Dodd-Frank’s Intersection With The Bankruptcy Code Could Have Significant Impact For Unsecured Creditors

On February 11th, the three private plaintiff-appellants and eleven State plaintiff-appellants in State National Bank of Big Spring, et al. v. Jacob J. Lew, et al. filed briefs with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in their appeal of the District Court's decision that the plaintiffs lacked standing to challenge certain provisions of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, Pub. L. No. 111-203, 124 Stat. 1376 (2010) (the "Dodd-Frank Act" or the "Act").  The plaintiff-appellants challenged the "Orderly Liquidation Authority" granted to the FDIC under Title II of the Dodd-Frank Act on the basis that such authority supplants Chapters 7 and 11 of the Bankruptcy Codeand thereby strips the plaintiff-appellants of the statutory protections, amounting to property rights, afforded by the Bankruptcy Code to unsecured creditors.  Judge Huvelle found this argument insufficient to satisfy the standing requirement imposed by Article