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Subject: 90-89 -- OPINION, PRIMATE PROTECTION LEAGUE v. TULANE ED. FUND

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in
the preliminary print of the United States Reports.  Readers are requested
to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States,
Washington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in
order that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to
press.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES


No. 90-89



INTERNATIONAL PRIMATE PROTECTION LEAGUE and its MEMBERS, et al.,
PETITIONERS v. ADMINISTRATORS OF TULANE EDUCATIONAL FUND et al.

on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the fifth
circuit

[May 20, 1991]



    Justice Marshall delivered the opinion of the Court.
    This case arose from an animal welfare dispute.  At issue is the fate
of certain monkeys used for medical experiments funded by the Federal
Government.  The case comes before us, however, on a narrow jurisdictional
question: whether a suit filed in state court challenging the treatment of
these monkeys was properly removed to the federal court by respondent
National Institutes of Health (NIH), one of the defendants.  We hold that
removal was improper and that the case should be remanded to state court.

I
    Petitioners, who are organizations and individuals seeking the humane
treatment of animals, filed this suit in Louisiana civil district court;
the monkeys are housed at a primate research center in that State.  Three
defendants were named and are respondents here.  Respondent Institutes for
Behavior Resources (IBR) is a private entity that owns the monkeys. {1}
Respondent NIH now maintains custody of the monkeys, with IBR's consent.
Respondent Administrators of the Tulane Educational Fund (Tulane) is the
governing body for the primate research center that, in 1986, entered into
an agreement with NIH to care for the monkeys.  The suit sought to enjoin
further experimentation on the monkeys and to obtain custody over them.
Petitioners based their claim for this relief upon Louisiana law, including
provisions that (1) impose criminal sanctions for cruelty to animals, La.
Rev. Stat. Ann. MDRV 14:102.1 (1986 and Supp. 1991); (2) permit officers of
humane societies to remove, to a "stable," animals being subjected to
cruelty or that are "bruised, wounded, crippled, abrased, sick, or
diseased," La. Rev. Stat. Ann. MDRV 3:2431 (1987); (3) authorize tort
damages for "[e]very act whatever of man that causes damage to another,"
La. Civ. Code Ann., Art. 2315 (1979 and Supp. 1991); and (4) direct courts
to "proceed according to equity" in situations not covered by "legislation
or custom," La. Civ. Code Ann., Art. 4 (Supp. 1991).  See App. to Pet. for
Cert. A-35 to A-37.
    Shortly after the suit was filed, NIH removed the case to federal court
pursuant to 28 U. S. C. MDRV 1442(a)(1), which authorizes removal of state
suits by certain federal defendants.  The federal District Court then
granted a temporary restraining order barring NIH from carrying out its
announced plan to euthanize three of the remaining monkeys and, in the
process, to complete some of the medical research by performing surgical
procedures.  The court extended this order beyond its 20-day limit, see
Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 65(b), and NIH accordingly appealed the court's action
under 28 U. S. C. MDRV 1292(a)(1), which permits appellate review of
preliminary injunctions.
    On appeal, NIH argued, inter alia, that petitioners were not entitled
to the injunction because they lacked standing to seek protection of the
monkeys.  Petitioners, in turn, argued that the District Court had no
jurisdiction over the case because 28 U. S. C. MDRV 1442(a)(1) permits only
federal officials -- not federal agencies such as NIH -- to remove cases in
which they are named as defendants.  The Court of Appeals for the Fifth
Circuit agreed with NIH that petitioners could not satisfy the requirements
under Article III of the United States Constitution for standing.  It also
held that federal agencies have the power to remove cases under MDRV
1442(a)(1).  Accordingly, the Court of Appeals vacated the injunction and
dismissed the case.  See 895 F. 2d 1056 (CA5 1990).  We granted certiorari
to resolve a conflict between the Courts of Appeals for the Fifth and Third
Circuits on the question whether MDRV 1442(a)(1) permits removal by federal
agencies. {2}  498 U. S. --- (1990).  We conclude that it does not.

II
    We confront at the outset an objection raised by NIH to our
jurisdiction over the removal question.  NIH argues that, because the Court
of Appeals found that petitioners lack Article III standing to seek
protection of the monkeys, petitioners also lack standing even to contest
the removal of their suit.  We believe NIH misconceives both standing
doctrine and the scope of the lower court's standing ruling.
    Standing does not refer simply to a party's capacity to appear in
court.  Rather, standing is gauged by the specific common-law, statutory or
constitutional claims that a party presents.  "Typically, . . . the
standing inquiry requires careful judicial examination of a complaint's
allegations to ascertain whether the particular plaintiff is entitled to an
adjudication of the particular claims asserted."  Allen v. Wright, 468 U.
S. 737, 752 (1984) (emphasis added).  See also Fletcher, The Structure of
Standing, 98 Yale L. J. 221, 229 (1988) (standing "should be seen as a
question of substantive law, answerable by reference to the statutory and
constitutional provision whose protection is invoked").
    It is well established that a party may challenge a violation of
federal statute in federal court if it has suffered "injury that fairly can
be traced to the challenged action of the defendant," Simon v. Eastern
Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U. S. 26, 41 (1976), and that is "likely
to be redressed by the requested relief."  Allen v. Wright, supra, at 751.
In the case now before us, petitioners challenge NIH's conduct as a
violation of MDRV 1442(a)(1).  Petitioners' injury is clear, for they have
lost the right to sue in Louisiana court -- the forum of their choice.
This injury "fairly can be traced to the challenged action of defendants,"
since it directly results from NIH's removal of the case.  And the injury
is "likely to be redressed" if petitioners prevail on their claim because,
if removal is found to have been improper under MDRV 1442(a)(1), the
federal courts will lose subject matter jurisdiction and the "case shall be
remanded."  28 U. S. C. MDRV 1447(c); see infra, at 14-16.  Therefore,
petitioners clearly have standing to challenge the removal.
    Nothing in the Court of Appeals' decision undermines this conclusion.
The court below found that petitioners did not have standing to protest
"disruption of their personal relationships with the monkeys," 895 F. 2d,
at 1059, to claim "harm to their `aesthetic, conservational and
environmental interests,' " id., at 1060, or to act as advocates for the
monkeys' interests, id., at 1061.  But at no point did the Court of Appeals
suggest that petitioners' lack of standing to bring these claims interfered
with their right to challenge removal.  Indeed, it was only after the court
rejected petitioners' standing to protect the monkeys  {3} that it
considered the question whether NIH's removal was proper.  Id., at
1061-1062.  NIH argues that, were we also to consider the propriety of
removal, "the Court would be resolving the removal question in a context in
which the court below specifically found the injury in fact necessary to
[the concrete] adverseness [required for standing] to be lacking."  Brief
for Respondent NIH 7, n. 4.  We disagree.  The "adverseness" necessary to
resolving the removal question is supplied not by petitioners' claims for
the monkeys' protection but rather by petitioners' desire to prosecute
their claims in state court. {4}

III


A
    Section 1442(a)(1) permits a defendant in a civil suit filed in state
court to remove the action to a federal district court if the defendant is
"[a]ny officer of the United States or any agency thereof, or person acting
under him, [in a suit challenging] any act under color of such office . . .
."  28 U. S. C. MDRV 1442(a)(1). {5}  The question before us is whether
this provision permits agencies to remove.  " `[T]he starting point in
every case involving construction of a statute is the language itself.' "
Watt v. Alaska, 451 U. S. 259, 265 (1981) (citation omitted).  We have
little trouble concluding that the statutory language excludes agencies
from the removal power.  To be sure, the first clause in MDRV 1442(a)(1)
contains the words "or any agency thereof."  IBR argues that those words
designate one of two grammatical subjects in MDRV 1442(a)(1)'s opening
clause (namely, agencies) and that the clause's other subject is "[a]ny
officer of the United States."  But such a reading is plausible only if
this first clause is examined in isolation from the rest of MDRV
1442(a)(1).  "We continue to recognize that context is important in the
quest for [a] word's meaning," United States v. Bishop, 412 U. S. 346, 356
(1973), and that "[s]tatutory construction . . . is a holistic endeavor."
United Savings Assn. of Texas v. Timbers of Inwood Forest Associates, Ltd.,
484 U. S. 365, 371 (1988).  We find that, when construed in the relevant
context, the first clause of MDRV 1442(a)(1) grants removal power to only
one grammatical subject, "[a]ny officer," which is then modified by a
compound prepositional phrase: "of the United States or [of] any agency
thereof."
    Several features of MDRV 1442(a)(1)'s grammar and language support this
reading.  The first is the statute's punctuation.  Cf. United States v. Ron
Pair Enterprises, Inc., 489 U. S. 235, 241 (1989) (statute's meaning is
"mandated" by its "grammatical structure").  If the drafters of MDRV
1442(a)(1) had intended the phrase "or any agency thereof" to describe a
separate category of entities endowed with removal power, they would likely
have employed the comma consistently.  That is, they would have separated
"or any agency thereof" from the language preceding it, in the same way
that a comma sets apart the subsequent clause, which grants additional
removal power to persons "acting under" federal officers.  Absent the
comma, the natural reading of the clause is that it permits removal by
anyone who is an "officer" either "of the United States" or of one of its
agencies.
    Secondly, the language that follows "[a]ny officer of the United States
or any agency thereof" confirms our reading of that clause.  The subsequent
grant of removal authority to any "person acting under him" makes little
sense if the immediately preceding words -- which ought to contain the
antecedent for "him" -- refer to an agency rather than to an individual.
Finally, the phrase in MDRV 1442(a)(1) that limits exercise of the removal
power to suits in which the federal defendant is challenged for "any act
under color of such office" reads very awkwardly if the prior clauses refer
not only to persons but to agencies.  An agency would not normally be
described as exercising authority "under color" of an "office."  In sum,
IBR's interpretation of MDRV 1442(a)(1) simply does not accord with the
statute's language and structure.
    IBR tries to rescue its argument by invoking the well-established
principle that each word in a statute should be given effect.  See 2A N.
Singer, Sutherland on Statutory Construction MDRV 46.06 (C. Sands 4th rev.
ed. 1984).  IBR contends that any officer of an agency is also an officer
of the United States and therefore that the reference to "agency thereof"
in MDRV 1442(a)(1) is redundant unless it signifies the agency itself.  IBR
notes, in support of this contention, that when Congress enacted MDRV
1442(a)(1) it also defined "agency" as "any department, independent
establishment, commission, administration, authority, board or bureau of
the United States or any corporation in which the United States has a
proprietary interest."  28 U. S. C. MDRV 451.  Since the words "of the
United States" modify all of the entities listed in MDRV 451, IBR concludes
that an officer of an agency is necessarily an "officer of the United
States."  Brief for Respondent IBR 16-17.
    We find this argument unpersuasive.  IBR's broad definition of "officer
of the United States" may well be favored today.  Cf. Buckley v. Valeo 424
U. S. 1, 126 (1976) (" `[O]fficer of the United States,' " as used in Art.
II, MDRV 2, cl. 2, refers to any "appointee exercising significant
authority pursuant to the laws of the United States").  But there is no
evidence that this was the definition Congress had in mind in 1948, when it
enacted MDRV 1442(a)(1) and the companion provision defining "agency."
Indeed, in 1948 and for some time thereafter, the relationship between
certain independent agencies and the "Government of the United States" was
often disputed.  See, e. g., Pierce v. United States, 314 U. S. 306 (1941)
(holding that an officer or employee of the Tennessee Valley Authority was
not "an officer or employee acting under the authority of the United
States, or any Department, or any officer of the Government thereof" within
the meaning of a criminal statute first enacted in 1884); see also
Rainwater v. United States 356 U. S. 590 (1958) (resolving a conflict among
the courts of appeals and finding that a claim against the Commodity Credit
Corporation was a claim "against the Government of the United States, or
any department or officer thereof," within the meaning of the False Claims
Act); United States v. McNinch, 356 U. S. 595 (1958) (overturning the
Fourth Circuit's decision that the Federal Housing Administration was not
covered by the same provisions of the False Claims Act).  Given the
uncertain status of these independent federal entities, Congress may well
have believed that federal courts would not treat every "officer of . . .
a[n] agency" as an "officer of the United States."  Thus, the most likely
explanation for Congress' insertion of the "any officer of . . . any agency
thereof" language is that Congress sought to eliminate any doubt that
officers of the Tennessee Valley Authority and like entities possessed the
same removal authority as other "officer[s] of the United States."  See
Cannon v. University of Chicago, 441 U. S. 677, 698-699 (1979) ("evaluation
of congressional action . . . must take into account its contemporary legal
context").  In any event, this reading of the "any agency thereof" language
gives full effect to all of MDRV 1442(a)(1)'s terms while avoiding the
grammatical and linguistic anomalies produced by IBR's interpretation.

B
    Respondent NIH finds an alternative basis for agency removal power in
the subsequent clause of MDRV 1442(a)(1) that grants removal authority to
any "person acting under him."  In NIH's view, since the word "him" refers
to an officer of the United States, an agency would be a "person acting
under him" because each agency is administered or directed by such an
officer.  This is a rather tortured reading of the language.  We doubt
that, if Congress intended to give removal authority to agencies, it would
have expressed this intent so obliquely, referring to agencies merely as
entities "acting under" the agency heads.
    NIH faces an additional hurdle, moreover, in arguing that the word
"person" in the phrase "person under him" should refer to an agency.  As we
have often noted, "in common usage, the term `person' does not include the
sovereign, [and] statutes employing the [word] are ordinarily construed to
exclude it."  Will v. Michigan Dept. of State Police, 491 U. S. 58, 64
(1989) (citation omitted; internal quotes omitted; brackets in original);
see also id., at 73 (Brennan, J., dissenting).  This Court has been
especially reluctant to read "person" to mean the sovereign where, as here,
such a reading is "decidedly awkward."  Id., at 64.
    Nevertheless, "there is no hard and fast rule of exclusion" of the
sovereign, United States v. Cooper Corp., 312 U. S. 600, 604-605 (1941),
and our conventional reading of "person" may therefore be disregarded if
"[t]he purpose, the subject matter, the context, the legislative history,
[or] the executive interpretation of the statute . . . indicate an intent,
by the use of the term, to bring state or nation within the scope of the
law."  Id., at 605 (footnote omitted).  In the present case, NIH argues
that Congress' intent to include federal agencies within the term "person"
in MDRV 1442(a)(1) can be inferred from contemporary changes that Congress
made in the federal administrative structure.
    During the 15 years prior to enactment of MDRV 1442(a)(1) in 1948,
Congress created several independent agencies that it authorized to "sue
and be sued" in their own names in both state and federal courts.  In NIH's
view, these selective waivers of sovereign immunity gave Congress a reason
to extend the removal authority to include agencies.  Thus, NIH argues, the
word "person" in the removal statute should be read as referring to such
agencies.  Although none of these early "sue and be sued" statutes involved
major departments of the Federal Government, {6} we agree that those laws
could have prompted Congress to change its removal policy.  However, we
find no persuasive evidence that Congress actually made such a change when
it revised the removal statute in 1948.  NIH concedes that each of the nine
preceding versions of the removal statute, extending as far back as 1815,
limited the removal authority to some subset of federal officers.  See
Brief for Respondent NIH 21-23, and n. 18; see also Willingham v. Morgan,
395 U. S. 402, 405-406 (1969).  In revising this removal provision to its
present text, the House Committee Report offered only this comment to
explain the change: "The revised subsection . . . is extended to apply to
all officers and employees of the United States or any agency thereof.
[The predecessor provision] was limited to revenue officers engaged in the
enforcement of the criminal or revenue laws."  H. R. Rep. No. 308, 80th
Cong., 1st Sess., A134 (1947).  This is the only legislative history on the
1948 revision and, as even NIH admits, it does not express a clear purpose
to extend the removal power to agencies.  See Brief for Respondent NIH 21.
At best, the report language could be described as ambiguous on this point.
Thus, the evidence that Congress intended to give agencies removal power is
insufficient to overcome both the presumption against designating the
sovereign with the word "person" and the awkwardness of referring to an
agency as a "person acting under him."  Accord, Mesa v. California, 489 U.
S. 121, 136 (1989) ("[s]ection 1442(a) . . . seek[s] to do nothing more
than grant district court jurisdiction over cases in which a federal
officer is a defendant").

C
    NIH argues, finally, that even if a literal reading of MDRV 1442(a)(1)
would exclude agencies from the removal power, we should reject that
construction because it produces absurd results.  See, e. g., Public
Citizen v. Department of Justice, 491 U. S. 440, 454 (1989) (court can look
beyond statutory language when plain meaning would "compel an odd result").
NIH points out that if agencies are denied removal power the removability
of the present lawsuit would turn on the mere technicality of whether
petitioners named NIH or only individual officers of NIH as defendants.
    We think Congress could rationally have made such a distinction.  As we
have already noted, for more than 100 years prior to 1948, Congress
expressly limited whatever removal power it conferred upon federal
defendants to individual officers.  NIH does not suggest that any of these
earlier statutes produced absurd results; indeed, it acknowledges that,
"[i]n drafting these removal provisions, Congress referred to federal
officers because they, and not federal agencies, were the ones being sued
in state courts."  Brief for Respondent NIH 23.  The reason agencies were
not being sued, of course, was that Congress had not consented to such
suits and the agencies were therefore shielded by sovereign immunity.  See,
e. g., Larson v. Domestic & Foreign Commerce Corp., 337 U. S. 682, 693
(1949) ("suit to enjoin [federal action] may not be brought unless the
sovereign has consented"); S. Breyer & R. Stewart, Administrative Law and
Regulatory Policy 1018 (2d ed. 1985) (same).  That fact, however, would not
have prevented a plaintiff from erroneously naming -- as NIH argues that
petitioners have erroneously named -- an agency as a defendant in state
court.  The first nine incarnations of the federal officer removal statute
clearly reflect Congress' belief that state courts could be trusted to
dismiss the agency as defendant.  The determination of an agency's
immunity, in other words, was sufficiently straightforward that a state
court, even if hostile to the federal interest, would be unlikely to
disregard the law.  Thus, agencies would not need the protection of federal
removal.
    By contrast, the question of the immunity of federal officers who were
named as defendants was much more complicated.  Such immunity hinged on
"the crucial question . . . whether the relief sought in a suit nominally
addressed to the officer [was] relief against the sovereign."  Larson v.
Domestic & Foreign Commerce Corp., 337 U. S., at 687 (footnote omitted).
Often this question was resolved by examining whether an officer's
challenged actions exceeded the powers the sovereign had delegated to him.
See id., at 689-690.  Determining whether a federal officer had acted ultra
vires was fraught with difficulty and subject to considerable manipulation.
See Jaffe, Suits Against Governments and Officers: Sovereign Immunity, 77
Harv. L. Rev. 1, 20 (1963) ("The question always has been which suits
against officers will be allowed and which will not be"); id., at 29-39
(discussing seeming inconsistencies in this Court's resolution of the
question); see also Davis, Suing the Government By Falsely Pretending to
Sue an Officer, 29 U. Chi. L. Rev. 435 (1962).  Given these complexities,
we think Congress could rationally decide that individual officers, but not
agencies, needed the protection of a federal forum in which to raise their
federal defenses.  See Willingham v. Morgan, 395 U. S., at 405 ("Obviously,
the removal provision was an attempt to protect federal officers from
interference by hostile state courts").
    The situation in the present case is no different from what would have
obtained under the pre-1948 statutes.  NIH's defense in this case is
precisely that it is not amenable to suit in state court by reason of
sovereign immunity. {7}  As noted, there is nothing irrational in Congress'
determination that adjudication of that defense may be safely entrusted to
a state judge.  The only question remaining, then, is whether the
distinction Congress initially drew between agencies and officers continued
to be rational in 1948, when Congress revised the removal statute.
Although by then Congress had waived the immunity to suit of several
independent agencies,  {8} see supra, at 10, and n. 6, we find no fatal
inconsistency in Congress' determination that these few agencies' other
federal defenses (i. e., those aside from immunity) could be adjudicated in
state courts.  A crucial reason for treating federal officers differently
remained: because of the manipulable complexities involved in determining
their immunity, federal officers needed the protection of a federal forum.
See Willingham v. Morgan, supra, at 407 ("[O]ne of the most important
reasons for removal is to have the validity of the defense of official
immunity tried in a federal court"); see also Arizona v. Manypenny, 451 U.
S. 232, 242 (1981).  Accordingly, we see no reason to discard our reading
of the current removal statute, which excludes agencies from this power.

IV
    Having concluded that NIH lacked authority to remove petitioners' suit
to federal court, we must determine whether the case should be remanded to
state court.  Section 1447(c) of Title 28 provides that, "[i]f at any time
before final judgment it appears that the district court lacks subject
matter jurisdiction [over a case removed from state court], the case shall
be remanded."  Since the district court had no original jurisdiction over
this case, see n. 4, supra, a finding that removal was improper deprives
that court of subject matter jurisdiction and obliges a remand under the
terms of MDRV 1447(c).  See, e. g., Brewer v. Department of Housing and
Urban Development, 508 F. Supp. 72, 74 (SD Ohio 1980).
    Notwithstanding the clear requirements of MDRV 1447(c), NIH asks us to
affirm the Court of Appeals' dismissal of this suit on the ground that a
remand of petitioners' claims to Louisiana court would be futile.  NIH
reasons that it is an indispensable party to the suit and thus that
petitioners will be required, on remand, to retain NIH as a defendant (in
which case the suit will have to be dismissed, since NIH cannot be sued in
state court) or to substitute an NIH official as defendant (who presumably
will then remove the case pursuant to MDRV 1442(a)(1)).  Alternatively, NIH
argues that even if the suit can proceed without an NIH defendant, Tulane
will be able to remove the case under MDRV 1442(a)(1) since, in caring for
the monkeys, Tulane is a "person acting under" an NIH officer.  See Tr. of
Oral Arg. 30, 33.  Obviously, if any of these events is certain to occur, a
remand would be futile.
    NIH finds authority for a futility exception to the rule of remand in
Maine Assn. of Interdependent Neighborhoods v. Commissioner, Maine Dept. of
Human Services, 876 F. 2d 1051 (CA1 1989) (hereinafter M. A. I. N.).  See
Tr. of Oral Arg. 39.  We believe NIH's reliance on M. A. I. N. is
misplaced.  In that case, the plaintiff in a suit that had been removed
under MDRV 1441(b) was found to lack Article III standing. {9}  The
District Court invoked futility to justify dismissing rather than remanding
the case, but the court was overruled by the First Circuit, which did
remand the case to state court.  Given the factual similarities between M.
A. I. N. and the case now before us, we find that the result in M. A. I. N.
supports our view that a remand is required here.
    The purported grounds for the futility of a remand in M. A. I. N. were
(1) the plaintiff's lack of standing, (2) the state Commissioner's declared
intent to remove the case (following remand) in his capacity as a "person
acting under" the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), and (3) the
ability of the Secretary of HHS (a third-party defendant) also to effect
removal, as an "officer of the United States."  The First Circuit concluded
that none of these anticipated barriers to suit in state court was
sufficiently certain to render a remand futile.  To begin with, plaintiff's
lack of Article III standing would not necessarily defeat its standing in
state court.  Secondly, plaintiff's suit challenged an action by the state
Commissioner that was not necessarily an "act under color of [federal]
office," a prerequisite to the exercise of removal power under MDRV
1442(a)(1).  Finally, the First Circuit doubted whether the Secretary of
HHS would be an indispensable party in state court.  Id., at 1054-1055.
    Similar uncertainties in the case before us preclude a finding that a
remand would be futile.  Whether NIH is correct in arguing that either it
or one of its officers will be deemed an indispensable party in state court
turns on a question of Louisiana law, and we decline to speculate on the
proper result.  Similarly, whether Tulane will be able to remove the
remanded case requires a determination whether it is a "person acting
under" the Director of NIH within the meaning of MDRV 1442(a)(1).  This
mixed question of law and fact should not be resolved in the first instance
by this Court, least of all without an appropriate record.  We also take
note, as did the First Circuit, of "the literal words of MDRV 1447(c),
which, on their face, give . . . no discretion to dismiss rather than
remand an action."  Id., at 1054.  The statute declares that, where subject
matter jurisdiction is lacking, the removed case "shall be remanded."  28
U. S. C. MDRV 1447(c) (emphasis added).  We therefore reverse the decision
of the Court of Appeals and remand the case to the District Court with
instructions that the case be remanded to the Civil District Court for the
Parish of Orleans, Louisiana.
It is so ordered.


    Justice Scalia took no part in the decision of this case.







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1
    IBR conducted the original research on these monkeys, testing their
ability to regain use of their limbs after certain nerves had been severed.
This research was carried out with NIH funds at IBR's facilities in Silver
Spring, Maryland.  In 1981, however, Maryland police seized the monkeys and
arrested the scientist supervising the research on charges of cruelty to
animals in violation of state law.  While those charges were pending, a
Maryland court gave NIH temporary custody of the monkeys.  That arrangement
continues to this day, although the state's charges have been resolved in
the scientist's favor and the Maryland court's custody order has expired.
After the Maryland prosecution had terminated, NIH moved the monkeys to
Louisiana.  See 895 F. 2d 1056, 1057-1958, and n. 2 (CA5 1990).

2
    See Lovell Manufacturing v. Export-Import Bank of the United States,
843 F. 2d 725, 733 (CA3 1988) (only federal officers, not agencies, may
remove cases under MDRV 1442(a)(1)).

3
    The question whether the Court of Appeals erred in applying Article
III's standing requirements to these claims is not before us.  See n. 4,
infra.

4
    Nor does the Court of Appeals' decision that petitioners lack Article
III standing to protect the monkeys render the dispute surrounding NIH's
removal moot.  If removal was improper, the case must be remanded to state
court, where the requirements of Article III plainly will not apply.
    Our grant of certiorari did not extend to the Court of Appeals'
determination that petitioners lacked standing to protect the monkeys.  We
therefore leave open the question whether a federal court in a MDRV
1442(a)(1) removal case may require plaintiffs to meet Article III's
standing requirements with respect to the state-law claims over which the
federal court exercises pendent jurisdiction.  See Mesa v. California, 489
U. S. 121, 136 (1989) (basis for removal jurisdiction under MDRV 1442(a)(1)
is the federal officer's substantive defense that "arises under" federal
law).  See also Arizona v. Manypenny, 451 U. S. 232, 242 (1981)
("[I]nvocation of removal jurisdiction by a federal officer . . . is a
purely derivative form of jurisdiction, neither enlarging nor contracting
the rights of the parties" (footnote omitted)); id., at 242, n. 17 ("This
principle of derivative jurisdiction is instructive where, as here,
relevant state-court jurisdiction is found to exist and the question is
whether the federal court in effect loses such jurisdiction as a result of
removal").

5
    Section 1442(a) reads in pertinent part:
    "(a) A civil action or criminal prosecution commenced in a State court
against any of the following persons may be removed by them to the district
court of the United States for the district and division embracing the
place wherein it is pending:
    "(1) Any officer of the United States or any agency thereof, or person
acting under him, for any act under color of such office or on account of
any right, title or authority claimed under any Act of Congress for the
apprehension or punishment of criminals or the collection of the revenue."

6
    Agencies that could sue and be sued in state court included the Federal
Crop Insurance Corporation, 52 Stat. 72, 73 (1938); the Farmers Home
Corporation, 50 Stat. 522, 527 (1937); and the Reconstruction Finance
Corporation, 47 Stat. 5, 6 (1932).

7
    We disregard NIH's other defense that petitioners lack Article III
standing.  That defense could not be raised in state court, and thus the
removal statute is not concerned with its protection.  Cf. Mesa v.
California, 489 U. S. 121 (1989).

8
    See, e. g., FHA v. Burr, 309 U. S. 242, 245 (1940) (agencies authorized
to "sue and be sued" are presumed to have fully waived immunity unless, as
to particular types of suits, there is clearly a contrary legislative
intent).

9
    Because the case in M. A. I. N. was removed to federal court pursuant
to MDRV 1441(b) (original jurisdiction removal) rather than MDRV 1442(a)(1)
(federal officer removal), the application of constitutional standing
requirements was appropriate.  Cf. n. 4, supra.