WASHINGTON — The current Supreme Court sometimes seems to relish a procedural puzzle.
But an argument on Wednesday proved so tangled that several justices said the only proper course was to clear away the threshold issues and decide the heart of the matter.
The case concerned a government program dating to the Great Depression meant to increase raisin prices by keeping some of them off the market. The central argument in the case was that the program amounted to an unconstitutional governmental taking of private property.
But that argument was surrounded by a host of others, including ones concerning which lower court should have considered the matter in the first place. As the argument progressed, one justice after another tried to boil the case down to its essence.
“Either this program is valid or it isn’t,” Justice Stephen G. Breyer said. “And if it isn’t, some authoritative set of courts should tell us that.”
Justice Antonin Scalia seemed to agree. “Did Congress create a statute in which we’re going to take your raisins and then you can go to” a specialized court to “get your money back?” he asked.
Joseph R. Palmore, a lawyer for the government, said yes, though he conceded that the right approach was “a close question.”
Justice Scalia disagreed. “I don’t think it’s close at all,” he said. “That’s a crazy statute.”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor joined in. “This really does sound to me, and I think that both Justice Scalia and Breyer are now are being more and more convinced, that there has to be a place to challenge this scheme,” she said.
Justice Elena Kagan said the justices should consider sending the case back to the lower courts so they can “go and try to figure out whether this marketing order is a taking or it’s just the world’s most outdated law.”
The case arose from the activities of Marvin D. Horne, a raisin farmer in Fresno, Calif., who in 2002 set up a business arrangement that he claimed allowed him to avoid the government marketing program.
Mr. Palmore, the government lawyer, said the arrangement was “a willful and intentional, knowing violation of regulatory requirements, because they were able to undercut their competitors by not playing by the rules.”
The Agriculture Department imposed fines, and Mr. Horne defended himself on the ground that aspects of the program violated the Fifth Amendment’s takings clause, which says that private property may not be taken for public use without just compensation.
On Wednesday, Justice Scalia said it was of no moment that the government sought money rather than property. “Part of that penalty was, you know, your raisins or your life,” he said. “You don’t have to pay the penalty if you give us the raisins.”
The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, initially ruled that there had been no taking. When Mr. Horne sought rehearing from the full court, the government raised a new argument, saying the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case because Mr. Horne should have sued in the Court of Federal Claims.
It was that decision that created the procedural thicket, and “that is producing so much enjoyment for us this morning,” said Michael W. McConnell, a former federal judge who argued on behalf of Mr. Horne.
In the Supreme Court, the government changed positions again. “We agree that the failure to go to the court of claims is not properly viewed as a jurisdictional defect,” Mr. Palmore said.
The flip-flop appeared to trouble Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who questioned Mr. Palmore closely about it and later said he had shown “less than good grace” in criticizing the other side for a litigation tactic.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg reflected on what she called a “mysterious thing” about the idea of sending the case back to the Ninth Circuit to decide the takings issue, as several of her colleagues suggested. A shortcoming of the plan, she said, was that the Ninth Circuit had already once decided the issue.