Bank of America, N. A. v. Caulkett, 575 U.S. 790, 135 S. Ct. 1995 (2015), is a bankruptcy law case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States on June 1, 2015.

[10] In common bankruptcy parlance, this same numeric relation is used to denominate a creditor-lienor's allowed claim as "oversecured," "fully secured," or "undersecured.

[14] Specifically, Dewsnup presented the question whether § 506(d) allows a Chapter 7 debtor to avoid an undersecured creditor's lien on the debtor's realty to the extent that the amount of the claim secured by that lien exceeds the collateral realty's fair market value.

[19][iv] In so concluding, the Court acknowledged the apparent logical infirmity in its construction of § 506(d), but observed that it was not "writing on a clean slate.

"[20] As support for that proposition, the Court cited "the pre-Code rule that liens pass through bankruptcy unaffected.

The Court's decision in Dewsnup was poorly received and has been subject to extensive criticism "from its inception.

"[23] For example, Justice Scalia's dissent in Dewsnup castigated the majority for "disregarding well-established and oft-repeated principles of statutory construction" and engaging in "'one-subsection-at-a-time' interpretation.

[27] After filing in Chapter 7, Caulkett moved to void Bank of America's junior mortgage lien under § 506(d).

[34] For example, one commentator has described it as "strange" that the Caulkett Court "went out of [its] way to criticize Dewsnup", yet declined to take the further step of overruling it.

The statement that "[a]part from reorganization proceedings ... no provision of the pre-Code statute permitted involuntary reduction of the amount of a creditor's lien for any reason other than payment on the debt" … reveals the Court's ignorance of the history of bankruptcy's treatment of liens.