs based on his disability, Arellano was denied at the highest court in the land.

Arellano served in the Navy from 1977 to 1981 and was honorably discharged. About 30 years later, Arellano applied for disability compensation based on psychiatric disorders resulting from his time in the Navy. Eventually he was awarded compensation with an effective date of June 3, 2011, the day he submitted his application. Arellano disagreed with the decision, believing his effective date should be 1981, the year he was discharged from service. He asserted that his disability had rendered him incapable of making such a claim for 30 years. Arellano then worked his way through the Veterans Affairs appeal process and found himself at the Supreme Court, fighting for an earlier effective date.

In determining an effective date for an award, the default rule found in 38 U.S.C. §5110(a)(1) typically applies. It states, “[u]nless specifically provided otherwise in this chapter, the effective date of an award based on an initial claim . . . shall be fixed in accordance with the facts found, but shall not be earlier than the date of receipt of application thereof.” The statute then lists sixteen exceptions to the rule. Arellano argued that one of these exceptions, §5110(b)(1), the provision stating that the effective date for “disability compensation to a veteran shall be the day following the day of the veteran’s discharge or release if the application therefor is received within one year from such date of discharge or release,” allows for equitable tolling. Because he was unable to file for benefits due to his disability, he asserts section (b)(1) applies. Equitable tolling could then allow the effective date of the award to date back to 1981, despite the general rule. If the Supreme Court had sided with him, he would have been able to recover decades worth of disability compensation. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

A unanimous Court decided that Congress did not intend for §5110(b)(1) to allow for equitable tolling. An opinion delivered by Justice Barrett reasoned that though equitable tolling is presumed to be present in statutes written by Congress, it can be rebutted and has been here. In the case of §5110(b)(1), the Court believed allowing equitable tolling to apply here would be “at odds with the statutory text and structure[.]” Arellano v. McDonough, 143 U.S. 543 at 548 (2023).

Congress created an exhaustive list of exceptions to the default rule §5110(a)(1) offers. The Court believed that if Congress had intended for equitable tolling to apply, it would have added it among the sixteen exceptions it lays out. The Court looked at the language of the statute, concluding that statutes containing “‘not only procedural limitations, but also substantive limitations on the amount of recovery’ strongly indicate[s] that ‘Congress did not intend courts to read other unmentioned, open-ended “equitable” exceptions into the statute that it wrote.’” Id. at 549 (quoting U.S. v. Brockamp, 519 U.S. 347, 352). The Court pointed out that §5110(b)(4), the exception allowing for equitable tolling for disability pensions when the disability prevented a veteran from applying for benefits, shows that Congress was thinking about the possibility that disability could create an exception. Since Congress did not expressly include similar language in §5110(b)(1), it must not have intended for equitable tolling to apply to this exception. Id. at 550.

This was an unfortunate decision for Arellano and for all veterans who struggle with debilitating disabilities, and creates a situation where a veteran under these circumstances seeking pension is treated more favorably than one seeking compensation. Veterans in this position are not missing deadlines because they wanted to; they simply could not do so due to circumstances outside of their control. Nonetheless, the holding prevents the application of equitable tolling to §5110(b)(1).