Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield (“Blue Cross”) and its wholly-owned subsidiary, USAble Corporation (“USAble”), brought this action against Little Rock Cardiology Clinic, P.A., and Little Rock HMA, Inc. (jointly, “the health care providers”), seeking to enjoin a civil action between the parties pending in the Circuit Court of Pulaski County, Arkansas. 1 The district court 2 granted the health care providers’ motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Blue Cross and USAble appeal, arguing that the district court’s dismissal was improper in numerous respects. The health care providеrs filed a cross-appeal, arguing alternatively that the district court could have found in their favor on grounds of claim or issue preclusion. For the following reasons, we affirm the district court’s dismissal for lack of jurisdiction.
I. BACKGROUND
More than ten years ago, the Prudential Insurance Company of America and other health insurers obtained a judgment in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas declaring that the Arkansas Patient Protection Act of 1995 (“the Arkansas PPA”) was partially preempted by the Employеe Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”).
3
Prudential Ins. Co. of Am. v. Nat’l Park Med. Ctr., Inc.,
The so-called
“Prudential I
injunction” was undisturbed for nearly five years. On April 2, 2003, however, the United States Supreme Court handed down its decision in
Kentucky Association of Health Plans, Inc. v. Miller,
Although the Court did not refer to Prudential I or the Arkansas PPA, interested parties soon came forward to argue that the any willing provider provisions of the preempted Arkansas PPA were materially indistinguishable from the Kentucky statutes saved from preemption in Miller. Little Rock Cardiology Clinic and Little Rock HMA (under the name “Southwest Regional Medical Center”) sent separate letters to Blue Cross requesting admittance to its provider network in light of the Supreme Court’s decision in Miller. Blue Cross and USAble responded to the health care providers’ requests by filing suit in the Eastern District of Arkansas CBlue Cross I). Blue Cross and USAble sought, among other things, a declaratory judgment stating that the Prudential I injunction remained valid after Miller. The health care providers counterclaimed, seeking admittance to Blue Cross and USAble’s provider networks as well as damages for Blue Cross and USAble’s alleged violation of the any willing provider provisions of the Arkansas PPA.
Soon thereafter, the State of Arkansas and two of the original defendants in
Prudential I
filed a motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b)(5) to dissolve the
Prudential I
injunction based on the Supreme Court’s decision in
Miller.
On February 12, 2004, the district court granted the motion and dissolved the
Prudential I
injunction in its entirety.
Prudential Ins. Co. of Am. v. Nat’l Park Med. Ctr., Inc.,
No. 4:95-cv-00514-JMM,
Meanwhile, the district court had stayed
Blue Cross I
pending the outcome of
Prudential II.
Once the court lifted its stay, the parties filed cross-motions for judgment on the pleadings. On March 27, 2006] the district court dismissed with prejudice Blue Cross and USAble’s declaratory judgment claim, finding that this court’s decision in
Prudential II
“disрosed of all or nearly all of the claims asserted in the complaint.”
Ark. Blue Cross & Blue Shield v. St. Vincent Infirmary Med. Ctr. (Blue Cross I),
No. 4:03-cv-00662-JLH,
Less than one month later, the health care providers filed suit against Blue Cross and USAble in the Circuit Court of Pulaski County, Arkansas {Blue Cross II), again seeking damages for Blue Cross and USAble’s alleged violation of the any willing provider provisions of the Arkansas PPA. While the parties disagree over how far Blue Cross II has progressed, by all accounts the litigation is ongoing.
Not willing merely to defend against the health care providers’ claims in state court, Blue Cross and USAble brought this action in federal court
(Blue Cross III),
seeking to enjoin the health care providers from proceeding in
Blue Cross II. Ark. Blue Cross & Blue Shield v. St. Vincent Infirmary Med. Ctr. (Blue Cross III),
No. 4:07-cv-00813-JMM,
II. DISCUSSION
It is a verity that federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction. Parties may not enlarge that jurisdiction by waiver or consent.
4:20 Commc’ns, Inc. v. Paradigm Co.,
We review de novo the district court’s grant of the health care providers’ motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.
Hastings v. Wilson,
From the outset, federal subject matter jurisdiction is plainly in doubt because Blue Cross and USAble have not shown any basis for federal question jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1331, or diversity jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1332. Ordinarily, that would end the inquiry. In this case, however, Blue Cross and USAble assert that the district court had ancillary jurisdiction to enforce the injunction that it entered more than a decade ago in Prudential I. Alternatively, Blue Cross and USAble assert that the district court’s “inherent power” under the All Writs Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1651, was “sufficient to establish jurisdiction” over this action. We disagree with both assertions.
To decide the jurisdictional question we must disentangle two distinct issues: first, whether the district court had ancillary jurisdiction to enforce the original terms of the injunction that it entered in Prudential I; and second, whether the All Writs Act supplied the district court with an independent source of subject matter jurisdiction.
Ancillary jurisdiction is not a wellspring of new jurisdiction. Ancillary jurisdiction is instead derived from some prеexisting source of jurisdiction. As the
*817
Supreme Court has described it, “the doctrine of ancillary jurisdiction ... recognizes federal courts’ jurisdiction over some matters (otherwise beyond their competence) that are incidental to other matters properly before them.”
Kokkonen,
Blue Cross and USAble invoke only the second “head” of ancillary jurisdiction, sometimes called “ancillary enforcement jurisdiction,”
see Myers v. Richland County,
We accept, as a general proposition, that a federal court may exercise ancillary enforcement jurisdiction to prevent a state court action from contravening a decree that the federal court has previously issued.
See, e.g., Berman v. Denver Tramway Corp.,
Blue Cross and USAble argued before the district court that it had ancillary enforcement jurisdiction to prevent the health care providers from contravening the
Prudential I
injunction in
Blue Cross II.
The district court’s analysis of Blue Cross and USAble’s asserted basis of jurisdiction turned on its interpretation of the Anti-Injunction Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2283, which provides that “[a] court of the United States may not grant an injunction to stay proceedings in a State court except as expressly authorized by Act оf Congress, or where necessary in aid of its jurisdiction, or to protect or effectuate its judgments.” According to Blue Cross and USAble, this action fell within the last of the enumerated exceptions to the Anti-Injunction Act, commonly known as the “relitigation exception,” because the court in
Prudential I
determined that health insurers could not be held liable under the Arkansas PPA for excluding health care providers from their networks. The district court held that the relitigation exception did not apply because the сourt had not decided “the instant issue” in
Prudential I
or, for that matter, in Blue Cross and USAble’s abortive declaratory judgment action,
Blue Cross I. See Chick Kam Choo v. Exxon Corp.,
Before considering Blue Cross and USAble’s argument оn appeal, we must first decide whether the district court’s approach is inconsistent with our holding in
Airlines Reporting Corp. v. Barry,
We find that the district court did not treat the Anti-Injunction Act as a jurisdictional statute. Instead, the court used the relitigation exception to the Anti-Injunction Act as the touchstone for its analysis of Blue Cross and USAble’s asserted basis of ancillary enforcement jurisdiction. This was not necessarily improper, insofar as the standard governing the applicatiоn of the relitigation exception is similar, and perhaps functionally equivalent, to the standard governing the exercise of ancillary enforcement jurisdiction to prevent the contravention of a federal decree. Nonetheless, we are concerned that the district court’s approach increases the risk of confusion in future cases where the governing standards do not overlap. 5 Accordingly, we limit our analysis to the doctrine of ancillary enforcement jurisdictiоn.
Here again, the crux of Blue Cross and USAble’s argument is that the district court had ancillary enforcement jurisdiction to prevent the health care providers from contravening the Prudential I injunction in Blue Cross Il. 6 Although Blue *819 Cross and USAble concede that the Prudential I injunction has been partially dissolved and that neither of its two remaining provisions applies to this case, they contend that the Prudential I injunction was not nullified, ab initio, because relief under Rule 60(b)(5) is “inherently prospective.” Blue Cross and USAble reason that the Prudential I injunction must, therefore, remain enforceable as to all actions taken between Januаry 31, 1997, when the injunction was first entered, and August 2, 2005, when the pertinent provisions of the injunction were dissolved. Carrying this syllogism to its logical conclusion, Blue Cross and USAble argue that the district court should have exercised ancillary jurisdiction over this action to enjoin Blue Cross II, in which the health care providers seek to thwart the original terms of the Prudential I injunction by obtaining damages for Blue Cross and USAble’s alleged violation of the any willing provider provisions of the Arkansas PPA during the pre-dissolution period.
Blue Cross and USAble’s argument rests on an untenable premise: namely, that Prudential I decided, once and for all, the availability of damages for violations of the any willing provider provisions of the Arkansas PPA that occurred between January 31, 1997, and August 2, 2005. Even assuming that the original terms of the Prudential I injunction were broad enough to preclude any action for damages under the Arkansas PPA, the rationale for the Prudential I injunction was discredited by the Supreme Court’s decision in Miller, and the injunction’s pertinent provisions were dissolved in accordance with this court’s decision in Prudential II. Simply put, there is nothing left of the Prudential I injunction to prevent the health care providers from litigating their action for damages in Blue Cross II.
Blue Cross and USAble attempt to overcome this inconvenient fact by focusing on the period from January 31, 1997, to August 2, 2005, when the Prudential I injunction was still in force. If the health care providers could not have prevailed in an action for damages under the Arkansas PPA before August 2, 2005, so the argument goes, then they cannot prevail in Blue Cross II, which seeks damages for conduct occurring between January 31, 1997, and August 2, 2005. The central flaw in this line оf reasoning is that it fails to account for the later developments in Miller and Prudential II. The district court that issued the Prudential I injunction did not contemplate the hypothetical availability of damages if the injunction was eventually dissolved; indeed, such an attempt to anticipate Miller and Prudential II so as to foreclose future cases along the lines of Blue Cross II would have veered perilously close to an advisory opinion. Since then, no federal court has decided whether, in light of Miller and Prudential II, health insurers such as Blue Cross and USAble may be held liable under the Arkansas PPA for excluding “willing” health care providers from their networks between January 31, 1997, and August 2, 2005. In the absence of an extant federal decree to effectuate, protect or enforce, we see no viable basis for ancillary enforcement jurisdiction in this case. 7
*820
We are not moved by Blue Cross and USAble’s contention that the district court’s refusal to enforce the original terms of the
Prudential I
injunction, as it existed before
Miller
and
Prudential II,
gave the court’s partial dissolution of the
Prudential I
injunction an impermissible retroactive effect. Blue Cross and USAble offer no concrete authority for this proposition apart from their idiosyncratic interpretation of Rule 60(b)(5), which authorizes courts to “relieve” a party from its obligations under a “final judgment” in cases where “applying [the judgment] prospectively is no longer equitable.” The term “prospectively,” as it is used in Rule 60(b)(5), limits the types of judgments from which courts may provide relief. For example, since money judgments do not apply prospectively, we have held that “relief from a final money judgment is ... not available under the equitable leg of Rule 60(b)(5).”
Stokors S.A. v. Morrison,
Because the district court could not effectuate, protect or enforce the dissolved provisions of the Prudential I injunction, Blue Cross and USAble have failed to establish ancillary enforcement jurisdiction. 8
Blue Cross and USAble’s reliance on the All Writs Act as an independent source of subject matter jurisdiction is equally misplaced. The All Writs Act provides that “[t]he Supreme Court and all courts established by Act of Congress may issue all writs necessary or appropriate in aid of their respective jurisdictions and agreeable to the usages and principles of law.” 28 U.S.C. § 1651(a). The Supreme Court has held that the All Writs Act authorizes federal courts to issue extraordinary writs, but only to the extent that “the issuance of process [is] ‘in aid of the issuing court’s jurisdiction.”
Clinton v. Goldsmith,
Our decision in
Canady v. Allstate Insurance Co.,
Compared to
Canady,
this case presents a different set of facts and an even more convoluted procеdural history. Yet much of
Canady’s
analysis involves legal principles that might be applied to cases, like this one, involving dissimilar circumstances. In particular,
Canady
seems to declare that the All Writs Act is either a source of or substitute for subject matter jurisdiction.
See id.
at 1013
9
& n. 6,
10
1016-17.
11
We are not bound to follow this expansive interpretation of the All Writs Act, because it is inconsistent with an intervening decision of the Supreme Court.
See T.L. ex rel. Ingram v. United States,
The Supreme Court decided
Syngenta Crop Protection, Inc. v. Henson,
The Court’s holding in Syngenta rejected Canady’s interpretation of the All Writs Act as either a source of or substitute for federal subject matter jurisdiction and effectively overruled Xiong, which was the foundation for significant portions of Ca-nady’s analysis. Consequently, Syngenta undermined Canady’s status as a binding precedent. Because this case does not involve the removal of a state cоurt action and because the parties have not meaningfully addressed the issue, we do not decide how much, if any, of Canady’s analysis survived Syngenta. For present purposes, it is enough to reiterate that Canady does not control the outcome in this case.
Since the All Writs Act is neither a source of nor substitute for federal subject matter jurisdiction, we return to the three potential bases of jurisdiction introduced above: federal question jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1331, diversity jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1332, and ancillary enforcement jurisdiction to effectuate, protect or enforce the Prudential I injunction. We conclude that Blue Cross and USAble have failed to meet their burden of establishing that any one of those bases of jurisdiction applies in this action. 12
III. CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court’s dismissal for lack of jurisdiction.
Notes
.A third health care provider, St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center, was dismissed from this case shortly before we heard oral _ argument.
. The Honorable James M. Moody, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Arkansas.
. The State of Arkansas intervened to defend the constitutionality of the Arkansas PPA.
. Once a court decides that it has subject matter jurisdiction over an action seeking to enjoin ongoing state court proceedings, it must then determine whether the Anti-Injunction Act nevertheless prohibits the issuance of injunctive relief.
. For example, the doctrine of ancillary enforcement jurisdiction is, in one sense, narrower than the relitigation exception, for the relitigation exception also applies to actions in which there is an independent source of federal subject matter jurisdiction that is unrelated to a previously issued federal decree. In such actions, ancillary jurisdiction is not germane to the question whether the federal court is authorized to issue injunctive relief,
see Chick Kam Choo,
.Blue Cross and US Able argue that the health care providers were subject to the Prudential I injunction, even though they were *819 not defendants in Prudential I, because the State of Arkansas represented the health care providers' interests as an intervenor. The health care providers maintain that the Prudential I injunction bound only the Prudential Insurance Company of America and the other named defendants. While we express no opinion about the merits of this dispute, we will assume that the health care providers were bound by the Prudential I injunction, or at least the accompanying declaration that the Arkansas PPA was preempted in its entirety.
. We note, however, that Blue Cross and USAble may raise all available defenses before
*820
the state court in
Blue Cross II, see Rivet v. Regions Bank of La.,
. Our decision in
Jenkins v. Kansas City Missouri School District,
. “As long as the original lawsuit was properly brought in federal court, the federal court retains subject matter jurisdiction to remove any subsequent state law action to federal court for purposes of applying the All Writs Act.” (Citing
Xiong,
. "For jurisdictiоnal purposes, the Eighth Circuit requires that the injunction at issue must seek to protect a judgment properly obtained in federal court, but does not require an independent basis for federal subject mat-
to:
jurisdiction when the All Writs Act is so invoked.” (Citing
Xiong,
.“[Bjecause federal subject matter jurisdiction attaches pursuant to the All Writs Act, procedural matters in this case, as well as any future case impacting the [district court's] prior judgment ... are governed by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.”
. Accordingly, we may not reach the merits of the health care providers' cross-appeal.
