[00:00:02] Speaker 00:
Case number 15-5333, Continental Resources Inc.

[00:00:07] Speaker 00:
Appellate versus Sally Jewell.

[00:00:08] Speaker 00:
Secretary, United States Department of the Interior at L. Mr. Leggett for the appellate, Ms.

[00:00:14] Speaker 00:
Roundtree for the appellate.

[00:00:49] Speaker 06:
May it please the court, public and continental resources, the Federal Royalty Act generally requires interior to issue decisions in royalty appeals within 33 months of their commencement, subject to tolling by agreement of the parties.

[00:01:07] Speaker 06:
Our case concerns a denial of our appeal by lack of a timely decision that was made final by operation of law on June 17, 2013.

[00:01:18] Speaker 06:
The Department gave Continental actual notice of finality six weeks later.

[00:01:23] Speaker 06:
We had 180 days to bring suit running from receipt of notice of the lessee of the final agency action.

[00:01:32] Speaker 06:
We filed 213 days after the action became final – excuse me – 171 days after we received notice.

[00:01:41] Speaker 06:
The district court held that we were deemed to have had constructive notice on the day that the decision became final by operation of law, making our suit 33 days late.

[00:01:55] Speaker 06:
But the case law says that receipt of notice and every other statute that we have found means receipt of an actual notice from the agency.

[00:02:03] Speaker 06:
The government will say that in the context of this statute, Section 1724, a different rule has to apply.

[00:02:12] Speaker 06:
But the problem with the government's interpretation is that the phrase receipt of notice comes from Section 1724 itself.

[00:02:22] Speaker 06:
That's the phrase that Congress chose when it overhauled the agency's royalty appeals procedure.

[00:02:29] Speaker 06:
The phrase in the statute is the same whether the decision is timely or tardy.

[00:02:35] Speaker 06:
And if Congress had intended a different rule to apply for tardy decisions so that they ran from date of finality, it would have said so.

[00:02:45] Speaker 04:
Why can't it be a phrase that applies to both contexts?

[00:02:49] Speaker 04:
So that in a situation in which you have a decision before the 33 months, the receipt of notice occurs when the decision is mailed to you and it's received, and then when, as the statute spells out by its plain terms, no decision is made by 33 months, then there's a receipt of notice because anybody who reads the statute has noticed that there's

[00:03:09] Speaker 04:
A decision has been made as of the 33-month deadline.

[00:03:13] Speaker 04:
It's a decision against the department.

[00:03:17] Speaker 06:
Well, the reason not to go that way is explained in the impact energy decision from the 10th Circuit.

[00:03:25] Speaker 06:
because it is in contradiction of congressional practice.

[00:03:29] Speaker 06:
That case catalogs several statutes where statutes of limitation begin to run from the date of finality of the action, and others where receipt of notice is required.

[00:03:41] Speaker 06:
In this case, receipt of notice was required.

[00:03:44] Speaker 06:
And if the constructive notice approach that the district court followed, and which I think is what underlies your question, Your Honor,

[00:03:51] Speaker 06:
if that were followed, that effectively takes one category of appeals and moves them into a camp where Congress could have said finality on the date – I mean, I'm sorry, this clock runs on the date that it becomes final.

[00:04:04] Speaker 04:
I mean, there's no doubt, as is often the case, Congress could have said something that would be clearer.

[00:04:09] Speaker 04:
That's definitely true.

[00:04:11] Speaker 04:
But I think the question is, what's the best way to deal with the statutory language that we have?

[00:04:16] Speaker 04:
in front of us.

[00:04:17] Speaker 04:
And the other cases that you rely on for construction of the term receipt of notice, do they involve a statute that has a provision like this one that says that there's

[00:04:30] Speaker 04:
There's deemed to be a decision on the expiration of the 33 months?

[00:04:34] Speaker 06:
There is one, the Federal Tort Claims Act.

[00:04:36] Speaker 06:
Yeah, that's the only one.

[00:04:37] Speaker 06:
Six months the government has.

[00:04:39] Speaker 06:
And even though the decision is deemed final or can be deemed final, the government still has to issue a mail-in notice of finality, a notice of final decision.

[00:04:50] Speaker 06:
And in the Barnes case, another 10th Circuit case, that court looked

[00:04:54] Speaker 06:
at the situation and said, no, these are two distinct clocks.

[00:04:58] Speaker 06:
So we would ask the court to be guided by that position here, because these are two distinct clocks.

[00:05:05] Speaker 05:
It wasn't entirely clear when the 33-month period expired in your case, was it?

[00:05:13] Speaker 05:
Because there was a dispute about the extension.

[00:05:17] Speaker 06:
That is correct.

[00:05:18] Speaker 06:
And there was a dispute, and it was caused by a disagreement not over the text of the statute itself, but over the terms of a tolling agreement between the parties.

[00:05:32] Speaker 06:
And the Board of Land Appeals didn't even order the parties to brief that, or at least our brief was not due until after it later determined the statute had expired.

[00:05:42] Speaker 06:
So.

[00:05:43] Speaker 05:
I mean, there may be a situation where there's

[00:05:47] Speaker 05:
I guess you could think of this in terms of defining what notice means.

[00:05:51] Speaker 05:
When the party that has the opportunity to bring the suit actually knows that the 33-month period clearly expired, there is a question whether the 180 days starts running from that point.

[00:06:09] Speaker 05:
Because they've had actual notice, they know it.

[00:06:14] Speaker 05:
They know the period expired as well as the Department of Interior knows.

[00:06:19] Speaker 05:
But that could save that issue for another day because that's not the situation here.

[00:06:27] Speaker 06:
Well, I agree with Your Honor on that point, although I think Ms.

[00:06:30] Speaker 06:
Roundtree will try to persuade you otherwise.

[00:06:33] Speaker 06:
But what she's basically asking the court to do is to adopt a Nostradamus exception to the rule on receipt of notice.

[00:06:43] Speaker 06:
If we had correctly foretold how the IBLA would rule on our dispute, then we should be deemed to be on notice as of the date we picked.

[00:06:52] Speaker 06:
Now, in the appendix to the record at 194 and 95, we showed we were no Nostradamus.

[00:06:59] Speaker 06:
We had argued for March 10 or no later than June 15.

[00:07:03] Speaker 06:
The board picked June 17.

[00:07:06] Speaker 04:
So can I ask you if, under your interpretation,

[00:07:09] Speaker 04:
If the 33 months passes and there's been no decision, then the regime that you would think should happen is that then the agency should mail you something that lets you know that the 33 months has elapsed.

[00:07:22] Speaker 04:
And then you'd have notice.

[00:07:23] Speaker 04:
Is that right?

[00:07:24] Speaker 04:
That's correct.

[00:07:24] Speaker 04:
And if they send you that kind of document and they say, I'm hereby notifying you that the 33 months passed on such and such date, which is looking back two weeks,

[00:07:36] Speaker 04:
What's the trigger date?

[00:07:37] Speaker 04:
The date we receive the notice.

[00:07:39] Speaker 04:
So even though the 33 months passed two weeks ago, it would be, and then a notice tells you that that's when it passed and that's when the decision was made, the triggering date would be the date that you got noticed that the 33 months has already passed.

[00:07:52] Speaker 06:
That's correct.

[00:07:53] Speaker 06:
And even in most timely appeals, lessees would not receive notice until some time after the final decision was actually issued.

[00:08:02] Speaker 06:
So there's almost always that kind of gap.

[00:08:03] Speaker 06:
There's going to be a lag period.

[00:08:05] Speaker 06:
If I may, before I sit down, I would like to call the Court's attention to page 150 in the appendix.

[00:08:12] Speaker 06:
Identified there is a Miss Amber Eller, a hardworking civil servant whose job it is to keep track of the 33-month clock for the government.

[00:08:22] Speaker 06:
If she is told that she ought to send notice out to parties that their appeal time or the 33-month period has lapsed, she will.

[00:08:31] Speaker 06:
And then the government's concern about an open-ended statute of limitations will dissolve.

[00:08:37] Speaker 06:
After all, the Administrative Procedure Act requires prompt notice of denials of decisions by the OSCE-555E, and that notice will create certainty in the operation of this statute.

[00:08:51] Speaker 06:
I'll reserve the rest of my time.

[00:08:52] Speaker 06:
Thank you.

[00:09:04] Speaker 01:
Good morning, Your Honors.

[00:09:05] Speaker 01:
May it please the Court to narrow round for the United States.

[00:09:09] Speaker 01:
As a threshold matter, the case before this Court arises only under the Royalty Act.

[00:09:16] Speaker 01:
And the Court need not look to any other statute to determine what it means for an administrative lessee to receive notice under Section 1724, because one, that meaning can be derived from the provisions in the legislative history of the Royalty Act itself,

[00:09:33] Speaker 01:
And two, the Act simply states that a lessee must be in receipt of notice, but the Act does not place any restrictions on the way in which receipt may be accomplished.

[00:09:48] Speaker 01:
Nor does the Act rule out the possibility that receipt may indeed be accomplished by operation of another provision within the statute.

[00:10:00] Speaker 01:
Now, against that backdrop, as the court decides the notice issue in this case, your analysis can be informed by looking at the way in which notice played out in the context of this case.

[00:10:12] Speaker 01:
The case arose as a royalty dispute in which the department issued an order to Continental directing that it pay a shy of $1.8 million in additional royalties that were owed to the United States.

[00:10:24] Speaker 01:
Now, when Continental made the decision to administratively appeal from that order, the crucial timeframes that are set forth in the statute went into effect and governed Continental's appeal.

[00:10:44] Speaker 01:
That took place from the very moment the administrative appeal was filed and it continued through

[00:10:53] Speaker 01:
tilled throughout the process.

[00:10:55] Speaker 04:
So your colleague on the other side says the same thing basically happens under the FDCA.

[00:11:00] Speaker 01:
Well, under the FDCA, if you'll read, there's no notice requirement that's associated with the deemed final decision provision.

[00:11:07] Speaker 01:
So though it does have a deemed final provision, there's no notice requirement associated with it.

[00:11:12] Speaker 01:
So it actually has no application to this case.

[00:11:14] Speaker 01:
I think perhaps they just relied on it because it has a deemed final provision.

[00:11:18] Speaker 01:
But it really, it adds nothing to this case because there's no notice requirement associated with it.

[00:11:23] Speaker 04:
What happens under the FTCA then when a decision enters in by operate because the period has lapsed?

[00:11:31] Speaker 01:
Under that statute, I believe it reads that the

[00:11:37] Speaker 01:
I'm sorry?

[00:11:38] Speaker 01:
It states that the failure of an agency to make a final disposition of a claim within six months after it is filed shall, at the option of the claimant, at any time thereafter, be deemed a final denial of the claim for purposes of this section.

[00:11:54] Speaker 01:
And that's not... So essentially it's exhaustion in that statute.

[00:11:58] Speaker 01:
Indeed.

[00:11:58] Speaker 01:
Right.

[00:12:01] Speaker 01:
Now, I'm sorry, getting back to my point, when Continental decided to administrative appeal from the order, the crucial timeframes that governed its appeal were set forth in the Royalty Act at subsections H and J, namely the 33-month time frame and the 180-day time frame.

[00:12:19] Speaker 05:
What about the tolling?

[00:12:21] Speaker 01:
Well, actually, that's an incorrect word.

[00:12:23] Speaker 01:
There is nothing in the statute that provides for the tolling of the 33-month period.

[00:12:27] Speaker 01:
It states that there can be an extension to that period.

[00:12:31] Speaker 05:
Well, extension, tolling.

[00:12:32] Speaker 01:
Well, no, actually, with all due respect, I think there's a difference.

[00:12:36] Speaker 01:
Tolling suggests that it stops running.

[00:12:40] Speaker 01:
There's nothing in the statute that says anything stops the 33-month period from running, including if there's a dispute about the length of an extension.

[00:12:49] Speaker 01:
So even if the parties are grappling or disagreeing as to the extent of an extension or the length of an extension, the 33-month provision is in place, and nothing in the statute says that it is told or that it just stops until that dispute is resolved.

[00:13:06] Speaker 04:
And if the dispute isn't resolved until after the 180 days have already elapsed?

[00:13:12] Speaker 01:
Well, to back up, if the dispute isn't resolved within the 33-month period, the 33-month period kicks in, and then the 180 days begin to run.

[00:13:21] Speaker 04:
Right.

[00:13:21] Speaker 04:
And so if the 180 days begin to run and there's no definitive resolution of the dispute by the time the 180 days have run, then what would happen?

[00:13:30] Speaker 01:
Well, it's our position that once the 33-month period kicks in and is activated and the legal consequences of it take... But it doesn't kick in until the extension is over?

[00:13:42] Speaker 01:
There's nothing in the statute that supports that reading.

[00:13:45] Speaker 01:
There's nothing that tolls it.

[00:13:46] Speaker 01:
There's nothing that tolls the statute.

[00:13:49] Speaker 01:
The point I'm trying to make is that

[00:13:51] Speaker 01:
Under the statute, 33 months are over, that's it.

[00:13:54] Speaker 01:
Everything goes into effect.

[00:13:55] Speaker 01:
There's a final agency action.

[00:13:57] Speaker 01:
The administrative appellant has a statutorily granted right to go to court.

[00:14:01] Speaker 01:
That's what the statute says.

[00:14:03] Speaker 01:
It doesn't say, oh, if there's a dispute about this extension, then we will stop the 33-month clock from running.

[00:14:09] Speaker 01:
There's nothing that supports that.

[00:14:11] Speaker 05:
So the parties are not free to enter into an agreement, an extension agreement?

[00:14:17] Speaker 01:
Oh, they may enter into an agreement, but my point is if there's a dispute as to what that agreement says, nothing stops the 33 months from running according to the language of the statute.

[00:14:28] Speaker 03:
I'm sorry, what would be the point of agreeing to an extension if it doesn't change the 33 months?

[00:14:37] Speaker 01:
If there's an agreement about the extension and it's in place, then you have the 33 months plus the time of extension.

[00:14:44] Speaker 04:
If it's undisputed.

[00:14:45] Speaker 04:
In other words, if it's undisputed.

[00:14:46] Speaker 02:
Correct.

[00:14:47] Speaker 02:
So you're just saying if they get into an argument about it.

[00:14:49] Speaker 02:
Right.

[00:14:50] Speaker 01:
There's nothing in the statute to provide for tolling or stopping the running of the 33 months.

[00:14:55] Speaker 01:
Now, for most... It just seems odd.

[00:14:57] Speaker 04:
If there's a dispute, then by definition the parties don't have a common understanding of what the deadline is.

[00:15:04] Speaker 04:
And then if the dispute lapses on past 180 days, and it turns out that the dispute is resolved in a way that says that the 38 months has already passed, then it seems a bit unfair to the party that thought that it had a good claim about the deadline.

[00:15:20] Speaker 01:
That could be read as perhaps a fault of the way in which the statute plays out, but what the statute does tell a lessee is that you need to protect your interests because by the language, all that's here in the statute, if you read everything, the only thing you have and you know for sure is that when 33 months are up, all of the legal, as I said, the legal consequences of that provision kick in.

[00:15:42] Speaker 01:
So it's not necessarily unfair, because a lessee always knows 33 months is an important time frame.

[00:15:48] Speaker 01:
And that's the point I was going to get to next, is that for most lessees, including continental, it would be important to be particularly mindful of the time frames that are in the statute.

[00:15:59] Speaker 01:
because and actually for them to be mindful of that time period from the very moment they file their administrative appeal throughout the process and that's because the legal consequences of failing to heed those time frames or failing to protect their interests with respect to those time frames are extremely significant and Continental doesn't dispute this at page 26.

[00:16:21] Speaker 05:
This is so reminiscent of a problem that plagued the

[00:16:26] Speaker 05:
the federal courts for years and years and years because the time limit for appeal ran from the entry of judgment, which was an act of the clerk of the court.

[00:16:36] Speaker 05:
And the only way that you could find out when that judgment was entered was to keep, at some point, it was before email or internet, you had to keep calling, you had to call the clerk of the court every day to make sure.

[00:16:50] Speaker 05:
So finally, the federal rules were changed.

[00:16:53] Speaker 05:
and required the clerk to give notice, and there's a separate rule that says if you don't get actual notice, then the time for appeal doesn't run.

[00:17:04] Speaker 05:
It sounds to me like the same thing.

[00:17:09] Speaker 01:
Let me, I'm not sure, I understand what you said, I'm not sure the point that you're making, but let me, to the extent you're grappling with notice, indulge me and let me explain the way notice plays out under the entirety of subsection H. It's short, but I think it will be helpful.

[00:17:25] Speaker 01:
Under subsection H1, which is not this case, H1 addresses circumstances in which the agency actually does issue a final notice, a final decision.

[00:17:38] Speaker 01:
In that circumstance, the agency can issue such a notice the day after the administrative proceeding begins, or it can wait, or if it has to wait, until the day before the 33rd month ends.

[00:17:51] Speaker 01:
It can issue anywhere in that timeframe.

[00:17:53] Speaker 01:
The lessee has no idea when the decision issues.

[00:17:59] Speaker 01:
The lessee has no idea what the decision says.

[00:18:03] Speaker 01:
In that instance, subsection J makes sure that the 180-day limitations period does not run until the lessee has received notice that there is a final agency decision.

[00:18:17] Speaker 01:
By contrast, let's go to the situation that applies here.

[00:18:20] Speaker 01:
That's H2B, subsection H2B.

[00:18:23] Speaker 01:
In that instance, the department does not issue a notice within the 33-month timeframe.

[00:18:30] Speaker 01:
But when the day after that 33 month passes, the lessee knows, the lessee has actual knowledge, the lessee has actual notice that there is a final decision in its case.

[00:18:43] Speaker 01:
It's a deemed final decision.

[00:18:45] Speaker 01:
The lessee knows that it has a statutory right to go to court and seek judicial review of that final decision.

[00:18:53] Speaker 04:
I mean, that's equivalent, but you could have an anonymous situation in which the decision comes down the day before the 33 months elapses, and then the agency sends the notice of the decision, and that notice doesn't get received until after the 33 months, right?

[00:19:07] Speaker 01:
Well, if that would still fall within the timeframe of the notice issuing within the 33 months, and so the time runs under section J.

[00:19:16] Speaker 01:
from the time the notice is received.

[00:19:19] Speaker 01:
But here, as I said, the lessee knows the day after the 33rd month.

[00:19:25] Speaker 01:
It knows there's a decision.

[00:19:26] Speaker 01:
It knows it can challenge it.

[00:19:27] Speaker 01:
And it knows what the decision says.

[00:19:29] Speaker 01:
The lessee knows that the decision is in the department's favor.

[00:19:34] Speaker 01:
So Section J doesn't have to require that the lessee receive a piece of mail or a fax to tell it that there's a final agency action because the lessee knows that by operation of law.

[00:19:47] Speaker 01:
I see my time is run.

[00:19:49] Speaker 01:
I'd just like to close, if you don't mind, by making two short points.

[00:19:52] Speaker 01:
The first is that Continental is urging this court to adopt a fundamentally untenable construction of the Royalty Act.

[00:20:00] Speaker 01:
It's a construction of the Act that's designed to get Continental out of the position it found itself in when, one, it failed to time to file its lawsuit within 180 days of the 33-month time frame in the statute.

[00:20:13] Speaker 01:
And two, it didn't file its lawsuit within 180 days of the June 15, 2013 date that Continental repeatedly and consistently advocated for.

[00:20:25] Speaker 01:
It's a construction of the statute that shuns all contextual meaning that could be derived from the provisions or the legislative history of the statute.

[00:20:35] Speaker 01:
And it's a construction that's at odds with Congress's intent in passing the Royalty Act amendments.

[00:20:43] Speaker 01:
And that was to provide for a swift and complete resolution of monetary royalty disputes.

[00:20:50] Speaker 01:
And for that reason, their construction should be rejected.

[00:20:53] Speaker 04:
Can I just ask you one factual question, which is how many cases are in, do you have a sense of how many cases are in the pipeline such that if your position were not to prevail, which would mean that in any case in which no notice was sent, even though the 33 months has elapsed, the 180-day clock is still alive, as I understand it, right?

[00:21:13] Speaker 04:
So if you lose,

[00:21:16] Speaker 04:
then for any decision that has already happened by virtue of the 33 months having elapsed, you haven't sent any notice because you didn't know you had to send a notice.

[00:21:26] Speaker 04:
And in theory, review could still be had in those cases, if I'm understanding correctly.

[00:21:30] Speaker 04:
Maybe I'm not understanding correctly.

[00:21:32] Speaker 04:
But I'm wondering how many cases, do you have a sense of how many cases we're talking about?

[00:21:36] Speaker 01:
I don't know how many cases, and to be sure that I understood your question, you're essentially asking how many cases are in the pipeline that are such as this one, where the time, the 33 months ran and there was no affirmative notice in addition to the operation.

[00:21:52] Speaker 01:
I do not know that number, I apologize.

[00:21:55] Speaker 05:
Before you sit down, I just looked at the statute.

[00:21:58] Speaker 05:
24H1, and the very last sentence, that's the provision, as you know, that deals with the 33-month period.

[00:22:08] Speaker 05:
The last sentence says the 33-month period may be extended by any period of time agreed upon in writing by the secretary and the appellant.

[00:22:17] Speaker 01:
Right?

[00:22:17] Speaker 01:
Yes.

[00:22:18] Speaker 01:
Yes, no, please, I hope you didn't misunderstand.

[00:22:21] Speaker 01:
An extension may be had.

[00:22:25] Speaker 05:
As long as the parties agree.

[00:22:26] Speaker 01:
An extension.

[00:22:29] Speaker 05:
For any period of time.

[00:22:31] Speaker 01:
It could be an extension for any period of time.

[00:22:33] Speaker 01:
There can be an extension.

[00:22:34] Speaker 01:
There's no denying that.

[00:22:35] Speaker 01:
My point was, if there is a dispute about the length or duration of that extension, nothing in the statute provides that the 33-month period is told until that dispute is resolved.

[00:22:52] Speaker 01:
The final point.

[00:22:54] Speaker 05:
Suppose that the parties

[00:22:56] Speaker 05:
reach an agreement and it's in writing and the secretary signs off on it.

[00:23:02] Speaker 05:
And the dispute is whether the agreement is for 60 days or 150 days.

[00:23:07] Speaker 05:
Is the extension only for 60 days under your view?

[00:23:14] Speaker 05:
The parties agree it's for 60 days.

[00:23:16] Speaker 05:
Is the extension only for 60 days under your view?

[00:23:20] Speaker 01:
Is your hypothetical saying the parties both agree that it's a 60-day extension?

[00:23:25] Speaker 05:
The dispute is whether the extension was for 60 days or 150 days.

[00:23:31] Speaker 05:
But they agree it was at least for 60.

[00:23:33] Speaker 05:
One party says it was for 150.

[00:23:35] Speaker 05:
The other says no, it's only for 60.

[00:23:37] Speaker 05:
When does the 33-month period run?

[00:23:43] Speaker 01:
Under the statute, the 33-month period runs when it's over.

[00:23:46] Speaker 05:
When what's over?

[00:23:48] Speaker 01:
when 33 months from the date the administrative proceeding began.

[00:23:52] Speaker 05:
Even though the party's minimum agreement is a 60-day extension?

[00:23:58] Speaker 01:
Under your hypothetical, if the dispute is still in place when the 33 months ran, I'm simply saying there's nothing in the statute that says that the 33-month time period has to stop, or is invalidated, or is told.

[00:24:09] Speaker 01:
Nothing supports that.

[00:24:11] Speaker 01:
That's the only point I'm making.

[00:24:12] Speaker 01:
I understand the point you're making, but I'm saying nothing in the statute provides for that time period to stop.

[00:24:18] Speaker 01:
The last point I'd like to make is that, as we've demonstrated, Continental received notice of the final agency action by operation of law.

[00:24:26] Speaker 01:
So from the very moment it received notice, Continental had the ability and the control to take measures and...

[00:24:39] Speaker 01:
But from the very moment it received notice of the fact that there was a final agency decision, Continental had the ability and the control to protect its interests by seeking judicial review within a time frame that satisfied the 180-day limitations period under even the most restrictive reading of the 33-month provision.

[00:25:04] Speaker 01:
Continental did not do so.

[00:25:06] Speaker 01:
Its lawsuit is time barred, and the judgment of the district court should be affirmed.

[00:25:14] Speaker 02:
Thank you.

[00:25:15] Speaker 02:
I know we had a little time left.

[00:25:17] Speaker 02:
Two minutes.

[00:25:17] Speaker 02:
OK.

[00:25:18] Speaker 02:
You had two minutes left.

[00:25:22] Speaker 06:
I will beat that easily.

[00:25:25] Speaker 06:
Under the government's proffered construction, a lot of complications will arise.

[00:25:31] Speaker 06:
The 1996 law that created Section 1724 is called the Federal Royalty Simplification and Fairness Act.

[00:25:41] Speaker 06:
The government's interpretation is not simple, and it's not fair.

[00:25:45] Speaker 06:
On page 13 of our reply brief, I call the Court's attention to legislative history that explained, because the federal royalty program is overly complex, burdensome, and unfair to oil and gas exploration and development companies who seek to do business with the Department of the Interior, competition for both onshore and offshore leases is diminished.

[00:26:07] Speaker 06:
Not every federal essay is an exon or even a continental resources.

[00:26:12] Speaker 06:
There are many small companies, especially in the West, who don't have high-priced Denver or Washington lawyers to advise them on the workings of the 33-month rule.

[00:26:22] Speaker 06:
Notice and receipt of notice will make this work.

[00:26:26] Speaker 06:
If the court has no further questions, we ask that the district court ruling be reversed.

[00:26:32] Speaker 06:
Thank you.

[00:26:34] Speaker 03:
The case will be submitted.