On the other hand, if the court were to ban all bankruptcy settlements that do not strictly follow the order of priority, supporters on Jevic’s side say it could wreak havoc with a number of established practices involving payments to creditors, especially in the early part of a bankruptcy. And they say it could hamstring judges in finding the right resolution in an individual case.

The drivers have received a lot of support including from surprising places like the Loan Syndications and Trading Association, which represents banks and other lenders. It argues that if the court rejects priority in settlements, there is a danger that the position of secured creditors who now stand at the front of the line of repayment also could be in jeopardy.

As the solicitor general explains in a brief on behalf of the drivers, the absolute priority rule “is designed to protect intermediate creditors from being squeezed out by a deal between senior and junior creditors.” The law itself does not detail this priority rule, but it has been followed since the 1930s and is seen as a proxy for what is “fair and equitable” in resolving a Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Jay L. Westbrook, a bankruptcy scholar at the University of Texas at Austin who signed the professors’ friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the drivers, said Chapter 11 bankruptcy involved a trade-off. On one hand, the company benefits from the enormous power of the law that shields it from creditors, as it plans its future, he said. But in turn it is required to settle with all the creditors — “not just the ones you want to deal with. A settlement in which you can do what you want is called a lawsuit,” he said.

On the other side, Jevic and its private equity owner said the settlement was the fairest result because if the company were liquidated, all of the small creditors would have been left empty-handed because of secured creditor liens on the company’s assets. By paying some of the small creditors a fraction of their claims, rather than zero, they argued, the settlement was in the best interest of most of the creditors. Their argument persuaded not only the bankruptcy judge, but also a divided panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

The 2-to-1 Third Circuit panel said that in rare cases an agreement could be acceptable even when the settlement “skips a class of objecting creditors in favor of more junior creditors.” In this case, Judge Thomas Hardiman wrote, the agreement was the “least bad alternative” that existed.

Christopher Landau, a partner and head of appellate litigation at Kirkland & Ellis, is one of the lawyers representing Sun before the Supreme Court. He said his firm, and Sun, would decline to comment on the case.