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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. Appellees, owners of retail liquor establishments, were holders of tavern liquor licenses issued under Wisconsin law by appellants, the cities of Racine and Kenosha. Acting pursuant to Wis. Stat. Ann. §§ 176.05 (1), (8) (1957 and Supp. 1973), the cities denied appellees’ applications for renewal of their one-year licenses after holding public “legislative” hearings. Alleging, inter alia, deprivations of their Fourteenth Amendment procedural due process rights in such denials and, by amended complaints, the unconstitutionality of §§ 176.05 (1), (8), appellees brought these federal civil rights actions for declaratory and injunctive relief naming in each case only the appropriate municipality as a defendant. The District Court entered temporary restraining orders commanding the immediate issuance of licenses and convened a three-judge district court pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 2281 to rule on the constitutionality of the statutory licensing procedure. Thereafter, the Attorney General of Wisconsin was allowed to intervene as a party defendant on his own motion. On cross-motions for summary judgment, the District Court declared the statute unconstitutional and enjoined its enforcement. This direct appeal followed. Under the Wisconsin local licensing scheme, the governing bodies of municipalities are authorized to grant liquor licenses “to such persons entitled to a license under this chapter as they deem proper to keep places within their respective towns, villages, or cities for the sale of intoxicating liquors. . . .” Wis. Stat. Ann. § 176.05 (1) (1957). The statutory scheme has been interpreted by the Wisconsin Supreme Court to require a “legislative type of hearing wherein one is given notice of the hearing and a fair opportunity to state his position on the issue,” in situations where municipalities have denied an application for renewal of a license. Ruffalo v. Common Council, 38 Wis. 2d 518, 524, 157 N. W. 2d 568, 571 (1968). Such applications may not be rejected “without a statement on the clerk’s minutes as to the reasons for such rejection,” Wis. Stat. Ann. § 176.05 (8) (Supp. 1973), and the state courts have certiorari jurisdiction to review whether such refusals by the councils are arbitrary, capricious, or discriminatory. Ruff alo v. Common Council, supra. In the case of the Racine denials, it was stipulated that the question of the appellees’ applications for licenses was referred to the License and Welfare Committee of the Common Council and that at public hearings conducted by that Committee, appellees were present and heard oral objections to the renewal of the licenses for their taverns. After holding a public hearing, the Common Council followed the Committee’s recommendation and voted to deny the applications, apparently because of the adverse effects on the community of nude dancing in the bars. It was also stipulated that at all meetings, all persons including appellees were given an opportunity to speak, but no speaker was sworn. None of the testimony was recorded and no verbatim transcript was made. Appellees were not advised that they could cross-examine any of the speakers, and they did not request such an opportunity. And there was no advance written specification of the charges against any of the bars. Relying on two Seventh Circuit decisions, the three-judge court (as had the single judge) held that “in light of the equitable nature of this action” it had jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1343 (3). Concluding that Racine’s interest in being able to deny the renewal of liquor licenses with no other safeguard than a legislative hearing is “minimal,” the court balanced that interest against that of appellees, assertedly their occupations and their investments, and determined that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires municipalities to grant an “adversary-type hearing in which the applicant is given timely notice of the reasons urged for denial [of renewal of his license] and an opportunity to present, confront, and cross-examine witnesses under oath with a verbatim transcript.” 346 F. Supp. 43, 51. I Neither party to the appeal has questioned the jurisdiction of the District Court, but “it is the duty of this court to see to it that the jurisdiction of the [district court], which is defined and limited by statute, is not exceeded.” Louisville ><&• Nashville R. Co. v. Mottley, 211 U. S. 149,152 (1908). Appellees alleged that they brought their action under 42 U. S. C. § 1983, and that the District Court therefore had jurisdiction under 28 U. S. C. § 1343. The District Court agreed. The only defendants named in the complaints, however, were the municipalities of Kenosha and Racine. In considering the reach of § 1983 in Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S. 167 (1961), this Court examined the legislative history surrounding its enactment and said: “The response of the Congress to the proposal to make municipalities liable for certain actions being brought within federal purview by the Act of April 20, 1871, was so antagonistic that we cannot believe that the word ‘person’ was used in this particular Act to include them.” Id., at 191. The District Court relied on Schnell v. City of Chicago, 407 F. 2d 1084 (CA7 1969), and Adams v. City of Park Ridge, 293 F. 2d 585 (CA7 1961), in holding that Monroe was limited to actions for damages, and that cities were proper defendants under § 1983 where equitable relief was sought. Adams, supra, in turn, relied on this Court's per curiam opinion in Holmes v. City of Atlanta, 350 U. S. 879 (1955). But in none of the three opinions in Holmes was the issue of whether or not a municipality is a “person” within the meaning of § 1983 discussed. The authority of that case as support for the proposition that a city is a “person” under § 1983 where equitable relief is sought, but is not a “person” under the same section where damages are prayed for, is at least seriously weakened by the following observation in Monroe, supra, at 191 n. 50: “In a few cases in which equitable relief has been sought, a municipality has been named, along with city officials, as defendant where violations of 42 U. S. C. § 1983 were alleged. See, e. g., Douglas v. City of Jeannette, 319 U. S. 157; Holmes v. City of Atlanta, 350 U. S. 879. The question dealt with in our opinion was not raised in those cases, either by the parties or by the Court. Since we hold that a municipal corporation is not a 'person’ within the meaning of § 1983, no inference to the contrary can any longer be drawn from those cases.” We find nothing in the legislative history discussed in Monroe, or in the language actually used by Congress, to suggest that the generic word “person” in § 1983 was intended to have a bifurcated application to municipal corporations depending on the nature of the relief sought against them. Since, as the Court held in Monroe, “Congress did not undertake to bring municipal corporations within the ambit of” § 1983, id., at 187, they are outside of its ambit for purposes of equitable relief as well as for damages. The District Court was therefore wrong in concluding that it had jurisdiction of appellees’ complaints under § 1343. As previously noted, after the complaints had been filed and issue joined, the Attorney General of Wisconsin was allowed to intervene as a party defendant in the actions. The District Court, having concluded that it had jurisdiction to entertain the original complaints under § 1343, understandably did not address itself to the question of whether the intervention of the Attorney General as a party would cure the jurisdictional defect which we now find to exist in appellees' complaints. The District Court also observed that “were not civil rights jurisdiction proper, each of the plaintiffs herein would be able to assert the necessary . . . controversy requirement of Title 28 U. S. C. § 1331.” 346 F. Supp., at 50. But although appellees in the Racine denials alleged jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1331 as well as § 1343, and in each complaint there was an allegation of an investment in a tavern of at least $20,000, the defendant municipal corporations answered by putting the appellees to their proof as to the amount in controversy. Since the cases were submitted and decided on cross-motions for summary judgment and stipulations of fact, and no stipulation as to the amount in controversy was filed, we cannot say on this state of the record whether or not jurisdiction over the complaints was affirmatively established. See Hague v. CIO, 307 U. S. 496, 507-508 (1939), and cases therein cited. With respect to the Kenosha denials, there was a stipulation as to jurisdictional amount in the proceedings before the single-judge District Court, and an allegation of the requisite jurisdictional amount in the amended complaint, which for the first time challenged the constitutional validity of the Wisconsin statutory licensing scheme. No answer was filed to the amended complaint prior to the entry of judgment by the District Court. We have had the benefit of neither briefs, arguments, nor explicit consideration by the District Court of the jurisdictional questions presented by the intervention of the Attorney General as a party, and the availability of § 1331 jurisdiction in view of the state of the record below. We therefore remand the case to the District Court for consideration of these issues. II Appellees’ licenses have been neither revoked nor suspended. Their claim of deprivation of Fourteenth Amendment procedural due process rights arises from the failure of the cities of Kenosha and Racine to hold full-blown adversary hearings before refusing to renew their one-year licenses. Our decisions last year in Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U. S. 564 (1972), and Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U. S. 593 (1972), discussed the nature of “liberty” and “property” that is protected against denial without due process by the Fourteenth Amendment. The District Court did not discuss these recent cases, and it followed, in part, the decision of the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit which was reversed in Roth. It, therefore, made no evaluation of “property” or “liberty” interests which might require a due process hearing, or of the nature of such a hearing if it were required in the light of our opinions in Roth, supra, and Perry, supra. The District Court, also, did not have the benefit of this Court’s decision in California v. LaRue, 409 U. S. 109 (1972). There we held again that while the Twenty-first Amendment did not abrogate a requirement of procedural due process, Wisconsin v. Constantineau, 400 U. S. 433 (1971), it did grant the States broad authority over the distribution and sale of liquor. We also held that regulations prohibiting the sale of liquor by the drink on premises where there were nude but not necessarily obscene performances were facially constitutional. We, therefore, direct the District Court, after addressing the issue of jurisdiction, to reconsider its judgment in the light of Roth, Perry, and LaRue. The judgment of the District Court is vacated and the cause is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. In the case of appellee Misurelli, it appears from the record that his partner was actually the holder of the expired license. The District Court held, however, that in substance his application was no different from those of the other appellees. Wis. Stat. Arm. § 176.05 provides: “(1) Authority to grant licenses. Each town board, village board and common council may grant retail licenses, under the conditions and restrictions in this chapter contained, to such persons entitled to a license under this chapter as they deem proper to keep places within their respective towns, villages, or cities for the sale of intoxicating liquors. No member of any such town board, village board or common council shall sell directly or indirectly or offer for sale, to any person, firm, or corporation that holds or applies for any such license any bond, material, product, or other matter or thing that may be used by any such licensee or prospective licensee in the carrying on of his or its said business.” Wis. Stat. Ann. § 176.05 provides: “(8) Annual license meetings. All town and village boards and common councils, or the duly authorized committees of such councils, shall meet not later than May 15 of each year and be in session from day to day thereafter, so long as it may be necessary, for the purpose of acting upon such applications for license as may be presented to them on or before April 15, and all applications fox license so filed shall be granted, issued or denied not later than June 15 for the ensuing license year, provided that nothing shall prevent any governing body from granting any licenses which are applied for at any other time. As soon as an application has been approved, a duplicate copy thereof shall be forwarded to the secretary of revenue. No application for a license which is in existence at the time of such annual license meeting shall be rejected without a statement on the clerk’s minutes as to the reasons for such rejection.” The Racine denials were utilized by the District Court as the basis for the main opinion holding the Wisconsin scheme unconstitutional and the other cases were decided on the basis of the main opinion. We are therefore primarily considering the factual background of the Racine denials in our disposition. No such stipulation was filed for appellee Robers, however. Schnell v. City of Chicago, 407 F. 2d 1084 (1969), and Adams v. City of Park Ridge, 293 F. 2d 585 (1961). Title 28 U. S. C. § 1343 provides: “The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of any civil action authorized by law to be commenced by any person: “(3) To redress the deprivation, under color of any State law, statute, ordinance, regulation, custom or usage, of any right, privilege or immunity secured by the Constitution of the United States or by any Act of Congress providing for equal rights of citizens or of all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States Title 42 U. S. C. § 1983 provides: “Every person, who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress.” The court in Schnell v. City of Chicago, supra, simply followed the previous circuit decision in Adams v. City of Park Ridge, supra, with no independent analysis. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Jackson delivered the opinion of the Court. Linde Air Products Co., owner of the Jones patent for an electric welding process and for fluxes to be used therewith, brought an action for infringement against Lincoln and the two Graver companies. The trial court held four flux claims valid and infringed and certain other flux claims and all process claims invalid. 75 U. S. P. Q. 231. The Court of Appeals affirmed findings of validity and infringement as to the four flux claims but reversed the trial court and held valid the process claims and the remaining contested flux claims. 167 F. 2d 531. We granted certiorari, 335 U. S. 810, and reversed the judgment of the Court of Appeals insofar as it reversed that of the trial court, and reinstated the District Court decree. 336 U. S. 271. Rehearing was granted, limited to the question of infringement of the four valid flux claims and to the applicability of the doctrine of equivalents to findings of fact in this case. 337 U. S. 910. At the outset it should be noted that the single issue before us is whether the trial court’s holding that the four flux claims have been infringed will be sustained. Any issue as to the validity of these claims was unanimously determined by the previous decision in this Court and attack on their validity cannot be renewed now by reason of limitation on grant of rehearing. The disclosure, the claims, and the prior art have been adequately described in our former opinion and in the opinions of the courts below. In determining whether an accused device or composition infringes a valid patent, resort must be had in the first instance to the words of the claim. If accused matter falls clearly within the claim, infringement is made out and that is the end of it. But courts have also recognized that to permit imitation of a patented invention which does not copy every literal detail would be to convert the protection of the patent grant into a hollow and useless thing. Such a limitation would leave room for — indeed encourage — the unscrupulous copyist to make unimportant and insubstantial changes and substitutions in the patent which, though adding nothing, would be enough to take the copied matter outside the claim, and hence outside the reach of law. One who seeks to pirate an invention, like one who seeks to pirate a copyrighted book or play, may be expected to introduce minor variations to conceal and shelter the piracy. Outright and forthright duplication is a dull and very rare type of infringement. To prohibit no other would place the inventor at the mercy of verbalism and would be subordinating substance to form. It would deprive him of the benefit of his invention and would foster concealment rather than disclosure of inventions, which is one of the primary purposes of the patent system. The doctrine of equivalents evolved in response to this experience. The essence of the doctrine is that one may not practice a fraud on a patent. Originating almost a century ago in the case of Winans v. Denmead, 15 How. 330, it has been consistently applied by this Court and the lower federal courts, and continues today ready and available for utilization when the proper circumstances for its application arise. “To temper unsparing logic and prevent an infringer from stealing the benefit of an invention” a patentee may invoke this doctrine to proceed against the producer of a device “if it performs substantially the same function in substantially the same way to obtain the same result.” Sanitary Refrigerator Co. v. Winters, 280 U. S. 30, 42. The theory on which it is founded is that “if two devices do the same work in substantially the same way, and accomplish substantially the same result, they are the same, even though they differ in name, form, or shape.” Machine Co. v. Murphy, 97 U. S. 120, 125. The doctrine operates not only in favor of the patentee of a pioneer or primary invention, but also for the patentee of a secondary invention consisting of a combination of old ingredients which produce new and useful results, Imhaeuser v. Buerk, 101 U. S. 647, 655, although the area of equivalence may vary under the circumstances. See Continental Paper Bag Co. v. Eastern Paper Bag Co., 210 U. S. 405, 414-415, and cases cited; Seymour v. Osborne, 11 Wall. 516, 556; Gould v. Rees, 15 Wall. 187, 192. The wholesome realism of this doctrine is not always applied in favor of a patentee but is sometimes used against him. Thus, where a device is so far changed in principle from a patented article that it performs the same or a similar function in a substantially different way, but nevertheless falls within the literal words of the claim, the doctrine of equivalents may be used to restrict the claim and defeat the patentee’s action for infringement. Westinghouse v. Boyden Power Brake Co., 170 U. S. 537, 568. In its early development, the doctrine was usually applied in cases involving devices where there was equivalence in mechanical components. Subsequently, however, the same principles were also applied to compositions, where there was equivalence between chemical ingredients. Today the doctrine is applied to mechanical or chemical equivalents in compositions or devices. See discussions and cases collected in 3 Walker on Patents (Deller’s ed. 1937) §§ 489-492; Ellis, Patent Claims (1949) §§ 59-60. What constitutes equivalency must be determined against the context of the patent, the prior art, and the particular circumstances of the ease. Equivalence, in the patent law, is not the prisoner of a formula and is not an absolute to be considered in a vacuum. It does not require complete identity for every purpose and in every respect. In determining equivalents, things equal to the same thing may not be equal to each other and, by the same token, things for most purposes different may sometimes be equivalents. Consideration must be given to the purpose for which an ingredient is used in a patent, the qualities it has when combined with the other ingredients, and the function which it is intended to perform. An important factor is whether persons reasonably skilled in the art would have known of the interchangeability of an ingredient not contained in the patent with one that was. A finding of equivalence is a determination of fact. Proof can be made in any form: through testimony of experts or others versed in the technology; by documents, including texts and treatises; and, of course, by the disclosures of the prior art. Like any other issue of fact, final determination requires a balancing of credibility, persuasiveness and weight of evidence. It is to be decided by the trial court and that court’s decision, under general principles of appellate review, should not be disturbed unless clearly erroneous. Particularly is this so in a field where so much depends upon familiarity with specific scientific problems and principles not usually contained in the general storehouse of knowledge and experience. In the case before us, we have two electric welding compositions or fluxes: the patented composition, Union-melt Grade 20, and the accused composition, Lincolnweld 660. The patent under which Unionmelt is made claims essentially a combination of alkaline earth metal silicate and calcium fluoride; Unionmelt actually contains, however, silicates of calcium and magnesium, two alkaline earth metal silicates. Lincolnweld’s composition is similar to Unionmelt’s, except that it substitutes silicates of calcium and manganese — the latter not an alkaline earth metal — for silicates of calcium and magnesium. In all other respects, the two compositions are alike. The mechanical methods in which these compositions are employed are similar. They are identical in operation and produce the same kind and quality of weld. The question which thus emerges is whether the substitution of the manganese which is not an alkaline earth metal for the magnesium which is, under the circumstances of this case, and in view of the technology and the prior art, is a change of such substance as to make the doctrine of equivalents inapplicable; or conversely, whether under the circumstances the change was so insubstantial that the trial court’s invocation of the doctrine of equivalents was justified. Without attempting to be all-inclusive, we note the following evidence in the record: Chemists familiar with the two fluxes testified that manganese and magnesium were similar in many of their reactions (R. 287, 669). There is testimony by a metallurgist that alkaline earth metals are often found in manganese ores in their natural state and that they serve the same purpose in the fluxes (R. 831-832); and a chemist testified that “in the sense of the patent” manganese could be included as an alkaline earth metal (R. 297). Much of this testimony was corroborated by reference to recognized texts on inorganic chemistry (R. 332). Particularly important, in addition, were the disclosures of the prior art, also contained in the record. The Miller patent, No. 1,754,566, which preceded the patent in suit, taught the use of manganese silicate in welding fluxes (R. 969, 971). Manganese was similarly disclosed in the Armor patent, No. 1,467,825, which also described a welding composition (R. 1346). And the record contains no evidence of any kind to show that Lincolnweld was developed as the result of independent research or experiments. It is not for this Court to even essay an independent evaluation of this evidence. This is the function of the trial court. And, as we have heretofore observed, “To no type of case is this . . . more appropriately applicable than to the one before us, where the evidence is largely the testimony of experts as to which a trial court may be enlightened by scientific demonstrations. This trial occupied some three weeks, during which, as the record shows, the trial judge visited laboratories with counsel and experts to observe actual demonstrations of welding as taught by the patent and of the welding accused of infringing it, and of various stages of the prior art. He viewed motion pictures of various welding operations and tests and heard many experts and other witnesses.” 336 U. S. 271, 274-275. The trial judge found on the evidence before him that the Lincolnweld flux and the composition of the patent in suit are substantially identical in operation and in result. He found also that Lincolnweld is in all respects equivalent to Unionmelt for welding purposes. And he concluded that “for all practical purposes, manganese silicate can be efficiently and effectually substituted for calcium and magnesium silicates as the major constituent of the welding composition.” These conclusions are adequately supported by the record; certainly they are not clearly erroneous. It is difficult to conceive of a case more appropriate for application of the doctrine of equivalents. The disclosures of the prior art made clear that manganese silicate was a useful ingredient in welding compositions. Specialists familiar with the problems of welding compositions understood that manganese was equivalent to and could be substituted for magnesium in the composition of the patented flux and their observations were confirmed by the literature of chemistry. Without some explanation or indication that Lincolnweld was developed by independent research, the trial court could properly infer that the accused flux is the result of imitation rather than experimentation or invention. Though infringement was not literal, the changes which avoid literal infringement are colorable only. We conclude that the trial court’s judgment of infringement respecting the four flux claims was proper, and we adhere to our prior decision' on this aspect of the case. Affirmed. Mr. Justice Minton took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. Mr. Justice Black, with whom Mr. Justice Douglas concurs, dissenting. 1 heartily agree with the Court that “fraud” is bad, “piracy” is evil, and “stealing” is reprehensible. But in this case, where petitioners are not charged with any such malevolence, these lofty principles do not justify the Court’s sterilization of Acts of Congress and prior decisions, none of which are even mentioned in today’s opinion. The only patent claims involved here describe respondent’s product as a flux “containing a major proportion of alkaline earth metal silicate.” The trial court found that petitioners used a flux “composed principally of manganese silicate.” Finding also that “manganese is not an alkaline earth metal,” the trial court admitted that petitioners’ flux did not “literally infringe” respondent’s patent. Nevertheless it invoked the judicial “doctrine of equivalents” to broaden the claim for “alkaline earth metals” so as to embrace “manganese.” On the ground that “the fact that manganese is a proper substitute . . . is fully disclosed in the specification” of respondent’s patent, it concluded that “no determination need be made whether it is a known chemical fact outside the teachings of the patent that manganese is an equivalent . . . .” Since today’s affirmance unquestioningly follows the findings of the trial court, this Court necessarily relies on what the specifications revealed. In so doing, it violates a direct mandate of Congress without even discussing that mandate. R. S. § 4888, as amended, 35 U. S. C. § 33, provides that an applicant “shall particularly point out and distinctly claim the part, improvement, or combination which he claims as his invention or discovery.” We have held in this very case that this statute precludes invoking the specifications to alter a claim free from ambiguous language, since “it is the claim which measures the grant to the patentee.” Graver Mfg. Co. v. Linde Co., 336 U. S. 271, 277. What is not specifically claimed is dedicated to the public. See, e. g., Miller v. Brass Co., 104 U. S. 350, 352. For the function of claims under R. S. § 4888, as we have frequently reiterated, is to exclude from the patent monopoly field all that is not specifically claimed, whatever may appear in the specifications. See, e. g., Marconi Wireless Co. v. United States, 320 U. S. 1, 23, and cases there cited. Today the Court tacitly rejects those cases. It departs from the underlying principle which, as the Court pointed out in White v. Dunbar, 119 U. S. 47, 51, forbids treating a patent claim “like a nose of wax which may be turned and twisted in any direction, by merely referring to the specification, so as to make it include something more than, or something different from, what its words express. . . . The claim is a statutory requirement, prescribed for the very purpose of making the patentee define precisely what his invention is; and it is unjust to the public, as well as an evasion of the law, to construe it in a manner different from the plain import of its terms.” Giving this patentee the benefit of a grant that it did not precisely claim is no less “unjust to the public” and no less an evasion of R. S. § 4888 merely because done in the name of the “doctrine of equivalents.” In seeking to justify its emasculation of R. S. § 4888 by parading potential hardships which literal enforcement might conceivably impose on patentees who had for some reason failed to claim complete protection for their discoveries, the Court fails even to mention the program for alleviation of such hardships which Congress itself has provided. 35 U. S. C. § 64 authorizes reissue of patents where a patent is “wholly or partly inoperative” due to certain errors arising from “inadvertence, accident, or mistake” of the patentee. And while the section does not expressly permit a patentee to expand his claim, this Court has reluctantly interpreted it to justify doing so. Miller v. Brass Co., 104 U. S. 350, 353-354. That interpretation, however, was accompanied by a warning that “Reissues for the enlargement of claims should be the exception and not the rule.” Id. at 355. And Congress was careful to hedge the privilege of reissue by exacting conditions. It also entrusted the Patent Office, not the courts, with initial authority to determine whether expansion of a claim was justified, ****8 and barred suits for retroactive infringement based on such expansion. Like the Court’s opinion, this congressional plan adequately protects patentees from “fraud,” “piracy,” and “stealing.” Unlike the Court's opinion, it also protects businessmen from retroactive infringement suits and judicial expansion of a monopoly sphere beyond that which a patent expressly authorizes. The plan is just, fair, and reasonable. In effect it is nullified by this decision undercutting what the Court has heretofore recognized as wise safeguards. See Milcor Steel Co. v. Fuller Co., 316 U. S. 143, 148. One need not be a prophet to suggest that today’s rhapsody on the virtue of the “doctrine of equivalents” will, in direct contravention of the Miller case, supra, make enlargement of patent claims the “rule” rather than the “exception.” Whatever the merits of the “doctrine of equivalents” where differences between the claims of a patent and the allegedly infringing product are de minimis, colorable only, and without substance, that doctrine should have no application to the facts of this case. For the differences between respondent’s welding substance and petitioners’ claimed flux were not nearly so slight. The claims relied upon here did not involve any mechanical structure or process where invention lay in the construction or method rather than in the materials used. Rather they were based wholly on using particular materials for a particular purpose. Respondent’s assignors experimented with several metallic silicates, including that of manganese. According to the specifications (if these are to be considered) they concluded that while several were “more or less efficacious in our process, we prefer to use silicates of the alkaline earth metals.” Several of their claims which this Court found too broad to be valid encompassed manganese silicate; the only claims found valid did not. Yet today the Court disregards that crucial deficiency, holding those claims infringed by a composition of which 88.49% by weight is manganese silicate. In view of the intense study and experimentation of respondent’s assignors with manganese silicate, it would be frivolous to contend that failure specifically to include that substance in a precise claim was unintentional. Nor does respondent attempt to give that or any other explanation for its omission. But the similar use of manganese in prior expired patents, referred to in the Court’s opinion, raises far more than a suspicion that its elimination from the valid claims stemmed from fear that its inclusion by name might result in denial or subsequent invalidation’ of respondent’s patent. Under these circumstances I think petitioners had a right to act on the belief that this Court would follow the plain mandates of Congress that a patent’s precise claims mark its monopoly boundaries, and that expansion of those claims to include manganese could be obtained only in a statutory reissue proceeding. The Court’s ruling today sets the stage for more patent “fraud” and “piracy” against business than could be expected from faithful observance of the congressionally enacted plan to protect business against judicial expansion of precise patent claims. Hereafter a manufacturer cannot rely on what the language of a patent claims. He must be able, at the peril of heavy infringement damages, to forecast how far a court relatively unversed in a particular technological field will expand the claim’s language after considering the testimony of technical experts in that field. To burden business enterprise on the assumption that men possess such a prescience bodes ill for the kind of competitive economy that is our professed goal. The way specific problems are approached naturally has much to do with the decisions reached. A host of prior cases, to some of which I have referred, have treated the 17-year monopoly authorized by valid patents as a narrow exception to our competitive enterprise system. For that reason, they have emphasized the importance of leaving business men free to utilize all knowledge not preempted by the precise language of a patent claim. E. g., Sontag Stores Co. v. Nut Co., 310 U. S. 281, and cases there cited. In the Sontag case Mr. Justice McReynolds, speaking for a unanimous Court, said in part: “In the case under consideration the patentee might have included in the application for the original patent, claims broad enough to embrace petitioner’s accused machine, but did not. This 'gave the public to understand’ that whatever was not claimed 'did not come within his patent and might rightfully be made by anyone.’ ” Id. at 293. The Court’s contrary approach today causes it to retreat from this sound principle. The damages retroactively assessed against petitioners for what was authorized until today are but the initial installment on the cost of that retreat. L. Hand in Boyal Typewriter Co. v. Remington Rand, 168 F. 2d 691, 692. Rule 52 (a), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, provides in part: “Findings of fact shall not be set aside unless clearly erroneous, and due regard shall be given to the opportunity of the trial court to judge of the credibility of the witnesses.” For this reason the tidbits of evidence painstakingly selected from the record by this Court have no significance, since the trial court avowedly did not look beyond the specifications themselves. This Court’s approval of the trial judge’s resort to specifications is ironic as well as unfortunate. In its original opinion this Court rejected respondent’s contention that the very language invoked here to support infringement should be applied to validate a claim otherwise too broad to be upheld. 336 U. S. 271, 277. “This provision was inserted in the law for the purpose of relieving the courts from the duty of ascertaining the exact invention of the patentee by inference and conjecture, derived from a laborious examination of previous inventions, and a comparison thereof with that claimed by him. This duty is now cast upon the Patent Office. There his claim is, or is supposed to be, examined, scrutinized, limited, and made to conform to what he is entitled to. If the office refuses to allow him all that he asks, he has an appeal. But the courts have no right to enlarge a patent beyond the scope of its claim as allowed by the Patent Office, or the appellate tribunal to which contested applications are referred. When the terms of a claim in a patent are clear and distinct (as they always should be), the patentee, in a suit brought upon the patent, is bound by it. Merrill v. Yeomans, 94 U. S. 568.” Keystone Bridge Co. v. Phoenix Iron Co., 95 U. S. 274, 278. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Blackmun delivered the opinion of the Court. This case presents the question whether a physician who is under contract with the State to provide medical services to inmates at a state-prison hospital on a part-time basis acts “under color of state law,” within the meaning of 42 U. S. C. § 1983, when he treats an inmate. Petitioner, Quincy West, tore his left Achilles tendon in 1983 while playing volleyball at Odom Correctional Center, the Jackson, N. C., state prison in which he was incarcerated. A physician under contract to provide medical care to Odom inmates examined petitioner and directed that he be transferred to Raleigh for orthopedic consultation at Central Prison Hospital, the acute-care medical facility operated by the State for its more than 17,500 inmates. Central Prison Hospital has one full-time staff physician, and obtains additional medical assistance under “Contracts for Professional Services” between the State and area physicians. Respondent, Samuel Atkins, M. D., a private physician, provided orthopedic services to inmates pursuant to one such contract. Under it, Doctor Atkins was paid approximately $52,000 annually to operate two “clinics” each week at Central Prison Hospital, with additional amounts for surgery. Over a period of several months, he treated West’s injury by placing his leg in a series of casts. West alleges that although the doctor acknowledged that surgery would be necessary, he refused to schedule it, and that he eventually discharged West while his ankle was still swollen and painful, and his movement still impeded. Because West was a prisoner in “close custody,” he was not free to employ or elect to see a different physician of his own choosing. Pursuant to 42 U. S. C. § 1983, West, proceeding pro se, commenced this action against Doctor Atkins in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina for violation of his Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment. West alleged that Atkins was deliberately indifferent to his serious medical needs, by failing to provide adequate treatment. Relying on a decision of its controlling court in Calvert v. Sharp, 748 F. 2d 861 (CA4 1984), cert. denied, 471 U. S. 1132 (1985), the District Court granted Doctor Atkins’ motion for summary judgment. In Calvert, the Fourth Circuit held that a private orthopedic specialist, employed by a nonprofit professional corporation which provided services under contract to the inmates at the Maryland House of Corrections and the Maryland Penitentiary, did not act “under color of state law,” a jurisdictional requisite for a § 1983 action. Because Doctor Atkins was a “contract physician,” the District Court concluded that he, too, was not acting under color of state law when he treated West’s injury. App. 37. A panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit vacated the District Court’s judgment. 799 F. 2d 923 (1986). Rather than considering if Calvert could be distinguished, the panel remanded the case to the District Court for an assessment whether the record permitted a finding of deliberate indifference to a serious medical need, a showing necessary for West ultimately to prevail on his Eighth Amendment claim. See Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U. S. 97, 104 (1976). On en banc rehearing, however, a divided Court of Appeals affirmed the District Court’s dismissal of West’s complaint. 815 F. 2d 993 (1987). In declining to overrule its decision in Calvert, the majority concluded: “Thus the clear and practicable principle enunciated by the Supreme Court [in Polk County v. [Dodson,] 454 U. S. 312 (1981)], and followed in Calvert, is that a professional, when acting within the bounds of traditional professional discretion and judgment, does not act under color of state law, even where, as in Dodson, the professional is a full-time employee of the state. Where the professional exercises custodial or supervisory authority, which is to say that he is not acting in his professional capacity, then a § 1983 claim can be established, provided the requisite nexus to the state is proved.” 815 F. 2d, at 995 (footnote omitted). The Court of Appeals acknowledged that this rule limits “the range of professionals subject to an Estelle action.” Ibid. The dissent in the Court of Appeals offered three grounds for holding that service rendered by a prison doctor— whether a permanent member of a prison medical staff, or under limited contract with the prison — constitutes action under color of state law for purposes of § 1983. First, the dissent concluded that prison doctors are as much “state actors” as are other prison employees, finding no significant difference between Doctor Atkins and the physician-employees assumed to be state actors in Estelle, and in O’Connor v. Donaldson, 422 U. S. 563 (1975). See 815 F. 2d, at 997-998. Second, the dissent concluded that the “public function” rationale applied because, in the prison context, medical care is within “the exclusive prerogative of the State,” in that the State is obligated to provide medical services for its inmates and has complete control over the circumstances and sources of a prisoner’s medical treatment. Id., at 998-999, citing Blum v. Yaretsky, 457 U. S. 991, 1011 (1982). Finally, the dissent reasoned that the integral role the prison physician plays within the prison medical system qualifies his actions as under color of state law. 815 F. 2d, at 999, citing United States v. Price, 383 U. S. 787, 794 (1966) (“[W]illful participant in joint activity with the State or its agents” may be liable under §1983); Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U. S. 922, 931-932 (1982); and Tower v. Glover, 467 U. S. 914 (1984). The Fourth Circuit’s ruling conflicts with decisions of the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, Ancata v. Prison Health Services, Inc., 769 F. 2d 700 (1985), and Ort v. Pinchback, 786 F. 2d 1105 (1986), which are to the effect that a physician who contracts with the State to provide medical care to prison inmates, even if employed by a private entity, acts under color of state law for purposes of §1983. We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict. 484 U. S. 912 (1987). II To state a claim under § 1983, a plaintiff must allege the violation of a right secured by the Constitution and laws of the United States, and must show that the alleged deprivation was committed by a person acting under color of state law. Parratt v. Taylor, 451 U. S. 527, 535 (1981) (overruled in part on other grounds, Daniels v. Williams, 474 U. S. 327, 330-331 (1986)); Flagg Bros., Inc. v. Brooks, 436 U. S. 149, 155 (1978). Petitioner West sought to fulfill the first requirement by alleging a violation of his rights secured by the Eighth Amendment under Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U. S. 97 (1976). There the Court held that deliberate indifference to a prisoner’s serious medical needs, whether by a prison doctor or a prison guard, is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment. Id., at 104-105. The adequacy of West’s allegation and the sufficiency of his showing on this element of his § 1983 cause of action are not contested here. The only issue before us is whether petitioner has established the second essential element — that respondent acted under color of state law in treating West’s injury. A The traditional definition of acting under color of state law requires that the defendant in a § 1983 action have exercised power “possessed by virtue of state law and made possible only because the wrongdoer is clothed with the authority of state law.” United States v. Classic, 313 U. S. 299, 326 (1941). Accord, Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S. 167, 187 (1961) (adopting Classic standard for purposes of § 1983) (overruled in part on other grounds, Monell v. New York City Dept. of Social Services, 436 U. S. 658, 695-701 (1978)); Polk County v. Dodson, 454 U. S. 312, 317-318 (1981); id., at 329 (dissenting opinion). In Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., supra, the Court made clear that if a defendant’s conduct satisfies the state-action requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment, “that conduct [is] also action under color of state law and will support a suit under § 1983.” Id., at 935. Accord, Rendell-Baker v. Kohn, 457 U. S. 830, 838 (1982); United States v. Price, 383 U. S., at 794, n. 7. In such circumstances, the defendant’s alleged infringement of the plaintiff’s federal rights is “fairly attributable to the State.” Lugar, 457 U. S., at 937. To constitute state action, “the deprivation must be caused by the exercise of some right or privilege created by the State ... or by a person for whom the State is responsible,” and “the party charged with the deprivation must be a person who may fairly be said to be a state actor.” Ibid. “[S]tate employment is generally sufficient to render the defendant a state actor.” Id., at 936, n. 18; see id., at 937. It is firmly established that a defendant in a § 1983 suit acts under color of state law when he abuses the position given to him by the State. See Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S., at 172. Thus, generally, a public employee acts under color of state law while acting in his official capacity or while exercising his responsibilities pursuant to state law. See, e. g., Parratt v. Taylor, 451 U. S., at 535-536; Adickes v. S. H. Kress & Co., 398 U. S. 144, 152 (1970). See also Flagg Bros., Inc. v. Brooks, 436 U. S., at 157, n. 5. Indeed, Polk County v. Dodson, relied upon by the Court of Appeals, is the only case in which this Court has determined that a person who is employed by the State and who is sued under § 1983 for abusing his position in the performance of his assigned tasks was not acting under color of state law. The Court held that “a public defender does not act under color of state law when performing a lawyer’s traditional functions as counsel to a defendant in a criminal proceeding.” 454 U. S., at 325. In this capacity, the Court noted, a public defender differs from the typical government employee and state actor. While performing his duties, the public defender retains all of the essential attributes of a private attorney, including, most importantly, his “professional independence,” which the State is constitutionally obliged to respect. Id., at 321-322. A criminal lawyer’s professional and ethical obligations require him to act in a role independent of and in opposition to the State. Id., at 318-319, 320. The Court accordingly concluded that when representing an indigent defendant in a state criminal proceeding, the public defender does not act under color of state law for purposes of § 1983 because he “is not acting on behalf of the State; he is the State’s adversary.” Id., at 323, n. 13. See also Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U. S., at 936, n. 18. B We disagree with the Court of Appeals and respondent that Polk County dictates a conclusion that respondent did not act under color of state law in providing medical treatment to petitioner. In contrast to the public defender, Doctor Atkins’ professional and ethical obligation to make independent medical judgments did not set him in conflict with the State and other prison authorities. Indeed, his relationship with other prison authorities was cooperative. “Institutional physicians assume an obligation to the mission that the State, through the institution, attempts to achieve.” Polk County, 454 U. S., at 320. The Manual governing prison health care in North Carolina’s institutions, which Doctor Atkins was required to observe, declares: “The provision of health care is a joint effort of correctional administrators and health care providers, and can be achieved only through mutual trust and cooperation.” Similarly, the American Medical Association Standards for Health Services in Prisons (1979) provide that medical personnel and other prison officials are to act in “close cooperation and coordination” in a “joint effort.” Preface, at i; Standard 102, and Discussion. Doctor Atkins’ professional obligations certainly did not oblige him to function as “the State’s adversary.” Polk County, 454 U. S., at 323, n. 13. We thus find the proffered analogy between respondent and the public defender in Polk County unpersuasive. Of course, the Court of Appeals did not perceive the adversarial role the defense lawyer plays in our criminal justice system as the decisive factor in the Polk County decision. The court, instead, appears to have misread Polk County as establishing the general principle that professionals do not act under color of state law when they act in their professional capacities. The court considered a professional not to be subject to suit under § 1983 unless he was exercising “custodial or supervisory” authority. 815 F. 2d, at 995. To the extent this Court in Polk County relied on the fact that the public defender is a “professional” in concluding that he was not engaged in state action, the case turned on the particular professional obligation of the criminal defense attorney to be an adversary of the State, not on the independence and integrity generally applicable to professionals as a class. Indeed, the Court of Appeals’ reading would be inconsistent with cases, decided before and since Polk County, in which this Court either has identified professionals as state actors, see, e. g., Tower v. Glover, 467 U. S. 914 (1984) (state public defenders), or has assumed that professionals are state actors in §1983 suits, see, e. g., Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U. S. 97 (1976) (medical director of state prison who was also the treating physician). See also Youngberg v. Romeo, 457 U. S. 307, 322-323, and n. 30 (1982) (establishing standards to determine whether decisions of “professional” regarding treatment of involuntarily committed can create liability for a due process violation). Defendants are not removed from the purview of § 1983 simply because they are professionals acting in accordance with professional discretion and judgment. The Court of Appeals’ approach to determining who is subject to suit under §1983, wholeheartedly embraced by respondent, cannot be reconciled with this Court’s decision in Estelle, which demonstrates that custodial and supervisory functions are irrelevant to an assessment whether the particular action challenged was performed under color of state law. In Estelle, the inmate’s Eighth Amendment claim was brought against the physician-employee, Dr. Gray, in his capacity both as treating physician and as medical director of the state prison system. See 429 U. S., at 107. Gray was sued, however, solely on the basis of allegedly substandard medical treatment given to the plaintiff; his supervisory and custodial functions were not at issue. The Court’s opinion did not suggest that Gray had not acted under color of state law in treating the inmate. To the contrary, the inference to be drawn from Estelle is that the medical treatment of prison inmates by prison physicians is state action. The Court explicitly held that “indifference . . . manifested by prison doctors in their response to the prisoner’s needs . . . states a cause of action under § 1983.” Id., at 104-105; see id., at 104, n. 10 (citing with approval Courts of Appeals’ decisions holding prison doctors liable for Eighth Amendment claims brought under § 1983 without mention of supervisory and custodial duties). The Court of Appeals’ rationale would sharply undermine this holding. C We now make explicit what was implicit in our holding in Estelle: Respondent, as a physician employed by North Carolina to provide medical services to state prison inmates, acted under color of state law for purposes of § 1983 when undertaking his duties in treating petitioner’s injury. Such conduct is fairly attributable to the State. The Court recognized in Estelle: “An inmate must rely on prison authorities to treat his medical needs; if the authorities fail to do so, those needs will not be met.” 429 U. S., at 103. In light of this, the Court held that the State has a constitutional obligation, under the Eighth Amendment, to provide adequate medical care to those whom it has incarcerated. Id., at 104. See also Spicer v. Williamson, 191 N. C. 487, 490, 132 S. E. 291, 293 (1926) (common law requires North Carolina to provide medical care to its prison inmates), cited in Estelle, 429 U. S., at 104, n. 9. North Carolina employs physicians, such as respondent, and defers to their professional judgment, in order to fulfill this obligation. By virtue of this relationship, effected by state law, Doctor Atkins is authorized and obliged to treat prison inmates, such as West. He does so “clothed with the authority of state law.” United States v. Classic, 313 U. S., at 326. He is “a person who may fairly be said to be a state actor.” Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U. S., at 937. It is only those physicians authorized by the State to whom the inmate may turn. Under state law, the only medical care West could receive for his injury was that provided by the State. If Doctor Atkins misused his power by demonstrating deliberate indifference to West’s serious medical needs, the resultant deprivation was caused, in the sense relevant for state-action inquiry, by the State’s exercise of its right to punish West by incarceration and to deny him a venue independent of the State to obtain needed medical care. The fact that the State employed respondent pursuant to a contractual arrangement that did not generate the same benefits or obligations applicable to other “state employees” does not alter the analysis. It is the physician’s function within the state system, not the precise terms of his employment, that determines whether his actions can fairly be attributed to the State. Whether a physician is on the state payroll or is paid by contract, the dispositive issue concerns the relationship among the State, the physician, and the prisoner. Contracting out prison medical care does not relieve the State of its constitutional duty to provide adequate medical treatment to those in its custody, and it does not deprive the State’s prisoners of the means to vindicate their Eighth Amendment rights. The State bore an affirmative obligation to provide adequate medical care to West; the State delegated that function to respondent Atkins; and respondent voluntarily assumed that obligation by contract. Nor does the fact that Doctor Atkins’ employment contract did not require him to work exclusively for the prison make him any less a state actor than if he performed those duties as a full-time, permanent member of the state prison medical staff. It is the physician’s function while working for the State, not the amount of time he spends in performance of those duties or the fact that he may be employed by others to perform similar duties, that determines whether he is acting under color of state law. In the State’s employ, respondent worked as a physician at the prison hospital fully vested with state authority to fulfill essential aspects of the duty, placed on the State by the Eighth Amendment and state law, to provide essential medical care to those the State had incarcerated. Doctor Atkins must be considered to be a state actor. III For the reasons stated above, we conclude that respondent’s delivery of medical treatment to West was state action fairly attributable to the State, and that respondent therefore acted under color of state law for purposes of §1983. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Doctor Atkins’ contractual duties included the following: to provide two orthopedic clinics per week; to see all orthopedic and neurological referrals; to perform orthopedic surgery as scheduled; to conduct rounds as often as necessary for his surgical and other orthopedic patients; to coordinate with the Physical Therapy Department; to request the assistance of neurosurgical consultants on spinal surgical cases; and to provide emergency on-call orthopedic services 24 hours per day. His contract required him to furnish two days of professional service each week in fulfillment of these duties. App. 24-25. Atkins also had supervisory authority over Department of Correction nurses and physician’s assistants, who were subject to his orders. Id., at 28. Apparently, respondent maintained a private practice apart from his work at the prison. Atkins’ submissions on his motion for summary judgment, however, do not reflect the extent of his nonprison practice or the extent to which he depended upon the prison work for his livelihood. North Carolina law bars all but minimum-security prisoners from exercising an option to go outside the prison and obtain medical care of their choice at their own expense or funded by family resources or private health insurance. See North Carolina Division of Prisons Health Care Procedure Manual §§ 710.1-710.2 (1980), App. to Brief for Petitioner 15a-16a (promulgated pursuant to 5 N. C. Admin. Code §02E.0203 (1987) and N. C. Gen. Stat. §§ 148-11, 148-19 (1987)). Petitioner is not a minimum-security prisoner. Section 1983 provides in relevant part: “Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any.citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress.” Doctor Atkins is represented here by the Attorney General of North Carolina. By statute, the State provides for representation and protection from liability for any person who provides medical services to inmates and who is sued pursuant to § 1983. See N. C. Gen. Stat. § 143-300.7 (1987). The State has informed its contract physicians, however, that it will not provide them with representation and indemnification in malpractice actions. West also named as defendants James B. Hunt, then Governor of the State of North Carolina, and Rae McNamara, Director of the Division of Prisons of the North Carolina Department of Correction. The District Court’s dismissal of West’s claims against Hunt and McNamara was affirmed on appeal. See 815 F. 2d 993, 996 (CA4 1987). West has not pursued his actions against those defendants before this Court. In addition, the Court of Appeals rejected petitioner’s contention that the provision of medical services to inmates is an “exclusive state function.” The court explained: “Decisions made in the day-to-day rendering of medical services by a physician are not the kind of decisions traditionally and exclusively made by the sovereign for and on behalf of the public.” Id., at 996, n. 2, citing Blum v. Yaretsky, 457 U. S. 991, 1012 (1982). In their resolution of § 1983 eases, other Courts of Appeals implicitly have concluded that prison physicians act under color of state law when treating incarcerated persons. See, e. g., Miranda v. Munoz, 770 F. 2d 255 (CA1 1985) (upholding jury verdict in § 1983 action against physician under contract with State to work eight hours per week at jail); Norris v. Frame, 585 F. 2d 1183 (CA3 1978) (pretrial detainee’s § 1983 claim against, among others, a prison physician); Murrell v. Bennett, 615 F. 2d 306 (CA5 1980) (reinstating inmate’s § 1983 action against state prison physician); Byrd v. Wilson, 701 F. 2d 592 (CA6 1983) (reinstating § 1983 action against medical staff, including two physicians, at state penitentiary); Duncan v. Duckworth, 644 F. 2d 653 (CA7 1981) (allowing § 1983 action against prison hospital administrator to proceed until identity of responsible members of medical staff was determined); Kelsey v. Ewing, 652 F. 2d 4 (CA8 1981) (upholding § 1983 action against contract physician at state prison). In his brief and at oral argument, respondent insisted that West had failed to state a cause of action under Estelle. He maintains that petitioner’s allegations “amount to no more than a claim of medical malpractice” or “a negligence based claim,” which, under Estelle, 429 U. S., 105-106, are not sufficient to make out a claim of cruel and unusual punishment. No court has undertaken the necessary factfinding, let aldhe-passed upon this Eighth Amendment issue. We decline to address it here in the first instance, particularly in light of settled doctrine that we avoid constitutional questions whenever possible. See Spector Motor Service, Inc. v. McLaughlin, 323 U. S. 101, 105 (1944); Jean v. Nelson, 472 U. S. 846, 854 (1985). North Carolina Division of Prisons Health Care Procedure Manual § 100.5. See App. to Brief for Petitioner 8a. We do not suggest that this factor is entirely irrelevant to the state-action inquiry. Where the issue is whether a private party is engaged in activity that constitutes state action, it may be relevant that the challenged activity turned on judgments controlled by professional standards, where those standards are not established by the State. The Court has held that “a State normally can be held responsible for a private decision only when it has exercised coercive power or has provided such significant encouragement, either overt or covert, that the choice must in law be deemed to be that of the State. ” Blum v. Yaretsky, 457 U. S., at 1004 (decisions of physicians and administrators of privately owned and operated nursing home to transfer Medicaid patients not state action); Rendell-Baker v. Kohn, 457 U. S. 830, 840 (1982) (discharge decisions of privately owned and operated school not state action). In both Blum and Rendell-Baker, the fact that the private entities received state funding and were subject to state regulation did not, without more, convert their conduct into state action. See Blum v. Yaretsky, 457 U. S., at 1004; Rendell-Baker v. Kohn, 457 U. S., at 840-843. The Court suggested that the private party’s challenged decisions could satisfy the state-action requirement if they were made on the basis of some rule of decision for which the State is responsible. The Court found, however, that the decisions were based on independent professional judgments and were not subject to state direction. Thus, the requisite “nexus” to the State was absent; This determination cannot be transformed into the proposition that no person acts under color of state law where he is exercising independent. professional judgment. “[T]he exercise of . . . independent professional judgment,” is not, as the Court of Appeals suggested, “the primary test.” 815 F. 2d, at 995, n. 1. And Blum and Rendell-Baker provide no support for respondent’s argument that a physician, employed by the State to fulfill the State’s constitutional obligations, does not act under color of state law merely because he renders medical care in accordance with professional obligations. The Court of Appeals, in our view, misunderstood this Court’s Polk County discussion of O’Connor v. Donaldson, 422 U. S. 563 (1975), and Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U. S. 97 (1976). We observed that O’Connor involved claims against a psychiatrist who served as the superintendent at a state mental hospital, and that Estelle involved a physician who was the medical director of the Texas Department of Corrections and the chief medical officer of a prison hospital. Polk County, 454 U. S., at 320. The Court made these observations, however, in the context of contrasting the role of the public defender with that of the physicians in response to the argument that state employment alone is sufficient to fulfill the under-color-of-state-law requirement. See id., at 319-320. We agree with the dissent in the Court of Appeals that the Court discussed these facts “in order to highlight the cooperative relationship between the doctors and the state and thus the absence of an adversarial relationship akin to that existing between public defenders and the state.” 815 F. 2d, at 997-998. See Polk County, 454 U. S., at 320 (“Institutional physicians assume an obligation to the mission that the State, through the institution, attempts to achieve”). Nothing in the Court’s opinion stands for the proposition that a prison physician must be acting in a custodial or supervisory function in order to act under color of state law. Furthermore, it would greatly diminish the meaning of a prisoner’s Eighth Amendment right, since few of those with supervisory and custodial functions are likely to be involved directly in patient care. And § 1983 liability is not available under the doctrine of respondeat superior. Monell v. New York City Dept. of Social Services, 436 U. S. 658, 690-695 (1978). By statute, the North Carolina Department of Correction is required to provide health services to its prisoners. N. C. Gen. Stat. § 148-19 (1987). In compliance with the statute, state regulations charge the Director, Division of Prisons, with the responsibility of providing each prisoner the services necessary to maintain basic health. 5 N. C. Admin. Code §02E.0201 (1987). State regulations provide that the delivery of health services at each facility is the responsibility of the prison administrator, who must designate a specific health authority “who is charged with the responsibility to provide health services to that facility.” § 02E.0202. Pursuant to these provisions, Doctor Atkins was employed by the Director, Division of Prisons, and was paid by the State, to provide orthopedic services to the State’s prisoners. As the dissent in the Court of Appeals explained, if this were the basis for delimiting § 1983 liability, “the state will be free to contract out all services which it is constitutionally obligated to provide and leave its citizens with no means for vindication of those rights, whose protection has been delegated to ‘private’ actors, when they have been denied.” 815 F. 2d, at 998. Contrary to respondent’s intimations, the fact that a state employee’s role parallels one in the private sector is not, by itself, reason to conclude that the former is not acting under color of state law in performing his duties. “If an individual is possessed of state authority and purports to act under that authority, his action is state action. It is irrelevant that he might have taken the same action had he acted in a purely private capacity _” Griffin v. Maryland, 378 U. S. 130, 135 (1964). Moreover, although the provision of medical services is a function traditionally performed by private individuals, the context in which respondent performs these services for the State (quite apart from the source of remuneration) distinguishes the relationship between respondent and West from the ordinary physician-patient relationship. Cf. Polk County, 454 U. S., at 318. Respondent carried out his duties at the state prison within the prison hospital. That correctional setting, specifically designed to be removed from the community, inevitably affects the exercise of professional judgment. Unlike the situation confronting free patients, the non-medical functions of prison life inevitably influence the nature, timing, and form of medical care provided to inmates' such as West. By regulation, matters of medical health involving clinical judgment are the prison physician’s “sole province.” 5 N. C. Admin. Code §02E.0204 (1987). These same regulations, however, require respondent to provide medical services “in keeping with the security regulations of the facility.” Ibid. The record is undeveloped as to the specific limitations placed on respondent by the state prison system. But studies of prison health care, and simple common sense, suggest that his delivery of medical care was not unaffected by the fact that the State controlled the circumstances and sources of a prisoner’s medical treatment. For one thing, the State’s financial resources are limited. Further, prisons and jails are inherently coercive institutions that for security reasons must exercise nearly total control over their residents’ lives and the activities within their confines; general schedules strictly regulate work, exercise, and diet. These factors can, and most often do, have a significant impact on the provision of medical services in prisons. See generally Neisser, Is There a Doctor in the Joint? The Search for Constitutional Standards for Prison Health Care, 63 Va. L. Rev. 921, 936-946 (1977) (describing the institutional effects on the delivery of health care services in prisons); M. Wishart & N. Dubler, Health Care in Prisons, Jails and Detention Centers: Some Legal and Ethical Dilemmas 4 (1983) (“[T]he delivery of medical services in the nation’s prisons and jails is beset with problems and conflicts which are virtually unknown to other health care services”). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice O’Connor delivered the opinion of the Court. We granted certiorari in this case, 467 U. S. 1203 (1984), to determine whether police officers may stop and briefly detain a person who is the subject of a “wanted flyer” while they attempt to find out whether an arrest warrant has been issued. We conclude that such stops are consistent with the Fourth Amendment under appropriate circumstances. I On December 4, 1981, two armed men robbed a tavern in the Cincinnati suburb of St. Bernard, Ohio. Six days later, a St. Bernard police officer, Kenneth Davis, interviewed an informant who passed along information that respondent Thomas Hensley had driven the getaway car during the armed robbery. Officer Davis obtained a written statement from the informant and immediately issued a “wanted flyer” to other police departments in the Cincinnati metropolitan area. The flyer twice stated that Hensley was wanted for investigation of an aggravated robbery. It described both Hensley and the date and location of the alleged robbery, and asked other departments to pick up and hold Hensley for the St. Bernard police in the event he were located. The flyer also warned other departments to use caution and to consider Hensley armed and dangerous. The St. Bernard Police Department’s “wanted flyer” was received by teletype in the headquarters of the Covington Police Department on December 10,' 1981. Covington is a Kentucky suburb of Cincinnati that is approximately five miles from St. Bernard. The flyer was read aloud at each change of shift in the Covington Police Department between December 10 and December 16, 1981. Some of the Coving-ton officers were acquainted with Hensley, and after December 10 they periodically looked for him at places in Covington he was known to frequent. On December 16, 1981, Covington Officer Terence Eger saw a white Cadillac convertible stopped in the middle of a Covington street. Officer Eger saw Hensley in the driver’s seat and asked him to move on. As Hensley drove away, Eger inquired by radio whether there was a warrant outstanding for Hensley’s arrest. Before the dispatcher could answer, two other Covington officers who were in separate cars on patrol interrupted to say that there might be an Ohio robbery warrant outstanding on Hensley. The officers, Daniel Cope and David Rassache, subsequently testified that they had heard or read the St. Bernard flyer on several occasions, that they recalled that the flyer sought a stop for investigation only, and that in their experience the issuance of such a flyer was usually followed by the issuance of an arrest warrant. While the dispatcher checked to see whether a warrant had been issued, Officer Cope drove to a Holman Street address where Hensley occasionally stayed, and Officer Rassache went to check a second location. The dispatcher had difficulty in confirming whether a warrant had been issued. Unable to locate the flyer, she called the Cincinnati Police Department on the mistaken belief that the flyer had originated in Cincinnati. The Cincinnati Police Department transferred the call to its records department, which placed the dispatcher on hold. In the meantime, Officer Cope reported that he had sighted a white Cadillac approaching him on Holman Street. Cope turned on his flashing lights and Hensley pulled over to the curb. Before Cope left his patrol car, the dispatcher advised him that she had “Cincinnati hunting for the warrant,” App. 49, but that she had not yet confirmed it. Cope approached Hensley’s car with his service revolver drawn and pointed into the air. He had Hensley and a passenger seated next to him step out of the car. Moments later, Officer Rassache arrived in his separate car. He recognized the passenger, Albert Green, a convicted felon. Rassache stepped up to the open passenger door of Hensley’s car and observed the butt of a revolver protruding from underneath the passenger’s seat. Green was then arrested. A search of the car uncovered a second handgun wrapped in a jacket in the middle of the front seat and a third handgun in a bag in the back seat. After the discovery of these weapons, Hensley was also arrested. After state handgun possession charges against Hensley were dismissed, Hensley was indicted by a federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Kentucky for being a convicted felon in possession of firearms in violation of 18 U. S. C. App. § 1202(a)(1). Hensley moved to suppress the handguns from evidence on the grounds that the Covington police had imper-missibly stopped him in violation of the Fourth Amendment and the principles announced in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1 (1968). The District Judge held the stop to be proper and denied the motion. Respondent was convicted after a bench/ trial and sentenced to two years in federal prison. The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit reversed the conviction. 713 F. 2d 220 (1983). The panel noted that the Covington police could not justifiably conclude from the St. Bernard flyer that a warrant had been issued for Hensley’s arrest; nor could the Covington police stop the respondent while they attempted to find out whether a warrant had in fact been issued. Reviewing this Court’s decisions applying Terry, the Sixth Circuit concluded that investigative stops remain a narrow exception to the probable-cause requirement, and that this Court has manifested a “clear intention to restrict investigative stops to settings involving the investigation of ongoing crimes.” 713 F. 2d, at 225. Since Covington police encountered Hensley almost two weeks after the armed robbery in St. Bernard, they had no reason to believe they were investigating an ongoing crime. Because the Covington police were familiar only with the St. Bernard flyer, and not with the specific information which led the St. Bernard police to issue the flyer, the Court of Appeals held they lacked a reasonable suspicion sufficient-to justify an investigative stop. The Court of Appeals concluded that Hensley’s conviction rested on evidence obtained through an illegal arrest, and therefore had to be reversed. We disagree, and now reverse. II The Fourth Amendment protects the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures. In Terry, supra, and subsequent cases, this Court has held that, consistent with the Fourth Amendment, police may stop persons in the absence of probable cause under limited circumstances. See Dunaway v. New York, 442 U. S. 200, 207-211 (1979). In particular, the Court has noted that law enforcement agents may briefly stop a moving automobile to investigate a reasonable suspicion that its occupants are involved in criminal activity. See United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U. S. 873, 881 (1975) (within United States borders, Government interest in preventing illegal entry of aliens permits a Terry stop on reasonable suspicion that particular vehicle contains aliens). Although stopping a car and detaining its occupants constitute a seizure within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, the governmental interest in investigating an officer’s reasonable suspicion, based on specific and articulable facts, may outweigh the Fourth Amendment interest of the driver and passengers in remaining secure from the intrusion. See Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U. S. 648, 653-655 (1979). In this case, the Sixth Circuit announced two prerequisites to such an investigatory stop and held that they were lacking: first, the crime being investigated was not imminent or ongoing, but rather was already completed; second, the “wanted flyer” was insufficient to create a reasonable suspicion that respondent had engaged in criminal activity. If either part of this analysis is correct, then it was indeed improper to stop respondent, and his conviction cannot stand. We accordingly turn to the separate but related issues of Terry stops to investigate completed crimes and Terry stops in reliance on another police department’s “wanted flyer.” A This is the first case we have addressed in which police stopped a person because they suspected he was involved in a completed crime. In our previous decisions involving investigatory stops on less than probable cause, police stopped or seized a person because they suspected he was about to commit a crime, e. g., Terry, supra, or was committing a crime at the moment of the stop, e. g., Adams v. Williams, 407 U. S. 143 (1972). Noting that Florida v. Royer, 460 U. S. 491 (1983), struck down a particularly intrusive detention of a person suspected of committing an ongoing crime, the Court of Appeals in this case concluded that we clearly intended to restrict investigative stops to the context of ongoing crimes. We do not agree with the Court of Appeals that our prior opinions contemplate an inflexible rule that precludes police from stopping persons they suspect of past criminal activity unless they have probable cause for arrest. To the extent previous opinions have addressed the issue at all, they have suggested that some investigative stops based on a reasonable suspicion of past criminal activity could withstand Fourth Amendment scrutiny. Thus United States v. Cortez, 449 U. S. 411, 417, n. 2 (1981), indicates in a footnote that “[o]f course, an officer may stop and question a person if there are reasonable grounds to believe that person is wanted for past criminal conduct.” And in United States v. Place, 462 U. S. 696 (1983), decided barely a month before the Sixth Circuit’s opinion, this Court stated that its prior opinions acknowledged police authority to stop a person “when the officer has reasonable, articulable suspicion that the person has been, is, or is about to be engaged in criminal activity.” Id., at 702 (emphasis added). See also Michigan v. Summers, 452 U. S. 692, 699, and n. 7 (1981). Indeed, Florida v. Royer itself suggests that certain seizures are justifiable under the Fourth Amendment even in the absence of probable cause “if there is articulable suspicion that a person has committed or is about to commit a crime.” 460 U. S., at 498 (plurality opinion) (emphasis added). At the least, these dicta suggest that the police are not automatically shorn of authority to stop a suspect in the absence of probable cause merely because the criminal has completed his crime and escaped from the scene. The precise limits on investigatory stops to investigate past criminal activity are more difficult to define. The proper way to identify the limits is to apply the same test already used to identify the proper bounds of intrusions that further investigations of imminent or ongoing crimes. That test, which is grounded in the standard of reasonableness embodied in the Fourth Amendment, balances the nature and quality of the intrusion on personal security against the importance of the governmental interests alleged to justify the intrusion. United States v. Place, supra, at 703; Michigan v. Summers, supra, at 698-701. When this balancing test is applied to stops to investigate past crimes, we think that probable cause to arrest need not always be required. The factors in the balance may be somewhat different when a stop to investigate past criminal activity is involved rather than a stop to investigate ongoing criminal conduct. This is because the governmental interests and the nature of the intrusions involved in the two situations may differ. As we noted in Terry, one general interest present in the context of ongoing or imminent criminal activity is “that of effective crime prevention and detection.” Terry, 392 U. S., at 22. A stop to investigate an already completed crime does not necessarily promote the interest of crime prevention as directly as a stop to investigate suspected ongoing criminal activity. Similarly, the exigent circumstances which require a police officer to step in before a crime is committed or completed are not necessarily as pressing long afterwards. Public safety may be less threatened by a suspect in a past crime who now appears to be going about his lawful business than it is by a suspect who is currently in the process of violating the law. Finally, officers making a stop to investigate past crimes may have a wider range of opportunity to choose the time and circumstances of the stop. See Brown v. Texas, 443 U. S. 47, 51 (1979); ALI Model Code of Pre-Arraignment Procedure 12 (Prop. Off. Draft No. 1, 1972). Despite these differences, where police have been unable to locate a person suspected of involvement in a past crime, the ability to briefly stop that person, ask questions, or check identification in the absence of probable cause promotes the strong government interest in solving crimes and bringing offenders to justice. Restraining police action until after probable cause is obtained would not only hinder the investigation, but might also enable the suspect to flee in the interim and to remain at large. Particularly in the context of felonies or crimes involving a threat to public safety, it is in the public interest that the crime be solved and the suspect detained as promptly as possible. The law enforcement interests at stake in these circumstances outweigh the individual’s interest to be free of a stop and detention that is no more extensive than permissible in the investigation of imminent or ongoing crimes. We need not and do not decide today whether Terry stops to investigate all past crimes, however serious, are permitted. It is enough to say that, if police have a reasonable suspicion, grounded in specific and articulable facts, that a person they encounter was involved in or is wanted in connection with a completed felony, then a Terry stop may be made to investigate that suspicion. The automatic barrier to such stops erected by the Court of Appeals accordingly cannot stand. B At issue in this case is a stop of a person by officers of one police department in reliance on a flyer issued by another department indicating that the person is wanted for investigation of a felony. The Court of Appeals concluded that “the Fourth Amendment does not permit police officers in one department to seize a person simply because a neighboring police department has circulated a flyer reflecting the desire to question that individual about some criminal investigation that does not involve the arresting officers or their department.” 713 F. 2d, at 225. This holding apparently rests on the omission from the flyer of the specific and articulable facts which led the first department to suspect respondent’s involvement in a completed crime. Ibid. This Court discussed a related issue in Whiteley v. Warden, 401 U. S. 560 (1971). In Whiteley, a county sheriff in Wyoming obtained an arrest warrant for a person suspected of burglary. The sheriff then issued a message through a statewide law enforcement radio network describing the suspect, his car, and the property taken. At least one version of the message also indicated that a warrant had been issued. Id., at 564, and n. 5. The message did not specify the evidence that gave the sheriff probable cause to believe the suspect had committed the breaking and entering. In reliance on the radio message, police in Laramie stopped the suspect and searched his car. The Supreme Court, in an opinion by Justice Harlan, ultimately concluded that the sheriff had lacked probable cause to obtain the warrant and that the evidence obtained during the search by the police in Laramie had to be excluded. In so ruling, however, the Court noted: “We do not, of course, question that the Laramie police were entitled to act on the strength of the radio bulletin. Certainly police officers called upon to aid other officers in executing arrest warrants are entitled to assume that the officers requesting aid offered the magistrate the information requisite to support an independent judicial assessment of probable cause. Where, however, the contrary turns out to be true, an otherwise illegal arrest cannot be insulated from challenge by the decision of the instigating officer to rely on fellow officers to make the arrest.” Id., at 568. This language in Whiteley suggests that, had the sheriff who issued the radio bulletin possessed probable cause for arrest, then the Laramie police could have properly arrested the defendant even though they were unaware of the specific facts that established probable cause. See United States v. Maryland, 479 F. 2d 566, 569 (CA5 1973). Thus Whiteley supports the proposition that, when evidence is uncovered during a search incident to an arrest in reliance merely on a flyer or bulletin, its admissibility turns on whether the officers who issued the flyer possessed probable cause to make the arrest. It does not turn on whether those relying on the flyer were themselves aware of the specific facts which led their colleagues to seek their assistance. In an era when criminal suspects are increasingly mobile and increasingly likely to flee across jurisdictional boundaries, this rule is a matter of common sense: it minimizes the volume of information concerning suspects that must be transmitted to other jurisdictions and enables police in one jurisdiction to act promptly in reliance on information from another jurisdiction. Neither respondent nor the Court of Appeals suggests any reason why a police department should be able to act on the basis of a flyer indicating that another department has a warrant, but should not be able to act on the basis of a flyer indicating that another department has a reasonable suspicion of involvement with a crime. Faced with this precise issue, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit applied Whiteley and concluded that, although the officer who issues a wanted bulletin must have a reasonable suspicion sufficient to justify a stop, the officer who acts in reliance on the bulletin is not required to have personal knowledge of the evidence creating a reasonable suspicion. United States v. Robinson, 536 F. 2d 1298, 1300 (1976). The Ninth Circuit there noted “that effective law enforcement cannot be conducted unless police officers can act on directions and information transmitted by one officer to another and that officers, who must often act swiftly, cannot be expected to cross-examine their fellow officers about the foundation for the transmitted information.” Id., at 1299. It could be argued that police can more justifiably rely on a report that a magistrate has issued a warrant than on a report that another law enforcement agency has simply concluded that it has a reasonable suspicion sufficient to authorize an investigatory stop. We do not find this distinction significant. The law enforcement interests promoted by allowing one department to make investigatory stops based upon another department’s bulletins or flyers are considerable, while the intrusion on personal security is minimal. The same interests that weigh in favor of permitting police to make a Terry stop to investigate a past crime, swpra, at 229, support permitting police in other jurisdictions to rely on flyers or bulletins in making stops to investigate past crimes. We conclude that, if a flyer or bulletin has been issued on the basis of articulable facts supporting a reasonable suspicion that the wanted person has committed an offense, then reliance on that flyer or bulletin justifies a stop to check identification, see United States ex rel. Kirby v. Sturges, 510 F. 2d 397, 400-401 (CA7) (Stevens, J.), cert. denied, 421 U. S. 1016 (1975), to pose questions to the person, or to detain the person briefly while attempting to obtain further information. See Adams v. Williams, 407 U. S. 143, 146 (1972) (“A brief stop of a suspicious individual, in order to determine his identity or to maintain the status quo momentarily while obtaining more information, may be the most reasonable in light of the facts known to the officer at the time”). If the flyer has been issued in the absence of a reasonable suspicion, then a stop in the objective reliance upon it violates the Fourth Amendment. In such a situation, of course, the officers making the stop may have a good-faith defense to any civil suit. See Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U. S. 232 (1974); Pierson v. Ray, 386 U. S. 547 (1967); Turner v. Raynes, 611 F. 2d 92, 93 (CA5) (officer relying in good faith on an invalid arrest warrant has defense to civil suit), cert. denied, 449 U. S. 900 (1980). It is the objective reading of the flyer or bulletin that determines whether other police officers can defensibly act in reliance on it. Cf. Terry, 392 U. S., at 21-22 (“it is imperative that the facts be judged against an objective standard: would the facts available to the officer at the moment of the seizure or the search ‘warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief’ that the action taken was appropriate?”). Assuming the police make a Terry stop in objective reliance on a flyer or bulletin, we hold that the evidence uncovered in the course of the stop is admissible if the police who issued the flyer or bulletin possessed a reasonable suspicion justifying a stop, United States v. Robinson, supra, and if the stop that in fact occurred was not significantly more intrusive than would have been permitted the issuing department. H-I ► — i I — f It remains to apply the two sets of principles described above to the stop and subsequent arrest of respondent Hensley. At the outset, we assume, arguendo, that the St. Bernard police who issued the “wanted flyer” on Hensley lacked probable cause for his arrest. The District Court implied that the St. Bernard police had probable cause for arrest, but held only that the St. Bernard officers had reasonable suspicion sufficient to justify a stop. App. to Pet. for Cert. 14a. The Court of Appeals implied that probable cause might be lacking, 713 F. 2d, at 223, but ultimately concluded that the question was irrelevant because the Covington police would not be entitled to make an arrest or a stop regardless of whether the St. Bernard police possessed probable cause or a reasonable suspicion. In this Court, no party contends that the St. Bernard police had probable cause to arrest Hensley. We agree with the District Court that the St. Bernard police possessed a reasonable suspicion, based on specific and articulable facts, that Hensley was involved in an armed robbery. The District Judge heard testimony from the St. Bernard officer who interviewed the informant. On the strength of the evidence, the District Court concluded that the wealth of detail concerning the robbery revealed by the informant, coupled with her admission of tangential participation in the robbery, established that the informant was sufficiently reliable and credible “to arouse a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity by [Hensley] and to constitute the specific and articulable facts needed to underly a stop.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 14a. Under the circumstances, “the information carried enough indicia of reliability,” Adams v. Williams, supra, at 147, to justify an investigatory stop of Hensley. The justification for a stop did not evaporate when the armed robbery was completed. Hensley was reasonably suspected of involvement in a felony and was at large from the time the suspicion arose until the stop by the Covington police. A brief stop and detention at the earliest opportunity after the suspicion arose is fully consistent with the principles of the Fourth Amendment. Turning to the flyer issued by the St. Bernard police, we believe it satisfies the objective test announced today. An objective reading of the entire flyer would lead an experienced officer to conclude that Thomas Hensley was at least wanted for questioning and investigation in St. Bernard. Since the flyer was issued on the basis of articulable facts supporting a reasonable suspicion, this objective reading would justify a brief stop to check Hensley’s identification, pose questions, and inform the suspect that the St. Bernard police wished to question him. As an experienced officer could well assume that a warrant might have been obtained in the period after the flyer was issued, we think the flyer would further justify a brief detention at the scene of the stop while officers checked whether a warrant had in fact been issued. It is irrelevant whether the Covington officers intended to detain Hensley only long enough to confirm the existence of a warrant, or for some longer period; what matters is that the stop and detention that occurred were in fact no more intrusive than would have been permitted an experienced officer on an objective reading of the flyer. To be sure, the St. Bernard flyer at issue did not request that other police departments briefly detain Hensley merely to check his identification or confirm the existence of a warrant. Instead, it asked other departments to pick up and hold Hensley for St. Bernard. Our decision today does not suggest that such a detention, whether at the scene or at the Covington police headquarters, would have been justified. Given the distance involved and the time required to identify and communicate with the department that issued the flyer, such a detention might well be so lengthy or intrusive as to exceed the permissible limits of a Terry stop. See United States v. Place, 462 U. S., at 709. Nor do we mean to endorse St. Bernard’s request in its flyer for actions that could forseeably violate the Fourth Amendment. We hold only that this flyer, objectively read and supported by a reasonable suspicion on the part of the issuing department, justified the length and intrusiveness of the stop and detention that actually occurred. When the Covington officers stopped Hensley, they were authorized to take such steps as were reasonably necessary to protect their personal safety and to maintain the status quo during the course of the stop. The Covington officers’ conduct was well within the permissible range in the context of suspects who are reported to be armed and dangerous. See Michigan v. Long, 463 U. S. 1032, 1049-1050 (1983); Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U. S. 106, 110-111 (1977) (per curiam). Having stopped Hensley, the Covington police were entitled to seize evidence revealed in plain view in the course of the lawful stop, to arrest Hensley’s passenger when evidence discovered in plain view gave probable cause to believe the passenger had committed a crime, Texas v. Brown, 460 U. S. 730 (1983) (plurality opinion), and subsequently to search the passenger compartment of the car because it was within the passenger’s immediate control. New York v. Belton, 453 U. S. 454 (1981). Finally, having discovered additional weapons in Hensley’s car during the course of a lawful search, the Covington officers had probable cause to arrest Hensley himself for possession of firearms. The length of Hensley’s detention from his stop to his arrest on probable cause was brief. A reasonable suspicion on the part of the St. Bernard police underlies and supports their issuance of the flyer. Finally, the stop that occurred was reasonable in objective reliance on the flyer and was not significantly more intrusive than would have been permitted the St. Bernard police. Under these circumstances, the investigatory stop was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, and the evidence discovered during the stop was admissible. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Jackson delivered the opinion of the Court. Plaintiff, a railroad brakeman, brought this action under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, 35 Stat. 65; 53 Stat. 1404; 45 U. S. C. § 51. He recovered a jury verdict of $24,990, but the Circuit Court of Appeals reversed because of errors in the charge by the District Judge and ordered a new trial. The plaintiff’s claim as submitted to the jury was negligence on the part of an engineer in effecting a coupling operation at a speed which plaintiff thought would jolt him off the stirrup of the car he was riding. In jumping for safety, he claimed to have received a severe and permanent back injury. The defendant denied the occurrence, offered testimony that plaintiff did not work at the time in question and also evidence of his admission that he did not work on that day but instead shoveled snow to get his car out of the garage. It also was testified that he had told his conductor he hurt his back on a different occasion. But if the injury was sustained at the time and place alleged, the defendant denied negligence, claimed contributory negligence and pleaded a general release. The controversy here concerns the release. It was proved and not denied that for a consideration of $250 the plaintiff executed a general release of “all claims and demands which I have or can or may have against the said Pennsylvania Railroad Company for or by reason of personal injuries sustained by me” at the time and place involved in the suit. It also released claims for loss of time and expense, and recited that the payment was in compromise and not an admission of liability, that plaintiff read and understood the agreement and that the sum of money stated therein is all that he was to receive. On the trial, the plaintiff testified that he read and understood the release, knew what he was doing and intended to waive any further claim, and that when he began talking settlement he said he should have between $300 and $350. No fraud was alleged, but the plaintiff testified that he executed the release in reliance on the claim agent’s assurance that “there was nothing wrong” and that he “was all right to go back to the job.” At the trial, plaintiff offered evidence from which the jury might well find that he had a permanent and serious injury. The claim agent admitted that at the time of settlement he did not know the plaintiff was suffering the injury which the doctors at the trial described. The plaintiff had gone to a family physician who taped his back and to a chiropractor whose report plaintiff took with him to the claim agent. It did not diagnose permanent injury but did suggest a weakness making him more susceptible to recurrence. The Railroad procured no medical examination of plaintiff. The claim agent’s testimony was that he determined the amount of the settlement on the basis of his belief that there was no liability. Instructing the jury, the trial court stated: “Anyhow, they settled to the extent of $250.00, and the release has been offered in evidence and admitted, and both sides agree that that release was not in contemplation of any sort of permanent injury. “Now, I am going to consider that release as binding to the amount of $250.00, and if you find a verdict for the plaintiff you will deduct that from any amount you would otherwise give him. The $250.00 he got for expenses and medical bills and services that he obtained up to that time; and if you find that he is entitled to a verdict at your hands I will ask you to deduct that $250.00 from any amount you otherwise would award him, because that is what he agreed to take toward that particular phase of his claim, and of course he would not and does not ask, as I understand it to be excused from that, — he admits that he got it, and there it is. “The release, as I have told the attorneys for both sides, I do not consider binding insofar as it applies to his permanent injuries, because the Pennsylvania Railroad certainly didn’t know he was permanently injured . . . .” The Circuit Court of Appeals, quite rightly we think, construed the charge of the District Judge as withdrawing the question of validity of the release from the jury and said: “This was palpable error under the facts relating to the release and entirely aside from the Court’s incorrect assumption that there was no dispute about the permanency of the injuries.” An examination of the record at the trial makes it clear that the issue was raised and sharply litigated as to whether the injury, if received by plaintiff in the manner alleged, was permanent in character. Only when and if this issue was resolved in favor of one party or the other could it be known whether there was a basis for finding a mutual mistake or any mistake of fact in executing the release. The court, however, resolved the issue of permanence of injury against the defendant, at least so far as the release was concerned, and on that basis withdrew consideration of that issue from the jury. Even if the issue of permanence were resolved against the defendant, an issue still existed as to validity of the release since the defendant insists that it did not act from mistake as to the nature and extent of the injuries but entered into the release for the small consideration involved because, upon the evidence in its hands at the time, no liability was indicated. We think the defendant was entitled to argue these contentions to the jury and to have them submitted under proper instructions. It is apparent that the jury accepted the instructions of the court on the subject of the release. Returning, they rendered a verdict “For the plaintiff, and assess the damages at $25,240, of which the railroad is to be reimbursed with $250.00.” The court, saying he wanted to make the record right, asked the jury if they made a net finding of $24,990, which the foreman said they did. Under the instructions they had received, there was little else that the jury could do, for the court had withdrawn from them the issue as to the validity of the release and consequently had given them no instructions as to the law that should govern the determination of any such question. While the trial court assumed a finding of permanency as a basis for his setting aside of the release, after challenge to his assumption as to the nature of the injuries he made every effort to correct the impression, insofar as it affected the issue of damages. But the trial court did not correct or in any way alter, his determination that the release was not binding insofar as it rested on the assumption of permanent injury. The Court of Appeals was right in holding that failure to submit this latter question to the jury was reversible error. We are urged, however, to decide in this case that the release was properly disregarded by the trial court upon the ground that the burden should not be on one who attacks a release, to show grounds of mutual mistake or fraud, but should rest upon the one who pleads such a contract, to prove the absence of those grounds. It is not contended that this is or ever has been the law; rather, it is contended that it should be the law, at least as to railroad cases. The amicus brief puts it that “We ask that the burden of establishing the validity of a release taken from a railroad employee under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act be placed on the railroad, and that, where but a nominal sum has been paid, which is less than or even equal to only the wages lost, that fact of itself be held to be evidence of at least a mistake of fact, if not presumed fraud, since the railroad possesses superior facilities for determining the extent of the injuries. . . .” Considerable reliance is placed upon a concurring opinion in the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Ricketts v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 153 F. 2d 757, 760. However persuasive the arguments there stated may be that inequality of bargaining power might well justify a change in the law, they are also a frank recognition that the Congress has made no such change. An amendment of this character is for the Congress to consider rather than for the courts to introduce. If the Congress were to adopt a policy depriving settlements of litigation of their prima jade validity, it might also make compensation for injuries more certain and the amounts thereof less speculative. But until the Congress changes the statutory plan, the releases of railroad employees stand on the same basis as the releases of others. One who attacks a settlement must bear the burden of showing that the contract he has made is tainted with invalidity, either by fraud practiced upon him or by a mutual mistake under which both parties acted. The plaintiff has also contended that this release violates § 5 of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act which provides that any contract to enable any common carrier to “exempt itself from any liability created by this chapter, shall to that extent be void.” 35 Stat. 66, 45 U. S. C. § 55. It is obvious that a release is not a device to exempt from liability but is a means of compromising a claimed liability and to that extent recognizing its possibility. Where controversies exist as to whether there is liability, and if so for how much, Congress has not said that parties may not settle their claims without litigation. Since we believe the Court of Appeals was right in directing a new trial at which the jury shall be permitted to pass on all issues of fact, the judgment is Affirmed. Mr. Justice Black, Mr. Justice Douglas, Mr. Justice Murphy and Mr. Justice Rutledge, being of the view that releases under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act should be governed by the same rule which applies to releases by seamen in admiralty (see the separate opinion of Judge Jerome Frank, Ricketts v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 153 F. 2d 757, 767-770), dissent from an affirmance of the judgment. [In support of the petition for certiorari, see post, p. 807.] Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Chief Justice Vinson delivered the opinion of the Court. Certiorari was granted in this case February 5, 1945, on a petition addressed to the question of the constitutionality of the Royalty Adjustment Act of October 31, 1942, and of Royalty Adjustment Order No. W-3, issued by the War Department July 28, 1943. We find now, however, that the Circuit Court of Appeals had before it, not only the constitutional question, which was decided, but also a non-constitutional question, which alone might properly have served as an adequate ground on which to dispose of the appeal. This non-constitutional question was neither considered nor decided by the court below, nor argued here. We have concluded, therefore, that we should not pass on the constitutional question at this time, but should vacate the judgment of the Circuit Court of Appeals, and remand the case to it for decision of any non-constitutional issues material to the appeal. To explain the reasons for this conclusion, we must state the history of the present proceedings in some detail. They were begun by a complaint in a District Court filed by respondent, The Timken-Detroit Axle Company, against petitioner, Alma Motor Company, asking a declaratory judgment as to their respective rights under a patent held by Alma and a coextensive license from Alma to Timken. The complaint alleged the existence of the patent, purporting to cover certain “transfer cases” or auxiliary automotive transmissions, and the license, by which Timken was authorized to manufacture the patented articles and required to pay certain specified royalties. It further alleged that Timken was engaged in manufacturing various designs of transfer cases, that some of these were once believed to have been covered by Alma’s patent and had been made the subject of royalty payments, but on the basis of later information Timken had concluded that none of them were covered, and that the patent was invalid. It asked for a judgment confirming this conclusion. Alma answered, claiming that all Timken’s transfer cases were covered, that the patent was valid, and that Timken was estopped from challenging validity, and counterclaimed for a money judgment for unpaid royalties. Following a trial, the District Court filed findings and an opinion, and entered judgment December 2,1942. It held Timken estopped from challenging the validity of Alma’s patent; that certain specified types of Timken’s transfer cases (generally those denominated T-32 and T-43) were covered by the patent and license; that Timken was indebted to Alma for royalties thereon; and that other types (generally those denominated T-79) were outside the patent and license. The court indicated that unless the parties could agree on the amount of the royalties so held to be payable, a special master would be appointed to determine the amount. Shortly before this judgment was entered, Congress enacted the Royalty Adjustment Act, which Alma seeks to attack here. The primary purpose of this Act was to reduce royalties for which the United States was ultimately liable on inventions manufactured for it by a licensee, from pre-war rates to rates appropriate to the volume of production in wartime. Whenever during the war a government contractor manufactured under a license, and the royalties seemed excessive to the head of the department concerned, the latter was empowered to stop piayments by notice to the licensor and licensee, and after a hearing, to fix by order “fair and just” royalties, “taking into account the conditions of wartime production.” Thereafter, the licensor could collect royalties from the licensee only at the rate so determined. If the licensor felt that the reduction was unfair, his remedy was by suit against the United States in the Court of Claims, where he could recover “fair and just compensation . . . taking into account the conditions of wartime production.” Whatever reduction was effected by the order was to inure to the benefit of the United States. The notice, stopping payment of royalties from Timken to Alma, was issued by the War Department December 30, 1942. Royalty Adjustment Order No. W-3 followed on July 28,1943, fixing a “fair and just” royalty at zero. The basis of this determination was the alleged invalidity of Alma’s patent, which the United States claims that the Act permits it to assert. In the meantime, Alma had taken an appeal from Paragraph o of the judgment of the District Court, which held that the T-79 transfer cases were outside the patent. Tim-ken did not appeal. After the Order was promulgated, Timken moved to dismiss the appeal and remand to the District Court with directions to vacate its judgment. The motion was predicated on an affidavit that Timken had manufactured transfer cases for the United States alone, together with the argument that the operation of the Act and Order transferred jurisdiction of the subject matter of the entire case to the Court of Claims. Alma countered with an attack on the constitutionality of the Act and Order, primarily as working a deprivation of property in contravention of the Fifth Amendment. The United States had at this time already submitted an amicus brief, in which it argued that the Order had made the appeal moot; and when Alma’s constitutional attack was filed, the United States intervened in support of the Act and Order. In its opinion the Circuit Court of Appeals considered that the question of the applicability of the Act and Order in this case was simply a question of their constitutional validity. It proceeded to consider this latter question, and decided that both the Act and the Order were entirely valid. Accordingly, it entered the following order: “. . . it is now here ordered and adjudged by this Court that paragraph 5 of the judgment of the said District Court in this case be, and the same is hereby vacated and the cause is remanded to the District Court with directions to proceed no further therein unless and until it shall appear to the Court that a justiciable controversy again exists between the parties arising out of the facts set forth in the complaint, except that the Court may, if it deems such action to be appropriate, vacate all or any part of the remainder of the judgment and dismiss the complaint as moot.” The War Department notice was issued after the District Court’s judgment, but before appeal was filed in the Circuit Court of Appeals. It appears that at no time did any party urge on the Circuit Court of Appeals or did that court pass on the question whether the T-79 transfer cases were covered by Alma’s patent and license. Indeed, it was not until after we had granted certiorari and heard argument at the October 1944 term on the constitutional question, and set the case down for further argument this term, that the United States pointed to this omission, and suggested that the Circuit Court of Appeals should have avoided the question of constitutionality by first considering the question of coverage. It argued here that the prior determination of any non-constitutional questions which might dispose of a controversy is a practice which is dictated by sound principles of judicial administration. It moved to vacate the judgment of the Circuit Court of Appeals, and to remand the case to it for such determination. Both Alma and Timken opposed the motion. Action was withheld pending argument on the motion and the case itself. This Court has said repeatedly that it ought not pass on the constitutionality of an act of Congress unless such adjudication is unavoidable. This is true even though the question is properly presented by the record. If two questions are raised, one of non-constitutional and the other of constitutional nature, and a decision of the non-constitutional question would make unnecessary a decision of the constitutional question, the former will be decided. This same rule should guide the lower courts as well as this one. We believe that the structure of the problems before the Circuit Court of Appeals required the application of the rule to this case. At the outset that court was confronted with the merits of the appeal, which involved simply the coverage by the patent and license of the T-79 transfer cases. Later, however, it was confronted also with a problem of jurisdictional nature. This involved the effect wrought by the Act and Order on its power to proceed to an adjudication on the merits. If for any reason, the Act and Order had no applicability in the case, the court should proceed to the merits. If, however, they were controlling, Alma was relegated to its statutory remedy against the United States, and the court would be required to dismiss the appeal, and to vacate Paragraph 5 of the judgment in the District Court. In the determination of this jurisdictional problem, we are of the opinion that the Circuit Court of Appeals erred. It assumed that this problem involved only the question of the constitutionality of the Act and Order. But the Act and Order, whether or not constitutional, do not control the disposition of this case unless they were intended to apply to it. The question of their applicability is a non-constitutional question, the decision of which might have made unnecessary any consideration of constitutionality. Were the Act and Order intended to apply? Their terms seem to make that depend upon whether the subject-matter of the appeal — the T-79 transfer cases — were covered by the patent and license. The Act provides that it is only “whenever an invention . . . shall be manufactured . . . for the United States, with license from the owner thereof . . .” and the department head believes the stipulated royalties to be unreasonable, that the latter shall give “written notice of such fact to the licensor and to the licensee.” It is only after such notice that the department head may fix “fair and just” royalties, and only “such licensee” who is forbidden to pay additional amounts as royalties, and only “such licensor” who is relegated to the Court of Claims. Conversely, if the putative invention is manufactured without license, or if the putative patentee is not actually the owner, these powers and disabilities do not arise. Even Order No. W-3 does not refer to T-79 transfer cases as such. It forbids the payment of royalties only on transfer cases “under” this license, or any license pursuant to this patent, “which embody . . . the . . . alleged inventions.” Again, if the T-79s are not “under” the Alma-Timken license, or if they do not “embody” Alma’s patented claim, then the Order expressly leaves Alma’s and Timken’s rights and remedies unaffected. Consequently, coverage of the T-79s, as well as constitutionality of the Act and Order, was a crucial issue in deciding the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court of Appeals. If they are covered, the Act and Order apply, and it was then necessary to decide constitutionality in order to determine whether the court could proceed to a judgment on the merits. If the T-79s are not covered, the Act and Order manifestly do not apply, and the court could proceed to a judgment on the merits, whether the Act and Order are constitutional or not. In that event, of course, no constitutional question would be decided. The Circuit Court of Appeals may have thought that the applicability of the Act and Order turn not on actual coverage, but on a claim of coverage, and hence that applicability was undisputed and only constitutionality was pertinent to jurisdiction in this case. Such construction is said to have some support in cases like Smithers v. Smith, 204 U. S. 632, and Bell v. Hood, 327 U. S. 678, in which bona fide claims of rights were held to satisfy jurisdictional requirements as to the amount in controversy and as to the existence of a certain federal question, regardless of whether such claims would ultimately be established. The answer to this argument is that the statutory language which controlled the cited cases expressly refers to the claim as the test of jurisdiction, whereas, as we have shown, the instant Act refers to the objective event. Furthermore, the test in the Smithers and Bell cases, supra, is a condition precedent to the exercise of jurisdiction. Unless such exercise is made to turn on what the plaintiff rather than what the court says is at stake, the court’s jurisdictional ruling will often deny the plaintiff a forum when a full hearing might later have shown a right to relief. The test in this case, on the other hand, is a condition subsequent, in certain instances depriving the court of jurisdiction, and the same danger is not present. Timken contends that the jurisdiction of all suits with respect to inventions manufactured for the United States in wartime is transferred to the Court of Claims, and that the coverage question is immaterial. It argues that where the Royalty Adjustment Act does not accomplish this transfer because the manufacture is not by a licensee, the Act of June 25,1910, as amended, should apply, and that it has the same effect. It is said, therefore, that the case should have been dismissed whether there was coverage or not, and that the Circuit Court of Appeals properly refrained from deciding that question. Assuming the premise is correct, we do not reach the same conclusion. Dismissal can be ordered under the 1910 Act, if it applies, without deciding any constitutional questions, for that Act has already been before this Court and been approved. To order dismissal under the 1942 Act, however, or under one of the two Acts alternatively, requires a determination of the constitutionality of the latter. As we have already indicated, this is sufficient reason for first deciding which Act impels the transfer. It is true that § 2 of the Royalty Adjustment Act provides that, if the licensor sues in the Court of Claims, the United States “may avail itself of any and all defenses, general or special, that might be pleaded by a defendant in an action for infringement as set forth in title sixty of the Revised Statutes, or otherwise.” We deem it clear that such defenses would include questions of coverage as well as validity of a patent. But we do not think that § 2 reflects a decision by Congress that all suits involving licenses under the Act and presenting questions of coverage or validity should be tried in the Court of Claims. As respects the problem with which we are now concerned, § 2 does no more than to make available such defenses in the Court of Claims whenever the suits authorized by the Act are brought there. Both Alma and Timken maintain that the constitutional question could not be avoided by the Circuit Court of Appeals, because the T-32 and T-43 transfer cases were covered, if the T-79s were not, and were therefore necessarily subject to the Order. Indeed, the District Court decided that they were covered, and Timken did not appeal. This point carries its own refutation. Neither party appealed from the adjudication as to the T-32 and T-43 transfer cases. No claim as to them was before the Circuit Court of Appeals. There is no claim now that a litigant may not appeal from part of a judgment, or that an appeal from part brings up the whole. The Circuit Court of Appeals was not properly concerned with their coverage, or with the applicability to them of the Act or Order. Therefore, the part of its order affecting T-32s and T-43s was unwarranted, and should not now be made the basis for approving a constitutional decision which was otherwise unnecessary. Alma objects strenuously to the Government “mending its hold” between the time it urged dismissal in an amicus brief in the Circuit Court of Appeals and argued constitutionality there and here, and the time it filed here its motion to vacate, and remand. The Government certainly aided and abetted the Circuit Court of Appeals in its error. But Alma is not without fault in creating the confusion. In its “Petition to Review” the Order, Alma asked the Circuit Court of Appeals to hold the Order unconstitutional. In its petition to the Circuit Court of Appeals for rehearing, it argued that the court should not have passed on constitutionality because Timken had not charged any royalties to the United States on T-79s, and the Act and Order were allegedly inapplicable. Before this Court it has returned to its original position. We agree that much time has been wasted by the earlier failure of the parties to indicate, or the Circuit Court of Appeals or this Court to see, the course which should have been followed. This, however, is no reason to continue now on the wrong course. The principle of avoiding constitutional questions is one which was conceived out of considerations of sound judicial administration. It is a traditional policy of our courts. The judgment is vacated and the case remanded for further proceedings in conformity with this opinion. 56 Stat. 1013, 35 U. S. C. Supp. V, §§ 89-96. Timken-Detroit Axle Co. v. Alma Motor Co., 47 F. Supp. 582 (D. Del. 1942). 56 Stat. 1013, 35 U. S. C. Supp. V, § 89. 56 Stat. 1013, 35 U. S. C. Supp. V, § 90. 56 Stat. 1013,35 U. S. C. Supp. V, § 90. Timken-Detroit Axle Co. v. Alma Motor Co., 144 F. 2d 714 (CCA 3,1944). The word “again” was deleted by an order of October 2,1944. Siler v. Louisville & Nashville R. Co., 213 U. S. 175, 193; Light v. United States, 220 U. S. 523, 538; Spector Motor Co. v. McLaughlin, 323 U. S. 101, 105. See Brandeis, J., concurring in Ashwander v. Tennessee Valley Authority, 297 U. S. 288, 347. 35 U. S. C. Supp. V, § 89. “The district courts shall have original jurisdiction . . . where the matter in controversy exceeds . . . the sum or value of $3,000, and (a) arises under the Constitution or laws of the United States . . .” 28U.S. C. § 41. Act of June 25, 1910, 36 Stat. 851, as amended by the Act of July 1,1918, 40 Stat. 705, 35 U. S. C. § 68, provides in part: “Whenever an invention described in and covered by a patent of the United States shall hereafter be used or manufactured by or for the United States without license of the owner thereof or lawful right to use or manufacture the same, such owner’s remedy shall be by suit against the United States in the Court of Claims for the recovery of his reasonable and entire compensation for such use and manufacture . . Crozier v. Krupp, 224 U. S. 290; Richmond Screw Anchor Co. v. United States, 275 U. S. 331. Section 2 provides in full: “Any licensor aggrieved by any order issued pursuant to section 1 hereof, fixing and specifying the maximum rates or amounts of royalties under a license issued by him, may institute suit against the United States in the Court of Claims, or in the District Courts of the United States insofar as such courts may have concurrent jurisdiction with the Court of Claims, to recover such sum, if any, as, when added to the royalties fixed and specified in such order, shall constitute fair and just compensation to the licensor for the manufacture, use, sale, or other disposition of the licensed invention for the United States, taking into account the conditions of wartime production. In any such suit the United States may avail itself of any and all defenses, general or special, that might be pleaded by a defendant in an action for infringement as set forth in title sixty of the Revised Statutes, or otherwise.” Rule 73 (b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provides that the “notice of appeal . . . shall designate the judgment or part thereof appealed from . . .” Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge, 11 Pet. 420, 553 (1837). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Rutledge delivered the opinion of the Court. Petitioner’s primary complaint is that he has been denied the trial “by an impartial jury” which the Sixth Amendment guarantees. He was convicted of violating the Harrison Narcotics Act, by a jury composed entirely of employees of the Federal Government. One juror, Moore, and the wife of another, Root, were employed in the office of the Secretary of the Treasury, who is charged by law with responsibility for administering and enforcing the federal narcotics statutes. As against objections based on these facts and other matters, the Court of Appeals affirmed petitioner’s conviction and sentence. 82 U. S. App. D. C. 332, 163 F. 2d 817. He has sought relief here by application for certiorari limited to the issues relating to the jury’s selection and composition. To review the determination made of them by the Court of Appeals we granted certiorari. 333 U. S. 873. Petitioner’s objections comprehend an attack upon the entire panel of prospective jurors, made during the course of voir dire examination, in an effort to have the panel stricken; a challenge to the jury as finally constituted, after petitioner had exhausted his ten peremptory challenges, voir dire examination had been completed, and the twelve jurors who tried the case had been qualified; and, either separately or in conjunction with his other objections, a claim of reversible error on account of the inclusion of Moore and Root as jurors. An adequate understanding of the issues thus raised requires a condensed statement of the proceedings followed in the District Court in the selection of the jury. Pursuant to customary practice, those proceedings began with the seating in the box of twelve prospective jurors for purposes of examination on voir dire. These twelve had been chosen previously, in accordance with prevailing practice, from jury lists maintained to supply grand and petit juries for all divisions of the District Court. Cf. D. C. Code (1940) § 11-1401, et seq. There is no claim that those lists were improperly made up. The usual preliminary examination began and continued until the noon recess, as is later noted, with counsel raising no question concerning the constitution of the lists or the panel. Petitioner inquired, among other things, how many were Government employees. Five of the original twelve indicated they were. One of these was excused by the court. The other four, including Moore, remained unchallenged and served on the jury. The seven remaining veniremen, including two housewives, were engaged in private occupations. All seven were challenged peremptorily by petitioner. To replace them and the one excused by the court, others including Root were called from time to time, and were examined in substantially the same manner as the original twelve. Altogether they numbered thirteen, nine Government employees, two in private employment, and two the nature of whose work does not appear. Of the latter, one was excused by the court and the other peremptorily challenged by the prosecution. Petitioner peremptorily challenged both of those in private employment and one of the nine in Government service. This exhausted petitioner’s peremptory challenges and left eight unchallenged Government employees to join the four like ones originally called in composing the twelve who made up the jury as finally chosen. The process of selection was interrupted shortly before noon, when petitioner still had two unused peremptory challenges, by a shortage of veniremen. Anticipating that others would be available later in the day, the court adjourned until 2:30 p. m. On its reconvening, additional prospective jurors were available. But petitioner then moved for the first time to strike the entire panel for alleged irregularity in the method used for selecting it, asserted to have been discovered by counsel through “a little investigation” during the noon recess. The court denied the motion, with leave to renew the objection in a motion for a new trial if petitioner should be convicted. The material part of the colloquy relating to these proceedings and disclosing the grounds for the motion and its denial is set forth in the margin. Petitioner then exercised his two remaining peremptory-challenges, after which he inquired of the twelve jurors then impaneled how many were employed by the Government. When all indicated they were, petitioner challenged the jury as impaneled for cause. The challenge and the court’s ruling in denial of it appear below. Although counsel sought to intermingle with this challenge the one previously made to the panel, the two are distinct attacks and must be treated separately. I. The method of selecting the panel. — -Apart from the objection that this challenge came too late, cf. Agnew v. United States, 165 U. S. 36, it is without merit. It consists exclusively of counsel’s statements, unsworn and unsupported by any proof or offer of proof. The Government did not explicitly deny those statements. But it was under no necessity to do so. The burden was upon the petitioner as moving party "to introduce, or to offer, distinct evidence in support of the motion.” Glasser v. United States, 315 U. S. 60, 87. See also Smith v. Mississippi, 162 U. S. 592; Tarrance v. Florida, 188 U. S. 519; Martin v. Texas, 200 U. S. 316; cf. Brownfield v. South Carolina, 189 U. S. 426. Of itself this failure in tender of proof would require denial of the motion. But even if proof had been made or offered there would have been no showing sufficient to require contrary action. The statements, if treated as allegations, comprehended in substance but two things. One was the very brief statement of facts relating to the procedure followed, namely, the subpoenaing of about five hundred jurors, their equal division for assignment to two branches of the court, and that those in each group who did not wish to serve were “told to step to one side.” This was all in the way of facts. From them followed counsel’s vague and general conclusion that the remaining number, from which it was said jurors were picked, “consisted mostly of Government employees and housewives, and unemployed.” Counsel then urged that this furnished basis for applying the decision in Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co., 328 U. S. 217, as not affording “a proper cross-section.” The trial court rightly held the Thiel case inapplicable, for the reasons that it requires a showing of systematic exclusion or attempt to exclude from the panel a particular occupational group or groups otherwise eligible for jury service, and the statements and conclusions of counsel here disclosed no such attempt. Beyond this, moreover, it seems highly doubtful that the facts set forth in the statement, if proved, would constitute any irregularity. Nothing is stated concerning the numbers who stepped to one side, their occupational classifications, whether they were excused or, if any, how many, by whom or for what cause. For all one could know from the statement, those stepping to one side may have included but one in ten, and of these, half or more may have been held for jury service after claiming exemption or seeking excuse. The facts stated, therefore, taken in the light of pertinent facts omitted, lay no foundation whatever for counsel’s conclusions, inf eren tially that jurors were selected only from those not standing aside, and explicitly that the remaining number “consisted mostly of Government employees and housewives, and unemployed.” The statement was obviously insufficient to lay any foundation for valid attack upon the method followed in selecting the panel. II. Composition of the jury. — The essence of this attack consists in counsel’s statement, “Now, I have exhausted my ten challenges, and here I have twelve Government jurors who are to. decide this defendant’s case, which is a violation of the Federal statute, being brought in a Federal Court, prosecuted by a Federal prosecutor, and the case is presented by Federal agents.” So put, the challenge has the sound of plausibility. Possibly it would have more of the substance of it if in this case it did not appear that petitioner himself was responsible, by deliberate choice, for the jury’s final composition. Given ten arbitrary choices among twenty-two prospective jurors not disqualified for cause, of whom thirteen were Government employees and nine privately engaged, he knowingly, of his own right, rejected nine of the latter and with knowledge or the full opportunity to secure it accepted without challenge all but one of the former. It would seem that ordinarily one anxious to secure a jury representative of both private and public employment in a community like Washington, and particularly to avoid overweighting the jury with Government employees, well might have found a more effective way of utilizing his peremptory challenges to achieve those objectives. The right of peremptory challenge is given, of course, to be exercised in the party’s sole discretion and was so exercised here. We do not question petitioner’s privilege to utilize his peremptory challenges as he did. But the right is given in aid of the party’s interest to secure a fair and impartial jury, not for creating ground to claim partiality which but for its exercise would not exist. It does not follow that by using the right as he pleases, he obtains the further one to repudiate the consequences of his own choice. Here petitioner was given a fairly and lawfully selected panel. From it all disqualified for cause were excused. The fully qualified jurors remaining were fairly evenly distributed among persons publicly and privately employed. For reasons entirely his own, petitioner chose to eliminate the latter and retain the former. This was a deliberate choice, not an uninformed one. We need draw no conclusion concerning whether or not it was made for the purpose of creating the basis now asserted for objecting to the jury’s composition. Rather we must take it as having been made exactly for the purpose for which the right was given, namely, to afford petitioner an opportunity beyond the minimum requirements of fair selection to express an arbitrary preference among jurors properly selected and fully qualified to sit in judgment on his case. Cf. note 11. Any other view would convict him of abusing his privilege. This we are unwilling to do. By the same token we are not willing to join in repudiating the consequences of his own selection. We take petitioner at his word as expressed by his repeated choices. The fact that he exercised his peremptory challenges as he did, so frequently and consistently to eliminate privately employed jurors and retain only Government employees, hardly can be said to give cause for him to claim overweighting of the jury with Government employees. There was no defect of the panel in this respect. Nor is there any claim or basis for one that the prosecution utilized its peremptory challenges to bring about a jury constituted only of them. It would be going very far to say that in the circumstances shown by this record petitioner was deprived, either in law or in fact, of an impartial jury or indeed of one fairly representative of the community. If deprivation there was, even in the latter sense, it was the result of his own choice, not of imperfection in the choices tendered him by law or in the procedures of selection afforded. In ruling upon petitioner’s objection the trial judge assessed the situation as follows: “Chance has resulted in this jury panel of twelve being composed of Government employees, but the jury list from which they by chance were selected is a mixture of Government employees and private employees.” Even in this view of what took place, petitioner has no cause to complain. The well-settled rule is that, given a lawfully selected panel, free from any taint of invalid exclusions or procedures in selection and from which all disqualified for cause have been excused, no cause for complaint arises merely from the fact that the jury finally chosen happens itself not to be representative of the panel or indeed of the community. There is, under such circumstances, no right to any particular composition or group representation on the jury. Finally, in this phase of the case, United States v. Wood, 299 U. S. 123, goes far toward precluding petitioner’s objection. That decision sustained the Act of Congress-of August 22, 1935, now D. C. Code (1940) § 11-1420, removing (with specified exceptions) the disqualification of Government employees previously existing in the District of Columbia for jury service in criminal and other cases to which the Government was a party. The disqualification had arisen in 1908 by virtue of the decision, made on common-law grounds, in Crawford v. United States, 212 U. S. 183. Owing to the large and increasing proportion of Government to private employees in the District, the effect of the Crawford decision had been by 1935 to create difficulties in securing properly qualified jurors. To meet this situation the 1935 statute was adopted. It continued specified exemptions previously existing, including all executive and judicial officers of the United States, and then directed in presently material part: “All other persons, otherwise qualified according to law whether employed in the service of the government of the United States or of the District of Columbia . . . shall be qualified to serve as jurors in the District of Columbia and shall not be exempt from such service . . . D. C. Code (1940) § 11-1420. The Wood case was a criminal prosecution for theft from a private corporation. Three of the jurors were federal employees, challenged for cause on that ground. In sustaining the conviction and the statute the Court first held that Congress had not “undertaken to preclude the ascertainment of actual bias,” and that the question in issue was limited to “implied bias, a bias attributable in law to the prospective juror regardless of actual partiality.” 299 U. S. at 133, 134. As to this the Court said of the statute, “The enactment itself is tantamount to a legislative declaration that the prior disqualification [under the Crawford ruling] was artificial and not necessary to secure impartiality.” Id. at 148-149. By way of sustaining the legislative judgment, the Court added on its own account: “In criminal prosecutions the Government is acting simply as the instrument of the public in enforcing penal laws for the protection of society. In that enforcement all citizens are interested. It is difficult to see why a governmental employee, merely by virtue of his employment, is interested in that enforcement either more or less than any good citizen is or should be. . . . We think that the imputation of bias simply by virtue of governmental employment, without regard to any actual partiality growing out of the nature and circumstances of particular cases, rests on an assumption without any rational foundation.” Ibid. The Court was not confronted in the Wood case with the exact situation we have here, namely, that all of the jurors finally selected were Government employees. But the purport of the decision was that the mere fact of Government employment, without more, would be insufficient under the statute’s mandate to disqualify a juror. Implicit in this was the conception that, insofar as that fact alone is or may be effective, Government employees and persons privately engaged were put upon the same basis without any limitation, explicit or implied, upon the number who might be selected as jurors from either group. The effect of these rulings, we think, was to make Government employees subject, as are all other persons and in the same manner, to challenge for “actual bias” and under all ordinary circumstances only to such challenge. In that view, absent any basis for such challenge, we do not see how a right to challenge the panel as a whole can arise from the mere fact that the jury chosen by proper procedures from a properly selected panel turns out to be composed wholly of Government employees or, a fortiori, of persons in private employment. The opinion in the Wood case, however, was very careful to stress more than once that the Sixth Amendment prescribes no specific tests for determining impartiality. 299 U. S. at 133. It afforded further assurances, beyond those given by Art. III, § 2, cl. 3, relating to trial by jury, in respect to speed, publicity, impartiality, etc. Id. at 142. But it did not require in these respects “the particular forms and procedure used at common law.” P. 143. The opinion emphasized especially that “Impartiality is not a technical conception. It is a state of mind. For the ascertainment of this mental attitude of appropriate indifference, the Constitution lays down no particular tests and procedure is not chained to any ancient and artificial formula.” Pp. 145-146. This seems to contemplate implicitly that in each case a broad discretion and duty reside in the court to see that the jury as finally selected is subject to no solid basis of objection on the score of impartiality, even though that basis might possibly arise through the working of chance or other lawful factors wholly within the framework of proper procedures for selecting the panel and choosing the jury from it. Such a situation could arise, if at all, only in the rarest and most extraordinary combination of circumstances. But even if that possibility is taken as conceded, for the reasons we have alreadjr stated this case presents no such problem. III. The challenges to Jurors Moore and Root.- — Considered as independent and individual challenges for “actual bias,” the objections to these jurors come too late. Moore was a Treasury messenger. Root’s wife was a Treasury employee. Petitioner’s counsel knew of the employment of Root’s wife and that Moore was a federal employee. He did not inquire where Moore was employed, but could have known his employment’s exact nature. It does not appear that either Moore or Root’s wife was connected with the Bureau of Narcotics or had any duty even remotely relating to its functions or those of the Secretary in relation to them. As respects challenge for “actual bias,” the Wood opinion was careful to put Government employees on the same basis as prospective jurors privately employed. It stated: “All the resources of appropriate judicial inquiry remain available in this instance as in others to ascertain whether a prospective juror, although not exempted from service, has any bias in fact which would prevent his serving as an impartial juror. In dealing with an employee of the Government, the court would properly be solicitous to discover whether, in view of the nature or circumstances of his employment, or of the relation of the particular governmental activity to the matters involved in the prosecution, or otherwise, he had actual bias, and, if he had, to disqualify him.” Petitioner challenged neither Moore nor Root for “actual bias,” though afforded the fullest opportunity legally and factually for doing so. After accepting them before trial, he could not challenge them successfully in a motion for a new trial. Queen v. Hepburn, 7 Cranch 290, 297; Raub v. Carpenter, 187 U. S. 159; cf. United States v. Gale, 109 U. S. 65. See Kohl v. Lehlback, 160 U. S. 293, 299-302. Whether or not employment in the Treasury outside the Narcotics Bureau would constitute ground for challenge for “actual bias,” such employment in the connections disclosed here affecting Moore and Root was not so obvious a disqualification or so inherently prejudicial as a matter of law, in the absence of any challenge to them before trial, as to require the court of its own motion or on petitioner’s suggestion afterward to set the verdict aside and grant a new trial. The challenge to Moore and Root stands no better if considered, not as a belated individual challenge for “actual bias” to each, but as additional support or buttressing for the challenge to the composition of the jury as a whole. Apart from the fact that the two sorts of challenge are distinct and are therefore to be dealt with separately, the challenge to the composition of the jury as made to the trial court and as ruled upon by it, made no special reference to either Moore or Root or the particular bases for objection now raised to them. Those references, so far as is shown by the record, first appeared in the assignments of error made by petitioner in the Court of Appeals. They therefore came too late, even if they could be considered as forming part of the challenge to the jury’s composition or as adding anything of weight to that challenge. Whether the matter is considered technically or on the broader, nontechnical basis of impartiality as a state of mind, petitioner has shown no ground for believing that he did not receive a trial “by an impartial jury” such as the Sixth Amendment assured him. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is Affirmed. 26 U. S. C. § 2553. The indictment charged, substantially in the statutory language, that petitioner knowingly, wilfully, unlawfully and feloniously did “purchase, sell, dispense, and distribute” certain narcotic drugs “not then and there, in or from, the original stamped package.” Pursuant to 26 U. S. C. § 2606 the Secretary has delegated to the Commissioner of Narcotics “the investigation, detection and prevention of violations of the Federal narcotic and marihuana laws.” 21 C. F. R., 1946 Supp., § 206.1. The Bureau of Narcotics, created within the Treasury Department, 5 U. S. C. § 282, is subject to the Secretary’s “general supervision and direction,” 21 C. F. R., 1946 Supp., § 206.3, and its decisions are subject to review by him. 5 U. S. C. § 282c. There were 87,830 employees in the Treasury Department as of September 30, 1948, of whom 19,645 were employed in the District of Columbia. Monthly Report of Employment, Executive Branch of the Federal Government, U. S. Civ. Serv. Comm’n, September, 1948, Table V. Published figures are not available to show the number of these employed by the Narcotics Bureau, but obviously in view of the number and diversity of the Treasury Department’s functions they must have comprised only a comparatively small fraction of the total. See Part III infra. In summary, twenty-five prospective jurors were examined. Of these one was peremptorily challenged by the prosecution and two were excused by the court for cause. Of the remaining twenty-two, thirteen were in Government work, nine privately employed. Petitioner peremptorily challenged the nine and one Government employee, thus exhausting his peremptory challenges. In this manner the jury composed wholly of federal employees resulted. Prior to his trial petitioner made no individual challenge to any of the twelve who constituted the jury as finally selected. They included Moore and Root. The objection was renewed in petitioner’s motions in arrest of judgment and for a new trial, and was denied in each instance. “Mr. Buckley. If your Honor please, I have made a little investigation of the impaneling or selection of this panel here as well as selection of the other panels sitting this month, and I most respectfully submit that the method and procedure used in selecting is irregular, and I am going to move to strike this whole panel, the reason being this: that from the inquiries I have made, there were about five hundred or five hundred and a few jurors subpenaed — that is, individually subpenaed to appear here — from which they selected a sufficient number of jurors here. “If there were five hundred, they were divided into two groups, two hundred fifty for one court and two hundred fifty for another court, and of the two hundred fifty for each court, they were asked how many of those two hundred fifty did not desire to serve as jurors, to raise their hands, so those who raised their hands were told to step to one side, and out of the remaining number that were left they picked the jurors, and the remaining number that were left consisted mostly of Government employees and housewives, and unemployed. There are only a few unemployed. “I know Your Honor has read this case in the Supreme Court, Thiel v. Southern Pacific Company. This is not a proper cross-section. “The Court. The Thiel case holds that it must be shown that there was a systematic attempt to exclude a certain type or group of persons. . . . That is what that case holds, and that is not the situation here.” “Mr. Buckley. If Your Honor please, with reference to the motion which I made a while ago, moving to strike the whole panel, I now find myself in this position. I have exhausted my ten challenges. “In selecting these different panels on the first Tuesday of the month, the Clerk says to the five hundred or two hundred fifty, whichever it may be, individuals who are summoned to appear here, from which to pick the juries, 'All those who do not desire to serve, step to one side.’ “That leaves a batch of Government employees and housewives. “Now, I have exhausted my ten challenges, and here I have twelve Government jurors who are to decide this defendant’s case, which is a violation of the Federal statute, being brought in a Federal Court, prosecuted by a Federal prosecutor, and the case is presented by Federal agents. I submit there is reason to challenge these people for cause. “The Court. I will deny the motion and request at this time that you take it up later, in a motion after the verdict, if you think it is sound. I do not believe your motion is sound. Chance has resulted in this jury panel of twelve being composed of Government employees, but the jury list from which they by chance were selected is a mixture of Government employees and private employees.” See note 7; cf. note 6. See note 7. See note 17 infra and text. The right is in the nature of a statutory privilege, variable in the number of challenges allowed, which may be withheld altogether without impairing the constitutional guaranties of “an impartial jury” and a fair trial. Stilson v. United States, 250 U. S. 583, 586, quoted in United States v. Wood, 299 U. S. 123, 145. Except in cases of treason and other capital offenses, no right to peremptory challenges existed in federal criminal trials until the Act of June 8, 1872, 17 Stat. 282, Rev. Stat. § 819, unless a rule of the particular federal court made applicable a provision of state law allowing peremptory challenges in noncapital cases. Act of April 30, 1790, §30, 1 Stat. 112, 119; United States v. Randall, Fed. Cas. No. 16, 118; United States v. Cottingham, Fed. Cas. No. 14,872; United States v. McPherson, Fed. Cas. No. 15,703; United States v. Krouse, Fed. Cas. No. 15,544. (However, the right of peremptory challenge in capital cases, which existed at common law, has been spoken of as “one of the most important of the rights secured to the accused.” Pointer v. United States, 151 U. S. 396, 408; see also Lewis v. United States, 146 U. S. 370, 376.) In noncapital cases, such as this, the privilege affords protection additional to constitutional guaranties, to be had exclusively at the party’s option. If no such privilege had been given in the District of Columbia, the normal and valid course of selection in this case would have produced a jury composed both of federal employees and persons engaged in private occupations; in other words, would have made it impossible for petitioner to raise his objection to the jury’s composition. See note 4; also note 11 and text. The assumption is not meant to imply that such a deprivation alone would constitute grounds for challenge to the jury. See text and authorities cited infra at note 15. See note 7. Ruthenberg v. United States, 245 U. S. 480; Thomas v. Texas, 212 U. S. 278, 282; Virginia v. Rives, 100 U. S. 313, 322-323; Higgins v. United States, 81 U. S. App. D. C. 371, 372, 160 F. 2d 222, 223; see Fay v. New York, 332 U. S. 261, 284-285; Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co., 328 U. S. 217, 220; cf. Akins v. Texas, 325 U. S. 398, 403-404. Ibid. See United States v. Wood, 299 U. S. at 132-133, quoting from the opinion of the Court of Appeals, 65 App. D. C. 330, 332, 83 F. 2d 587, 589. See also H. R. Rep. No. 1421, Sen. Rep. No. 1297, 74th Cong., 1st Sess.; 79 Cong. Rec. 13,401, relating to the bill which became the Act of Congress of August 22, 1935, now D. C. Code (1940) § 11-1420. The Government’s brief in the Wood case, relying upon figures assembled from various official sources, indicated that of the probable 353,949 persons otherwise available for jury service in the District of Columbia as of 1935, some 156,874, or 44.3 per cent, were disqualified to serve either by virtue of exemption or by the mere fact of employment by or receipt of benefits from the Government, under the ruling in the Crawford case. Given of course a panel and jury otherwise selected in accordance with law. Since the Wood case the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has held that juries including four and nine Government employees were not inherently defective. Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. v. District of Columbia, 67 App. D. C. 30, 89 F. 2d 502; Higgins v. United States, 81 U. S. App. D. C. 371, 160 F. 2d 222. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has held that a Canal Zone jury composed entirely of persons who were either employees or tenants of the Government was not improperly constituted. Schackow v. Government of the Canal Zone, 108 F. 2d 625. The phrase “actual bias” is used in this opinion as it was in the Wood case. The Wood opinion stated: “The bias of a prospective juror may be actual or implied; that is, it may be bias in fact or bias conclusively presumed as matter of law.” 299 U. S. at 133. It later pointed out that “Challenges at common law were to the array, that is, with respect to the constitution of the panel, or to the polls, for disqualification of a juror. Challenges to the polls were either ‘principal’ or ‘to the favor,’ the former being upon grounds of absolute disqualification, the latter for actual bias.” Pp. 134-135. As appears from the portion of the opinion quoted in the text infra at note 23, the Court regarded “actual bias” or challenge “to the favor” as including not only prejudice in the subjective sense but also such as might be thought implicitly to arise “in view of the nature or circumstances of his employment, or of the relation of the particular governmental activity to the matters involved in the prosecution, or otherwise.” Cf. text supra at notes 3 and 8. Apart from petitioner’s opportunity for discovery by specific inquiry, lists of jury panels, showing the name, age, address, and occupation of each member are prepared in the criminal division of the District Court for the District of Columbia and are available to counsel before trial on request. Cf. note 2. 299 U. S. at 133-134. In United States v. Wood the Court, speaking of the Crawford case, said: “It will be observed that the employment was in the very department to the affairs of which the alleged conspiracy related. But the decision took a broader range and did not rest upon that possible distinction.” 299 U. S. at 140. It is at least highly doubtful that an employment having no more relationship to the particular governmental activity involved in the prosecution than did that of Moore in this case, cf. note 2, or that of Root’s wife, would give ground for challenge for “actual bias,” although coming under the same ultimate departmental supervision, even though if timely called to-the court’s attention the circumstance might afford basis for the court, in an excess of caution, to excuse the venireman. See note 7. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Chief Justice Warren delivered the opinion of the Court. We granted certiorari in this case to determine whether the right of a defendant in a criminal case under the Sixth Amendment to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor is applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, and whether that right was violated by a state procedural statute providing that persons charged as principals, accomplices, or accessories in the same crime cannot be introduced as witnesses for each other. Petitioner, Jackie Washington, was convicted in Dallas County, Texas, of murder with malice and was sentenced by a jury to 50 years in prison. The prosecution’s evidence showed that petitioner, an 18-year-old youth, had dated a girl named Jean Carter until her mother had forbidden her to see him. The girl thereafter began dating another boy, the deceased. Evidently motivated by jealousy, petitioner with several other boys began driving around the City of Dallas on the night of August 29, 1964, looking for a gun. The search eventually led to one Charles Fuller, who joined the group with his shotgun. After obtaining some shells from another source, the group of boys proceeded to Jean Carter’s home, where Jean, her family and the deceased were having supper. Some of the boys threw bricks at the house and then ran back to the car, leaving petitioner and Fuller alone in front of the house with the shotgun. At the sound of the bricks the deceased and Jean Carter’s mother rushed out on the porch to investigate. The shotgun was fired by either petitioner or Fuller, and the deceased was fatally wounded. Shortly afterward petitioner and Fuller came running back to the car where the other boys waited, with Fuller carrying the shotgun. Petitioner testified in his own behalf. He claimed that Fuller, who was intoxicated, had taken the gun from him, and that he had unsuccessfully tried to persuade Fuller to leave before the shooting. Fuller had insisted that he was going to shoot someone, and petitioner had run back to the automobile. He saw the girl’s mother come out of the door as he began running, and he subsequently heard the shot. At the time, he had thought that Fuller had shot the woman. In support of his version of the facts, petitioner offered the testimony of Fuller. The record indicates that Fuller would have testified that petitioner pulled at him and tried to persuade him to leave, and that petitioner ran before Fuller fired the fatal shot. It is undisputed that Fuller’s testimony would have been relevant and material, and that it was vital to the defense. Fuller was the only person other than petitioner who knew exactly who had fired the shotgun and whether petitioner had at the last minute attempted to prevent the shooting. Fuller, however, had been previously convicted of the same murder and sentenced to 50 years in prison, and he was confined in the Dallas County jail. Two Texas statutes provided at the time of the trial in this case that persons charged or convicted as coparticipants in the same crime could not testify for one another, although there was no bar to their testifying for the State. On the basis of these statutes the trial judge sustained the State’s objection and refused to allow Fuller to testify. Petitioner’s conviction followed, and it was upheld on appeal by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. 400 S. W. 2d 756. We granted certiorari. 385 U. S. 812. We reverse. I. We have not previously been called upon to decide whether the right of an accused to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, guaranteed in federal trials by the Sixth Amendment, is so fundamental and essential to a fair trial that it is incorporated in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. At one time, it was thought that the Sixth Amendment had no application to state criminal trials. That view no longer prevails, and in recent years we have increasingly looked to the specific guarantees of the Sixth Amendment to determine whether a state criminal trial was conducted with due process of law. We have held that due process requires that the accused have the assistance of counsel for his defense, that he be confronted with the witnesses against him, and that he have the right to a speedy and public trial. The right of an accused to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor stands on no lesser footing than the other Sixth Amendment rights that we have previously held applicable to the States. This Court had occasion in In re Oliver, 333 U. S. 257 (1948), to describe what it regarded as the most basic ingredients of due process of law. It observed that: “A person’s right to reasonable notice of a charge against him, and an opportunity to be heard in his defense — a right to his day in court — are basic in our system of jurisprudence; and these rights include, as a minimum, a right to examine the witnesses against him, to offer testimony, and to be represented by counsel.” 333 U. S., at 273 (footnote omitted). The right to offer the testimony of witnesses, and to compel their attendance, if necessary, is in plain terms the right to present a defense, the right to present the defendant’s version of the facts as well as the prosecution’s to the jury so it may decide where the truth lies. Just as an accused has the right to confront the prosecution’s witnesses for the purpose of challenging their testimony, he has the right to present his own witnesses to establish a defense. This right is a fundamental element of due process of law. II. Since the right to compulsory process is applicable in this state proceeding, the question remains whether it was violated in the circumstances of this case. The testimony of Charles Fuller was denied to the defense not because the State refused to compel his attendance, but because a state statute made his testimony inadmissible whether he was present in the courtroom or not. We are thus called upon to decide whether the Sixth Amendment guarantees a defendant the right under any circumstances to put his witnesses on the stand, as well as the right to compel their attendance in court. The resolution of this question requires some discussion of the common-law context in which the Sixth Amendment was adopted. Joseph Story, in his famous Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, observed that the right to compulsory process was included in the Bill of Rights in reaction to the notorious common-law rule that in cases of treason or felony the accused was not allowed to introduce witnesses in his defense at all. Although the absolute prohibition of witnesses for the defense had been abolished in England by statute before 1787, the Framers of the Constitution felt it necessary specifically to provide that defendants in criminal cases should be provided the means of obtaining witnesses so that their own evidence, as well as the prosecution’s, might be evaluated by the jury. Despite the abolition of the rule generally disqualifying defense witnesses, the common law retained a number of restrictions on witnesses who were physically and mentally capable of testifying. To the extent that they were applicable, they had the same effect of suppressing the truth that the general proscription had had. Defendants and codefendants were among the large class of witnesses disqualified from testifying on the ground of interest. A party to a civil or criminal case was not allowed to testify on his own behalf for fear that he might be tempted to lie. Although originally the disqualification of a codefendant appears to have been based only on his status as a party to the action, and in some jurisdictions co-indictees were allowed to testify for or against each other if granted separate trials, other jurisdictions came to the view that accomplices or co-indictees were incompetent to testify at least in favor of each other even at separate trials, and in spite of statutes making a defendant competent to testify in his own behalf. It was thought that if two persons charged with the same crime were allowed to testify on behalf of each other, “each would try to swear the other out of the charge.” This rule, as well as the other disqualifications for interest, rested on the unstated premises that the right to present witnesses was subordinate to the court’s interest in preventing perjury, and that erroneous decisions were best avoided by preventing the jury from hearing any testimony that might be perjured, even if it were the only testimony available on a crucial issue. The federal courts followed the common-law restrictions for a time, despite the Sixth Amendment. In United States v. Reid, 12 How. 361 (1852), the question was whether one of two defendants jointly indicted for murder on the high seas could call the other as a witness. Although this Court expressly recognized that the Sixth Amendment was designed to abolish some of the harsh rules of the common law, particularly including the refusal to allow the defendant in a serious criminal case to present witnesses in his defense, it held that the rules of evidence in the federal courts were those in force in the various States at the time of the passage of the Judiciary Act of 1789, including the disqualification of defendants indicted together. The holding in United States v. Reid was not satisfactory to later generations, however, and in 1918 this Court expressly overruled it, refusing to be bound by “the dead hand of the common-law rule of 1789,” and taking note of “the conviction of our time that the truth is more likely to be arrived at by hearing the testimony of all persons of competent understanding who may seem to have knowledge of the facts involved in a case, leaving the credit and weight of such testimony to be determined by the jury or by the court . . . Rosen v. United States, 245 U. S. 467, 471. Although Rosen v. United States rested on noncon-stitutional grounds, we believe that its reasoning was required by the Sixth Amendment. In light of the common-law history, and in view of the recognition in the Reid case that the Sixth Amendment was designed in part to make the testimony of a defendant’s witnesses admissible on his behalf in court, it could hardly be argued that a State would not violate the clause if it made all defense testimony inadmissible as a matter of procedural law. It is difficult to see how the Constitution is any less violated by arbitrary rules that prevent whole categories of defense witnesses from testifying on the basis of a priori categories that presume them unworthy of belief. The rule disqualifying an alleged accomplice from testifying on behalf of the defendant cannot even be defended on the ground that it rationally sets apart a group of persons who are particularly likely to commit perjury. The absurdity of the rule is amply demonstrated by the exceptions that have been made to it. For example, the accused accomplice may be called by the prosecution to testify against the defendant. Common sense would suggest that he often has a greater interest in lying in favor of the prosecution rather than against it, especially if he is still awaiting his own trial or sentencing. To think that criminals will lie to save their fellows but not to obtain favors from the prosecution for themselves is indeed to clothe the criminal class with more nobility than one might expect to find in the public at large. Moreover, under the Texas statutes the accused accomplice is no longer disqualified if he is acquitted at his own trial. Presumably, he would then be free to testify on behalf of his comrade, secure in the knowledge that he could incriminate himself as freely as he liked in his testimony, since he could not again be prosecuted for the same offense. The Texas law leaves him free to testify when he has a great incentive to perjury, and bars his testimony in situations where he has a lesser motive to lie. We hold that the petitioner in this case was denied his right to have compulsory process for obtaining .witnesses in his favor because the State arbitrarily denied him the right to put on the stand a witness who was physically and mentally capable of testifying to events that he had personally observed, and whose testimony would have been relevant and material to the defense. The Framers of the Constitution did not intend to commit the futile act of giving to a defendant the right to secure the attendance of witnesses whose testimony he had no right to use. The judgment of conviction must be reversed. It is so ordered. “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.” “[N]or shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law . . . .” See Fuller v. State, 397 S. W. 2d 434 (Tex. Crim. App. 1966). “Persons charged as principals, accomplices or accessories, whether in the same or by different indictments, can not be introduced as witnesses for one another, but they may claim a severance, and if one or more be acquitted they may testify in behalf of the others.” Tex. Pen. Code, Art. 82. “Persons charged as principals, accomplices or accessories, whether in the same or different indictments, cannot be introduced as witnesses for one another, but they may claim a severance; and, if any one or more be acquitted, or the prosecution against them be dismissed, they may testify in behalf of the others.” Tex. Code Crim. Proc., Art. 711 (1925). These statutory provisions were apparently repealed by implication by Art. 36.09 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure of 1965, which became effective after petitioner’s trial. Article 36.09 provides that “Two or more defendants who are jointly or separately indicted or complained against for the same offense or an offense growing out of the same transaction may be, in the discretion of the court, tried jointly or separately as to one or more defendants; provided that in any event either defendant may testify for the other or on behalf of the State . . . .” Counsel have cited no statutes from other jurisdictions, and we have found none, that flatly disqualify coparticipants in a crime from testifying for each other regardless of whether they are tried jointly or separately. To be distinguished are statutes providing that one of two or more defendants tried jointly may, if the evidence against him is insufficient, be entitled to an immediate acquittal so he may testify for the others. These statutes seem designed to allow such joint defendants to testify without incriminating themselves. See, e. g., Ala. Code, Tit. 15, § 309 (1958); Alaska Code Crim. Proc. § 12.20.060 (1962); Kan. Gen. Stat. Ann. § 62-1440 (1964). Rangel v. State, 22 Tex. Ct. App. 642, 3 S. W. 788 (1887). “[A] provision of the Bill of Rights which is ‘fundamental and essential to a fair trial’ is made obligatory upon the States by the Fourteenth Amendment.” Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335, 342 (1963). See West v. Louisiana, 194 U. S. 258, 264 (1904). Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963). Pointer v. Texas, 380 U. S. 400 (1965). Klopfer v. North Carolina, 386 U. S. 213 (1967). In re Oliver, 333 U. S. 257 (1948). 3 Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States §§ 1786-1788 (1st ed. 1833). By 1701 the accused in both treason and felony cases was allowed to produce witnesses who could testify under oath. See 2 Wigmore, Evidence § 575, at 685-686 (3d ed. 1940). See generally 2 Wigmore §§ 575-576 (3d ed. 1940). We have discussed elsewhere the gradual demise of the common-law rule prohibiting defendants from testifying in their own behalf. See Ferguson v. Georgia, 365 U. S. 570 (1961). See 2 Wigmore § 580, at 709-710 (3d ed. 1940); Henderson v. State, 70 Ala. 23, 24-25 (Dec. Term 1881); Allen v. State, 10 Ohio St. 287, 303 (Dec. Term 1859). See Foster v. State, 45 Ark. 328 (May Term 1885); State v. Drake, 11 Ore. 396, 4 Pac. 1204 (1884). Both cases have been overturned by statute. Ark. Stat. Ann. §43-2017 (1947); Ore. Rev. Stat. § 139.315 (1965). Benson v. United States, 146 U. S. 325, 335 (1892). “Indeed, the theory of the common law was to admit to the witness stand only those presumably honest, appreciating the sanctity of an oath, unaffected as a party by the result, and free from any of the temptations of interest. The courts were afraid to trust the intelligence of jurors.” Benson v. United States, 146 U. S. 325, 336 (1892). 12 How., at 363-364. See n. 5, supra. Nothing in this opinion should be construed as disapproving testimonial privileges, such as the privilege against self-incrimination or the lawyer-client or husband-wife privileges, which are based on entirely different considerations from those underlying the common-law disqualifications for interest. Nor do we deal in this case with nonarbitrary state rules that disqualify as witnesses persons who, because of mental infirmity or infancy, are incapable of observing events or testifying about them. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. In 1901 an Apache Indian, Paukune, was issued a trust patent to land in Caddo County, Oklahoma. This allotment was made under the General Allotment Act of February 8, 1887, 24 Stat. 388, 389. Paukune died testate in 1919, leaving a wife Juana and a son Jose. By his will he devised an undivided one-third interest in the allotment to his widow and an undivided two-thirds interest-to his son. No fee patent to the land has issued to Paukune, to his widow, or to the son. The trust period of twenty-five years has from time to time been extended. In other words, the United States still holds the land in trust for Paukune and his heirs. In 1947 Juana’s undivided one-third interest was assessed for ad valorem taxes in the amount of $21.33 and was advertised for sale for failure to pay. She thereupon instituted this suit in the Oklahoma courts to enjoin the sale and any further levy of ad valorem taxes on the theory that the land was exempt from state taxation. The petitioners answered, alleging that Juana was a non-Indian and therefore not exempt from the taxes. The trial court, without determining whether the widow was an Indian, held her interest nontaxable by the state; and the Supreme Court of Oklahoma affirmed, 206 Okla. 527, 244 P. 2d 1137, saying it mattered not under federal law whether the widow was Indian or non-Indian. The case is here on certiorari. 344 U. S. 812. Levindale Lead Co. v. Coleman, 241 U. S. 432, dealt with restrictions on alienation attached to land under the Osage Indian Allotment Act of June 28, 1906, 34 Stat. 539. The Court held that the policy of that Act did not embrace persons who were not Indians, since the Congress sought to protect only those toward whom it owed the duties of a guardian. The same answer must be given here. If Juana is not an Indian, the United States, has no interest of hers in the land to protect. True, the United States holds the legal title to the land. But nothing in the Act prevents the devolution of the equitable interest to the widow. If she is not within the class whom Congress sought to protect, the trust is a dry and passive one; there remains only a ministerial act for the trustee to perform, namely the issuance of a fee patent to the cestui. The judgment of the Supreme Court of Oklahoma is reversed and the cause is remanded to that court for proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. So ordered. Section 5 of the Act provides in part as follows: “That upon the approval of the allotments provided for in this act by the Secretary of the Interior, he shall cause patents to issue therefor in the name of the allottees, which patents shall be of the legal effect, and declare that the United States does and will hold the land thus allotted, for the period of twenty-five years, in trust for the sole use and benefit of the Indian to whom such allotment shall have been made, or, in case of his decease, of his heirs according to the laws of the State or Territory where such land is located, and that at the expiration of said period the United States will convey the same by patent to said Indian, or his heirs as aforesaid, in fee, discharged of said trust and free of all charge or incumbrance whatsoever: Provided, That the President of the United States may in any case in his discretion extend the period. And if any conveyance shall be made of the lands set apart and allotted as herein provided, or any contract made touching the same, before the expiration of the time above mentioned, such conveyance or contract shall be absolutely null and void: Provided, That the law of descent and partition in force in the State or Territory where such lands are situate shall apply thereto after patents therefor have been executed and delivered, except as herein otherwise provided ...” And see Mixon v. Littleton, 265 F. 603; Unkle v. Wills, 281 F. 29, 35. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Stewart delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from the judgment of a three-judge district court setting aside an order of the Interstate Commerce Commission which had disallowed certain freight rates filed by the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad Company (hereafter “the New Haven”) and other rail carriers. The issue presented is whether § 1 (6) of the Interstate Commerce Act, as amended, which requires carriers “to establish, observe, and enforce just and reasonable classifications of property for transportation, with reference to which,rates, tariffs, regulations, or practices are or may be made or prescribed,” is applicable to so-called all-commodity freight rates. The Commission, with three members dissenting, held that § 1 (6) does apply to such rates, and that the section was violated by the rate schedules here in question. . 315 I. C. C. 419. The District Court held that' § 1 (6) requires “the maintenance in being of class rates” but does not prohibit “competitively compelled departures from classifications, within the established maxima, absent some other violation of the Act than the mere departure from the classification.” 221 F. Supp.' 370, 374. We agree with the District Court and affirm the judgment before us. A general word as to the basic distinction between class rates and commodity rates may be appropriate before proceeding to the specifics of the present case. Class rates were at the foundation of the railroad rate structure at the time of the enactment of the Interstate Commerce Act in 1887. Such rates are applied to traffic through two separate tariffs. One tariff, the “classification,” assigns each of the many thousand commodities carried by rail to one of presently some 30 categories or classes, based upon the commodity’s particular characteristics.. A companion tariff specifies the rate at which each class of freight will be carried. By contrast, commodity rates, which were also in existence at the time of the original passage of the Interstate Commerce Act, are rates made specifically applicable for the carriage of a particular commodity or group of commodities from one designated point to another. The original function of commodity rates, which are generally lower than class rates, was to encourage the movement of bulk commodities, such as coal and grain. With the onset and rapid growth of intermodal competition, the railroads increasingly turned to commodity rates in an effort to prevent diversion of traffic to other modes of transportation. Since 1932, numerous all-commodity or all-freight rail rates have been established between various points throughout the country. Typically, such rates have not literally applied to all commodities, but to a broad number, and they have often applied only to mixed carload shipments. Today only a small fraction of rail carload tonnage moves on class rates; by far the major portion moves on commodity rates of some kind. In the summer of 1958 the rail carriers competing with the New Haven established a trailer-on-flatcar service.. Under this system truck-trailers loaded with various commodities are brought to the railroad’s loading ramp for carriage on freight cars to destination for delivery to the consignee at the railroad’s unloading ramp. . This type' of service was instituted in an effort to meet motor carrier competition. Eastern Central Motor Carriers Assn. v. Baltimore & O. R. Co., 314 I. C. C. 5. The New Haven had physical clearance problems and equipment shortages which prevented its participation in this type of freight transportation, and during the first two months that the trailer-on-flatcar rates were in effect bn competing railroads, the New Haven lost the equivalent of more than 350 cars of traffic from Boston to St. Louis, and suffered substantial further losses of traffic westward from othdr New England points. In order to compete with the trailer-on-flatcar rates, and in an effort to cope with a significant imbalance between eastbound and westbound traffic over its lines, the New Haven filed with, the Commission the all-commodity rates which have become the subject of the present litigation. These rates applied to traffic between specified New England points and Chicago and St. Louis. Restricted to boxcar freight moving westward, in straight or mixed carloads, the rates were graduated according to minimum weight per car. They did not apply to certain designated kinds of traffic. The Commission initially suspended the rates, but allowed them to become effective on July 6, 1959, and they have remained in effect since that date. Various motor carrier associations and some of their individual members protested the rates, but in February 1961, Division 2 of the Commission filed a report approving them. 313 I. C. C. 275. On reconsideration later that year, the full Commission held by a divided vote that the rates violated § 1 (6) of the Act. 315 I. C. C. 419. The District Court set aside the Commission’s order and enjoined its enforcement, holding that the order rested on an erroneous interpretation of § 1 (6) of the Act. The intervening protestants brought this appeal here, and we noted probable jurisdiction. 376 U. S. 961. It is clear that § 1 (6) gives the Commission power to require that carriers maintain just and reasonable classifications in conjunction with the setting of class rates. The question here posed is whether that section applies to commodity rates as well, and specifically whether it applies to all-commodity rates. No doubt the language of the statute, “just and reasonable classifications of property” and “just and reasonable regulations and practices affecting classifications” is susceptible of a construction which would embrace the rates in issue here. The rates do not apply to a single, uniquely identifiable article but to a large group of commodities, which could be described as a classification of property. But the fact that the terms of the statute can be interpreted broadly enough to encompass these rates without doing violence to the English language does not settle the problem. It remains to inquire whether the legislative history warrants or the statutory structure supports such a broad interpretation. At the time of the enactment of the Interstate Commerce Act the vast preponderance of rail freight traffic moved pn class rates. These classes as well as the rates applicable to them varied greatly among different railroads and different sections of the country. When the Interstate Commerce Act was formulated, consideration was given to empowering the Commission to prescribe classifications, but it was finally concluded that the provisions of the bill which required publication of rates and classifications, together with the provisions regulating unreasonable rates, would ultimately prove adequate to achieve the desired uniformity of classifications. Beginning with its First Annual Report, however, the Commission expressed its concern with the continuing lack of uniformity in freight classifications, and seven years later recommended that it be empowered to make a uniform classification. In 1906 the Hepburn Act gave the Commission power for the first time to prescribe maximum reasonable rates, but transportation charges could still be increased by changes in the classification of any commodity. The Commission had succeeded in exercising power over classifications in proceedings under §§ 1, 2, and 3 of the Act, and in many cases had declared classifications of particular commodities to be unreasonable. However, the power of the Commission to halt manipulation of the classification rate system had been thrown into serious doubt by a case decided in 1905. It was against this background that § 1 (6) was enacted in 1910 as part of the Mann-Elkins Act, which also gave the Commission power to find classifications unreasonable and to. prescribe reasonable classifications for the future. The immediate genesis of these provisions seems to have been a special message to Congress by President Taft recommending “. . . that the commission shall be fully empowered, beyond any question, to pass upon the classifications of commodities for purposes of fixing rates, in like manner as it may now do with respect to the maximum rate applicable to any transportation.” During the course of the debate on the proposed bill in the House of Representatives, Congressman Russell, a member of the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, said “[T]he shipper can be extorted from; he can be made to pay an unjust rate just as well through classification as he can through the fixing of a rate. The . carriers can put an article in one classification, subject to a given rate, and if the Interstate Commerce Commission sees fit to declare that rate unreasonable, and reduce it, declaring what shall be a reasonable rate to take its place, the carrying corporation can obtain the same benefit and put the shipper under the same disadvantages by simply changing the classification of the article;” Chairman Mann stated that “classification of freight is just as "important as rates, because by. moving a particular article from one class to another you affect the rates.” He added that “in the course of time undoubtedly the power of the commission to have control of classifications will lead to greater uniformity and possibly to complete uniformity of classifications.” The Senate Report alluded only to the doubt which had been recently cast upon the Commission’s power to deal, with classifications. This legislative history makes it apparent that the object of § 1 (6) was to give the Commission clear power to deal with the twin problems which had arisen in the administration of class rates — the possibility of their manipulation to avoid maximum rate regulation and their lack ,qf uniformity. Those problems never affected commodity rates, because those rates were competitively compelled reductions from whatever class rates , would otherwise be applicable, and because standardization of commodity rates would have been completely inconsistent with their basic function of accommodating specific particularized competitive . conditions. The legislative history thus fully supports the conclusion that the reach of § 1 (6) of the Act was confined to class rates. This conclusion is amply confirmed by the pattern of the Commission’s decisions since § 1 (6) was enacted. The course of those decisions makes clear that the Commission has given full consideration to the question of whether § 1 (6) applies to all-commodity rates, and has squarely decided that the section is inapplicable. All-commodity rates first came under scrutiny of the Commission more than 25 years ago. In 1937 and 1938, the Commission approved all-commodity rates on four different occasions without the slightest suggestion that the rates were subject to the provisions of § 1 (6). The principal concern of the Commission’s inquiry in these cases was to ascertain whether the rates were prejudicial to any person, locality, or déscription of traffic. In a similar case decided in 1939, Commissioner Alldredge filed a dissent expressing the view that § 1 (6) did apply to all-commodity rates, and that the rates in question violated that section by lumping into a single category articles which had traditionally been assigned to different categories under the customary classification criteria.' With Commissioner Alldredge’s dissent putting in issue the applicability of § 1 (6), it is clear that the Commission consciously rejected his position. Two years later, however, the view taken by Commissioner Alldredge prevailed in a two-to-one order by Division 3, which struck down all-commodity rates as violative of § 1 (6). With the decisions thus in conflict, the problem received consideration by the full Commission a year later in All Freight to Pacific Coast, 248 I. C. C. 73. There the Commission squarely held that § 1 (6) does not apply to all-commodity rates. Its report stated: “Respondents now maintain a full line of class rates . governed by the western classification from and to all of the points involved in this proceeding, as required by section 1 (6) of the Interstate Commerce Act. They also maintain hundreds of lower rates as exceptions to the classification,. including commodity rates, that are not subject to the classification ratings nor to rules as to mixing of commodities in carloads. “Class rates normally reflect the maximum of reasonableness on goods falling within the various classes of traffic. Commodity rates are established, and necessary or desirable exceptions to the classification are made, when circumstances and conditions suggest that the class basis is too high for application on the traffic. We have approved this basis of rate making, and have never required commodity rates to conform to the ratings of the classification.” 248 I. C. C., at 86-87, In a separate concurrence, Commissioner Eastman said: “As is well known, the classifications; of freight which the railroads publish are for the purpose of governing the application of their class rates. The latter are used when no . rate has been published applying specifically to the movement in question, such specific rates being called commodity rates. The railroads carry, of course, a vast multitude of separate and distinct commodities, and the class rates are a convenient device for avoiding the publication of a like multitude of separate and distinct rates. . . .” 248 I. C. C., at 88. Thereafter, the Commission rejected other challenges to all-commodity rates based on § 1 (6) upon the authority of the Pacific Freight decision, and the two-to-one decision based on § 1 (6) which Division 3 had previously rendered was recalled and decided upon another ground. In the years that followed, the Pacific Freight case was regarded as controlling, and all-commodity rate cases were decided without reference to the provisions of § 1 (6). Finally, it is significant that in approving the trailer-on-flatcar service instituted by the New Haven’s rail competitors in 1958, the Commission did not discern any problem created by § 1 (6). Thus both the legislative history and the course of the Commission’s decisions clearly impel the conclusion that § 1 (6) does not apply to all-commodity rates. In reaching this conclusion, we hardly need add that, as the Act is structured, these rates are subject to full policing by the Commission under other provisions. If a commodity rate is too high, the Commission may reduce it. If a commodity rate unjustly discriminates against a shipper, the Commission may order the discrimination removed. If a commodity rate results in an undue preference in favor of or an unreasonable prejudice against any person, locality, or description of traffic, the Commission may require that appropriate adjustments be made. If a commodity rate is unreasonably low, the Commission may order that it be increased. The District Court’s opinion contains, by way of dicta, considerable discussion concerning the continuing validity of the concept of value of service as a factor in the setting of railroad freight rates, and that subject was also discussed in' the briefs and oral arguments in this Court. But the extent to which value of service may continue as a valid element in assessing thé lawfulness, of rates under the sections of the Act applicable to commodity rates is a question we need not and dó not decide. We decide only that the District Court was correct in holding that the issues in this case, “should never have been framed under §1 (6).” Affirmed. “It is made the duty of all common carriers subject to the provisions of this chapter to establish, observe, and enforce just and reasonable classifications of property for transportation, with reference to which rates, tariffs, regulations, or practices are or may be made or prescribed, and just and reasonable regulations and practices affecting classifications, rates, or tariffs, the issuance, form, and substance of tickets, receipts, and bills of lading, the manner and method of presenting, marking, packing, and delivering property for transportation, the facilitiés for transportation, the carrying of personal, sample, and excess baggage, and all other matters relating to or connected with the receiving,'handling, transporting, storing, and delivery of property subject to the provisions of this chapter which may be necessary or proper to. secure the safe and prompt-receipt, handling, transportation, and delivery of property subject to the provisions of this chapter upon just and reasonable terms, and every unjust and unreasonable classification, regulation, and practice is prohibited and declared to be unlawful.” 49 U. S. C. § 1 (6) (1958 ed.). The characteristics of a commodity which are generally considered in determining the classification to which it should be assigned are: 1. Shipping weight per cubic foot. 2. Liability to damage. 3. Liability to damage other commodities with which it is transported. 4. Perishability. 5. Liability to spontaneous combustion or explosion. 6. Susceptibility to theft. 7. Value per pound in comparison with other articles. 8. Ease or difficulty in loading or unloading. 9. Stowability. 10. Excessive weight. 11. Excessive length. 12. Care or attention necessary in loading and transporting; 13. Trade conditions. 14. Value of service. 15. Competition with other commodities transported. Motor Carrier Rates in New England, 47 M. C. C.. 657, 660-661; Class Rate Investigation, 1939, 262 I. C. C. 447, 508; Investigation and Suspension Docket No. 76, 25 I. C. C. 442, 472-473. Every day the New Haven was dispatching approximately 150 émpty boxcars to Chicago and St. Louis, with' an annual carrying capacity of 3,000,000 tons. The rates did not apply to import, export, or ex-water traffic. In addition, certain commodities were excluded, such as livestock, explosives, scientific equipment, and easily damaged goods. The Commission’s report also spoke of the rates as “constituting a destructive competitive practice in contravention, of the national transportation policy,” but in a brief filed here the Commission has pointed out that this statement was “merely an adjunct to the Commission’s ruling that the rates violated Section 1 (6),” and that this conclusion “cannot be sustained as an independent basis for disallowing the rates, in the absence of additional findings.” The Commission and the United States did not appeal. • Instead, the Commission reopened the case for further hearings, since it entertained doubt as.;to the adequacy of its findings. Those further hearings have been postponed pending resolution of this' appeal. . The Commission has filed a brief on the merits, however, agreeing,-as do . all the parties, that the § 1 (6) issue is necessarily presented by "this appeal. We agree, and further agree with the Commission that there is nothing in the District Court’s judgment or in our disposition of this appeal to prevent.further Commission proceedings with respect to these rates. S. Rep. No. 46,49th Cong., 1st Sess., 188. 1 I. C. C. Ann. Rep. 30-32 (1887). 8 I. C. C. Ann. Rep. 38-39. See also 5 I. C. C. Ann. Rep. 33. 34 Stat. 589, 49.U. S. C. § 15 (1) (1958 ed.). James Pyle & Sons v. East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia R. Co., 1 I. C. C. 465 (1888); Thurber v. New York Central & H. R. Co., 3 I. C. C. 473 (1890); see National Hay Assn. v. Lake Shore & M. S. R. Co., 9 I. C. C. 264 (1902). Interstate Commerce Commission v. Lake Shore & M. S. R. Co., 134 F. 942, aff’d by an equally divided Court, 202 U. S. 613. In this case the court struck down a Commission order commanding the reclassification of hay and straw to a lower-rated class. 36 Stat. 546, 551, 552; 49 U. S. C. §§ 1 (6), 15 (1), 15 (7) (1958. ed.). H. R. Rep. No. 923, 61st Cong., 2d Sess., 3. 45 Cong. Rec. 5142. 45 Cong. Rec. 4578. Ibid. The Senate Report stated: “Some doubt has been raised as to whether, under the provisions of section 15 of the existing act, the commission is empowered to review classifications of freight as well as rates, and to make orders dealing with improper classifications. (Judson on Interstate Com-' merce, Ed. of 1908, secs. 209, 210.) By section 9 of the bill, this doubt is removed and the power is expressly vested in the commission.” S. Rep. No. 355, 61st Cong., 2d Sess., 8 (1910). The authority primarily relied on by the Judson treatise was the Lake Shore casa, note 12, supra. Freight from Boston to East Hartford, 223 I. C. C. 421 (Div. 4, 1937); Commodities between Chicago, Ill., and Twin Cities, 226 I. C. C. 356 (Div. 3, 1938); All Freight between Boston & Maine Railroad Points, 226 I. C. C. 387 (Div. 4, 1938); All Freight from Chicago and St. Louis to Birmingham, 226 I. C. C. 455 (Div. 3, 1938). All Freight between Harlem River, N. Y., and Boston, 234 I. C. C. 673 (Div. 3, 1939). See also Commissioner Alldredge’s dissents in the following cases: All Freight from Chicago and St. Louis to Santa Rosa, N. Mex., 243 I. C. C. 517 (Div. 2, 1941); All Freight between Los Angeles and Albuquerque, 28 M. C. C. 161 (Div. 3, 1941). All Freight from Eastern Ports to the South, 245 I. C. C. 207 (Div. 3, 1941). See also the decision under §216 (b) of the Interstate- Commerce Act by Commissioners Alldredge and Johnson in AU Freight from Chicago and St. Louis to El Paso, Tex., 28 M. C. C. 727 (Div. 2, 1941). All Freight from Butte, Mont., to Spokane, Wash., 251 I. C. C. 291 (Div. 2, 1942); All Freight Rates to Points in Southern Territory, 253 I. C. C. 623 (1942). All Freight from Eastern Ports to the South, 251 I. C. C. 361 (1942). See All Freight, Straight Carloads, to and from the South, 258 I. C. C. 579 (Div. 2, 1944); All-Commodity Rates between Calif. and Ore., Wash., 293 I. C. C. 327 (Div. 3, 1954). Eastern Central Motor Carriers Assn. v. Baltimore & O. R. Co., 314 I. C. C. 5, 48-49. The trailer-on-flatcar rates, unlike the all-commodity rates involved in the present case-, are subject to a mixing rule requiring that the lading consist of at least two commodities, no one of which shall exceed 60% of- the total volume of the lading. But the New.Hayen points out that this mixing-rule is satisfied whenever two straight trailerloads, each containing a different commodity, are tendered at the same loading platform under a single bill of lading, even though they may be consigned by different shippers and destined for different consignees. 49 U. 8. C. §§ 1 (5) and 15 (Í) (1958 ed.). 49 U. S. C. §§ 2 and 15 (1) (1958 ed.). 49 U. S. C. §§3 (1) and 15 (1) (1958 ed.). 49 U. 8. C. §§ 1 (5), 15a (2), 15a (3), and 15 (1) (1958 ed.). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Held : The judgment is reversed and the case is remanded. 670 F.3d 61, reversed and remanded. Justice GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court, concluding that § 1514A's whistleblower protection includes employees of a public company's private contractors and subcontractors. Pp. 1165 - 1176. (a) This reading of § 1514A is supported by the provision's text. Pp. 1165 - 1169. (1) The Court looks first to the ordinary meaning of the provision's language. See Moskal v. United States, 498 U.S. 103, 108, 111 S.Ct. 461, 112 L.Ed.2d 449. As relevant here, § 1514A(a) provides that "no... contractor... may discharge... an employee." The ordinary meaning of "an employee" in this proscription is the contractor's own employee. FMR's "narrower construction" requires inserting "of a public company" after "an employee," but where Congress meant "an employee of a public company," it said so. The provision as a whole supports this reading. The prohibited retaliatory measures enumerated in § 1514A(a)-discharge, demotion, suspension, threats, harassment, or discrimination in employment terms and conditions-are actions an employer takes against its own employees. Contractors are not ordinarily positioned to take adverse actions against employees of the public company with whom they contract. FMR's interpretation of § 1514A, therefore, would shrink to insignificance the provision's ban on retaliation by contractors. The protected activity covered by § 1514A, and the provision's enforcement procedures and remedies, also indicate that Congress presumed an employer-employee relationship between the retaliator and the whistleblowing employee. Pp. 1165 - 1168. (2) FMR's textual arguments are unpersuasive. It urges that "an employee" must be read to refer exclusively to public company employees to avoid the absurd result of extending protection to the personal employees of company officers and employees, e.g., their housekeepers or gardeners. This concern appears more theoretical than real and, in any event, is outweighed by the compelling arguments opposing FMR's reading of § 1514A. FMR also urges that its reading is supported by the provision's statutory headings, but those headings are "not meant to take the place of the detailed provisions of the text." Trainmen v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co., 331 U.S. 519, 528, 67 S.Ct. 1387, 91 L.Ed. 1646. Pp. 1168 - 1169. (b) Other considerations support the Court's textual analysis. Pp. 1169 - 1175. (1) The Court's reading fits § 1514A's aim to ward off another Enron debacle. The legislative record shows Congress' understanding that outside professionals bear significant responsibility for reporting fraud by the public companies with whom they contract, and that fear of retaliation was the primary deterrent to such reporting by the employees of Enron's contractors. Sarbanes-Oxley contains numerous provisions designed to control the conduct of accountants, auditors, and lawyers who work with public companies, but only § 1514A affords such employees protection from retaliation by their employers for complying with the Act's reporting requirements. Pp. 1169 - 1171. (2) This Court's reading of § 1514A avoids insulating the entire mutual fund industry from § 1514A. Virtually all mutual funds are structured so that they have no employees of their own; they are managed, instead, by independent investment advisors. Accordingly, the "narrower construction" endorsed by FMR would leave § 1514A with no application to mutual funds. The Court's reading of § 1514A, in contrast, protects the employees of investment advisors, who are often the only firsthand witnesses to shareholder fraud involving mutual funds. Pp. 1171 - 1172. (3) There is scant evidence that today's decision will open any floodgates for whistleblowing suits outside § 1514A's purposes. The Department of Labor's regulations have interpreted § 1514A as protecting contractor employees for almost a decade, yet FMR is unable to identify a single case in which the employee of a private contractor has asserted a § 1514A claim based on allegations unrelated to shareholder fraud. Plaintiffs and the Solicitor General suggest various limiting principles to dispel any overbreadth problems. This Court need not determine § 1514A's bounds here, however, because, if plaintiffs' allegations prove true, plaintiffs are precisely the "firsthand witnesses to [the shareholder] fraud" Congress anticipated § 1514A would protect. S.Rep. No. 107-146, p. 10. Pp. 1172 - 1174. (4) The 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act does not affect this Court's task of determining whether Congress in 2002 afforded protection to whistleblowing contractor employees. Pp. 1173 - 1175. (c) AIR 21's whistleblower protection provision has been read to cover, in addition to employees of air carriers, employees of contractors and subcontractors of the carriers. Given the parallel statutory texts and whistleblower protective aims, the Court reads the words "an employee" in AIR 21 and in § 1514A to have similar import. Pp. 1175 - 1176. Justice SCALIA, joined by Justice THOMAS, relying only on 18 U.S.C. § 1514A's text and broader context, agreed that § 1514A protects employees of private contractors from retaliation when they report covered forms of fraud. Pp. 1176 - 1177. GINSBURG, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C.J., and BREYER and KAGAN, JJ., joined, and in which SCALIA and THOMAS, JJ., joined in principal part. SCALIA, J., filed an opinion concurring in principal part and concurring in the judgment, in which THOMAS, J., joined. SOTOMAYOR, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which KENNEDY and ALITO, JJ., joined. Eric Schnapper, Seattle, WA, for the petitioners. Nicole A. Saharsky, for the United States as amicus curiae, by special leave of the Court, supporting the petitioners. Mark A. Perry, Washington, DC, for the respondents. Eric Schnapper, Counsel of Record, Seattle, WA, Indira Talwani, Segal Roitman, LLP, Boston, MA, Kevin G. Powers, Rodgers, Powers & Schwartz, LLP, Boston, MA, Counsel for Petitioners. Stephen M. Shapiro, Timothy S. Bishop, Mayer Brown LLP, Chicago, IL, Mark A. Perry, Counsel of Record, Porter N. Wilkinson, Geoffrey C. Weien, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, Washington, DC, Rachel S. Brass, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, San Francisco, CA, Counsel for Respondents. Justice GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court. To safeguard investors in public companies and restore trust in the financial markets following the collapse of Enron Corporation, Congress enacted the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, 116 Stat. 745. See S.Rep. No. 107-146, pp. 2-11 (2002). A provision of the Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1514A, protects whistleblowers. Section 1514A, at the time here relevant, instructed: "No [public] company..., or any officer, employee, contractor, subcontractor, or agent of such company, may discharge, demote, suspend, threaten, harass, or in any other manner discriminate against an employee in the terms and conditions of employment because of [whistleblowing or other protected activity]." § 1514A(a) (2006 ed.). This case concerns the definition of the protected class: Does § 1514A shield only those employed by the public company itself, or does it shield as well employees of privately held contractors and subcontractors-for example, investment advisers, law firms, accounting enterprises-who perform work for the public company? We hold, based on the text of § 1514A, the mischief to which Congress was responding, and earlier legislation Congress drew upon, that the provision shelters employees of private contractors and subcontractors, just as it shelters employees of the public company served by the contractors and subcontractors. We first summarize our principal reasons, then describe this controversy and explain our decision more comprehensively. Plaintiffs below, petitioners here, are former employees of private companies that contract to advise or manage mutual funds. The mutual funds themselves are public companies that have no employees. Hence, if the whistle is to be blown on fraud detrimental to mutual fund investors, the whistleblowing employee must be on another company's payroll, most likely, the payroll of the mutual fund's investment adviser or manager. Taking the allegations of the complaint as true, both plaintiffs blew the whistle on putative fraud relating to the mutual funds and, as a consequence, suffered adverse action by their employers. Plaintiffs read § 1514A to convey that "[n]o... contractor... may... discriminate against [its own] employee [for whistleblowing]." We find that reading consistent with the text of the statute and with common sense. Contractors are in control of their own employees, but are not ordinarily positioned to control someone else's workers. Moreover, we resist attributing to Congress a purpose to stop a contractor from retaliating against whistleblowers employed by the public company the contractor serves, while leaving the contractor free to retaliate against its own employees when they reveal corporate fraud. In the Enron scandal that prompted the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, contractors and subcontractors, including the accounting firm Arthur Andersen, participated in Enron's fraud and its coverup. When employees of those contractors attempted to bring misconduct to light, they encountered retaliation by their employers. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act contains numerous provisions aimed at controlling the conduct of accountants, auditors, and lawyers who work with public companies. See, e.g., 116 Stat. 750-765, 773-774, 784, §§ 101-107, 203-206, 307. Given Congress' concern about contractor conduct of the kind that contributed to Enron's collapse, we regard with suspicion construction of § 1514A to protect whistleblowers only when they are employed by a public company, and not when they work for the public company's contractor. Congress borrowed § 1514A's prohibition against retaliation from the wording of the 2000 Wendell H. Ford Aviation Investment and Reform Act for the 21st Century (AIR 21), 49 U.S.C. § 42121. That Act provides: "No air carrier or contractor or subcontractor of an air carrier may discharge an employee or otherwise discriminate against an employee with respect to compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment" when the employee provides information regarding violations "relating to air carrier safety" to his or her employer or federal authorities. § 42121(a)(1). AIR 21 has been read to cover, in addition to employees of air carriers, employees of contractors and subcontractors of the carriers. Given the parallel statutory texts and whistleblower protective aims, we read the words "an employee" in AIR 21 and in § 1514A to have similar import. I A The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (Sarbanes-Oxley or Act) aims to "prevent and punish corporate and criminal fraud, protect the victims of such fraud, preserve evidence of such fraud, and hold wrongdoers accountable for their actions." S.Rep. No. 107-146, p. 2 (2002) (hereinafter S. Rep.).1 Of particular concern to Congress was abundant evidence that Enron had succeeded in perpetuating its massive shareholder fraud in large part due to a "corporate code of silence"; that code, Congress found, "discourage[d] employees from reporting fraudulent behavior not only to the proper authorities, such as the FBI and the SEC, but even internally." Id., at 4-5 (internal quotation marks omitted). When employees of Enron and its accounting firm, Arthur Andersen, attempted to report corporate misconduct, Congress learned, they faced retaliation, including discharge. As outside counsel advised company officials at the time, Enron's efforts to "quiet" whistleblowers generally were not proscribed under then-existing law. Id., at 5, 10. Congress identified the lack of whistleblower protection as "a significant deficiency" in the law, for in complex securities fraud investigations, employees "are [often] the only firsthand witnesses to the fraud." Id., at 10. Section 806 of Sarbanes-Oxley addresses this concern. Titled "Protection for Employees of Publicly Traded Companies Who Provide Evidence of Fraud," § 806 added a new provision to Title 18 of the United States Code, 18 U.S.C. § 1514A, which reads in relevant part: "Civil action to protect against retaliation in fraud cases "(a) Whistleblower Protection for Employees of Publicly Traded Companies.-No company with a class of securities registered under section 12 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (15 U.S.C. § 78 l ), or that is required to file reports under section 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (15 U.S.C. § 78 o (d)), or any officer, employee, contractor, subcontractor, or agent of such company, may discharge, demote, suspend, threaten, harass, or in any other manner discriminate against an employee in the terms and conditions of employment because of any lawful act done by the employee- "(1) to provide information, cause information to be provided, or otherwise assist in an investigation regarding any conduct which the employee reasonably believes constitutes a violation of section 1341 [mail fraud], 1343 [wire fraud], 1344 [bank fraud], or 1348 [securities or commodities fraud], any rule or regulation of the Securities and Exchange Commission, or any provision of Federal law relating to fraud against shareholders, when the information or assistance is provided to or the investigation is conducted by [a federal agency, Congress, or supervisor]...." § 806, 116 Stat. 802.2 Congress has assigned whistleblower protection largely to the Department of Labor (DOL), which administers some 20 United States Code incorporated whistleblower protection provisions. See 78 Fed.Reg. 3918 (2013). The Secretary has delegated investigatory and initial adjudicatory responsibility over claims under a number of these provisions, including § 1514A, to DOL's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Ibid. OSHA's order may be appealed to an administrative law judge, and then to DOL's Administrative Review Board (ARB). 29 CFR §§ 1980.104 to 1980.110 (2011). In common with other whistleblower protection provisions enforced by DOL, see 77 Fed.Reg. 3912 (2012), the ARB's determination on a § 1514A claim constitutes the agency's final decision and is reviewable in federal court under the standards stated in the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 706. If, however, the ARB does not issue a final decision within 180 days of the filing of the complaint, and the delay is not due to bad faith on the claimant's part, the claimant may proceed to federal district court for de novo review. 18 U.S.C. § 1514A(b). An employee prevailing in a proceeding under § 1514A is entitled to "all relief necessary to make the employee whole," including "reinstatement with the same seniority status that the employee would have had, but for the discrimination," backpay with interest, and compensation for litigation costs. § 1514A(c). Congress modeled § 1514A on the anti-retaliation provision of the Wendell H. Ford Aviation Investment and Reform Act for the 21st Century (AIR 21), 49 U.S.C. § 42121, a measure enacted two years earlier. See S. Rep., at 30 (corporate whistleblower protections "track [AIR 21's] protections as closely as possible"). Section 1514A incorporates by cross-reference AIR 21's administrative enforcement procedures. 18 U.S.C. § 1514A(b)(2). B Petitioners Jackie Hosang Lawson and Jonathan M. Zang (plaintiffs) separately initiated proceedings under § 1514A against their former employers, privately held companies that provide advisory and management services to the Fidelity family of mutual funds. The Fidelity funds are not parties to either case; as is common in the mutual fund industry, the Fidelity funds themselves have no employees. Instead, they contract with investment advisers like respondents to handle their day-to-day operations, which include making investment decisions, preparing reports for shareholders, and filing reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Lawson was employed by Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC, a subsidiary of FMR Corp., which was succeeded by FMR LLC. Zang was employed by a different FMR LLC subsidiary, Fidelity Management & Research Co., and later by one of that company's subsidiaries, FMR Co., Inc. For convenience, we refer to respondents collectively as FMR. Lawson worked for FMR for 14 years, eventually serving as a Senior Director of Finance. She alleges that, after she raised concerns about certain cost accounting methodologies, believing that they overstated expenses associated with operating the mutual funds, she suffered a series of adverse actions, ultimately amounting to constructive discharge. Zang was employed by FMR for eight years, most recently as a portfolio manager for several of the funds. He alleges that he was fired in retaliation for raising concerns about inaccuracies in a draft SEC registration statement concerning certain Fidelity funds. Lawson and Zang separately filed administrative complaints alleging retaliation proscribed by § 1514A. After expiration of the 180-day period specified in § 1514A(b)(1), Lawson and Zang each filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. FMR moved to dismiss the suits, arguing, as relevant, that neither plaintiff has a claim for relief under § 1514A. FMR is privately held, and maintained that § 1514A protects only employees of public companies- i.e., companies that either have "a class of securities registered under section 12 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934," or that are "required to file reports under section 15(d)" of that Act. § 1514A(a).3 In a joint order, the District Court rejected FMR's interpretation of § 1514A and denied the dismissal motions in both suits. 724 F.Supp.2d 141 (Mass.2010). On interlocutory appeal, a divided panel of the First Circuit reversed. 670 F.3d 61 (2012). The Court of Appeals majority acknowledged that FMR is a "contractor" 4 within the meaning of § 1514A(a), and thus among the actors prohibited from retaliating against "an employee" who engages in protected activity. The majority agreed with FMR, however, that "an employee" refers only to employees of public companies and does not cover a contractor's own employees. Id., at 68-80. Judge Thompson dissented. In her view, the majority had "impose[d] an unwarranted restriction on the intentionally broad language of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act" and "bar[red] a significant class of potential securities-fraud whistleblowers from any legal protection." Id., at 83. Several months later, the ARB issued a decision in an unrelated case, Spinner v. David Landau & Assoc., LLC, No. 10-111 etc., ALJ No. 2010-SOX-029 (May 31, 2012),5 disagreeing with the Court of Appeals' interpretation of § 1514A. In a comprehensive opinion, the ARB explained its position that § 1514A affords whistleblower protection to employees of privately held contractors that render services to public companies. Ibid.6 We granted certiorari, 569 U.S. ----, 133 S.Ct. 2387, 185 L.Ed.2d 1103 (2013), to resolve the division of opinion on whether § 1514A extends whistleblower protection to employees of privately held contractors who perform work for public companies. II A In determining the meaning of a statutory provision, "we look first to its language, giving the words used their ordinary meaning." Moskal v. United States, 498 U.S. 103, 108, 111 S.Ct. 461, 112 L.Ed.2d 449 (1990) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). As Judge Thompson observed in her dissent from the Court of Appeals' judgment, "boiling [§ 1514A(a) ] down to its relevant syntactic elements, it provides that 'no... contractor... may discharge... an employee.' " 670 F.3d, at 84 (quoting § 1514A(a)). The ordinary meaning of "an employee" in this proscription is the contractor's own employee. FMR's interpretation of the text requires insertion of "of a public company" after "an employee." But where Congress meant "an employee of a public company," it said so: With respect to the actors governed by § 1514A, the provision's interdictions run to the officers, employees, contractors, subcontractors, and agents "of such company," i.e., a public company. § 1514A(a). Another anti-retaliation provision in Sarbanes-Oxley provides: "[A] broker or dealer and persons employed by a broker or dealer who are involved with investment banking activities may not, directly or indirectly, retaliate against or threaten to retaliate against any securities analyst employed by that broker or dealer or its affiliates...." 15 U.S.C. § 78 o-6(a)(1)(C) (emphasis added). In contrast, nothing in § 1514A's language confines the class of employees protected to those of a designated employer. Absent any textual qualification, we presume the operative language means what it appears to mean: A contractor may not retaliate against its own employee for engaging in protected whistleblowing activity.7 Section 1514A's application to contractor employees is confirmed when we enlarge our view from the term "an employee" to the provision as a whole. The prohibited retaliatory measures enumerated in § 1514A(a)-discharge, demotion, suspension, threats, harassment, or discrimination in the terms and conditions of employment-are commonly actions an employer takes against its own employees. Contractors are not ordinarily positioned to take adverse actions against employees of the public company with whom they contract. FMR's interpretation of § 1514A, therefore, would shrink to insignificance the provision's ban on retaliation by contractors. The dissent embraces FMR's "narrower" construction. See post, at 1178, 1178 - 1179, 1179, 1180 - 1181. FMR urges that Congress included contractors in § 1514A's list of governed actors simply to prevent public companies from avoiding liability by employing contractors to effectuate retaliatory discharges. FMR describes such a contractor as an "ax-wielding specialist," illustrated by George Clooney's character in the movie Up in the Air.8 Brief for Respondents 24-25 (internal quotation marks omitted). As portrayed by Clooney, an ax-wielding specialist is a contractor engaged only as the bearer of the bad news that the employee has been fired; he plays no role in deciding who to terminate. If the company employing the ax-wielder chose the recipients of the bad tidings for retaliatory reasons, the § 1514A claim would properly be directed at the company. Hiring the ax-wielder would not insulate the company from liability. Moreover, we see no indication that retaliatory ax-wielding specialists are the real-world problem that prompted Congress to add contractors to § 1514A. 9 Moving further through § 1514A to the protected activity described in subsection (a)(1), we find further reason to believe that Congress presumed an employer-employee relationship between the retaliator and the whistleblower. Employees gain protection for furnishing information to a federal agency, Congress, or "a person with supervisory authority over the employee (or such other person working for the employer who has the authority to investigate, discover, or terminate misconduct)." § 1514A(a)(1) (emphasis added). And under § 1514A(a)(2), employees are protected from retaliation for assisting "in a proceeding filed or about to be filed ( with any knowledge of the employer ) relating to an alleged violation" of any of the enumerated fraud provisions, securities regulations, or other federal law relating to shareholder fraud. § 1514A(a)(2) (emphasis added). The reference to employer knowledge is an additional indicator of Congress' expectation that the retaliator typically will be the employee's employer, not another entity less likely to know of whistleblower complaints filed or about to be filed. Section 1514A's enforcement procedures and remedies similarly contemplate that the whistleblower is an employee of the retaliator. As earlier noted, see supra, at 1163 - 1164, § 1514A(b)(2)(A) provides that a claim under § 1514A "shall be governed under the rules and procedures set forth in section 42121(b) of title 49," i.e., AIR 21's anti-retaliation provision. Throughout § 42121(b), the respondent is referred to as "the employer." See 49 U.S.C. § 42121(b)(2)(B)(ii) (The Secretary shall not conduct an investigation into a retaliation claim "if the employer demonstrates, by clear and convincing evidence, that the employer would have taken the same unfavorable personnel action in the absence of that behavior."); § 42121(b)(2)(B)(iv) ("Relief may not be ordered... if the employer demonstrates by clear and convincing evidence that the employer would have taken the same unfavorable personnel action in the absence of that behavior."). Regarding remedies, § 1514A(c)(2) states that a successful claimant shall be entitled to "reinstatement with the same seniority status that the employee would have had, but for the discrimination," as well as "the amount of back pay, with interest." As the Solicitor General, for the United States as amicus curiae, observed, "It is difficult, if not impossible, to see how a contractor or subcontractor could provide those remedies to an employee of a public company." Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 15. The most sensible reading of § 1514A's numerous references to an employer-employee relationship between the respondent and the claimant is that the provision's protections run between contractors and their own employees. Remarkably, the dissent attributes to Congress a strange design. Under the dissent's "narrower" construction, post, at 1178, 1178 - 1179, 1179, 1180 - 1181, a public company's contractor may not retaliate against a public company's employees, academic here because the public company has no employees. According to the dissent, this coverage is necessary to prevent "a gaping hole" that would allow public companies to "evade § 1514A simply by hiring a contractor to engage in the very retaliatory acts that an officer or employee could not." Post, at 1182. This cannot be right-even if Congress had omitted any reference to contractors, subcontractors, or agents in § 1514A, the remaining language surely would prohibit a public company from directing someone else to engage in retaliatory conduct against the public company's employees; hiring an ax-wielder to announce an employee's demotion does not change the fact that the public company is the entity commanding the demotion. Under the dissent's reading of § 1514A, the inclusion of contractors as covered employers does no more than make the contractor secondarily liable for complying with such marching orders-hardly a hole at all.10 There would be a huge hole, on the other hand, were the dissent's view of § 1514A's reach to prevail: Contractors' employees would be disarmed; they would be vulnerable to retaliation by their employers for blowing the whistle on a scheme to defraud the public company's investors, even a scheme engineered entirely by the contractor. Not only would mutual fund advisers and managers escape § 1514A's control. Legions of accountants and lawyers would be denied § 1514A's protections. See infra, at 1170 - 1172. Instead of indulging in fanciful visions of whistleblowing babysitters and the like, post, at 1177 - 1178, 1180, 1183 - 1184, 1187 - 1188, the dissent might pause to consider whether a Congress, prompted by the Enron debacle, would exclude from whistleblower protection countless professionals equipped to bring fraud on investors to a halt. B We turn next to two textual arguments made by FMR. First, FMR urges that "an employee" must be read to refer exclusively to public company employees to avoid the absurd result of extending protection to the personal employees of company officers and employees, e.g., their housekeepers or gardeners. See Brief for Respondents 19-20; post, at 1177 - 1178, 1180, 1183 - 1184, 1187 - 1188. Plaintiffs and the Solicitor General do not defend § 1514A's application to personal employees. They argue, instead, that the prohibition against an "officer" or "employee" retaliating against "an employee" may be read as imposing personal liability only on officers and employees who retaliate against other public company employees. Brief for Petitioners 12; Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 16.11 FMR calls this reading "bizarre," for it would ascribe to the words "an employee" in § 1514A(a) "one meaning if the respondent is an 'officer' and a different meaning if the respondent is a 'contractor.' " Brief for Respondents 20-21. We agree with FMR that plaintiffs and the Solicitor General offer an interpretation at odds with the text Congress enacted. If, as we hold, "an employee" includes employees of contractors, then grammatically, the term also includes employees of public company officers and employees. Nothing suggests Congress' attention was drawn to the curiosity its drafting produced. The issue, however, is likely more theoretical than real. Few housekeepers or gardeners, we suspect, are likely to come upon and comprehend evidence of their employer's complicity in fraud. In any event, FMR's point is outweighed by the compelling arguments opposing FMR's contention that "an employee" refers simply and only to public company employees. See supra, at 1165 - 1168. See also infra, at 1172 - 1174 (limiting principles may serve as check against overbroad applications). Second, FMR argues that the statutory headings support the exclusion of contractor employees from § 1514A's protections. Although § 1514A's own heading is broad ("Civil action to protect against retaliation in fraud cases"), subsection (a) is captioned "Whistleblower Protection for Employees of Publicly Traded Companies." Similarly, the relevant public law section, § 806 of Sarbanes-Oxley, is captioned "Protection for Employees of Publicly Traded Companies Who Provide Evidence of Fraud." 116 Stat. 802. The Court of Appeals described the latter two headings as "explicit guides" limiting protection under § 1514A to employees of public companies. 670 F.3d, at 69. This Court has placed less weight on captions. In Trainmen v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co., 331 U.S. 519, 67 S.Ct. 1387, 91 L.Ed. 1646 (1947), we explained that where, as here, "the [statutory] text is complicated and prolific, headings and titles can do no more than indicate the provisions in a most general manner." Id., at 528, 67 S.Ct. 1387. The under-inclusiveness of the two headings relied on by the Court of Appeals is apparent. The provision indisputably extends protection to employees of companies that file reports with the SEC pursuant to § 15(d) of the 1934 Act, even when such companies are not "publicly traded." And the activity protected under § 1514A is not limited to "provid[ing] evidence of fraud"; it also includes reporting violations of SEC rules or regulations. § 1514A(a)(1). As in Trainmen, the headings here are "but a short-hand reference to the general subject matter" of the provision, "not meant to take the place of the detailed provisions of the text." 331 U.S., at 528, 67 S.Ct. 1387.Section 1514A is attended by numerous indicators that the statute's prohibitions govern the relationship between a contractor and its own employees; we do not read the headings to "undo or limit" those signals. Id., at 529, 67 S.Ct. 1387.12 III A Our textual analysis of § 1514A fits the provision's purpose. It is common ground that Congress installed whistleblower protection in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act as one means to ward off another Enron debacle. S. Rep., at 2-11. And, as the ARB observed in Spinner, "Congress plainly recognized that outside professionals-accountants, law firms, contractors, agents, and the like-were complicit in, if not integral to, the shareholder fraud and subsequent cover-up [Enron] officers... perpetrated." ALJ No. 2010-SOX-029, pp. 12-13. Indeed, the Senate Report demonstrates that Congress was as focused on the role of Enron's outside contractors in facilitating the fraud as it was on the actions of Enron's own officers. See, e.g., S. Rep., at 3 (fraud "occurred with extensive participation and structuring advice from Arthur Andersen... which was simultaneously serving as both consultant and independent auditor for Enron" (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted)); id., at 4 ("professionals from accounting firms, law firms and business consulting firms, who were paid millions to advise Enron on these practices, assured others that Enron was a solid investment"); id., at 4-5 (team of Andersen employees were tasked with destroying "physical evidence and documents" relating to Enron's fraud); id., at 5 ("Enron and Andersen were taking advantage of a system that allowed them to behave in an apparently fraudulent manner"); id., at 11 (Enron's fraud partly attributable to "the well-paid professionals who helped create, carry out, and cover up the complicated corporate ruse when they should have been raising concerns"); id., at 20-21 ("Enron's accountants and lawyers brought all their skills and knowledge to bear in assisting the fraud to succeed and then in covering it up."). Also clear from the legislative record is Congress' understanding that outside professionals bear significant responsibility for reporting fraud by the public companies with whom they contract, and that fear of retaliation was the primary deterrent to such reporting by the employees of Enron's contractors. Congressional investigators discovered ample evidence of contractors demoting or discharging employees they have engaged who jeopardized the contractor's business relationship with Enron by objecting to Enron's financial practices. See, e.g., Oppel, Merrill Replaced Research Analyst Who Up Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

E

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal (28 U. S. C. § 1253) from the judgment of a three-judge District Court which dismissed a complaint seeking to enjoin the condemnation of appellants’ property under the District of Columbia Redevelopment Act of 1945, 60 Stat. 790, D. C. Code, 1951, §§ 5-701-5-719. The challenge was to the constitutionality of the Act, particularly as applied to the taking of appellants’ property. The District Court sustained the constitutionality of the Act. 117 F. Supp. 705. By § 2 of the Act, Congress made a “legislative determination” that “owing to technological and sociological changes, obsolete lay-out, and other factors, conditions existing in the District of Columbia with respect to substandard housing and blighted areas, including the use of buildings in alleys as dwellings for human habitation, are injurious to the public health, safety, morals, and welfare; and it is hereby declared to be the policy of the United States to protect and promote the welfare of the inhabitants of the seat of the Government by eliminating all such injurious conditions by employing all means necessary and appropriate for the purpose.” Section 2 goes on to declare that acquisition of property is necessary to eliminate these housing conditions. . Congress further finds in § 2 that these ends cannot be attained “by the ordinary operations of private enterprise alone without public participation”; that “the sound replanning and redevelopment of an obsolescent or obsolescing portion” of the District “cannot be accomplished unless it be done in the light of comprehensive and coordinated planning of the whole of the territory of the District of Columbia and its environs”; and that “the acquisition and the assembly of real property and the leasing or sale thereof for redevelopment pursuant to a project area redevelopment plan ... is hereby declared to be a public use.” Section 4 creates the District of Columbia Redevelopment Land Agency (hereinafter called the Agency), composed of five members, which is granted power by § 5 (a) to acquire and assemble, by eminent domain and otherwise, real property for “the redevelopment of blighted territory in the District of Columbia and the prevention, reduction, or elimination of blighting factors or causes of blight.” Section 6 (a) of the Act directs the National Capital Planning Commission (hereinafter called the Planning Commission) to make and develop “a comprehensive or general plan” of the District, including “a land-use plan” which designates land for use for “housing, business, industry, recreation, education, public buildings, public reservations, and other general categories of public and private uses of the land.” Section 6 (b) authorizes the Planning Commission to adopt redevelopment plans for specific project areas. These plans are subject to the approval of the District Commissioners after a public hearing; and they prescribe the various public and private land uses for the respective areas, the “standards of population density and building intensity,” and “the amount or character or class of any low-rent housing.” § 6 (b). Once the Planning Commission adopts a plan and that plan is approved by the Commissioners, the Planning Commission certifies it to the Agency. § 6 (d). At that point, the Agency is authorized to acquire and assemble the real property in the area. Id. After the real estate has been assembled, the Agency is authorized to transfer to public agencies the land to be devoted to such public purposes as streets, utilities, recreational facilities, and schools, § 7 (a), and to lease or sell the remainder as an entirety or in parts to a redevelopment company, individual, or partnership. § 7 (b), (f). The leases or sales must provide that the lessees or purchasers will carry out the redevelopment plan and that “no use shall be made of any land or real property included in the lease or sale nor any building or structure erected thereon” which does not conform to the plan, §§7 (d), 11. Preference is to be given to private enterprise over public agencies in executing the redevelopment plan. §7 (g). The first project undertaken under the Act relates to Project Area B in Southwest Washington, D. C. In 1950 the Planning Commission prepared and published a comprehensive plan for the District. Surveys revealed that in Area B, 64.3% of the dwellings were beyond repair, 18.4% needed major repairs, only 17.3% were satisfactory ; 57.8% of the dwellings had outside toilets, 60.3% had no baths, 29.3% lacked electricity, 82.2% had no wash basins or laundry tubs, 83.8% lacked central heating. In the judgment of the District’s Director of Health it was necessary to redevelop Area B in the interests of public health. The population of Area B amounted to 5,012 persons, of whom 97.5% were Negroes. The plan for Area B specifies the boundaries and allocates the use of the land for various purposes. It makes detailed provisions for types of dwelling units and provides that at least one-third of them are to be low-rent housing with a maximum rental of $17 per room per month. After a public hearing, the Commissioners approved the plan and the Planning Commission certified it to the Agency for execution. The Agency undertook the preliminary steps for redevelopment of the area when this suit was brought. Appellants own property in Area B at 712 Fourth Street, S. W. It is not used as a dwelling or place of habitation. A department store is located on it. Appellants object to the appropriation of this property for the purposes of the project. They claim that their property may not be taken constitutionally for this project. It is commercial, not residential property; it is not slum housing; it will be put into the project under the management of a private, not a public, agency and redeveloped for private, not public, use. That is the argument; and the contention is that appellants’ private property is being taken contrary to two mandates of the Fifth Amendment — (1) “No person shall ... be deprived of . . . property, without due process of law”; (2) “nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.” To take for the purpose of ridding the area of slums is one thing; it is quite another, the argument goes, to take a man’s property merely to develop a better balanced, more attractive community. The District Court, while agreeing in general with that argument, saved the Act by construing it to mean that the Agency could condemn property only for the reasonable necessities of slum clearance and prevention, its concept of “slum” being the existence of conditions “injurious to the public health, safety, morals and welfare.” 117 F. Supp. 705, 724-725. The power of Congress over the District of Columbia includes all the legislative powers which a state may exercise over its affairs. See District of Columbia v. Thomp son Co., 346 U. S. 100, 108. We deal, in other words, with what traditionally has been known as the police power. An attempt to define its reach or trace its outer limits is fruitless, for each case must turn on its own facts. The definition is essentially the product of legislative determinations addressed to the purposes of government, purposes neither abstractly nor historically capable of complete definition. Subject to specific constitutional limitations, when the legislature has spoken, the public interest has been declared in terms well-nigh conclusive. In such cases the legislature, not the judiciary, is the main guardian of the public needs to be served by social legislation, whether it be Congress legislating concerning the District of Columbia (see Block v. Hirsh, 256 U. S. 135) or the States legislating concerning local affairs. See Olsen v. Nebraska, 313 U. S. 236; Lincoln Union v. Northwestern Co., 335 U. S. 525; California State Association v. Maloney, 341 U. S. 105. This principle admits of no exception merely because the power of eminent domain is involved. The role of the judiciary in determining whether that power is being exercised for a public purpose is an extremely narrow one. See Old Dominion Co. v. United States, 269 U. S. 55, 66; United States ex rel. T. V. A. v. Welch, 327 U. S. 546, 552. Public safety, public health, morality, peace and quiet, law and order — these are some of the more conspicuous examples of the traditional application of the police power to municipal affairs. Yet they merely illustrate the scope of the power and do not delimit it. See Noble State Bank v. Haskell, 219 U. S. 104, 111. Misc.able and disreputable housing conditions may do more than spread disease and crime and immorality. They may also suffocate the spirit by reducing the people who live there to the status of cattle. They may indeed make living an almost insufferable burden. They may also be an ugly sore, a blight on the community which robs it of charm, which makes it a place from which men turn. The misery of housing may despoil a community as an open sewer may ruin a river. We do not sit to determine whether a particular housing project is or is not desirable. The concept of the public welfare is broad and inclusive. See Day-Brite Lighting, Inc. v. Missouri, 342 U. S. 421, 424. The values it represents are spiritual as well as physical, aesthetic as well as monetary. It is within the power of the legislature to determine that the community should be beautiful as well as healthy, spacious as well as clean, well-balanced as well as carefully patrolled. In the present case, the Congress and its authorized agencies have made determinations that take into account a wide variety of values. It is not for us to reappraise them. If those who govern the District of Columbia decide that the Nation’s Capital should be beautiful as well as sanitary, there is nothing in the Fifth Amendment that stands in the way. Once the object is within the authority of Congress, the right to realize it through the exercise of eminent domain is clear. For the power of eminent domain is merely the means to the end. See Luxton v. North River Bridge Co., 153 U. S. 525, 529-530; United States v. Gettysburg Electric R. Co., 160 U. S. 668, 679. Once the object is within the authority of Congress, the means by which it will be attained is also for Congress to determine, Here one of the means chosen is the use of private enterprise for redevelopment of the area. Appellants argue that this makes the project a taking from one businessman for the benefit of another businessman. But the means of executing the project are for Congress and Congress alone to determine, once the public purpose has been established. See Luxton v. North River Bridge Co., supra; cf. Highland v. Russell Car Co., 279 U. S. 253. The public end may be as well or better served through an agency of private enterprise than through a department of government — or so the Congress might conclude. We cannot say that public ownership is the sole method of promoting the public purposes of community redevelopment projects. What we have said also disposes of any contention concerning the fact that certain property owners in the area may be permitted to repurchase their properties for redevelopment in harmony with the over-all plan. That, too, is a legitimate means which Congress and its agencies may adopt, if they choose. In the present case, Congress and its authorized agencies attack the problem of the blighted parts of the community on an area rather than on a structure-by-structure basis. That, too, is opposed by appellants. They maintain that since their building does not imperil health or safety nor contribute to the making of a slum or a blighted area, it cannot be swept into a redevelopment plan by the mere dictum of the Planning Commission or the Commissioners. The particular uses to be made of the land in the project were determined with regard to the needs of the particular community. The experts concluded that if the community were to be healthy, if it were not to revert again to a blighted or slum area, as though possessed of a congenital disease, the area must be planned as a whole. It was not enough, they believed, to remove existing buildings that were insanitary or unsightly. It was important to redesign the whole area so as to eliminate the conditions that cause slums — the overcrowding of dwellings, the lack of parks, the lack of adequate streets and alleys, the absence of recreational areas, the lack of light and air, the presence of outmoded street patterns. It was believed that the piecemeal approach, the removal of individual structures that were offensive, would be only a palliative. The entire area needed redesigning so that a balanced, integrated plan could be developed for the region, including not only new homes but also schools, churches, parks, streets, and shopping centers. In this way it was hoped that the cycle of decay of the area could be controlled and the birth of future slums prevented. Cf. Gohld Realty Co. v. Hartford, 141 Conn. 135, 141-144, 104 A. 2d 365, 368-370; Hunter v. Redevelopment Authority, 195 Va. 326, 338-339, 78 S. E. 2d 893, 900-901. Such diversification in future use is plainly relevant to the maintenance of the desired housing standards and therefore within congressional power. The District Court below suggested that, if such a broad scope were intended for the statute, the standards contained in the Act would not be sufficiently definite to sustain the delegation of authority. 117 F. Supp. 705, 721. We do not agree. We think the standards prescribed were adequate for executing the plan to eliminate not only slums as narrowly defined by the District Court but also the blighted areas that tend to produce slums. Property may of course be taken for this redevelopment which, standing by itself, is innocuous and unoffending. But we have said enough to indicate that it is the need of the area as a whole which Congress and its agencies are evaluating. If owner after owner were permitted to resist these redevelopment programs on the ground that his particular property was not being used against the public interest, integrated plans for redevelopment would suffer greatly. The argument pressed on us is, indeed, a plea to substitute the landowner’s standard of the public need for the standard prescribed by Congress. But as we have already stated, community redevelopment programs need not, by force of the Constitution, be on a piecemeal basis — lot by lot, building by building. It is not for the courts to oversee the choice of the boundary line nor to sit in review on the size of a particular project area. Once the question of the public purpose has been decided, the amount and character of land to be taken for the project and the need for a particular tract to complete the integrated plan rests in the discretion of the legislative branch. See Shoemaker v. United States, 147 U. S. 282, 298; United States ex rel. T. V. A. v. Welch, supra, 554; United States v. Carmack, 329 U. S. 230, 247. The District Court indicated grave doubts concerning the Agency’s right to take full title to the land as distinguished from the objectionable buildings located on it. 117 F. Supp. 705, 715-719. We do not share those doubts. If the Agency considers it necessary in carrying out the redevelopment project to take full title to the real property involved, it may do so. It is not for the courts to determine whether it is necessary for successful consummation of the project that unsafe, unsightly, or insanitary buildings alone be taken or whether title to the land be included, any more than it is the function of the courts to sort and choose among the various parcels selected for condemnation. The rights of these property owners are satisfied when they receive that just compensation which the Fifth Amendment exacts as the price of the taking. The judgment of the District Court, as modified by this opinion, is Affirmed. The Act does not define either “slums” or “blighted areas.” Section 3 (r), however, states: “ ‘Substandard housing conditions’ means the conditions obtaining in connection with the existence of any dwelling, or dwellings, or housing accommodations for human beings, which because of lack of sanitary facilities, ventilation, or light, or because of dilapidation, overcrowding, faulty interior arrangement, or any combination of these factors, is in the opinion of the Commissioners detrimental to the safety, health, morals, or welfare of the inhabitants of the District of Columbia.” Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

D

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. The motion of Legal Defense Fund for Unborn Children for leave to file a brief, as amicus curiae, is denied. The motion of David Gaetano for leave to file a brief, as amicus curiae, is granted. Appellee was indicted by a grand jury of Richland County, S. C., for criminal abortion and murder in connection with the abortion of a 25-week-old fetus. The District Court enjoined the prosecution, concluding that under Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113 (1973), there was no possibility of obtaining a constitutionally binding conviction of appellee. 440 F. Supp. 535 (1977). Because the District Court may have reached this conclusion on the basis of an erroneous concept of “viability,” which refers to potential, rather than actual, survival of the fetus outside the womb, Colautti v. Franklin, 439 U. S. 379, 388-389 (1979), the judgment is vacated and the case is remanded to the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina for further consideration in light of Colautti. In addition, it is suggested, in view of the alternative constructions of the South Carolina criminal statutes that are available, that the District Court give further consideration to the possibility of abstention, at least in part, in deference to the pendency of the state-court proceeding. Vacated and remanded. Mr. Justice Stewart dissents. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

E

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from the judgment of a three-judge District Court, convened under 28 U. S. C. §§ 2281, 2284, declaring certain fishing laws of Alaska and regulations under them unconstitutional and enjoining their enforcement. 297 F. Supp. 300. We noted probable jurisdiction. 396 U. S. 811. The laws in question, passed in 1968, concern salmon net gear licenses for commercial fishing, not licenses for other types of salmon fishing. They are challenged because they limit licensees to a defined group of persons. The Act in material part provides: “Persons eligible for gear licenses, (a) Except in cases of extreme hardship as defined by the Board of Fish and Game, a salmon net gear license for a specific salmon registration area may be issued only to a person who “(1) has previously held a salmon net gear license for that specific salmon registration area; or “(2) has, for any three years, held a commercial fishing license and while so licensed actively engaged in commercial fishing in that specific area.” The regulations provide that except in cases of “extreme hardship ... a salmon net gear license for a specific salmon registration area may be issued only to a person who: “(A) has held in 1965 or subsequent years a salmon net gear license for that specific salmon registration area; or “(B) has, for any three years -since January 1, 1960, held a commercial fishing license and while so licensed actively engaged in commercial fishing in that specific aireaN Appellees are nonresidents who applied for commercial salmon net gear licenses. They apparently are experienced net gear salmon fishermen but they cannot qualify for a salmon net gear license to fish in any of the 12 regions or areas described in the Act and the regulations. Appellees filed a motion for summary judgment on the grounds that the Act and regulations deprived them of their rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and also their rights under the Alaska Constitution. That constitution provides in Art. VIII, § 3: “Wherever, occurring in their natural state, fish, wildlife, and 'waters are reserved to the -people- for common use.” And it provides in Art. VIII, § 15: “No exclusive right or special privilege of fishery shall be created or authorized in the natural waters of the State.” Appellants filed a motion to dismiss or alternatively to stay the proceedings in the District Court pending the determination of the Alaska constitutional question by an Alaska court. Appellants’ motion to dismiss or to stay was denied. Appellees’ motion for summary judgment was granted, the three-judge District Court holding that the Act and regulations in question were unconstitutional both under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and under the Constitution of Alaska. 297 F. Supp., at 304-307. This case is virtually on all fours with City of Meridian v. Southern Bell Tel. & Tel. Co., 358 U. S. 639, where a single district judge in construing a Mississippi statute held that it violated both the Federal and the State Constitutions. The Court of Appeals affirmed and we vacated its judgment and remanded to the District Court with directions to hold the case while the parties repaired to a state tribunal “for an authoritative declaration of applicable state law.” Id., at 640. We said: “Proper exercise of federal jurisdiction requires that controversies involving unsettled questions of state law be decided in the state tribunals preliminary to a federal court’s consideration of the underlying federal constitutional questions. . . . That is especially desirable where the questions of state law are enmeshed with federal questions. . . . Here, the state law problems are delicate ones, the resolution of which is not without substantial difficulty — certainly for a federal court. ... In such a case, when the state court’s interpretation of the statute or evaluation of its validity under the state constitution may obviate any need to consider its validity under the Federal Constitution, the federal court should hold its hand, lest it render a constitutional decision unnecessarily.” Id., at 640-641. We are advised that the provisions of the Alaska Constitution at issue have never been interpreted by an Alaska court. The District Court, feeling sure of its grounds on the merits, held, however, that this was not a proper case for abstention, saying that “if the question had been presented to an Alaska court, it would have shared our conviction that the challenged gear licensing scheme is not supportable.” 297 F. Supp., at 304. The three-judge panel was a distinguished one, two being former Alaska lawyers. And they felt that prompt decision was necessary to avoid the “grave and irreparable” injury to the “economic livelihood” of the appellees which would result, if they could not engage in their occupation “during this year’s forthcoming fishing season.” Ibid. It is, of course, true that abstention is not necessary whenever a federal court is faced with a question of local law, the classic case being Meredith v. Winter Haven, 320 U. S. 228, where federal jurisdiction was based on diversity only. Abstention certainly involves duplication of effort and expense and an attendant delay. See England v. Louisiana State Board, 375 U. S. 411. That is why we have said that this judicially created rule which stems from Railroad Comm’n v. Pullman Co., 312 U. S. 496, should be applied only where “the issue of state law is uncertain.” Harman v. Forssenius, 380 U. S. 528, 534. Moreover, we said in Zwickler v. Koota, 389 U. S. 241, 248, that abstention was applicable “only in narrowly limited 'special circumstances,’ ” citing Prosper v. Clark, 337 U. S. 472, 492. In Zwickler, a state statute was attacked on the ground that on its face it was repugnant to the First Amendment; and it was conceded that state court construction could not render unnecessary a decision of the First Amendment question. 389 U. S., at 250. A state court decision here, however, could conceivably avoid any decision under the Fourteenth Amendment and would avoid any possible irritant in the federal-state relationship. The Pullman doctrine was based on “the avoidance of needless friction” between federal pronouncements and state policies. 312 U. S., at 500. The instant case is the classic case in that tradition, for here the nub of the whole controversy may be the state constitution. The constitutional provisions relate to fish resources, an asset unique in its abundance in Alaska. The statute and regulations relate to that same unique resource, the management of which is a matter of great state concern. We appreciate why the District Court felt concern over the effect of further delay on these plaintiffs, the appellees here; but we have concluded that the first judicial application of these constitutional provisions should properly be by an Alaska court. We think the federal court should have stayed its hand while the parties repaired to the state courts for a resolution of their state constitutional questions. We accordingly vacate the judgment of the District Court and remand the case for proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Alaska Stat. § 16.05.536 (1968). Subd. (b) of that section specifies the data to be supplied in applications for a gear license. Section 16.05.540 provides that the licensee shall “personally operate or assist in the operation of the licensed fishing gear”; that he shall “personally own or lease the licensed fishing gear”; and that the license is “transferable.” Alaska Commercial Fishing Regulations § 102.09 (a) (1969). As defined in the regulations, id., § 102.09 (a) (2). While the original complaint challenged the 1968 regulations, it was amended to challenge the 1968 Act and the 1969 regulations under it, which regulated the 1969 fishing season. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. In this case we decide whether our decision in Caldwell v. Mississippi, 472 U. S. 320 (1985), provided cause for respondent’s failure to challenge the trial court’s instructions in accordance with state procedures. Respondent Aubrey Dennis Adams, Jr., was charged with the first-degree murder of 8-year-old Trisa Gail Thornley, and the State sought to impose the death penalty. At the start of jury selection for respondent’s trial, the trial judge undertook to instruct the prospective jurors on their “advisory” role under Florida law. The judge informed the initial panel of prospective jurors: “The Court is not bound by your recommendation. The ultimate responsibility for what this man gets is not on your shoulders. It’s on my shoulders. You are merely an advisory group to me in Phase Two. You can come back and say, Judge, we think you ought to give the man life. I can say, I disregard the recommendation of the Jury and I give him death. You can come back and say, Judge, we think he ought to be put to death. I can say, I disregard your recommendation and give him life. So that this conscience part of it as to whether or not you’re going to put the man to death or not, that is not your decision to make. That’s only my decision to make and it has to be on my conscience. It cannot be on yours.” App. 19-20. The judge had intended to give this explanation to the entire venire before beginning the selection process but forgot to do so, and so he gave a similar explanation each time new prospective jurors were seated. As a result, each of the jurors ultimately selected heard the explanation at least once, and several heard it a number of times. In addition, the judge interrupted counsel’s voir dire on two occasions to repeat that the court, not the jury, was responsible for sentencing, and again instructed the jury to that effect before it began its deliberations. Defense counsel did not object at any point to these instructions. On October 20, 1978, the jury found respondent guilty of first-degree murder. After a separate sentencing hearing, the jury recommended that he be sentenced to death, and the trial judge imposed a death sentence. The Florida Supreme Court affirmed respondent’s conviction and sentence on direct appeal, Adams v. State, 412 So. 2d 850 (1982), and this Court denied certiorari, 459 U. S. 882 (1982). Respondent did not allege as error, on either state or federal grounds, the trial judge’s instructions to the jurors on their responsibility for the sentence they would recommend. In September 1984, the Florida Supreme Court affirmed the denial of respondent’s first motion for postconviction relief under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850. Adams v. State, 456 So. 2d 888. Again, respondent did not challenge the trial judge’s statements to the jurors on their responsibility for the death sentence. Respondent next filed his first federal habeas petition in District Court; once again he did not challenge the trial judge’s instructions. The District Court denied his habeas petition on September 18, 1984, Adams v. Wainwright, No. 84-170—Civ-Oc-16 (MD Fla.), the Eleventh Circuit affirmed, 764 F. 2d 1356 (1985), and this Court denied certiorari, 474 U. S. 1073 (1986). On June 11, 1985, Caldwell v. Mississippi, 472 U. S. 320, was decided. The Court there held that remarks by the prosecutor in a capital case that misinformed the jury as to the role of appellate review violated the Eighth Amendment. Id., at 336 (plurality opinion); id., at 341-342 (O’Connor, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment). Based on Caldwell, respondent filed a second motion for postconviction relief under Florida Rule 3.850, challenging for the first time the trial judge’s statements to the jurors that they were not responsible for the sentence they recommended and arguing that the judge’s instructions violated the Eighth Amendment by misinforming the jury of its role under Florida law. According to respondent, although the Florida death penalty statute provided that the jury’s recommendation was only advisory, the Florida Supreme Court had held that a trial judge could only override the jury’s verdict if the facts were “so clear and convincing that virtually no reasonable person could differ.” Tedder v. State, 322 So. 2d 908, 910 (1975) (per curiam). Since the trial judge in this case told the jurors that the sentencing responsibility was solely his and failed to tell them that he could override their verdict only under limited circumstances, respondent argued, the judge misled the jury in violation of Caldwell. The Florida Supreme Court refused to address respondent’s argument on the merits, however, because respondent had failed to raise the argument on direct appeal. Adams v. State, 484 So. 2d 1216, 1217, cert. denied, 475 U. S. 1103 (1986). The Caldwell claim was then raised in respondent’s second federal habeas petition. The District Court held that the claim was procedurally barred, and that, alternatively, respondent’s Caldwell claim was meritless. Adams v. Wainwright, No. 86-64—Civ-Oc-16 (MD Fla., Mar. 7, 1986), p. 9, App. to Pet. for Cert. A-43, A-56 — A-60. The Eleventh Circuit reversed. Adams v. Wainwright, 804 F. 2d 1526 (1986), modified on denial of rehearing, 816 F. 2d 1493 (1987). The Court of Appeals held that respondent’s Caldwell claim “was so novel at the time of [his] trial in October 1978 and his sentencing and appeal in early 1979 that its legal basis was not reasonably available at that time”; therefore, he had established cause for his procedural default. 816 F. 2d, at 1498. The court proceeded to address the merits of respondent’s Caldwell claim, concluding that the trial judge’s instructions violated the Eighth Amendment. 804 F. 2d, at 1532-1533. We granted certiorari to review the Eleventh Circuit’s holding that Caldwell provides cause for respondent’s procedural default, 485 U. S. 933 (1988), and we now reverse. In Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S. 72, 87 (1977), this Court required that habeas petitioners show “cause” and “prejudice” before federal courts will review claims that the state courts have found procedurally defaulted. We have reaffirmed this requirement on several occasions. See Murray v. Carrier, 477 U. S. 478, 494-495 (1986); Engle v. Isaac, 456 U. S. 107, 129 (1982). We have, however, “left open ‘for resolution in future decisions the precise definition’ ” of cause .and prejudice. Amadeo v. Zant, 486 U. S. 214, 221 (1988) '(quoting Sykes, supra, at 87). See also Reed v. Ross, 468 U. S. 1, 13 (1984). Reed v. Ross held that one way a petitioner can establish cause is by showing that “a constitutional claim is so novel that its legal basis is not reasonably available to counsel.” Id., at 16. The Eleventh Circuit, relying on Reed, held in this case that “Eighth Amendment jurisprudence at the time of [respondent’s] procedural default did not provide a reasonable basis” on which to raise a Caldwell claim. 816 F. 2d, at 1499. The Court of Appeals reviewed our prior cases and concluded that none of them indicated that statements such as the ones made by the trial judge here “implicated the Eighth Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.” Ibid. The Court also noted that it could find no decisions by other courts suggesting that “this type of Eighth Amendment claim was being raised at that time.” Ibid. We believe that the Eleventh Circuit failed to give sufficient weight to a critical fact that leads us to conclude, without passing on the Court of Appeals’ historical analysis, that Caldwell does not provide cause for respondent’s procedural default. As we have noted, the decision in “Caldwell is relevant only to certain types of comment — those that mislead the jury as to its role in the sentencing process in a way that allows the jury to feel less responsible than it should for the sentencing decision.” Darden v. Wainwright, 477 U. S. 168, 184, n. 15 (1986). As respondent conceded at oral argument, if the challenged instructions accurately described the role of the jury under state law, there is no basis for a Caldwell claim. To establish a Caldwell violation, a defendant necessarily must show that the remarks to the jury improperly described the role assigned to the jury by local law. See, e. g., Tr. of Oral Arg. 29, 32, 33, and 36-37. Respondent therefore must be asserting in this case that the trial court’s remarks violated state law, and in finding a Caldwell violation in this case, the Court of Appeals must have concluded that the remarks in question were error under Florida law. If respondent and the Court of Appeals are correct in this regard, respondent plainly had the basis for an objection and an argument on appeal that the instructions violated state law. See Pait v. State, 112 So. 2d 380, 383-384 (Fla. 1959) (holding that misinforming the jury of its role constitutes reversible error); Blackwell v. State, 79 So. 731, 735-736 (Fla. 1918) (same). Yet, despite the availability of this claim under state law, respondent did not object to the remarks at trial or challenge them on appeal. As a result, Florida law bars respondent from raising the issue in later state proceedings. See, e. g., Adams, 484 So. 2d, at 1217. Respondent offers no excuse for his failure to challenge the remarks on state-law grounds, and we discern none that would amount to good cause in a federal habeas corpus proceeding. Had respondent objected at the time and asserted error under state law, and had the trial or appellate court sustained his objection, the error would have been corrected in the state system. Had his objection been overruled and that ruling sustained on appeal, we would very likely know that the instruction was an accurate reflection of state law. In either event, it is doubtful that the later decision in Caldwell would have provoked the filing of a second habeas corpus petition. In these circumstances, the fact that it turns out that the trial court’s remarks were objectionable on federal as well as state grounds is not good cause for his failure to follow Florida procedural rules. Reed v. Ross is of no help to respondent. In that case, the -defendant failed to challenge on appeal an instruction that was plainly valid under the settled law of the State. Six years later, it was held in Mullaney v. Wilbur, 421 U. S. 684 (1975), that such an instruction violated the Due Process Clause of the Federal Constitution. We held that there was a good cause for the procedural default because a challenge to the instruction was “so novel that its legal basis [was] not reasonably available to counsel.” 468 U. S., at 16. Hence, there was no reason for suspecting that defense counsel was flouting state procedures for tactical or other reasons. But here respondent claims that the court’s remarks were invalid under state law at the time; yet those remarks were not objected to nor were they challenged on appeal. Unlike Reed, the legal basis for a challenge was plainly available, and it would not be safe to assume that the failure to object was not for tactical or other reasons that will not excuse the default in a habeas corpus proceeding. Indeed, at the time of respondent’s trial there was some suggestion that comments such as those by the trial judge would incline the jury toward leniency rather than toward recommending a death sentence. See Dobbert v. Florida, 432 U. S. 282, 294, and n. 7 (1977). Furthermore, because in Reed the legal basis for the claim at issue was so lacking, it could not be said that adjudicating the claim in federal court would infringe on the interest of the state courts in enforcing their procedural rules. But here, as we have said, the State has every interest in having the defendant challenge a faulty instruction in a timely manner so that it can correct the misstatement, and that interest does not disappear when it is later held that the instruction violates the Federal Constitution if it erroneously describes the role of the jury under state law. We agree with respondent and the Court of Appeals that the availability of a claim under state law does not of itself establish that a claim was available under the United States Constitution. See 816 F. 2d, at 1499, n. 6. It is clear that “mere errors of state law are not the concern of this Court unless they rise for some other reason to the level of a denial of rights protected by the United States Constitution.” Barclay v. Florida, 463 U. S. 939, 957-958 (1983) (plurality opinion) (citation omitted). But the issue in this case is not whether respondent could have obtained federal habeas relief at the time of his trial for the trial judge’s instructions. Rather, the issue is whether we should exercise our equitable power to overlook respondent’s state procedural default. Reed, 468 U. S., at 9. Neither do we hold that whenever a defendant has any basis for challenging particular conduct as improper, a failure to preserve that claim under state procedural law bars any subsequently available claim arising out of the same conduct. Indeed, respondent here could have challenged the improper remarks by the trial judge at the time of his trial as a violation of due process. See Donnelly v. DeChristoforo, 416 U. S. 637 (1974). Rather, what is determinative in this case is that the ground for challenging the trial judge’s instructions — that they were objectionable under state law — was a necessary element of the subsequently available Caldwell claim. In such a case, the subsequently available federal claim does not excuse the procedural default. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore reversed. It is so ordered. Florida Stat. §921.141 (1985) provides in relevant part as follows: “(2) ADVISORY SENTENCE BY THE JURY.-After hearing all the evidence, the jury shall deliberate and render an advisory sentence to the court, based upon the following matters: “(a) Whether sufficient aggravating circumstances exist as enumerated in subsection (5); “(b) Whether sufficient mitigating circumstances exist which outweigh the aggravating circumstances found to exist; and “(c) Based on these considerations, whether the defendant should be sentenced to life imprisonment or death. “(3) FINDINGS IN SUPPORT OF SENTENCE OF DEATH.-Notwithstanding the recommendation of a majority of the jury, the court, after weighing the aggravating and mitigating circumstances, shall enter a sentence of life imprisonment or death, but if the court imposes a sentence of death, it shall set forth in writing its findings upon which the sentence of death is based as to the facts: “(a) That sufficient aggravating circumstances exist as enumerated in subsection (5), and “(b) That there are insufficient mitigating circumstances to outweigh the aggravating circumstances.” As aggravating circumstances, the trial judge found that the murder was committed while respondent was engaged in or attempting kidnaping and rape, was committed to avoid arrest, and was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel. As mitigating circumstances, the trial judge found that respondent had no significant history of prior criminal activity, was under the influence of extreme emotional or mental disturbance at the time of the murder because he and his wife were getting a divorce, and was only 20 years of age. Shortly after the Eleventh Circuit’s decision in this case, the Tenth Circuit also held that Caldivell was sufficiently novel to provide cause for a procedural default. Dutton v. Brown, 812 F. 2d 593, 596 (en banc) (finding cause for procedural default because “[t]he law petitioner relies on did not become established until the Caldwell decision in 1985”), cert. denied, 484 U. S. 836 (1987). Previously, however, the Fifth Circuit had held in Moore v. Blackburn, 774 F. 2d 97 (1985) (alternative holding), cert. denied, 476 U. S. 1176 (1986), that the failure to raise a Caldwell claim in a prior habeas petition was an abuse of the writ, see 28 U. S. C. § 2254 Rule 9(b). According to the Court of Appeals, “[t]hat a competent attorney should have been aware of this claim is apparent from the Supreme Court’s Caldwell opinion.” 774 F. 2d, at 98. Although petitioners allege in their brief that respondent’s failure to raise a Caldwell claim in his first federal habeas petition constitutes an abuse of the writ, we need not address this contention given our resolution of the ease on procedural bar grounds. We do not decide whether in fact the jury as instructed in this case was misinformed of its role under Florida law. The petition for certiorari did not raise this issue, and the merit of respondent’s Caldwell claim is irrelevant to our disposition of the case. Both of these cases were cited in Caldwell v. Mississippi, 472 U. S. 320, 334, n. 5 (1985), as support for the decision in that case. Respondent asserts, as an alternative basis for upholding the judgment of the Court of Appeals, that the procedural bar on which the Florida Supreme Court relied is not “adequate” — that is, it has not been “consistently or regularly applied." Johnson v. Mississippi, 486 U. S. 578, 589 (1988). The Eleventh Circuit stated that “[i]t is doubtful. . . that an adequate and independent state-law ground is present in this case,” 816 F. 2d 1493, 1497 (1987), but went on to find that respondent had established cause and prejudice for his default. First, respondent argues that under Florida law, claims based on major changes in constitutional law that occur after a defendant’s direct appeal are cognizable in a Rule 3.850 proceeding. Respondent contends that, in the words of the Eleventh Circuit, his “Caldwell claim is the very type of claim for which Florida created the Rule 3.850 procedure.” Ibid. But, given our conclusion that Caldwell does not excuse respondent’s procedural default, we can hardly fault the Florida Supreme Court for reaching a similar conclusion under its own procedural rules. Second, respondent asserts, and the dissent agrees, that the Florida Supreme Court has failed to apply its procedural rule consistently and regularly because it has addressed the merits in several cases raising Caldwell claims on postconviction review. In the vast majority of cases, however, the Florida Supreme Court has faithfully applied its rule that claims not raised on direct appeal cannot be raised on postconviction review. See Bertolotti v. State, 534 So. 2d 386, 387, n. 2 (1988); Clark v. State, 533 So. 2d 1144, 1145 (1988); Jones v. Dagger, 533 So. 2d 290, 292 (1988); Woods v. State, 531 So. 2d 79, 83 (1988); Cave v. State, 529 So. 2d 293, 296 (1988); Preston v. State, 528 So. 2d 896, 899 (1988); Doyle v. State, 526 So. 2d 909, 911 (1988); Ford v. State, 522 So. 2d 345, 346 (1988), cert. pending No. 88-5582; Henderson v. Dugger, 522 So. 2d 835, 836, n. (1988); Tafero v. Dugger, 520 So. 2d 287, 289 (1988); Foster v. State, 518 So. 2d 901, 901-902 (1987), cert. denied, 487 U. S. 1240 (1988); Phillips v. Dugger, 515 So. 2d 227, 227-228 (1987); Copeland v. Wainwright, 505 So. 2d 425, 427-428, vacated on other grounds, 484 U. S. 807 (1987); Aldridge v. State, 503 So. 2d 1257, 1259 (1987); State v. Sireci, 502 So. 2d 1221, 1223-1224 (1987); Adams v. State, 484 So. 2d 1216, 1217, cert. denied, 475 U. S. 1103 (1986); Middleton v. State, 465 So. 2d 1218, 1226 (1985). Moreover, the few cases that respondent and the dissent cite as ignoring procedural defaults do not convince us that the Florida Supreme Court fails to apply its procedural rule regularly and consistently. In Darden v. State, 475 So. 2d 217, 218 (1985), the only alleged default discussed by the court involved the failure to raise the Caldwell claim in a prior Rule 3.850 proceeding. In Mann v. State, 482 So. 2d 1360, 1362 (1986) (as construed in Mann v. Dugger, 844 F. 2d 1446, 1448, n. 4 (CA11 1988), cert. pending, No. 87-2073), the court did not even expressly mention the defendant’s Caldwell claim. In Combs v. State, 525 So. 2d 853, 856 (1988), the Florida court noted that “[i]n Caldwell, unlike the instant case, the defendant had objected to the Mississippi prosecutor’s comment,” while in Daugherty v. State, 533 So. 2d 287, 288, cert. denied, 488 U. S. 959 (1988), the court merely relied on Combs. Finally, in Glock v. Dugger, 537 So. 2d 99, 102 (1989), the court merely stated that “the trial court was justified in summarily denying relief” on the petitioner’s 16 claims; it is not clear from the opinion whether the trial court held that the Caldivell claim was or was not procedurally barred. Regardless of whether any of these cases might be subject to federal habeas review because of the lack of a plain statement that the decision was based on state-law grounds, an issue we considered in Harris v. Reed, ante, p. 255, we do not believe that they are sufficient to undercut the adequacy of the Florida procedural rule. Respondent also argues that we should overlook his procedural default because failing to do so would result in a “fundamental miscarriage of justice.” We disagree. In Murray v. Carrier, 477 U. S. 478, 496 (1986), this Court stated that “where a constitutional violation has probably resulted in the conviction of one who is actually innocent, a federal habeas court may grant the writ even in the absence of a showing of cause for the procedural default.” We made clear, however, that such a ease would be an “extraordinary" one, idl'd., and have since recognized the difficulty of translating the concept of “actual” innocence from the guilt phase to the sentencing phase of a capital trial, Smith v. Murray, 477 U. S. 527, 537 (1986). We do not undertake here to define what it means to be “actually innocent” of a death sentence. But it is clear to us that the fact that the trial judge in this case found an equal number of aggravating and mitigating circumstances is not sufficient to show that an alleged error in instructing the jury on sentencing resulted in a fundamental miscarriage of justice. The dissent “assume[s], arguendo," that a fundamental miscarriage of justice results whenever “there is a substantial claim that the constitutional violation undermined the accuracy of the sentencing decision.” Post, at 415, n. 4. According to the dissent, since “the very essence of a Caldwell claim is that the accuracy of the sentencing determination has been unconstitutionally undermined," post, at 423, the standard for showing a fundamental miscarriage of justice necessarily is satisfied. We reject this overbroad view. Demonstrating that an error is by its nature the kind of error that might have affected the accuracy of a death sentence is far from demonstrating that an individual defendant probably is “actually innocent” of the sentence he or she received. The approach taken by the dissent would turn the case in which an error results in a fundamental miscarriage of justice, the “extraordinary case,” Carrier, supra, at 496, into an all too ordinary one. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA or Act), 84 Stat. 175, as amended, 20 U. S. C. § 1400 et seq., requires States receiving federal funding to make a “free appropriate public education” (EAPE) available to all children with disabilities residing in the State, § 1412(a)(1)(A). We have previously held that when a public school fails to provide a FAPE and a child’s parents place the child in an appropriate private school without the school district’s consent, a court may require the district to reimburse the parents for the cost of the private education. See School Comm, of Burlington v. Department of Ed. of Mass., 471 U. S. 359, 370 (1985). The question presented in this ease is whether the IDEA Amendments of 1997 (Amendments), 111 Stat. 37, categorically prohibit reimbursement for private-education costs if a child has not “previously received special education and related services under the authority of a public agency.” § 1412(a)(10)(C)(ii). We hold that the Amendments impose no such categorical bar. I Respondent T. A. attended public schools in the Forest Grove School District (School District or District) from the time he was in kindergarten through the winter of his junior year of high school. From kindergarten through eighth grade, respondent’s teachers observed that he had trouble paying attention in class and completing his assignments. When respondent entered high school, his difficulties increased. In December 2000, during respondent’s freshman year, his mother contacted the school counselor to discuss respondent’s problems with his schoolwork. At the end of the school year, respondent was evaluated by a school psychologist. After interviewing him, examining his school records, and administering cognitive ability tests, the psychologist concluded that respondent did not need further testing for any learning disabilities or other health impairments, including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The psychologist and two other school officials discussed the evaluation results with respondent’s mother in June 2001, and all agreed that respondent did not qualify for special-education services. Respondent’s parents did not seek review of that decision, although the hearing examiner later found that the School District’s evaluation was legally inadequate because it failed to address all areas of suspected disability, including ADHD. With extensive help from his family, respondent completed his sophomore year at Forest Grove High School, but his problems worsened during his junior year. In February 2003, respondent’s parents discussed with the School District the possibility of respondent completing high school through a partnership program with the local community college. They also sought private professional advice, and in March 2003 respondent was diagnosed with ADHD and a number of disabilities related to learning and memory. Advised by the private specialist that respondent would do best in a structured, residential learning environment, respondent’s parents enrolled him at a private academy that focuses on educating children with special needs. Four days after enrolling him in private school, respondent’s parents hired a lawyer to ascertain their rights and to give the School District written notice of respondent’s private placement. A few weeks later, in April 2003, respondent’s parents requested an administrative due process hearing regarding respondent’s eligibility for special-education services. In June 2003, the District engaged a school psychologist to assist in determining whether respondent had a disability that significantly interfered with his educational performance. Respondent’s parents cooperated with the District during the evaluation process. In July 2003, a multidisciplinary team met to discuss whether respondent satisfied IDEA’S disability criteria and concluded that he did not because his ADHD did not have a sufficiently significant adverse impact on his educational performance. Because the School District maintained that respondent was not eligible for special-education services and therefore declined to provide an individualized education program (IEP), respondent’s parents left him enrolled at the private academy for his senior year. The administrative review process resumed in September 2003. After considering the parties’ evidence, including the testimony of numerous experts, the hearing officer issued a decision in January 2004 finding that respondent’s ADHD adversely affected his educational performance and that the School District failed to meet its obligations under IDEA in not identifying respondent as a student eligible for special-education services. Because the District did not offer respondent a FAPE and his private-school placement was appropriate under IDEA, the hearing officer ordered the District to reimburse respondent’s parents for the cost of the private-school tuition. The School District sought judicial review pursuant to § 1415(i)(2), arguing that the hearing officer erred in granting reimbursement. The District Court accepted the hearing officer’s findings of fact but set aside the reimbursement award after finding that the 1997 Amendments categorically bar reimbursement of private-school tuition for students who have not “previously received special education and related services under the authority of a public agency.” §612(a)(10)(C)(ii), 111 Stat. 63, 20 U. S. C. § 1412(a)(10)(C)(ii). The District Court further held that, “[e]ven assuming that tuition reimbursement may be ordered in an extreme case for a student not receiving special education services, under general principles of equity where the need for special education was obvious to school authorities,” the facts of this case do not support equitable relief. App. to Pet. for Cert. 53a. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed and remanded for further proceedings. The court first noted that, prior to the 1997 Amendments, “IDEA was silent on the subject of private school reimbursement, but courts had granted such reimbursement as ‘appropriate’ relief under principles of equity pursuant to 20 U. S. C. § 1415(i)(2)(C).” 523 F. 3d 1078, 1085 (2008) (citing Burlington, 471 U. S., at 370). It then held that the Amendments do not impose a categorical bar to reimbursement when a parent unilaterally places in private school a child who has not previously received special-education services through the public school. Rather, such students “are eligible for reimbursement, to the same extent as before the 1997 amendments, as ‘appropriate’ relief pursuant to § 1415(i)(2)(C).” 523 F. 3d, at 1087-1088. The Court of Appeals also rejected the District Court’s analysis of the equities as resting on two legal errors. First, because it found that § 1412(a)(10)(C)(ii) generally bars relief in these circumstances, the District Court wrongly stated that relief was appropriate only if the equities were sufficient to “ ‘override’ ” that statutory limitation. The District Court also erred in asserting that reimbursement is limited to “ ‘extreme’ ” cases. Id., at 1088 (emphasis deleted). The Court of Appeals therefore remanded with instructions to reexamine the equities, including the failure of respondent’s parents to notify the School District before removing respondent from public school. In dissent, Judge Rymer stated her view that reimbursement is not available as an equitable remedy in this case because respondent’s parents did not request an IEP before removing him from public school, and respondent’s right to a FAPE was therefore not at issue. Because the Courts of Appeals that have considered this question have reached inconsistent results, we granted certiorari to determine whether § 1412(a)(10)(C) establishes a categorical bar to tuition reimbursement for students who have not previously received special-education services under the authority of a public education agency. 555 U. S. 1130 (2009). II Justice Rehnquist’s opinion for a unanimous Court in Burlington provides the pertinent background for our analysis of the question presented. In that case, respondent challenged the appropriateness of the IEP developed for his child by public-school officials. The child had previously received special-education services through the public school. While administrative review was pending, private specialists advised respondent that the child would do best in a specialized private educational setting, and respondent enrolled the child in private school without the school district’s consent. The hearing officer concluded that the IEP was not adequate to meet the child’s educational needs and that the school district therefore failed to provide the child a FAPE. Finding also that the private-school placement was appropriate under IDEA, the hearing officer ordered the school district to reimburse respondent for the cost of the private-school tuition. We granted certiorari in Burlington to determine whether IDEA authorizes reimbursement for the cost of private education when a parent or guardian unilaterally enrolls a child in private school because the public school has proposed an inadequate IEP and thus failed to provide a FAPE. The Act at that time made no express reference to the possibility of reimbursement, but it authorized a court to “grant such relief as the court determines is appropriate.” § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii). In determining the scope of the relief authorized, we noted that “the ordinary meaning of these words confers broad discretion on the court” and that, absent any indication to the contrary, what relief is “appropriate” must be determined in light of the Act’s broad purpose of providing children with disabilities a FAPE, including through publicly funded private-school placements when necessary. 471 U. S., at 369. Accordingly, we held that the provision’s grant of authority includes “the power to order school authorities to reimburse parents for their expenditures on private special education for a child if the court ultimately determines that such placement, rather than a proposed IEP, is proper under the Act.” Ibid. Our decision rested in part on the fact that administrative and judicial review of a parent’s complaint often takes years. We concluded that, having mandated that participating States provide a FAPE for every student, Congress could not have intended to require parents to either accept an inadequate public-school education pending adjudication of their claim or bear the cost of a private education if the court ultimately determined that the private placement was proper under the Act. Id., at 370. Eight years later, we unanimously reaffirmed the availability of reimbursement in Florence County School Dish Four v. Carter, 510 U. S. 7 (1993) (holding that reimbursement may be appropriate even when a child is placed in a private school that has not been approved by the State). The dispute giving rise to the present litigation differs from those in Burlington and Carter in that it concerns not the adequacy of a proposed IEP but the School District’s failure to provide an IEP at all. And, unlike respondent, the children in those cases had previously received public special-education services. These differences are insignificant, however, because our analysis in the earlier cases depended on the language and purpose of the Act and not the particular facts involved. Moreover, when a child requires special-education services, a school district’s failure to propose an IEP of any kind is at least as serious a violation of its responsibilities under IDEA as a failure to provide an adequate IEP. It is thus clear that the reasoning of Burlington and Carter applies equally to this case. The only question is whether the 1997 Amendments require a different result. Ill Congress enacted IDEA in 1970 to ensure that all children with disabilities are provided “ ‘a free appropriate public education which emphasizes special education and related services designed to meet their unique needs [and] to assure that the rights of [such] children and their parents or guardians are protected.’” Burlington, 471 U. S., at 367 (quoting 20 U. S. C. § 1400(c) (1982 ed.), now codified as amended at §§ 1400(d)(1)(A), (B)). After examining the States’ progress under IDEA, Congress found in 1997 that substantial gains had been made in the area of special education but that more needed to be done to guarantee children with disabilities adequate access to appropriate services. See S. Rep. No. 105-17, p. 5 (1997). The 1997 Amendments were intended “to place greater emphasis on improving student performance and ensuring that children with disabilities receive a quality public education.” Id., at 3. Consistent with that goal, the Amendments preserved the Act’s purpose of providing a FAPE to all children with disabilities. And they did not change the text of the provision we considered in Burlington, § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii), which gives courts broad authority to grant “appropriate” relief, including reimbursement for the cost of private special education when a school district fails to provide a FAPE. “Congress is presumed to be aware of an administrative or judicial interpretation of a statute and to adopt that interpretation when it re-enacts a statute without change.” Lorillard v. Pons, 434 U. S. 575, 580 (1978). Accordingly, absent a clear expression elsewhere in the Amendments of Congress’ intent to repeal some portion of that provision or to abrogate our decisions in Burlington and Carter, we will continue to read § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii) to authorize the relief respondent seeks. The School District and the dissent argue that one of the provisions enacted by the Amendments, § 1412(a)(10)(C), effects such a repeal. Section 1412(a)(10)(C) is entitled “Payment for education of children enrolled in private schools without consent of or referral by the public agency,” and it sets forth a number of principles applicable to public reimbursement for the costs of unilateral private-school placements. Section 1412(a)(10)(C)(i) states that IDEA “does not require a local educational agency to pay for the cost of education ... of a child with a disability at a private school or facility if that agency made a free appropriate public education available to the child” and his parents nevertheless elected to place him in a private school. Section 1412(a)(10)(C)(ii) then provides that a “court or hearing officer may require [a public] agency to reimburse the parents for the cost of [private-school] enrollment if the court or hearing officer finds that the agency had not made a free appropriate public education available” and the child has “previously received special education and related services under the authority of [the] agency.” Finally, § 1412(a)(10)(C)(iii) discusses circumstances under which the “cost of reimbursement described in clause (ii) may be reduced or denied,” as when a parent fails to give 10 days’ notice before removing a child from public school or refuses to make a child available for evaluation, and § 1412(a)(10)(C)(iv) lists circumstances in which a parent’s failure to give notice may or must be excused. Looking primarily to clauses (i) and (ii), the School District argues that Congress intended § 1412(a)(10)(C) to provide the exclusive source of authority for courts to order reimbursement when parents unilaterally enroll a child in private school. According to the District, clause (i) provides a safe harbor for school districts that provide a FAPE by foreclosing reimbursement in those circumstances. Clause (ii) then sets forth the circumstance in which reimbursement is appropriate — namely, when a school district fails to provide a FAPE to a child who has previously received special-education services through the public school. The District contends that because § 1412(a)(10)(C) only discusses reimbursement for children who have previously received special-education services through the public school, IDEA only authorizes reimbursement in that circumstance. The dissent agrees. For several reasons, we find this argument unpersuasive. First, the School District’s reading of the Act is not supported by its text and context, as the 1997 Amendments do not expressly prohibit reimbursement under the circumstances of this case, and the District offers no evidence that Congress intended to supersede our decisions in Burlington and Carter. Clause (i)’s safe harbor explicitly bars reimbursement only when a school district makes a FAPE available by correctly identifying a child as having a disability and proposing an IEP adequate to meet the child’s needs. The clause says nothing about the availability of reimbursement when a school district fails to provide a FAPE. Indeed, its statement that reimbursement is not authorized when a school district provides a FAPE could be read to indicate that reimbursement is authorized when a school district does not fulfill that obligation. Clause (ii) likewise does not support the District’s position. Because that clause is phrased permissively, stating only that courts “may require” reimbursement in those circumstances, it does not foreclose reimbursement awards in other circumstances. Together with clauses (iii) and (iv), clause (ii) is best read as elaborating on the general rule that courts may order reimbursement when a school district fails to provide a FAPE by listing factors that may affect a reimbursement award in the common situation in which a school district has provided a child with some special-education services and the child’s parents believe those services are inadequate. Referring as they do to students who have previously received special-education services through a public school, clauses (ii) through (iv) are premised on a history of cooperation and together encourage school districts and parents to continue to cooperate in developing and implementing an appropriate IEP before resorting to a unilateral private placement. The clauses of § 1412(a)(10)(C) are thus best read as elucidative rather than exhaustive. Cf. United States v. Atlantic Research Corp., 551 U. S. 128, 137 (2007) (noting that statutory language may “perfor[m] a significant function simply by clarifying” a provision’s meaning). This reading of § 1412(a)(10)(C) is necessary to avoid the conclusion that Congress abrogated sub silentio our decisions in Burlington and Carter. In those cases, we construed § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii) to authorize reimbursement when a school district fails to provide a FAPE and a child’s private-school placement is appropriate, without regard to the child’s prior receipt of services. It would take more than Congress’ failure to comment on the category of cases in which a child has not previously received special-education services for us to conclude that the Amendments substantially superseded our decisions and in large part repealed § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii). See Branch v. Smith, 538 U. S. 254, 273 (2003) (plurality opinion) (“[A]bsent a clearly expressed congressional intention, repeals by implication are not favored” (internal quotation marks and citation omitted)). We accordingly adopt the reading of § 1412(a)(10)(C) that is consistent with those decisions. The School District’s reading of § 1412(a)(10)(C) is also at odds with the general remedial purpose underlying IDEA and the 1997 Amendments. The express purpose of the Act is to “ensure that all children with disabilities have available to them a free appropriate public education that emphasizes special education and related services designed to meet their unique needs,” § 1400(d)(1)(A) — a factor we took into account in construing the scope of § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii), see Burlington, 471 U. S., at 369. Without the remedy respondent seeks, a “child’s right to a free appropriate education . . . would be less than complete.” Id., at 370. The District’s position similarly conflicts with IDEA’S “child find” requirement, pursuant to which States are obligated to “identif[y], locat[e], and evaluat[e]” “[a]ll children with disabilities residing in the State” to ensure that they receive needed special-education services. § 1412(a)(3)(A); see § 1412(a)(10)(A)(ii). A reading of the Act that left parents without an adequate remedy when a school district unreasonably failed to identify a child with disabilities would not comport with Congress’ acknowledgment of the paramount importance of properly identifying each child eligible for services. Indeed, by immunizing a school district’s refusal to find a child eligible for special-education services no matter how compelling the child’s need, the School District’s interpretation of § 1412(a)(10)(C) would produce a rule bordering on the irrational. It would be particularly strange for the Act to provide a remedy, as all agree it does, when a school district offers a child inadequate special-education services but to leave parents without relief in the more egregious situation in which the school district unreasonably denies a child access to such services altogether. That IDEA affords parents substantial procedural safeguards, including the right to challenge a school district’s eligibility determination and obtain prospective relief, see post, at 258-259, is no answer. We roundly rejected that argument in Burlington, observing that the “review process is ponderous” and therefore inadequate to ensure that a school’s failure to provide a FAPE is remedied with the speed necessary to avoid detriment to the child’s education. 471 U. S., at 370. Like Burlington, see ibid., this case vividly demonstrates the problem of delay, as respondent’s parents first sought a due process hearing in April 2003, and the District Court issued its decision in May 2005 — almost a year after respondent graduated from high school. The dissent all but ignores these shortcomings of IDEA’S procedural safeguards. IV The School District advances two additional arguments for reading the Act to foreclose reimbursement in this case. First, the District contends that because IDEA was an exercise of Congress’ authority under the Spending Clause, U. S. Const., Art. I, §8, cl. 1, any conditions attached to a State’s acceptance of funds must be stated unambiguously. See Pennhurst State School and Hospital v. Halderman, 451 U. S. 1, 17 (1981). Applying that principle, we held in Arlington Central School Dist. Bd. of Ed. v. Murphy, 548 U. S. 291, 304 (2006), that IDEA’S fee-shifting provision, § 1415(i)(3)(B), does not authorize courts to award expert-services fees to prevailing parents in IDEA actions because the Act does not put States on notice of the possibility of such awards. But Arlington is readily distinguishable from this case. In accepting IDEA funding, States expressly agree to provide a FAPE to all children with disabilities. See § 1412(a)(1)(A). An order awarding reimbursement of private-education costs when a school district fails to provide a FAPE merely requires the district “to belatedly pay expenses that it should have paid all along.” Burlington, 471 U. S., at 370-371. And States have in any event been on notice at least since our decision in Burlington that IDEA authorizes courts to order reimbursement of the costs of private special-education services in appropriate circumstances. Pennhurst’s notice requirement is thus clearly satisfied. Finally, the District urges that respondent’s reading of the Act will impose a substantial financial burden on public-school districts and encourage parents to immediately enroll their children in private school without first endeavoring to cooperate with the school district. The dissent echoes this concern. See post, at 258. For several reasons, those fears are unfounded. Parents “are entitled to reimbursement only if a federal court concludes both that the public placement violated IDEA and the private school placement was proper under the Act.” Carter, 510 U. S., at 15. And even then courts retain discretion to reduce the amount of a reimbursement award if the equities so warrant — for instance, if the parents failed to give the school district adequate notice of their intent to enroll the child in private school. In considering the equities, courts should generally presume that public-school officials are properly performing their obligations under IDEA. See Schaffer v. Weast, 546 U. S. 49, 62-63 (2005) (Stevens, J., concurring). As a result of these criteria and the fact that parents who “ ‘unilaterally change their child’s placement during the pendency of review proceedings, without the consent of state or local school officials, do so at their own financial risk,’ ” Carter, 510 U. S., at 15 (quoting Burlington, 471 U. S., at 373-374), the incidence of private-school placement at public expense is quite small, see Brief for National Disability Rights Network et al. as Amici Curiae 13-14. V The IDEA Amendments of 1997 did not modify the text of § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii), and we do not read § 1412(a)(10)(C) to alter that provision’s meaning. Consistent with our decisions in Burlington and Carter, we conclude that IDEA authorizes reimbursement for the cost of private special-education services when a school district fails to provide a FAPE and the private-school placement is appropriate, regardless of whether the child previously received special education or related services through the public school. When a court or hearing officer concludes that a school district failed to provide a PAPE and the private placement was suitable, it must consider all relevant factors, including the notice provided by the parents and the school district’s opportunities for evaluating the child, in determining whether reimbursement for some or all of the cost of the child’s private education is warranted. As the Court of Appeals noted, the District Court did not properly consider the equities in this case and will need to undertake that analysis on remand. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. APPENDIX Title 20 U. S. C. § 1412(a)(10)(C) provides: “(C) Payment for education of children enrolled in private schools without consent of or referral by the public agency “(i) In general “Subject to subparagraph (A), this subchapter does not require a local educational agency to pay for the cost of education, including special education and related services, of a child with a disability at a private school or facility if that agency made a free appropriate public education available to the child and the parents elected to place the child in such private school or facility. “(ii) Reimbursement for private school placement “If the parents of a child with a disability, who previously received special education and related services under the authority of a public agency, enroll the child in a private elementary school or secondary school without the consent of or referral by the public agency, a court or a hearing officer may require the agency to reimburse the parents for the cost of that enrollment if the court or hearing officer finds that the agency had not made a free appropriate public education available to the child in a timely manner prior to that enrollment. “(iii) Limitation on reimbursement “The cost of reimbursement described in clause (ii) may be reduced or denied— “(I) if- “(aa) at the most recent IEP meeting that the parents attended prior to removal of the child from the public school, the parents did not inform the IEP Team that they were rejecting the placement proposed by the public agency to provide a free appropriate public education to their child, including stating their concerns and their intent to enroll their child in a private school at public expense; or “(bb) 10 business days (including any holidays that occur on a business day) prior to the removal of the child from the public school, the parents did not give written notice to the public agency of the information described in item (aa); “(II) if, prior to the parents’ removal of the child from the public school, the public agency informed the parents, through the notice requirements described in section 1415(b)(3) of this title, of its intent to evaluate the child (including a statement of the purpose of the evaluation that was appropriate and reasonable), but the parents did not make the child available for such evaluation; or “(III) upon a judicial finding of unreasonableness with respect to actions taken by the parents.” An IEP is an education plan tailored to a child’s unique needs that is designed by the school district in consultation with the child’s parents after the child is identified as eligible for special-education services. See 20 U. S. C. §§ 1412(a)(4), 1414(d). Although it was respondent’s parents who initially sought reimbursement, when respondent reached the age of majority in 2003 his parents’ rights under IDEA transferred to him pursuant to Ore. Admin. Rule 581-015-2325(1) (2008). Compare Frank G. v. Board of Ed. of Hyde Park, 459 F. 3d 356, 376 (CA2 2006) (holding that § 1412(a)(10)(C)(ii) does not bar reimbursement for students who have not previously received public special-education services), and M. M. v. School Bd. of Miami-Dade-Cty., Fla., 437 F. 3d 1085, 1099 (CA11 2006) (per curiam) (same), with Greenland School Dish v. Amy N., 358 F. 3d 150, 159-160 (CA1 2004) (finding reimbursement barred in those circumstances). We previously granted certiorari to address this question in Board of Ed. of City School Dist. of New York v. Tom F., 552 U. S. 1 (2007), in which we affirmed without opinion the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit by an equally divided vote. At the time we decided Burlington, that provision was codified at § 1415(e)(2). The 1997 Amendments renumbered the provision but did not alter its text. For ease of reference, we refer to the provision by its current section number, § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii). The legislation was enacted as the Education of the Handicapped Act, Title VI of Pub. L. 91-230, 84 Stat. 175, and was renamed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in 1990, see § 901(a)(3), Pub. L. 101-476, 104 Stat. 1142. The full text of § 1412(a)(10)(C) is set forth in the Appendix, infra, at 248. The dissent asserts that, under this reading of the Act, “Congress has called for reducing reimbursement only for the most deserving . . . but provided no mechanism to reduce reimbursement to the least deserving.” Post, at 254 (opinion of Souter, J.). In addition to making unsubstantiated generalizations about the desert of parents whose children have been denied public special-education services, the dissent grossly mischaracterizes our view of § 1412(a)(10)(C). The fact that clause (iii) permits a court to reduce a reimbursement award when a parent whose child has previously received special-education services fails to give the school adequate notice of an intended private placement does not mean that it prohibits courts from similarly reducing the amount of reimbursement when a parent whose child has not previously received services fails to give such notice. Like clause (ii), clause (iii) provides guidance regarding the appropriateness of relief in a common factual scenario, and its instructions should not be understood to preclude courts and hearing officers from considering similar factors in other scenarios. In arguing that § 1412(a)(10)(C) is the exclusive source of authority for granting reimbursement awards to parents who unilaterally place a child in private school, the dissent neglects to explain that provision’s failure to limit the type of private-school placements for which parents may be reimbursed. School Comm. of Burlington v. Department of Ed. of Mass., 471 U. S. 359 (1985), held that courts may grant reimbursement under § 1415(i) (2) (C) (iii) only when a school district fails to provide a FAPE and the private-school placement is appropriate. See id., at 369; see Florence County School Dish Four v. Carter, 510 U. S. 7, 12-13 (1993). The latter requirement is essential to ensuring that reimbursement awards are granted only when such relief furthers the purposes of the Act. See Burlington, 471 U. S., at 369. That § 1412(a)(10)(C) did not codify that requirement further indicates that Congress did not intend that provision to supplant § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii) as the sole authority on reimbursement awards but rather meant to augment the latter provision and our decisions construing it. As discussed above, although the children in Burlington and Carter had previously received special-education services in public school, our decisions in no way depended on their prior receipt of services. Those holdings rested instead on the breadth of the authority conferred by § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii), the interest in providing relief consistent with the Act’s purpose, and the injustice that a contrary reading would produce, see Burlington, 471 U. S., at 369-370; see also Carter, 510 U. S., at 12-14 — considerations that were not altered by the 1997 Amendments. For the same reason, we reject the District’s argument that because § 1412(a)(10)(C)(ii) authorizes “a court or a hearing officer” to award reimbursement for private-school tuition, whereas § 1415(i)(2)(C)(iii) only provides a general grant of remedial authority to “court[s],” the latter section cannot be read to authorize hearing officers to award reimbursement. That argument ignores our decision in Burlington, 471 U. S., at 363, 370, which interpreted § 1415(i) (2) (C) (iii) to authorize hearing officers as well as courts to award reimbursement notwithstanding the provision’s silence with regard to hearing officers. When Congress amended IDEA without altering the text of § 1415 (i) (2) (C)(iii), it implicitly adopted that construction of the statute. See Lorillard v. Pons, 434 U. S. 575, 580-581 (1978). Looking to the Amendments’ legislative history for support, the School District cites two House and Senate Reports that essentially restate the text of § 1412(a)(10)(C)(ii), H. R. Rep. No. 105-95, pp. 92-93 (1997); S. Rep. No. 105-17, p. 13 (1997), and a floor statement by Representative Mike Castle, 143 Cong. Rec. 8013 (1997) (stating that the “bill makes it harder for parents to unilaterally place a child in elite private schools at public taxpayer expense, lowering costs to local school districts”). Those ambiguous references do not undermine the meaning that we discern from the statute’s language and context. Notably, the agency charged with implementing IDEA has adopted respondent’s reading of the statute. In commentary to regulations implementing the 1997 Amendments, the Department of Education stated that “hearing officers and courts retain their authority, recognized in Burlington ... to award ‘appropriate’ relief if a public agency has failed to provide FAPE, including reimbursement ... in instances in which the child has not yet received special education and related services.” 64 Fed. Reg. 12602 (1999); see 71 Fed. Reg. 46599 (2006). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. The Court is advised that the petitioner died in St. Louis, Missouri, on May 30, 2007. The judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit is therefore vacated as moot. See United States v. Munsingwear, Inc., 340 U. S. 36 (1950). It is so ordered. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Souter delivered the opinion of the Court. The question in this ease is whether treatment decisions made by a health maintenance organization, acting through its physician employees, are fiduciary acts within the meaning of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), 88 Stat. 832, as amended, 29 U. S. C. § 1001 et seq. (1994 ed. and Supp. III). We hold that they are not. r-f Petitioners, Carle Clinic Association, P. C., Health Alliance Medical Plans, Inc., and Carle Health Insurance Management Co., Inc. (collectively Carle), function as a health maintenance organization (HMO) organized for profit. Its owners are physicians providing prepaid medical services to participants whose employers contract with Carle to provide such coverage. Respondent, Cynthia Herdrich, was covered by Carle through her husband’s employer, State Farm Insurance Company. The events in question began when a Carle physician, petitioner Lori Pegram, examined Herdrich, who was experiencing pain in the midline area of her groin. Six days later, Dr. Pegram discovered a six by eight centimeter inflamed mass in Herdrich’s abdomen. Despite the noticeable inflammation, Dr. Pegram did not order an ultrasound diagnostic procedure at a local hospital, but decided that Herdrich would have to wait eight more days for an ultrasound, to be performed at a facility staffed by Carle more than 50 miles away. Before the eight days were over, Herdrich’s appendix ruptured, causing peritonitis. See 154 F. 3d 362, 365, n. 1 (CA7 1998). Herdrich sued Pegram and Carle in state court for medical malpractice, and she later added two counts charging state-law fraud. Carle and Pegram responded that ERISA preempted the new counts, and removed the ease to federal court, where they then sought summary judgment on the state-law fraud counts. The District Court granted their motion as to the second fraud count hut granted Herdrieh leave to amend the one remaining. This she did by alleging that provision of medical services under the terms of the Carle HMO organization, rewarding its physician owners for limiting medical care, entailed an inherent or anticipatory breach of an ERISA fiduciary duty, since these terms created an incentive to make decisions in the physicians’ self-interest, rather than the exclusive interests of plan participants. Herdrich sought relief under 29 U. S. C. § 1109(a), which provides that “[a]ny person who is a fiduciary with respect to a plan who breaches any of the responsibilities, obligations, or duties imposed upon fiduciaries by this subchapter shall be personally liable to make good to such plan any losses to the plan resulting from each such breach, and to restore to such plan any profits of such fiduciary which have been made through use of assets of the plan by the fiduciary, and shall be subject to such other equitable or remedial relief as the court may deem appropriate, including removal of such fiduciary.” When Carle moved to dismiss the ERISA count for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted, the District Court granted the motion, accepting the Magistrate Judge’s determination that Carle was not “involved [in these events] as” an ERISA fiduciary. App. to Pet. for Cert. 68a. The original malpractice counts were then tried to a jury, and Herdrich prevailed on both, receiving $35,000 in compensation for her injury. 154 F. 3d, at 367. She then appealed the dismissal of the ERISA claim to the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, which reversed. The court held that Carle was acting as a fiduciary when its physicians made the challenged decisions and that Herdrieh’s allegations were sufficient to state a claim: “Our decision does not stand for the proposition that the existence of incentives automatically gives rise to a breach of fiduciary duty. Rather, we hold that incentives can rise to the level of a breach where, as pleaded here, the fiduciary trust between plan participants and plan fiduciaries no longer exists (i. e., where physicians delay providing necessary treatment to, or withhold administering proper care to, plan beneficiaries for the sole purpose of increasing their bonuses).” Id., at 373. We granted certiorari, 527 U. S. 1068 (1999), and now reverse the Court of Appeals. II Whether Carle is a fiduciary when it acts through its physician owners as pleaded in the ERISA count depends on some background of fact and law about HMOs, medical benefit plans, fiduciary obligation, and the meaning of Herdrich’s allegations. A Traditionally, medical care in the United States has been provided on a “fee-for-service” basis. A physician charges so much for a general physical exam, a vaccination, a tonsillectomy, and so on. The physician bills the patient for services provided or, if there is insurance and the doctor is willing, submits the bill for the patient’s care to the insurer, for payment subject to the terms of the insurance agreement. Cf. R. Rosenblatt, S. Law, & S. Rosenbaum, Law and the American Health Care System 548-544 (1997) (hereinafter Rosenblatt) (citing Weiner & de Lissovoy, Razing a Tower of Babel: A Taxonomy for Managed Care and Health Insurance Plans, 18 J. Health Politics, Policy & Law 75,76-78 (Summer 1998)). In a fee-for-service system, a physician’s financial incentive is to provide more care, not less, so long as payment is forthcoming. The check on this incentive is a physician’s obligation to exercise reasonable medical skill and judgment in the patient’s interest. Beginning in the late 1960’s, insurers and others developed new models for health-care delivery, including HMOs. Cf. Rosenblatt 546. The defining feature of an HMO is receipt of a fixed fee for each patient enrolled under the terms of a contract to provide specified health care if needed. The HMO thus assumes the financial risk of providing the benefits promised: if a participant never gets sick, the HMO keeps the money regardless, and if a participant becomes expensively ill, the HMO is responsible for the treatment agreed upon even if its cost exceeds the participant’s premiums. Like other risk-bearing organizations, HMOs take steps to control costs. At the least, HMOs, like traditional insurers, will in some fashion make coverage determinations, scrutinizing requested services against the contractual provisions to make sure that a request for care falls within the seope of covered circumstances (pregnancy, for example), or that a given treatment falls within the scope of the care promised (surgery, for instance). They customarily issue general guidelines for their physicians about appropriate levels of care. See id., at 568-570. And they commonly require utilization review (in which specific treatment decisions are reviewed by a decisionmaker other than the treating physician) and approval in advance (preeertification) for many types of care, keyed to standards of medical necessity or the reasonableness of the proposed treatment. See Andresen, Is Utilization Review the Practice of Medicine?, Implications for Managed Care Administrators, 19 J. Legal Med. 431, 482 (Sept. 1998). These cost-controlling measures are commonly complemented by specific financial incentives to physicians, rewarding them for decreasing utilization of health-care services, and penalizing them for what may be found to be excessive treatment, see Rosenblatt 568-565; Iglehart, Health Policy Report: The American Health Care System— Managed Care, 327 New England J. Med. 742,742-747 (1992). Hence, in an HMO system, a physician’s financial interest lies in providing less care, not more. The check on this influence (like that on the converse, fee-for-service incentive) is the professional obligation to provide covered services with a reasonable degree of skill and judgment in the patient’s interest. See Brief for American Medical Association as Amicus Curiae 17-21. The adequacy of professional obligation to counter financial self-interest has been challenged no matter what the form of medical organization. HMOs became popular because fee-for-service physicians were thought to be providing unnecessary or useless services; today, many doctors and other observers argue that HMOs often ignore the individual needs of a patient in order to improve the HMOs’ bottom lines. See, e. g., 154 F. 3d, at 375-378 (citing various critics of HMOs). In this case, for instance, one could argue that Pegram’s decision to wait before getting an ultrasound for Herdrich, and her insistence that the ultrasound be done at a distant facility owned by Carle, reflected an interest in limiting the HMO’s expenses, which blinded her to the need for immediate diagnosis and treatment. B Herdrich focuses on the Carle scheme’s provision for a “year-end distribution,” n. 3, swpra, to the HMO’s physician owners. She argues that this particular incentive device of annually paying physician owners the profit resulting from their own decisions rationing care can distinguish Carle’s organization from HMOs generally, so that reviewing Carle’s decisions under a fiduciary standard as pleaded in Herdrich’s complaint would not open the door to like claims about other HMO structures. While the Court of Appeals agreed, we think otherwise, under the law as now written. Although it is true that the relationship between sparing medical treatment and physician reward is not a subtle one under the Carle scheme, no HMO organization could survive without some incentive connecting physician reward with treatment rationing. The essence of an HMO is that salaries and profits are limited by the HMO’s fixed membership fees. See Orentlicher, Paying Physicians More To Do Less: Financial Incentives to Limit Care, 30 U. Rich. L. Rev. 155, 174 (1996). This is not to suggest that the Carle provisions are as socially desirable as some other HMO organizational schemes; they may not be. See, e. g., Grumbach, Osmond, Vranigan, Jaffe, & Bindman, Primary Care Physicians’ Experience of Financial Incentives in Managed-Care Systems, 339 New England J. Med. 1516 (1998) (arguing that HMOs that reward quality of care and patient satisfaction would be preferable to HMOs that reward only physician productivity). But whatever the HMO, there must be rationing and inducement to ration. Since inducement to ration care goes to the very point of any HMO scheme, and rationing necessarily raises some risks while reducing others (ruptured appendixes are more likely; unnecessary appendectomies are less so), any legal principle purporting to draw a line between good and bad HMOs would embody, in effect, a judgment about socially acceptable medical risk. A valid conclusion of this sort would, however, necessarily turn on facts to which courts would probably not have ready access: correlations between malpractice rates and various HMO models, similar correlations involving fee-for-service models, and so on. And, of course, assuming such material could be obtained by courts in litigation like this, any standard defining the unacceptably risky HMO structure (and consequent vulnerability to claims like Herdrich’s) would depend on a judgment about the appropriate level of expenditure for health care in light of the associated malpractice risk. But such complicated factfind-ing and such a debatable social judgment are not wisely required of courts unless for some reason resort cannot be had to the legislative process, with its preferable forum for comprehensive investigations and judgments of social value, such as optimum treatment levels and health-care expenditure. Cf. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. v. FCC, 512 U. S. 622, 665-666 (1994) (plurality opinion) (“Congress is far better equipped than the judiciary to ‘amass and evaluate the vast amounts of data’ bearing upon an issue as complex and dynamic as that presented here” (quoting Walters v. National Assn. of Radiation Survivors, 473 U. S. 305, 381, n. 12 (1985))); Patsy v. Board of Regents of Fla., 457 U. S. 496, 513 (1982) (“[Tjhe relevant policy considerations do not invariably point in one direction, and there is vehement disagreement over the validity of the assumptions underlying many of them. The very difficulty of these policy considerations, and Congress’ superior institutional competence to pursue this debate, suggest that legislative not judicial solutions are preferable” (footnote omitted)). We think, then, that courts are not in a position to derive a sound legal principle to differentiate an HMO like Carle from other HMOs. For that reason, we proceed on the assumption that the decisions listed in Herdrich’s complaint cannot be subject to a claim that they violate fiduciary standards unless all such decisions by all HMOs acting through their owner or employee physicians are to be judged by the same standards and subject to the same claims. C We turn now from the structure of HMOs to the requirements of ERISA. A fiduciary within the meaning of ERISA must be someone acting in the capacity of manager, administrator, or financial adviser to a “plan,” see 29 U. S. C. §§ 1002(21)(A)(i) — (iii), and Herdrieh’s ERISA count accordingly charged Carle with a breach of fiduciary duty in discharging its obligations under State Farm’s medical plan. App. to Pet. for Cert. 85a-86a. ERISA’s definition of an employee welfare benefit plan is ultimately circular: “any plan, fund, or program... to the extent that such plan, fund, or program was established... for the purpose of providing... through the purchase of insurance or otherwise... medical, surgical, or hospital care or benefits.” § 1002(1)(A). One is thus left to the common understanding of the word “plan” as referring to a scheme decided upon in advance, see Webster’s New International Dictionary 1879 (2d ed. 1957); Jacobson & Pomfret, Form, Function, and Managed Care Torts: Achieving Fairness and Equity in ERISA Jurisprudence, 35 Houston L. Rev. 985, 1050 (1998). Here the scheme comprises a set of rules that define the rights of a beneficiary and provide for their enforcement. Rules governing collection of premiums, definition of benefits, submission of claims, and resolution of disagreements over entitlement to services are the sorts of provisions that constitute a plan. See Hansen v. Continental Ins. Co., 940 F. 2d 971, 977 (CA5 1991). Thus, when employers contract with an HMO to provide benefits to employees subject to ERISA, the provisions of documents that set up the HMO are not, as such, an ERISA plan; but the agreement between an HMO and an employer who pays the premiums may, as here, provide elements of a plan by setting out rules under which beneficiaries will be entitled to care. D As just noted, fiduciary obligations can apply to managing, advising, and administering an ERISA plan, the fiduciary function addressed by Herdrich’s ERISA count being the exercise of “discretionary authority or discretionary responsibility in the administration of [an ERISA] plan,” 29 U. S. C. § 1002(21)(A)(iii). And as we have already suggested, although Carle is not an ERISA fiduciary merely because it administers or exercises discretionary authority over its own HMO business, it may still be a fiduciary if it administers the plan. In general terms, fiduciary responsibility under ERISA is simply stated. The statute provides that fiduciaries shall discharge their duties with respect to a plan “solely in the interest of the participants and beneficiaries,” § 1104(a)(1), that is, “for the exclusive purpose of (i) providing benefits to participants and their beneficiaries; and (ii) defraying reasonable expenses of administering the plan,” § 1104(a)(1)(A). These responsibilities imposed by ERISA have the familiar ring of their source in the common law of trusts. See Central States, Southeast & Southwest Areas Pension Fund v. Central Transport, Inc., 472 U. S. 559, 570 (1985) (“[RJather than explicitly enumerating all of the powers and duties of trustees and other fiduciaries, Congress invoked the common law of trusts to define the general scope of their authority and responsibility”). Thus, the common law (understood as including what were once the distinct rules of equity) charges fiduciaries with a duty of loyalty to guarantee beneficiaries’ interests: “The most fundamental duty owed by the trustee to the beneficiaries of the trust is the duty of loyalty.... It is the duty of a trustee to administer the trust solely in the interest of the beneficiaries.” 2A A. Scott & W. Fratcher, Trusts § 170, p. 311 (4th ed. 1987) (hereinafter Scott); see also G. Bogert & G. Bogert, Law of Trusts and Trustees §543 (rev. 2d ed. 1980) (‘Terhaps the most fundamental duty of a trustee is that he must display throughout the administration of the trust complete loyalty to the interests of the beneficiary and must exclude all selfish interest and all consideration of the interests of third persons”); Central States, supra, at 570-571; Meinhard v. Salmon, 249 N. Y. 458, 464, 164 N. E. 545, 546 (1928) (Cardozo, J.) (“Many forms of conduct permissible in a workaday world for those acting at arm’s length, are forbidden to those bound by fiduciary ties. A trustee is held to something stricter than the morals of the market place. Not honesty alone, but the punctilio of an honor the most sensitive, is then the standard of behavior”). Beyond the threshold statement of responsibility, however, the analogy between ERISA fiduciary and common law trustee becomes problematic. This is so because the trustee at common law characteristically wears only his fiduciary hat when he takes action to affect a beneficiary, whereas the trustee under ERISA may wear different hats. Speaking of the traditional trustee, Professor Scott’s treatise admonishes that the trustee “is not permitted to place himself in a position where it would be for his own benefit to violate his duty to the beneficiaries.” 2A Scott § 170, at 311. Under ERISA, however, a fiduciary may have financial interests adverse to beneficiaries. Employers, for example, can be ERISA fiduciaries and still take actions to the disadvantage of employee beneficiaries, when they act as employers (e. g., firing a beneficiary for reasons unrelated to the ERISA plan), or even as plan sponsors (e. g., modifying the terms of a plan as allowed by ERISA to provide less generous benefits). Nor is there any apparent reason in the ERISA provisions to conclude, as Herdrieh argues, that this tension is permissible only for the employer or plan sponsor, to the exclusion of persons who provide services to an ERISA plan. ERISA does require, however, that the fiduciary with two hats wear only one at a time, and wear the fiduciary hat when making fiduciary decisions. See Hughes Aircraft Co. v. Jacobson, 525 U. S. 432, 443-444 (1999); Varity Corp. v. Howe, 516 U. S. 489, 497 (1996). Thus, the statute does not describe fiduciaries simply as administrators of the plan, or managers or advisers. Instead it defines an administrator, for example, as a fiduciary only “to the extent” that he acts in such a capacity in relation to a plan. 29 U. S. C. § 1002(21)(A). In every case charging breach of ERISA fiduciary duty, then, the threshold question is not whether the actions of some person employed to provide services under a plan adversely affected a plan beneficiary’s interest, but whether that person was acting as a fiduciary (that is, was performing a fiduciary function) when taking the action subject to complaint. E The allegations of Herdrich’s ERISA count that identify the claimed fiduciary breach are difficult to understand. In this count, Herdrich does not point to a particular act by any Carle physician owner as a breach. She does not complain about Pegram’s actions, and at oral argument her counsel confirmed that the ERISA count could have been brought, and would have been no different, if Herdrich had never had a sick day in her life. Tr. of Oral Arg. 53-54. What she does claim is that Carle, acting through its physician owners, breached its duty to act solely in the interest of beneficiaries by making decisions affecting medical treatment while influenced by the terms of the Carle HMO scheme, under which the physician owners ultimately profit from their own choices to minimize the medical services provided. She emphasizes the threat to fiduciary responsibility in the Carle scheme’s feature of a year-end distribution to the physicians of profit derived from the spread between subscription income and expenses of care and administration. App. to Pet. for Cert. 86a. The specific payout detail of the plan was, of course, a feature that the employer as plan sponsor was free to adopt without breach of any fiduciary duty under ERISA, since an employer’s decisions about the content of a plan are not themselves fiduciary acts. Lockheed Corp. v. Spink, 517 U. S. 882, 887 (1996) (“Nothing in ERISA requires employers to establish employee benefit plans. Nor does ERISA mandate what kind of benefits employers must provide if they choose to have such a plan”). Likewise it is clear that there was no violation of ERISA when the incorporators of the Carle HMO provided for the year-end payout. The HMO is not the ERISA plan, and the incorporation of the HMO preceded its contract with the State Farm plan. See 29 U. S. C. § 1109(b) (no fiduciary liability for acts preceding fiduciary status). The nub of the claim, then, is that when State Farm contracted with Carle, Carle became a fiduciary under the plan, acting through its physicians. At once, Carle as fiduciary administrator was subject to such influence from the year-end payout provision that its fiduciary capacity was necessarily compromised, and its readiness to act amounted to anticipatory breach of fiduciary obligation. F The pleadings must also be parsed very carefully to understand what acts by physician owners acting on Carle’s behalf are alleged to be fiduciary in nature. It will help to keep two sorts of arguably administrative acts in mind. Cf. Dukes v. U. S. Healthcare, Inc., 57 F. 3d 350, 361 (CA3 1995) (discussing dual medical/administrative roles of HMOs). What we will call pure “eligibility decisions” turn on the plan’s coverage of a particular condition or medical procedure for its treatment. “Treatment decisions,” by contrast, are choices about how to go about diagnosing and treating a patient’s condition: given a patient’s constellation of symptoms, what is the appropriate medical response? These decisions are often practically inextricable from one another, as amici on both sides agree. See Brief for Washington Legal Foundation as Amicus Curiae 12; Brief for Health Law, Policy, and Ethics Scholars as Amici Curiae 10. This is so not merely because, under a scheme like Carle’s, treatment and eligibility decisions are made by the same person, the treating physician. It is so because a great many and possibly most coverage questions are not simple yes- or-no questions, like whether appendicitis is a covered condition (when there is no dispute that a patient has appendicitis), or whether acupuncture is a covered procedure for pain relief (when the claim of pain is unchallenged). The more common coverage question is a when-and-how question. Although coverage for many conditions will be clear and various treatment options will be indisputably compensable, physicians still must decide what to do in particular cases. The issue may be, say, whether one treatment option is so superior to another under the circumstances, and needed so promptly, that a decision to proceed with it would meet the medical necessity requirement that conditions the HMO’s obligation to provide or pay for that particular procedure at that time in that case. The Government in its brief alludes to a similar example when it discusses an HMO’s refusal to pay for emergency care on the ground that the situation giving rise to the need for care was not an emergency, Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 20-21. In practical terms, these eligibility decisions cannot be untangled from physicians’ judgments about reasonable medical treatment, and in the case before us, Dr. Pegram’s decision was one of that sort. She decided (wrongly, as it turned out) that Her-drieh’s condition did not warrant immediate action; the consequence of that medical determination was that Carle would not cover immediate care, whereas it would have done so if Dr. Pegram had made the proper diagnosis and judgment to treat. The eligibility decision and the treatment decision were inextricably mixed, as they are in countless medical administrative decisions every day. The kinds of decisions mentioned in Herdrieh’s ERISA count and claimed to be fiduciary in character are just such mixed eligibility and treatment decisions: physicians’ conclusions about when to use diagnostic tests; about seeking consultations and making referrals to physicians and facilities other than Carle’s; about proper standards of care, the experimental character of a proposed course of treatment, the reasonableness of a certain treatment, and the emergency character of a medical condition. We do not read the ERISA count, however, as alleging fiduciary breach with reference to a different variety of administrative decisions, those we have called pure eligibility determinations, such as whether a plan covers an undisputed ease of appendicitis. Nor do we read it as claiming breach by reference to discrete administrative decisions separate from medical judgments; say, rejecting a claim for no other reason than the HMO’s financial condition. The closest Her-drich’s ERISA count comes to stating a claim for a pure, unmixed eligibility decision is her general allegation that Carle determines “which claims are covered under the Plan and to what extent,” App. to Pet. for Cert. 86a. But this vague statement, difficult to interpret in isolation, is given content by the other elements of the complaint, all of which refer to decisions thoroughly mixed with medical judgment. Cf. 5A C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1357, pp. 320-321 (1990) (noting that, where specific allegations clarify the meaning of broader allegations, they may be used to interpret the complaint as a whole). Any lingering uncertainty about what Herdrich has in mind is dispelled by her brief, which explains that this allegation, like the others, targets medical necessity determinations. Brief for Respondent 19; see also id., at 3. )-H HH A Based on our understanding of the matters just discussed, we think Congress did not intend Carle or any other HMO to be treated as a fiduciary to the extent that it makes mixed eligibility decisions acting through its physicians. We begin with doubt that Congress would ever have thought of a mixed eligibility decision as fiduciary in nature. At common law, fiduciary duties characteristically attach to decisions about managing assets and distributing property to beneficiaries. See Bogert & Bogert, Law of Trusts and Trustees §§551, 741-747, 751-775, 781-799; 2A Scott §§176,181; 3 id., §§188-193; 3A id., §232. Trustees buy, sell, and lease investment property, lend and borrow, and do other things to conserve and nurture assets. They pay out income, choose beneficiaries, and distribute remainders at termination. Thus, the common law trustee’s most defining concern historically has been the payment of money in the interest of the beneficiary. Mixed eligibility decisions by an HMO acting through its physicians have, however, only a limited resemblance to the usual business of traditional trustees. To be sure, the physicians (like regular trustees) draw on resources held for others and make decisions to distribute them in accordance with entitlements expressed in a written instrument (embodying the terms of an ERISA plan). It is also true that the objects of many traditional private and public trusts are ultimately the same as the ERISA plans that contract with HMOs. Private trusts provide medical care to the poor; thousands of independent hospitals are privately held and publicly accountable trusts, and charitable foundations make grants to stimulate the provision of health services. But beyond this point the resemblance rapidly wanes. Traditional trustees administer a medical trust by paying out money to buy medical care, whereas physicians making mixed eligibility decisions consume the money as well. Private trustees do not make treatment judgments, whereas treatment judgments are what physicians reaching mixed decisions do make, by definition. Indeed, the physicians through whom HMOs act make just the sorts of decisions made by licensed medical practitioners millions of times every day, in every possible medical setting: HMOs, fee-for-service proprietorships, public and private hospitals, military field hospitals, and so on. The settings bear no more resemblance to trust departments than a decision to operate turns on the factors controlling the amount of a quarterly income distribution. Thus, it is at least questionable whether Congress would have had mixed eligibility decisions in mind when it provided that decisions administering a plan were fiduciary in nature. Indeed, when Congress took up the subject of fiduciary responsibility under ERISA, it concentrated on fiduciaries’ financial decisions, focusing on pension plans, the difficulty many retirees faced in getting the payments they expected, and the financial mismanagement that had too often deprived employees of their benefits. See, e. g., S. Rep. No. 93-127, p. 5 (1973); S. Rep. No. 93-383, p. 17 (1973); id., at 95. Its focus was far from the subject of Herdrieh’s claim. Our doubt that Congress intended the category of fiduciary administrative functions to encompass the mixed determinations at issue here hardens into conviction when we consider the consequences that would follow from Herdrieh’s contrary view. B First, we need to ask how this fiduciary standard would affect HMOs if it applied as Herdrich claims it should be applied, not directed against any particular mixed decision that injured a patient, but against HMOs that make mixed decisions in the course of providing medical care for profit. Recovery would be warranted simply upon showing that the profit incentive to ration care would generally affect mixed decisions, in derogation of the fiduciary standard to act solely in the interest of the patient without possibility of conflict. Although Herdrieh is vague about the mechanics of relief, the one point that seems clear is that she seeks the return of profit from the pockets of the Carle HMO’s owners, with the money to be given to the plan for the benefit of the participants. See 29 U. S. C. § 1109(a) (return of all profits is an appropriate ERISA remedy). Since the provision for profit is what makes the HMO a proprietary organization, her remedy in effect would be nothing less than elimination of the for-profit HMO. Her remedy might entail even more than that, although we are in no position to tell whether and to what extent nonprofit HMO schemes would ultimately survive the recognition of Herdrieh’s theory. It is enough to recognize that the Judiciary has no warrant to precipitate the upheaval that would follow a refusal to dismiss Her-drieh’s ERISA claim. The fact is that for over 27 years the Congress of the United States has promoted the formation of HMO practices. The Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973, 87 Stat. 914, 42 U. S. C. §300e et seq., allowed the formation of HMOs that assume financial risks for the provision of health-care services, and Congress has amended the Aet several times, most recently in 1996. See 110 Stat. 1976, 42 U. S. C. §300e (1994 ed., Supp. III). If Congress wishes to restrict its approval of HMO practice to certain preferred forms, it may choose to do so. But the Federal Judiciary would be acting contrary to the congressional policy of allowing HMO organizations if it were to entertain an ERISA fiduciary claim portending wholesale attacks on existing HMOs solely because of their structure, untethered to claims of concrete harm. C The Court of Appeals did not purport to entertain quite the broadside attack that Herdrieh’s ERISA claim thus entails, see 154 F. 3d, at 373, and the second possible consequence of applying the fiduciary standard that requires our attention would flow from the difficulty of extending it to particular mixed decisions that on Herdrieh’s theory are fiduciary in nature. The fiduciary is, of course, obliged to act exclusively in the interest of the beneficiary, but this translates into no rule readily applicable to HMO decisions or those of any other variety of medical practice. While the incentive of the HMO physician is to give treatment sparingly, imposing a fiduciary obligation upon him would not lead to a simple default rule, say, that whenever it is reasonably possible to disagree about treatment options, the physician should treat aggressively. After all, HMOs came into being because some groups of physicians consistently provided more aggressive treatment than others in similar circumstances, with results not perceived as justified by the marginal expense and risk associated with intervention; excessive surgery is not in the patient’s best interest, whether provided by fee-for-service surgeons or HMO surgeons subject to a default rule urging them to operate. Nor would it be possible to translate fiduciary duty into a standard that would allow recovery from an HMO whenever a mixed decision influenced by the HMO’s financial incentive resulted in a bad outcome for the patient. It would be so easy to allege, and to find, an economic influence when sparing care did not lead to a well patient, that any such standard in practice would allow a factfinder to convert an HMO into a guarantor of recovery. These difficulties may have led the Court of Appeals to try to confine the fiduciary breach to eases where “the sole purpose” of delaying or withholding treatment was to increase the physician’s financial reward, ibid. But this attempt to confine mixed decision claims to their most egregious examples entails erroneous corruption of fiduciary obligation and would simply lead to further difficulties that we think fatal. While a mixed decision made solely to benefit the HMO or its physician would violate a fiduciary duty, the fiduciary standard condemns far more than that, in its requirement of “an eye single” toward beneficiaries’ interests, Donovan v. Bierwirth, 680 F. 2d 268, 271 (CA2 1982). But whether under the Court of Appeals’s rule or a straight standard of undivided loyalty, the defense of any HMO would be that its physician did not act out of financial interest but for good medical reasons, the plausibility of which would require reference to standards of reasonable and customary medical practice in like circumstances. That, of course, is the traditional standard of the common law. See W. Keeton, D. Dobbs, R. Keeton, & D. Owens, Prosser and Keeton on Law of Torts §32, pp. 188-189 (5th ed. 1984). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Breyer delivered the opinion of the Court. This case concerns pre-emption. A Michigan law imposes “an annual fee of $100.00” upon each Michigan license-plated truck that is “operating entirely in interstate commerce.” Mich. Comp. Laws Ann. §478.2(2) (West 2002) (hereinafter MCL). A federal statute states that “a State registration requirement,.. is an unreasonable burden” upon interstate commerce when it imposes so high a fee. 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b) (emphasis added); see also § 14504(e)(2)(B)(iv)(III). Does this federal statutory provision pre-empt the Michigan law? We conclude that the Michigan fee requirement is not the kind of “State registration requirement” to which the federal statute refers. And for that reason, the statute does not pre-empt it. I A Federal law has long required most motor carriers doing interstate business to obtain a permit — which we shall call a Federal Permit — that reflects compliance with certain federal requirements. See 49 U. S. C. § 13901 et seq.; 49 CFR § 365.101 et seq. (2004). In 1965, Congress authorized States to require proof that the operator of an interstate truck had secured a Federal Permit. 49 U. S. C. § 302(b)(2) (1976 ed.); see generally Yellow Transp., Inc. v. Michigan, 537 U. S. 36, 39 (2002). By 1991, 39 States demanded such proof by requiring some form of what we shall call State Registration (of the Federal Permit). Those States typically would require truckers to file with a state agency evidence that each interstate truck was covered by a Federal Permit. They would require the trucker to pay a State Registration fee of up to $10 per truck. And they would issue a State Registration stamp that the trucker would affix to a multistate “bingo card” carried within the vehicle. See 49 CFR §§ 1023.32, 1023.33 (1990); Yellow Transp., 537 U. S., at 39. In 1991, Congress focused upon the fact that the “bingo card” system required a trucking company to obtain a separate stamp from each State through which an interstate truck traveled. It found this scheme inefficient and burdensome. See id., at 39-40. And it enacted a statute setting forth a new system, the Single State Registration System (SSRS), which remains in effect today. Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA), 49 U. S. C. § 14504. The SSRS allows a trucking company to fill out one set of forms in one State (the base State), and by doing so to register its Federal Permit in every participating State through which its trucks will travel. § 14504(c); 49 CFR § 367.4(b) (2004). The SSRS statute says that the base State can demand: (1) proof of the trucking company’s possession of a Federal Permit, (2) proof of insurance, (3) the name of an agent designated to receive “service of process,” and (4) a total fee (charged for the filing of the proof of insurance) equal to the sum of the individual state fees. 49 U. S. C. §§ 14604(c)(2)(A)(i)-(iv); 49 CFR §§ 367.4(c)(1)-(4) (2004). Each individual state fee, it adds, cannot exceed the amount the State charged under the “bingo card” system, and in no event can it exceed $10 per truck. 49 U. S. C. § 14504(c) (2)(B)(iv)(III). After a truck owner registers, base state officials provide the owner with a receipt to be kept in the cab of each registered truck. 49 CFR §§ 367.5(a), (b), (e) (2004). The base State distributes to each participating State its share of the total registration fee. § 367.6(a). The SSRS statute specifies that a State may not impose any additional “registration requirement.” It states specifically, in the statutory sentence at issue here, that when a State Registration requirement imposes further obligations, “the part in excess is an unreasonable burden.” 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b). It adds that a State may not require “decals, stamps, cab cards, or any other means of registering... specific vehicles.” § 14504(c)(2)(B)(iii). And it provides that the “charging or collection of any fee under this section that is not in accordance with the fee system established [in this provision] shall be deemed to be a burden on interstate commerce.” § 14504(c)(2)(C). At the same time, the statute makes clear that a State that complies with the SSRS system need not fear Commerce Clause attack, for it says that a state requirement that an interstate truck “must register with the State” is “not an unreasonable burden on transportation,” provided that “the State registration is completed” in accordance with the SSRS statute. § 14504(b). B The state law at issue here, §478.2(2) of the Michigan Motor Carrier Act, reads as follows: “A motor carrier licensed in this state shall pay an annual fee of $100.00 for each vehicle operated by the motor carrier which is registered in this state [i e., which has a Michigan license plate] and operating entirely in interstate commerce.” Related state rules and regulations require a carrier paying the $100 fee to identify each interstate truck by make, type, year, serial number, and unit number. See Equipment List Form P-344-T, App. to Defendant’s Response to Plaintiffs’ Motion for Summary Disposition in No. 95-15628-CM etc. (Mich. Ct. Cl.) (hereinafter Equipment List Form P-344-T). They also make clear that, upon payment of the fee, the carrier will receive a decal that must be affixed to the truck. App. 24 (Affidavit of Pub. Serv. Comm’n. official Thomas R. Lonergan). And they provide that a carrier who pays this fee need not pay the $10 SSRS registration fee if the carrier chooses Michigan as its SSRS base State. See, e.g., id., at 67, n.; Westlake Transp., Inc. v. Michigan Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 255 Mich. App. 589, 603-604, n. 6, 662 N. W. 2d 784, 790-792, n. 6 (2003); Reply Brief for Petitioners 14-15, n. 8. C Petitioners are interstate trucking companies with trucks that bear Michigan license plates and operate entirely in interstate commerce. Hence they are subject to Michigan’s $100 fee. MCL § 478.2(2) (West 2002). They asked a Michigan court to invalidate § 478.2(2) as pre-empted by the federal SSRS statute. 255 Mich. App., at 592, 662 N. W. 2d, at 789-790. The Michigan Court of Claims rejected their claim. Id., at 593-594, 662 N. W. 2d, at 789-790. And the Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed. Id., at 604, 662 N. W. 2d, at 795. The Court of Appeals wrote that the $100 fee is a “regulatory fee” — a “fee imposed for the administration” of the State’s Motor Carrier Act and for enforcement of Michigan “safety regulations.” Ibid. As such, it falls outside the scope of the term “registration requirement” as used in the federal SSRS statute, 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b). 255 Mich. App., at 604, 662 N. W. 2d, at 795. The federal statute, according to the Michigan court, consequently does not pre-empt it. Ibid. Petitioners sought leave to appeal to the Michigan Supreme Court; leave was denied. Westlake Transp., Inc. v. Michigan Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 469 Mich. 976, 673 N. W. 2d 752 (2003). We granted their petition for certiorari and consolidated the case with American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Michigan Pub. Serv. Comm’n, ante, p. 429, a case in which interstate truckers sought review of a separate Michigan fee. We now affirm the Michigan court’s judgment in this case, though for other reasons. II A The first legal question before us concerns the meaning of the federal statutory words “State registration requirement.” They appear in a subsection that reads in relevant part as follows: “The requirement of a State that a motor carrier, providing [interstate transportation] in that State, must register with the State is not an unreasonable burden on transportation... when the State registration is completed under standards of the Secretary [of Transportation] under subsection (c). When a State registration requirement imposes obligations in excess of the standards of the Secretary, the part in excess is an unreasonable burden.” 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b) (emphasis added). What is the scope of the italicized words? Petitioners ask us to give these words a broad interpretation, sweeping within their ambit every state requirement involving some form of individualized registration that affects an interstate motor carrier. Brief for Petitioners 15 (federal statute’s limits apply “to all interstate motor carriers compelled to register their operations with any State regulatory commission under any State law” (emphasis in original)). The United States argues for a somewhat narrower interpretation, submitting that the words apply to “state registration requirements that are imposed on interstate carriers by reason of their operation in interstate commerce.” Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 19-20 (emphasis in original). In our view, however, the language, read in context, is yet more narrow. Reference to text, historical context, and purpose discloses that the words “State registration requirement” do not apply to every State Registration requirement that happens to cover interstate carriers, nor to every such requirement specifically focused on a trucking operation’s interstate character. Rather, they apply only to those state requirements that concern SSRS registration — that is, registration with a State of evidence that a carrier possesses a Federal Permit, registration of proof of insurance, or registration of the name of an agent “for service of process.” § 14504(c)(2)(A)(iv). Thus, the federal provision pre-empts only those state requirements that (1) concern the subject matter of the SSRS and (2) are “in excess” of the requirements that the SSRS imposes in respect to that subject matter. See § 14504(b). To begin with, statutory language makes clear that the federal provision reaches no further. Section 14504(b)’s first sentence says that a state “requirement” that an interstate motor carrier must “register with the State is not an unreasonable burden... when the State registration is completed under standards of the Secretary under subsection (c).” Ibid. It is clear from the text as a whole that “State registration” cannot cover all registration requirements, but only some. Cf. post, at 464-465 (Kennedy, J., dissenting). The first sentence’s reference to the “standards of the Secretary” (as well as the focus of the entire statute) tells us which. Those “standards,” set forth in subsection (c) — which is titled “Single State Registration System” — exclusively relate to State Registration of “evidence of” a Federal Permit, “proof of” insurance, and the “name of a local agent for service of process,” and state fees “for the filing of proof of insurance.” §§ 14504(c)(2)(A)(i)-(iv); § 14504(c)(2)(B)(iv). And the rest of the statute similarly deals exclusively with SSRS matters. See § 14504(a) (“standards” mean “the specification of forms and procedures required” to prove that a motor carrier is in compliance with federal requirements). Thus, the words “State registration” in the pre-emption provision’s first sentence refer only to state systems that seek evidence that a trucker has complied with specific, federally enumerated, SSRS obligations. Cf. 49 U. S. C. § 13908(d) (§ 14504’s fees relate specifically to state efforts to obtain proof of insurance under the SSRS); §§ 13908(b)(2) — (3) (indicating that § 14504 refers to state requirements having this purpose). How could the same words in the second sentence refer to something totally different? We have found no language here or elsewhere in the statute (which we reproduce in the Appendix, infra) suggesting that the term “State registration requirement” in sentence two refers to all State Registration requirements “imposed on interstate carriers by reason of their operation in interstate commerce.” Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 20 (emphasis in original). Indeed, to read the words “by reason of... ” into § 14504, a linguistic stretch, would be wholly inconsistent with the statute’s basic purposes, because it would leave a State free to implement a regulation in excess of specific SSRS limitations as long as it did not single out interstate carriers (say, a neutral rule that all truckers must pay $50, or $500, per truck for proof of insurance, or must designate multiple agents for service of process). See post, at 463 (Kennedy, J., dissenting). To avoid this severely incongruous result, the dissent (which adopts the Government’s view) must resort to interpretive acrobatics. After first reading subsection (b) to say that a neutral base state requirement, despite being “in excess” of SSRS standards, is not an “unreasonable burden on” commerce, it then reads subsection (c) to say that such a requirement, because it is “in excess” of SSRS standards, is nonetheless prohibited by the statute (in effect, an unreasonable burden on commerce). Post, at 466-468. Aside from imposing significant complexities on the statute where otherwise none would exist, this reading stretches subsection (c)’s function beyond that which its structure and language will allow. Similarly, we see no language elsewhere in the statute suggesting that the term “State registration requirement” refers to any kind of State Registration whatsoever that might affect interstate carriers. And even the Government concedes that certain registration obligations — those in “traditional areas of state regulation” — are beyond the preemptive reach of the statute. Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 19. Finally, the implementing regulations do not support these broader constructions. See 49 CFR §367.1 et seq. (2004). Our reading of the text finds confirmation in historical context. Congress enacted §14504 to simplify the old “bingo card” system. See Yellow Transp., 537 U. S., at 39-40. Under the “bingo card” scheme, each State could independently demand the same separate filings (evidence of a Federal Permit, proof of insurance, and a service-of-process agent) as well as separate fees. 49 U. S. C. § 302(b)(2) (1976 ed.); §11506 (1988 ed.); 49 CFR §§ 1023.11, 1023.21, 1023.32, 1023.51 (1990). Federal law governing that scheme placed no express constraints on any state filings or fees other than those concerning Federal Permit and insurance requirements. Indeed, federal regulations specified that the federal “bingo card” statute did not “affect” the “collection or [the] method of collection of taxes or fees by a State” from interstate truckers “for the operation of vehicles within” its “borders.” § 1023.104. And they further provided that the statute did not “affect” state requirements “as to the external identification of vehicles to indicate the payment of a State tax or fee imposed for revenue purposes or for any other purpose” not governed by the “bingo card” system. §1023.42. When Congress created the new SSRS, it did not indicate (in the text, structure, or divinable purpose of the new provision) that the pre-emptive scope of the new scheme would be any broader than that of the old. See ISTEA, 105 Stat. 1914. The relevant differences between the SSRS and the “bingo card” regime were that: (1) one State, rather than many, would collect the relevant filings; (2) one State, rather than many, would collect the relevant fees; and (3) these fees, limited to the same amount as before, would relate to filing of proof of insurance rather than to filing of the Federal Permit. Compare 49 U. S. C. § 11506 (1988 ed.) with § 14504 (2000 ed.); see also § 11506 (1988 ed., Supp. IV). These modifications merely sought more efficient, not greater, federal regulation. See Yellow Transp., supra; see also 49 U. S. C. §§ 13908(a), (d) (authorizing the Secretary to replace the SSRS with a yet more streamlined system and pre-empting only those State “insurance filing requirements or fees that are for the same purposes as filings or fees the Secretary requires under the new system” (emphasis added)). And while the new regulations implementing the SSRS do not explicitly exempt unrelated state requirements from the statute’s pre-emptive reach, neither they nor the rulemaking that produced them suggest any change to pre-existing practice in this respect. See 49 CFR §367.1 et seq. (2004); see also Single State Insurance Registration, 9 I. C. C. 2d 610 (1993) (Interstate Commerce Commission decision announcing new regulations); Single State Insurance Registration, No. MC-100 (Sub-No. 6), 1993 WL 17833 (I. C. C., Jan. 13, 1993) (proposing regulations, providing justifications, and soliciting farther comments). Finally, we have found nothing in the statute’s basic purposes or objectives — improving the efficiency of the “bingo card” system and simplifying a uniform scheme for providing States with certain vital information — that either requires a broader reading of the statutory term, or that impliedly pre-empts other, non-SSRS-related state rules. Cf. Geier v. American Honda Motor Co., 529 U. S. 861, 881 (2000) (federal statutes by implication pre-empt state law that stands “as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution” of their federal objectives (internal quotation marks omitted)). That is, we can find no indication that Congress sought to use this narrowly focused statute to forbid state fee or registration obligations that have nothing to do with basic SSRS (or earlier “bingo card”) objectives — say, for example, a State Registration requirement related to compliance by interstate carriers with rules governing the introduction of foreign pests into the jurisdiction, or with a State’s version of the Amber Alert system, or with size, weight, and safety standards. The Constitution’s Commerce Clause may (or may not) forbid some such rules. But this statute — which identifies and regulates very specific items — says nothing about them, and there is no reason to believe that Congress wished to resolve that kind of Commerce Clause issue in this provision. Cf. 49 U. S. C. § 13908 (indicating that the SSRS may well be only a temporary system and similarly focusing on limited, federally enumerated requirements without discussing broad pre-emption). We conclude, as we have said, that the term “State registration requirement,” as used in the second sentence of the SSRS statute, covers only those State Registration requirements that concern the subject matter of that statutory provision, namely, the registration of a Federal Permit, proof of insurance, and the name of an agent for service of process. See supra, at 446-447. It neither explicitly nor implicitly reaches unrelated matters. B The second legal question involves the Michigan statute imposing the $100 fee on Michigan-plated trucks operating entirely in interstate commerce. MCL §478.2(2) (West 2002). Do the requirements set forth in that statute concern the SSRS statute’s subject matter? We think that they do not. For one thing, the Michigan statute imposing the $100 fee makes no reference to evidence of a Federal Permit, to any insurance requirement, or to an agent for receiving service of process. Nor, as far as we can tell, do any state rules related to the $100 fee require the filing of information about these matters. See Equipment List Form P-344-T (requiring information about truck make, type, year, unit number, and serial number). For another thing, Michigan law imposed a separate fee on interstate motor carriers with trucks license plated in Michigan before the SSRS existed and before Michigan began to participate in the “bingo card” system. See App. 24-25; Plaintiffs’ Second Motion for Partial Summary Disposition in No. 95-15628-CM etc. (Mich. Ct. Cl.), p. 5; Plaintiffs-Appellants’ Brief on Appeal, in No. 226052 etc. (Mich. Ct. App.), pp. 5-6; MCL § 478.7(4) (West 2002). Hence such a fee does not represent an effort somehow to circumvent the limitations imposed in connection with federal laws governing State Registration of Federal Permits. Finally, Michigan rules provide that a Michigan-plated interstate truck choosing Michigan as its SSRS base State can apparently comply with Michigan’s SSRS requirements even if it does not comply with Michigan’s $100 fee requirement. The owner of that truck can fill out Michigan form RS-1, thereby providing Michigan with evidence that it has a Federal Permit. App. 65-66. It can also fill out form RS-2, on which it indicates the total SSRS fees it owes to all participating States whose borders the truck will cross. Id., at 67. Upon submission of the two forms and payment of the fees, Michigan apparently will give the owner form RS-3, an SSRS receipt, a copy of which the owner can place in the vehicle of the truck, thereby complying with Michigan’s (and all other participating States’) SSRS-related “State registration requirements.” If that owner fails to pay Michigan’s $100 fee for that truck, the owner will not receive a state fee decal. But that owner will have violated only Michigan’s $100 fee statute here at issue, MCL §478.2(2) (West 2002). Petitioners have provided us with nothing that suggests the owner will have violated any other provision of Michigan law. See § 478.7(4). And they have not demonstrated that Michigan law in practice holds hostage a truck owner’s SSRS compliance until the owner pays §478.2(2)’s $100 fee. On the other hand, we recognize that Michigan form RS-2, the form that lists all SSRS-participating States together with their SSRS-related fees, places an asterisk next to Michigan and states that “[vjehicles base-plated in Michigan need not” pay any SSRS fee but “are required to have a $100.00” Michigan decal. App. 67. Michigan thereby forgives Michigan-plated interstate trucks (which must pay Michigan $100) payment of the $10 Michigan SSRS fee that would otherwise be due. And to that extent, there is a connection between the $100 fee and the SSRS. Michigan appears to forgive its $10 SSRS fee, however, only for the Michigan-plated interstate trucks of a carrier that has chosen Michigan as its SSRS “base” State. See Reply Brief for Petitioners 14-15, n. 8. Michigan-plated trucks operating out of a different SSRS base State, say, Ohio, must pay the fee, which is remitted back to Michigan. Thus, the $10 reduction can be seen simply as an effort to provide modest, administratively efficient (because Michigan itself is handling both fees) recompense to those motor carriers that operate Michigan-plated trucks and choose Michigan as their SSRS base State. That subsidiary connection cannot transform Michigan’s $100 fee, which exclusively involves non-SSRS subject matter (and was created for non-SSRS-related reasons), into a requirement that concerns the subject matter of the SSRS statute. * * * For these reasons, we conclude that 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b) does not pre-empt Michigan’s $100 fee. The judgment of the Michigan Court of Appeals is affirmed. It is so ordered. APPENDIX TO OPINION OF THE COURT Title 49 U. S. C. § 14504 provides: “Registration of motor carriers by a State “(a) Definitions. — In this section, the terms ‘standards’ and ‘amendments to standards’ mean the specification of forms and procedures required by regulations of the Secretary to prove the lawfulness of transportation by motor carrier referred to in section 13501. “(b) General Rule. — The requirement of a State that a motor carrier, providing transportation subject to jurisdiction under subchapter I of chapter 135 and providing transportation in that State, must register with the State is not an unreasonable burden on transportation referred to in section 13501 when the State registration is completed under standards of the Secretary under subsection (c). When a State registration requirement imposes obligations in excess of the standards of the Secretary, the part in excess is an unreasonable burden. “(c) Single State Registration System.— “(1) In general. — The Secretary shall maintain standards for implementing a system under which— “(A) a motor carrier is required to register annually with only one State by providing evidence of its Federal registration under chapter 139; “(B) the State of registration shall fully comply with standards prescribed under this section; and “(C) such single State registration shall be deemed to satisfy the registration requirements of all other States. “(2) Specific requirements.— “(A) Evidence of federal registration; proof OF insurance; payment of fees. — Under the standards of the Secretary implementing the single State registration system described in paragraph (1) of this subsection, only a State acting in its capacity as registration State under such single State system may require a motor carrier registered by the Secretary under this part— “(i) to file and maintain evidence of such Federal registration; “(ii) to file satisfactory proof of required insurance or qualification as a self-insurer; “(iii) to pay directly to such State fee amounts in accordance with the fee system established under subpara-graph (B)(iv) of this paragraph, subject to allocation of fee revenues among all States in which the carrier operates and which participate in the single State registration system; and “(iv) to file the name of a local agent for service of process. “(B) Receipts; pee system. — The standards of the Secretary— “(i) shall require that the registration State issue a receipt, in a form prescribed under the standards, reflecting that the carrier has filed proof of insurance as provided under subparagraph (A)(ii) of this paragraph and has paid fee amounts in accordance with the fee system established under clause (iv) of this subparagraph; “(ii) shall require that copies of the receipt issued under clause (i) of this subparagraph be kept in each of the carrier’s commercial motor vehicles; “(iii) shall not require decals, stamps, cab cards, or any other means of registering or identifying specific vehicles operated by the carrier; “(iv) shall establish a fee system for the filing of proof of insurance as provided under subparagraph (A)(ii) of this paragraph that— “(I) is based on the number of commercial motor vehicles the carrier operates in a State and on the number of States in which the carrier operates; “(II) minimizes the costs of complying with the registration system; and “(III) results in a fee for each participating State that is equal to the fee, not to exceed $10 per vehicle, that such State collected or charged as of November 15, 1991; and “(v) shall not authorize the charging or collection of any fee for filing and maintaining evidence of Federal registration under subparagraph (A)(i) of this paragraph. “(C) Prohibited fees. — The charging or collection of any fee under this section that is not in accordance with the fee system established under subparagraph (B)(iv) of this paragraph shall be deemed to be a burden on interstate commerce. “(D) Limitation on participation by States.— Only a State which, as of January 1, 1991, charged or collected a fee for a vehicle identification stamp or number under part 1023 of title 49, Code of Federal Regulations, shall be eligible to participate as a registration State under this subsection or to receive any fee revenue under this subsection.” Justice Kennedy, with whom The Chief Justice and Justice O’Connor join, dissenting. The Michigan Court of Appeals, in my view, erred in holding that Mich. Comp. Laws Ann. §478.2(2) (West 2002) (hereinafter MCL) is not a registration requirement. Westlake Transp., Inc. v. Michigan Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 255 Mich. App. 589, 603-605, 662 N. W. 2d 784, 795 (2003). Our Court, too, errs by concluding that the term “State registration requirement” in 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b) includes only those state registration requirements that “concern the [same] subject matter” as the Single State Registration System (SSRS) established by § 14504(c). Ante, at 447, 451. This respectful dissent explains my reasons for rejecting these two holdings. I Title 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b) provides: “The requirement of a State that a motor carrier, providing [interstate transportation] in that State, must register with the State is not an unreasonable burden on transportation... when the State registration is completed under standards of the Secretary [of Transportation] under [§ 14504(c)]. When a State registration requirement imposes obligations in excess of the standards of the Secretary, the part in excess is an unreasonable burden.” The dispositive question in the instant case is whether MCL §478.2(2) is a “State registration requirement” within the meaning of the second sentence of 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b). The Michigan Court of Appeals said the answer is no because MCL § 478.2(2) is not a registration requirement at all. The Court also says the answer is no, but for a different reason. It concludes that, even though § 478.2(2) is a registration requirement, the term “registration requirement” in 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b) includes only the subset of registration requirements that concern the same subject matter as the SSRS. Neither the Court’s reason, nor the different reason given by the Michigan Court of Appeals, is persuasive. A The Michigan Court of Appeals adopted a categorical rule: “If the purpose of a fee is to regulate an industry or service, it can be properly classified as a regulatory fee,” not a registration fee. 255 Mich. App., at 605, 662 N. W. 2d, at 795. Proceeding to apply the rule so announced, the Court of Appeals held that the $100 fee imposed by MCL § 478.2(2) on Michigan-plated interstate carriers is a regulatory fee rather than a registration fee because the fee is “imposed for the administration of the [Michigan Motor Carrier Act], particularly covering costs of enforcing safety regulations.” Id., at 604, 662 N. W. 2d, at 795. The majority affirms the judgment below, but “for other reasons.” Ante, at 446. The Court’s reluctance to adopt the Michigan Court of Appeals’ rationale is understandable. MCL §478.2(2) and related state rules and regulations require a motor carrier that wants to operate Michigan-plated vehicles in interstate commerce in Michigan to fill out a form providing detailed identifying information for each vehicle and to pay a $100-per-vehicle fee. In return, the State provides the carrier with decals that it must place on its trucks. See ante, at 444-445. If this is not a “State registration requirement” in the general and ordinary sense of the term, it is hard to conceive of what is. The Court of Appeals’ holding would allow the State to convert any registration fee into a regulatory fee simply by declaring a regulatory purpose or spending some portion of the money collected on regulation or administration. The logic of this approach excludes from the coverage of 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b) almost all state requirements, including those dealing with similar subject matter as the SSRS. The purpose of SSRS requirements, after all, is to regulate the interstate motor carrier industry; and the fees collected are used to administer the system. The Court’s disapproval of the Michigan Court of Appeals’ reasoning is implicit in the Court’s decision to affirm on a different ground. Ante, at 446. Yet the Court’s affirmance of the Court of Appeals’ decision, coupled with the Court’s failure to make its apparent disagreement with the reasoning explicit, will result in the Michigan Court of Appeals’ broad rule surviving to work additional mischief in future cases, a most undesirable result in this area, where fees and regulatory requirements are so pervasive. B 1 Although the Court' appears to agree that MCL §478.2(2) imposes a state registration requirement on interstate motor carriers, it holds, nonetheless, that the provision is not preempted by 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b). This, according to the Court, is because the phrase “State registration requirement” in § 14504(b) refers not to state registration requirements generally, but only to those state registration requirements that concern the same subject matter as the SSRS: registration of a federal permit, proof of insurance, and designation of an agent for service of process. Ante, at 451. Section 14504(b) simply cannot bear the narrowing construction the Court seeks to impose upon it. The first sentence of § 14504(b) authorizes States to impose registration requirements on interstate motor carriers if the registration “is completed under standards of the Secretary under [§ 14504(c)],” i. e., under the SSRS. The second sentence of § 14504(b) pre-empts “a State registration requirement” that imposes “obligations in excess” of the SSRS. There ought to be no question that MCL § 478.2(2) is a state registration requirement. The Court seems to agree, at least when the phrase “State registration requirement” is used in its ordinary and general sense. It should also be apparent that the obligations imposed by § 478.2(2) are in excess of those authorized by the standards of the Secretary under 49 U. S. C. § 14504(c). The plain text of § 14504(b), then, would appear to pre-empt MCL §478.2(2), at least when § 478.2(2) is considered in isolation. The Court, however, departs from the text of the statute. Title 49 U. S. C. § 14504(b), by its terms, saves from preemption only one class of state registration requirements imposed on interstate motor carriers: those completed under standards of the Secretary under § 14504(c), i. e., those that are authorized under the SSRS. To this subset the Court adds a second class of state registration requirements saved from pre-emption: Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

J

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. These cases concern a facial challenge to Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regulations which limit the ability of Title X fund recipients to engage in abortion-related activities. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld the regulations, finding them to be a permissible construction of the statute as well as consistent with the First and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution. We granted certiorari to resolve a split among the Courts of Appeals. We affirm. I A In 1970, Congress enacted Title X of the Public Health Service Act (Act), 84 Stat. 1506, as amended, 42 U. S. C. §§300 to 300a-6, which provides federal funding for family-planning services. The Act authorizes the Secretary to “make grants to and enter into contracts with public or nonprofit private entities to assist in the establishment and operation of voluntary family planning projects which shall offer a broad range of acceptable and effective family planning methods and services.” § 300(a). Grants and contracts under Title X must “be made in accordance with such regulations as the Secretary may promulgate.” §300a-4(a). Section 1008 of the Act, however, provides that “[n]one of the funds appropriated under this subchapter shall be used in programs where abortion is a method of family planning.” 42 U. S. C. § 300a-6. That restriction was intended to ensure that Title X funds would “be used only to support preventive family planning services, population research, infertility services, and other related medical, informational, and educational activities.” H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 91-1667, p. 8 (1970). In 1988, the Secretary promulgated new regulations designed to provide “ ‘clear and operational guidance’ to grantees about how to preserve the distinction between Title X programs and abortion as a method of family planning.” 53 Fed. Reg. 2923-2924 (1988). The regulations clarify, through the definition of the term “family planning,” that Congress intended Title X funds “to be used only to support preventive family planning services.” H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 91-1667, p. 8 (emphasis added). Accordingly, Title X services are limited to “preconeeptional counseling, education, and general reproductive health care,” and expressly exclude “pregnancy care (including obstetric or prenatal care).” 42 CFR §59.2 (1989). The regulations “focus the emphasis of the Title X program omits traditional mission: The provision of preventive family planning services specifically designed to enable individuals to determine the number and spacing of their children, while clarifying that pregnant women must be referred to appropriate prenatal care services.” 53 Fed. Reg. 2925 (1988). The regulations attach three principal conditions on the grant of federal funds for Title X projects. First, the regulations specify that a “Title X project may not provide counseling concerning the use of abortion as a method of family planning or provide referral for abortion as a method of family planning.” 42 CFR § 59.8(a)(1) (1989). Because Title X is limited to preconeeptional services, the program does not furnish services related to childbirth. Only in the context of a referral out of the Title X program is a pregnant woman given transitional information. § 59.8(a)(2). Title X projects must refer every pregnant client “for appropriate prenatal and/or social services by furnishing a list of available providers that promote the welfare of mother and unborn child.” Ibid. The list may not be used indirectly to encourage or promote abortion, “such as by weighing the list of referrals in favor of health care providers which perform abortions, by including on the list of referral providers health care providers whose principal business is the' provision of abortions, by excluding available providers who do not provide abortions, or by ‘steering’ clients to providers who offer abortion as a method of family planning.” § 59.8(a)(3). The Title X project is expressly prohibited from referring a pregnant woman to an abortion provider, even upon specific request. One permissible response to such an inquiry is that “the project does not consider abortion an appropriate method of family planning and therefore does not counsel or refer for abortion. ” § 59.8(b)(5). Second, the regulations broadly prohibit a Title X project from engaging in activities that “encourage, promote or advocate abortion as a method of family planning.” §59.10(a). Forbidden activities include lobbying for legislation that would increase the availability of abortion as a method of family planning, developing or disseminating materials advocating abortion as a method of family planning, providing speakers to promote abortion as a method of family planning, using legal action to make abortion available in any way as a method of family planning, and paying dues to any group that advocates abortion as a method of family planning as a substantial part of its activities. Ibid. Third, the regulations require that Title X projects be organized so that they are “physically and financially separate” from prohibited abortion activities. §59.9. To be deemed physically and financially separate, “a Title X project must have an objective integrity and independence from prohibited activities. Mere bookkeeping separation of Title X funds from other-monies is not sufficient.” Ibid. The regulations provide a list of nonexclusive factors for the Secretary to consider in conducting a case-by-case determination of objective integrity and independence, such as the existence of separate accounting records and separate personnel, and the degree of physical separation of the project from facilities for prohibited activities. Ibid. B Petitioners are Title X grantees and doctors who supervise Title X funds suing on behalf of themselves and their patients. Respondent is the Secretary of HHS. After the regulations had been promulgated, but before they had been applied, petitioners filed two separate actions, later consolidated, challenging the facial validity of the regulations and seeking declaratory and injunctive relief to prevent implementation of the regulations. Petitioners challenged the regulations on the grounds that they were not authorized by Title X and that they violate the First and Fifth Amendment rights of Title X clients and the First Amendment rights of Title X health providers. After initially granting petitioners a preliminary injunction, the District Court rejected petitioners’ statutory and constitutional challenges to the regulations and granted summary judgment in favor of the Secretary. New York v. Bowen, 690 F. Supp. 1261 (SDNY 1988). A panel of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed. 889 F. 2d 401 (1989). Applying this Court’s decision in Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837, 842-843 (1984), the Court of Appeals determined that the regulations were a permissible construction of the statute that legitimately effectuated congressional intent. The court rejected as “highly strained,” petitioners’ contention that the plain language of § 1008 forbids Title X projects only from performing abortions. The court reasoned that “it would be wholly anomalous to read Section 1008 to mean that a program that merely counsels but does not perform abortions does not include abortion as a ‘method of family planning.’ ” 889 F. 2d, at 407. “[T]he natural construction of... the term ‘method of family planning’ includes counseling concerning abortion.” Ibid. The court found this construction consistent with the legislative history and observed that “[appellants’ contrary view of the legislative history is based entirely on highly generalized statements about the expansive scope of the family planning services” that “do not specifically mention counseling concerning abortion as an intended service of Title X projects” and that “surely cannot be read to trump a section of the statute that specifically excludes it.” Id., at 407-408. Turning to petitioners’ constitutional challenges to the regulations, the Court of Appeals rejected petitioners’ Fifth Amendment challenge. It held that the regulations do not impermissibly burden a woman’s right to an abortion because the “government may validly choose to favor childbirth over abortion and to implement that choice by funding medical services relating to childbirth but not those relating to abortion.” Id., at 410. Finding that the prohibition on the performance of abortions upheld by the Court in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, 492 U. S. 490 (1989), was “substantially greater in impact than the regulations challenged in the instant matter,” 889 F. 2d, at 411, the court concluded that the regulations “create[d] no affirmative legal barriers to access to abortion.” Ibid., citing Webster v. Reproductive Health Services. The court likewise found that the “Secretary’s implementation of Congress’s decision not to fund abortion counseling, referral or advocacy also does not, under applicable Supreme Court precedent, constitute a facial violation of the First Amendment rights of health care providers or of women.” 889 F. 2d, at 412. The court explained that under Regan v. Taxation with Representation of Wash., 461 U. S. 540 (1983), the Government has no obligation to subsidize even the exercise of fundamental rights, including “speech rights.” The court also held that the regulations do not violate the First Amendment by “condition[ing] receipt of a benefit on the relinquishment of constitutional rights" because Title X grantees and their employees "remain free to say whatever they wish about abortion outside the Title X project." 889 F. 2d, at 412. Finally, the court rejected petitioners' contention that the regulations "facially discriminate on the basis of the viewpoint of the speech involved." Id., at 414. II We begin by pointing out the posture of the cases before us. Petitioners are challenging the facial validity of the regulations. Thus, we are concerned only with the question whether, on their face, the regulations are both authorized by the Act and can be construed in such a manner that they can be applied to a set of individuals without infringing upon constitutionally protected rights. Petitioners face a heavy burden in seeking to have the regulations invalidated as facially unconstitutional. "A facial challenge to a legislative Act is, of course, the most difficult challenge to mount successfully, since the challenger must establish that no set of circumstances exists under which the Act would be valid. The fact that [the regulations] might operate unconstitutionally under some conceivable set of circumstances is insufficient to render [them] wholly invalid." United States v. Salerno, 481 U. S. 739, 745 (1987). We turn first to petitioners' contention that the regulations exceed the Secretary's authority under Title X and are arbitrary and capricious. We begin with an examination of the regulations concerning abortion counseling, referral, and advocacy, which every Court of Appeals has found to be authorized by the statute, and then turn to the "program integrity requirement," with respect to which the courts below have adopted conflicting positions. We then address petitioners' claim that the regulations must be struck down because they raise a substantial constitutional question. A We need not dwell on the plain language of the statute because we agree with every court to have addressed the issue that the language is ambiguous. The language of § 1008— that “[n]one of the funds appropriated under this subchapter shall be used in programs where abortion is a method of family planning” — does not speak directly to the issues of counseling, referral, advocacy, or program integrity. If a statute is “silent or ambiguous with respect to the specific issue, the question for the court is whether the agency’s answer is based on a permissible construction of the statute.” Chevron, 467 U. S., at 842-843. The Secretary’s construction of Title X may not be disturbed as an abuse of discretion if it reflects a plausible construction of the plain language of the statute and does not otherwise conflict with Congress’ expressed intent. Ibid. In determining whether a construction is permissible, “[t]he court need not conclude that the agency construction was the only one it permissibly could have adopted... or even the reading the court would have reached if the question initially had arisen in a judicial proceeding.” Id., at 843, n. 11. Rather, substantial deference is accorded to the interpretation of the authorizing statute by the agency authorized with administering it. Id., at 844. The broad language of Title X plainly allows the Secretary’s construction of the statute. By its own terms, § 1008 prohibits the use of Title X funds “in programs where abortion is a method of family planning.” Title X does not define the term “method of family planning,” nor does it enumerate what types of medical and counseling services are entitled to Title X funding. Based on the broad directives provided by Congress in Title X in general and § 1008 in particular, we are unable to say that the Secretary’s construction of the prohibition in § 1008 to require a ban on counseling, referral, and advocacy within the Title X project is impermissible. The District Courts and Courts of Appeals that have examined the legislative history have all found, at least with regard to the Act’s counseling, referral, and advocacy provisions, that the legislative history is ambiguous with respect to Congress’ intent in enacting Title X and the prohibition of § 1008. Massachusetts v. Secretary of Health and Human Services, 899 F. 2d 53, 62 (CA1 1990) (“Congress has not addressed specifically the question of the scope of the abortion prohibition. The language of the statute and the legislative history can support either of the litigants’ positions”); Planned Parenthood Federation of America v. Sullivan, 913 F. 2d 1492, 1497 (CA10 1990) (“[T]he contemporaneous legislative history does not address whether clinics receiving Title X funds can engage in nondirective counseling including the abortion option and referrals”); 889 F. 2d, at 407 (case below) (“Nothing in the legislative history of Title X detracts” from the Secretary’s construction of § 1008). We join these courts in holding that the legislative history is ambiguous and fails to shed light on relevant congressional intent. At no time did Congress directly address the issues of abortion counseling, referral, or advocacy. The parties’ attempts to characterize highly generalized, conflicting statements in the legislative history into accurate revelations of congressional intent are unavailing. When we find, as we do here, that the legislative history is ambiguous and unenlightening on the matters with respect to which the regulations deal, we customarily defer to the expertise of the agency. Petitioners argue, however, that the regulations are entitled to little or no deference because they “reverse a longstanding agency policy that permitted nondi-rective counseling and referral for abortion,” Brief for Petitioners in No. 89-1392, p. 20, and thus represent a sharp break from the Secretary’s prior construction of the statute. Petitioners argue that the agency’s prior consistent interpretation of §1008 to permit nondirective counseling and to encourage coordination with local and state family planning services is entitled to substantial weight. This Court has rejected the argument that an agency’s interpretation “is not entitled to deference because it represents a sharp break with prior interpretations” of the statute in question. Chevron, 467 U. S., at 862. In Chevron, we held that a revised interpretation deserves deference because “[a]n initial agency interpretation is not instantly carved in stone” and “the agency, to engage in informed rulemaking, must consider varying interpretations and the wisdom of its policy on a continuing basis.” Id., at 863-864. An agency is not required to “‘establish rules of conduct to last forever,”’ Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Assn. of United States, Inc. v. State Farm Mut. Automobile Ins. Co., 463 U. S. 29, 42 (1983), quoting American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Atchison, T. & S. F. R. Co., 387 U. S. 397, 416 (1967); NLRB v. Curtin Matheson Scientific, Inc., 494 U. S. 775 (1990), but rather “must be given ample latitude to ‘adapt [its] rules and policies to the demands of changing circumstances.’” Motor Vehicle Mfrs., supra, at 42, quoting Permian Basin Area Rate Cases, 390 U. S. 747, 784 (1968). We find that the Secretary amply justified his change of interpretation with a “reasoned analysis.” Motor Vehicle Mfrs., supra, at 42. The Secretary explained that the regulations are a result of his determination, in the wake of the critical reports of the General Accounting Office (GAO) and the Office of the Inspector General (OIG), that prior policy failed to implement properly the statute and that it was necessary to provide “ ‘clear and operational guidance’ to grantees about how to preserve the distinction between Title X programs and abortion as a method of family planning. ” 53 Fed. Reg. 2923-2924 (1988). He also determined that the new regulations are more in keeping with the original intent of the statute, are justified by client experience under the prior policy, and are supported by a shift in attitude against the “elimination of unborn children by abortion.” We believe that these justifications are sufficient to support the Secretary’s revised approach. Having concluded that the plain language and legislative history are ambiguous as to Congress’ intent in enacting Title X, we must defer to the Secretary’s permissible construction of the statute. B We turn next to the “program integrity” requirements embodied at § 59.9 of the regulations, mandating separate facilities, personnel, and records. These requirements are not inconsistent with the plain language of Title X. Petitioners contend, however, that they are based on an impermissible construction of the statute because they frustrate the clearly expressed intent of Congress that Title X programs be an integral part of a broader, comprehensive, health-care system-. They argue that this integration is impermissibly burdened because the efficient use of non-Title-X funds by Title X grantees will be adversely affected by the regulations. The Secretary defends the separation requirements of §59.9 on the grounds that they are necessary to assure that Title X grantees apply federal funds only to federally authorized purposes and that grantees avoid creating the appearance that the Government is supporting abortion-related activities. The program integrity regulations were promulgated in direct response to the observations in the GAO and OIG reports that “[b]ecause the distinction between the recipients’ title X and other activities may not be easily recognized, the public can get the impression that Federal funds are being improperly used for abortion activities.” App. 85. The Secretary concluded: “[MJeeting the requirement of section 1008 mandates that Title X programs be organized so that they are physically and financially separate from other activities which are prohibited from inclusion in a Title X program. Having a program that is separate from such activities is a necessary predicate to any determination that abortion is not being included as a method of family planning in the Title X program.” 53 Fed. Reg. 2940 (1988). The Secretary further argues that the separation requirements do not represent a deviation from past policy because the agency has consistently taken the position that § 1008 requires some degree of physical and financial separation between Title X projects and abortion-related activities. We agree that the program integrity requirements are based on a permissible construction of the statute and are not inconsistent with congressional intent. As noted, the legislative history is clear about very little, and program integrity is no exception. The statements relied upon by petitioners to infer such an intent are highly generalized and do not directly address the scope of § 1008. For example, the Cornerstone of the conclusion that in Title X Congress intended a comprehensive, integrated system of family planning services is the statement in the statute requiring state health authorities applying for Title X funds to submit “a State plan for a coordinated and comprehensive program of family planning services.” § 1002. This statement is, on its face, ambiguous as to Congress’ intent in enacting Title X and the prohibition of § 1008. Placed in context, the statement merely requires that a state health authority submit a plan for a “coordinated and comprehensive program of family planning services” in order to be eligible for Title X funds. By its own terms, the language evinces Congress’ intent to place a duty on state entities seeking federal funds; it does not speak either to an overall view of family planning services or to the Secretary’s responsibility for implementing the statute. Likewise, the statement in the original House Report on Title X that the Act was “not intended to interfere with or limit programs conducted in accordance with State or local laws” and supported through non-Title X funds is equally unclear. H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 91-1667, pp. 8-9 (1970). This language directly follows the statement that it is the “intent of both Houses that the funds authorized under this legislation be used only to support preventive family planning services.... The conferees have adopted the language contained in section 1008, which prohibits the use of such funds for abortion, in order to make this intent clear.” Id., at 8. When placed in context and read in light of the express prohibition of § 1008, the statements fall short of evidencing a congressional intent that would render the Secretary’s interpretation of the statute impermissible. While petitioners’ interpretation of the legislative history may be a permissible one, it is by no means the only one, and it is certainly not the one found by the Secretary. It is well established that legislative history which does not demonstrate a clear and certain congressional intent cannot form the basis for enjoining regulations. See Motor Vehicle Mfrs., 463 U. S., at 42. The Secretary based the need for the separation requirements “squarely on the congressional intent that abortion not be a part of a Title X funded program.” • 52 Fed. Reg. 33212 (1987). Indeed, if one thing is clear from the legislative history, it is that Congress intended that Title X funds be kept separate and distinct from abortion-related activities. It is undisputed that Title X was intended to provide primarily prepregnancy preventive services. Certainly the Secretary’s interpretation of the statute that separate facilities are necessary, especially in light of the express prohibition of § 1008, cannot be judged unreasonable. Accordingly, we defer to the Secretary’s reasoned determination that the program integrity requirements are necessary to implement the prohibition. Petitioners also contend that the regulations must be invalidated because they raise serious questions of constitutional law. They rely on Edward J. DeBartolo Corp. v. Florida Gulf Coast Building & Construction Trades Council, 485 U. S. 568 (1988), and NLRB v. Catholic Bishop of Chicago, 440 U. S. 490 (1979), which hold that “an Act of Congress ought not be construed to violate the Constitution if any other possible construction remains available.” Id., at 500. Under this canon of statutory construction, “‘[t]he elementary rule is that every reasonable construction must be resorted to, in order to save a statute from unconstitutionality.’” DeBartolo Corp., supra, at 575 (emphasis added), quoting Hooper v. California, 155 U. S. 648, 657 (1895). The principle enunciated in Hooper v. California, supra, and subsequent cases, is a categorical one: “as between two possible interpretations of a statute, by one of which it would be unconstitutional and by the other valid, our plain duty is to adopt that which will save the Act.” Blodgett v. Holden, 275 U. S. 142, 148 (1927) (opinion of Holmes, J.). This principle is based at least in part on the fact that a decision to declare an Act of Congress unconstitutional “is the gravest and most delicate duty that this Court is called on to perform.” Ibid. Following Hooper, supra, cases such as United States ex rel. Attorney General v. Delaware & Hudson Co., 213 U. S. 366, 408 (1909), and United States v. Jin Fuey Moy, 241 U. S. 394, 401 (1916), developed the corollary doctrine that “[a] statute must be construed, if fairly possible, so as to avoid not only the conclusion that it is unconstitutional but also grave doubts upon that score.” This canon is followed out of respect for Congress, which we assume legislates in the light of constitutional limitations. FTC v. American Tobacco Co., 264 U. S. 298, 306-307 (1924). It is qualified by the proposition that “avoidance of a difficulty will not be pressed to the point of disingenuous evasion.” George Moore Ice Cream Co. v. Rose, 289 U. S. 373, 379 (1933). Here Congress forbade the use of appropriated funds in programs where abortion is a method of family planning. It authorized the Secretary to promulgate regulations implementing this provision. The extensive litigation regarding governmental restrictions on abortion since our decision in Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113 (1973), suggests that it was likely that any set of regulations promulgated by the Secretary— other than the ones in force prior to 1988 and found by him to be relatively toothless and ineffectual — would be challenged on constitutional grounds. While we do not think that the constitutional arguments made by petitioners in these cases are without some force, in Part III, infra, we hold that they do not carry the day. Applying the canon of construction under discussion as best we can, we hold that the regulations promulgated by the Secretary do not raise the sort of “grave and doubtful constitutional questions,” Delaware & Hudson Co., supra, at 408, that would lead us to assume Congress did not intend to authorize their issuance. Therefore, we need not invalidate the regulations in order to save the statute from unconstitutionality. I-H HH I — Í Petitioners contend that the regulations violate the First Amendment by impermissibly discriminating based on viewpoint because they prohibit “all discussion about abortion as a lawful option — including counseling, referral, and the provision of neutral and accurate information about ending a pregnancy — while compelling the clinic or counselor to provide information that promotes continuing a pregnancy to term.” Brief for Petitioners in No. 89-1391, p. 11. They assert that the regulations violate the “free speech rights of private health care organizations that receive Title X funds, of their staff, and of thpir patients” by impermissibly imposing “viewpoint-discriminatory conditions on government subsidies” and thus “penaliz[e] speech funded with non-Title X monies.” Id., at 13, 14, 24. Because “Title X continues to fund speech ancillary to pregnancy testing in a manner that is not evenhanded with respect to views and information about abortion, it invidiously discriminates on the basis of viewpoint.” Id., at 18. Relying on Regan v. Taxation with Representation of Wash., 461 U. S. 540 (1983), and Arkansas Writers’ Project, Inc. v. Ragland, 481 U. S. 221, 234 (1987), petitioners also assert that while the Government may place certain conditions on the receipt of federal subsidies, it may not “discriminate invidiously in its subsidies in such a way as to ‘ai[m] at the suppression of dangerous ideas.’” Regan, supra, at 548 (quoting Cammarano v. United States, 358 U. S. 498, 513 (1959)). There is no question but that the statutory prohibition contained in §1008 is constitutional. In Maher v. Roe, 432 U. S. 464 (1977), we upheld a state welfare regulation under which Medicaid recipients received payments for services related to childbirth, but not for nontherapeutic abortions. The Court rejected the claim that this unequal subsidization worked a violation of the Constitution. We held that the government may “make a value judgment favoring childbirth over abortion, and... implement that judgment by the alio-cation of public funds.” Id,., at 474. Here the Government is exercising the authority it possesses under Maher and Harris v. McRae, 448 U. S. 297 (1980), to subsidize family planning services which will lead to conception and childbirth, and declining to “promote or encourage abortion.” The Government can, without violating the Constitution, selectively fund a program to encourage certain activities it believes to be in the public interest, without at the same time funding an alternative program which seeks to deal with the problem in another way. In so doing, the Government has not discriminated on the basis of viewpoint; it has merely chosen to fund one activity to the exclusion of the other. “[A] legislature’s decision not to subsidize the exercise of a fundamental right does not infringe the right.” Regan, supra, at 549. See also Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1 (1976); Cammarano v. United States, supra. “A refusal to fund protected activity, without more, cannot be equated with the imposition of a ‘penalty’ on that activity.” McRae, supra, at 317, n. 19. “There is a basic difference between direct state interference with a protected activity and state encouragement of an alternative activity consonant with legislative policy.” Maher, supra, at 475. The challenged regulations implement the statutory prohibition by prohibiting counseling, referral, and the provision of information regarding abortion as a method of family planning. They are designed to ensure that the limits of the federal program are observed. The Title X program is designed not for prenatal care, but to encourage family planning. A doctor who wished to offer prenatal care to a project patient who became pregnant could properly be prohibited from doing so because such service is outside the scope of the federally funded program. The regulations prohibiting abortion counseling and referral are of the same ilk; “no funds appropriated for the project may be used in programs where abortion is a method of family planning,” and a doctor employed by the project may be prohibited in the course of his project duties from counseling abortion or referring for abortion. This is not a case of the Government “suppressing a dangerous idea,” but of a prohibition on a project grantee or its employees from engaging in activities outside of the project’s scope. To hold that the Government unconstitutionally discriminates on the basis of viewpoint when it chooses to fund a program dedicated to advance certain permissible goals, because the program in advancing those goals necessarily discourages alternative goals, would render numerous Government programs constitutionally suspect. When Congress established a National Endowment for Democracy to encourage other countries to adopt democratic principles, 22 U. S. C. § 4411(b), it was not constitutionally required to fund a program to encourage competing lines of political philosophy such as communism and fascism. Petitioners’ assertions ultimately boil down to the position that if the Government chooses to subsidize one protected right, it must subsidize analogous counterpart rights. But the Court has soundly rejected that proposition. Regan v. Taxation with Representation of Wash., supra; Maher v. Roe, supra; Harris v. McRae, supra. Within far broader limits than petitioners are willing to concede, when the Government appropriates public funds to establish a program it is entitled to define the limits of that program. We believe that petitioners’ reliance upon our decision in Arkansas Writers’ Project, supra, is misplaced. That case involved a state sales tax which discriminated between magazines on the basis of their content. Relying on this fact, and on the fact that the tax “targets a small group within the press,” contrary to our decision in Minneapolis Star & Tribune Co. v. Minnesota Comm’r of Revenue, 460 U. S. 575 (1983), the Court held the tax invalid. But we have here not the case of a general law singling out a disfavored group on the basis of speech content, but a case of the Government refusing to fund activities, including speech, which are specifically excluded from the scope of the project funded. Petitioners rely heavily on their claim that the regulations would not, in the circumstance of a medical emergency, permit a Title X project to refer a woman whose pregnancy places her life in imminent peril to a provider of abortions or abortion-related services. These cases, of course, involve only a facial challenge to the regulations, and we do not have before us any application by the Secretary to a specific fact situation. On their face, we do not read the regulations to bar abortion referral or counseling in such circumstances. Abortion counseling as a “method of family planning” is prohibited, and it does not seem that a medically necessitated abortion in such circumstances would be the equivalent of its use as a “method of family planning.” Neither § 1008 nor the specific restrictions of the regulations would apply. Moreover, the regulations themselves contemplate that a Title X project would be permitted to engage in otherwise-prohibited, abortion-related activity in such circumstances. Section 59.8(a)(2) provides a specific exemption for emergency care and requires Title X recipients “to refer the client immediately to an appropriate provider of emergency medical services.” 42 CFR § 59.8(a)(2) (1989). Section 59.5(b)(1) also requires Title X projects to provide “necessary referral to other medical facilities when medically indicated.” Petitioners also contend that the restrictions on the subsidization of abortion-related speech contained in the regulations are impermissiblé because they condition the receipt of a benefit, in these cases Title X funding, on the relinquishment of a constitutional right, the right to engage in abortion advocacy and counseling. Relying on Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U. S. 593, 597 (1972), and FCC v. League of Women Voters of Cal., 468 U. S. 364 (1984), petitioners argue that “even though the government may deny [a]... benefit for any number of reasons, there are some reasons upon which the government may not rely. It may not deny a benefit to a person on a basis that infringes his constitutionally protected interests — especially, his interest in freedom of speech.” Perry, supra, at 597. Petitioners’ reliance on these cases is unavailing, however, because here the Government is not denying a benefit to anyone, but is instead simply insisting that public funds be spent for the purposes for which they were authorized. The Secretary’s regulations do not force the Title X grantee to give up abortion-related speech; they merely require that the grantee keep such activities separate and distinct from Title X activities. Title X expressly distinguishes between a Title X grantee and a Title X project. The grantee, which normally is a health-care organization, may receive funds from a variety of sources for a variety of purposes. Brief for Petitioners in No. 89-1391, pp. 3, n. 5, 13. The grantee receives Title X funds, however, for the specific and limited purpose of establishing and operating a Title X project. 42 U. S. C. § 300(a). The regulations govern the scope of the Title X project’s activities, and leave the grantee unfettered in its other activities. The Title X grantee can continue to perform abortions, provide abortion-related services, and engage in abortion advocacy; it simply is required to conduct those activities through programs that are separate and independent from the project that receives Title X funds. 42 CFR §59.9 (1989). In contrast, our “unconstitutional conditions” cases involve situations in which the Government has placed a condition on the recipient of the subsidy rather than on a particular program or service, thus effectively prohibiting the recipient from engaging in the protected conduct outside the scope of the federally funded program. In FCC v. League of Women Voters of Cal., we invalidated a federal law providing that noncommercial television and radio stations that receive federal grants may not “engage in editorializing.” Under that law, a recipient of federal funds was “barred absolutely from all editorializing” because it “is not able to segregate its Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

E

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. Petitioner, convicted of capital murder, complains that his right to due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment was violated because he was not given adequate notice of some of the evidence the Commonwealth intended to use against him at the penalty hearing of his trial. We hold that this claim would necessitate a “new rule,” and that therefore it does not provide a basis on which he may seek federal habeas relief. I A Richard McClelland was the manager of a department store, Murphy’s Mart, in Portsmouth, Virginia. On May 2, 1985, at approximately 9:30 p.m., petitioner and Melvin Tucker, a friend, both under the influence of cocaine, parked in the parking lot of the Murphy’s Mart and watched McClel-land and a store security guard inside. Shortly before midnight, McClelland and the guard came out of the store and left in separate automobiles. With Tucker in the passenger seat, petitioner followed McClelland, pulled in front of his car at a stop sign, threatened him with a .32-caliber revolver, ordered him into petitioner’s car, and struck him. Petitioner and Tucker took McClelland’s wallet and threatened to harm his family if he did not cooperate. Gray v. Commonwealth, 233 Va. 313, 340-341, 356 S. E. 2d 157, 172, cert. denied, 484 U. S. 873 (1987). Petitioner drove the car back to the Murphy’s Mart, where he forced McClelland at gunpoint to reopen the store. They filled three gym bags with money, totaling between $12,000 and $13,000. Petitioner drove McClelland and Tucker to a service station, bought gasoline for his car and for a gas can in the car’s trunk, and proceeded to a remote side road. He took McClelland 15 to 20 feet behind the car and ordered him to lie down. While McClelland begged petitioner not to hurt or shoot him, petitioner assured him he would not be harmed. Having thus assured McClelland, petitioner fired six pistol shots into the back of his head in rapid succession. 233 Va., at 341-342, 356 S. E. 2d, at 172-173. Leaving McClelland’s dead body on the side road, petitioner and Tucker returned to the intersection where they had seized him. Petitioner, telling Tucker he wanted to destroy McClelland’s car as evidence, doused its interior with gasoline and lit it with a match. Id., at 341-342, 356 S. E. 2d, at 173. Petitioner and Tucker were later arrested and indicted in the Circuit Court of the city of Suffolk on several counts, including capital murder. Having evidence that petitioner had announced before the killing that “he was going to get” McClelland for having fired his wife from her job as a saleswoman at the Murphy’s Mart, and that petitioner had told other witnesses after the killing that he had performed it, the prosecutor entered into a plea bargain with Tucker. In return for being tried for first-degree murder instead of capital murder, Tucker would testify at petitioner’s trial about events leading up to the killing and would identify petitioner as the actual “trigger man.” Id., at 331, 356 S. E. 2d, at 167. B On Monday, December 2, 1985, petitioner’s trial began. Petitioner’s counsel moved that the trial court order the prosecution to disclose the evidence it planned to introduce in the penalty phase. The prosecutor acknowledged that “in the event [petitioner] is found guilty we do intend to introduce evidence of statements he has made to other people about other crimes he has committed of which he has not been convicted.” 14 Record 8. In particular, the prosecution intended to show that petitioner had admitted to a notorious double murder in Chesapeake, a city adjacent to Suffolk. Lisa Sorrell and her 3-year-old daughter, Shanta, had been murdered five months before McClelland was killed. The prosecutor told petitioner’s counsel in court that the only evidence he would introduce would be statements by petitioner to Tucker or fellow inmates that he committed these murders. Id., at 11. On Thursday, December 5, 1985, the jury convicted petitioner on all counts. That evening, the prosecution informed petitioner’s counsel that the Commonwealth would introduce evidence, beyond petitioner’s own admissions, linking petitioner to the Sorrell murders. The additional evidence included photographs of the crime scene and testimony by the police detective who investigated the murders and by the state medical examiner who performed autopsies on the Sorrells’ bodies. The testimony was meant to show that the manner in which Lisa and Shanta Sorrell had been killed resembled the manner in which McClelland was killed. The next morning, petitioner’s counsel made two motions “to have excluded from evidence during [the] penalty trial any evidence pertaining to any . . . felony for which the defendant has not yet been charged.” 18 id., at 776. Counsel argued that the additional evidence exceeded the scope of unadjudicated-crime evidence admissible for sentencing under Virginia law, because “[i]n essence, what [the prosecutor is] doing is trying [the Sorrell] case in the minds of the jurors.” Id., at 724 (citing Watkins v. Commonwealth, 229 Va. 469, 331 S. E. 2d 422 (1985), cert. denied, 475 U. S. 1099 (1986)). Although counsel also complained that he was not “prepared for any of this [additional evidence], other than [that petitioner] may have made some incriminating statements,” 18 Record 725, and that the “[d]efense was taken by surprise,” id., at 777, he never requested a continuance. The trial court denied the motions to exclude. During the sentencing phase, Tucker testified that, shortly after the McClelland murder, petitioner pointed to a picture of Lisa Sorrell in a newspaper and told Tucker that he had “knocked off” Sorrell. Petitioner’s counsel did not cross-examine Tucker. Officer Michael Slezak, who had investí-gated the Sorrell murders, testified that he found Lisa’s body in the front seat of a partially burned automobile and Shan-ta’s body in the trunk. Dr. Faruk Presswalla, the medical examiner who had performed autopsies on the bodies, testified that Lisa was killed by six bullets to the head, shot from a .32-caliber gun. Gray, supra, at 345, 356 S. E. 2d, at 175. Petitioner’s counsel did not cross-examine Dr. Presswalla, and only cross-examined Officer Slezak to suggest that McClelland’s murder may have been a “copycat” murder, committed by a different perpetrator. 18 Record 793, 802. The jury fixed petitioner’s sentence for McClelland’s murder at death. The trial court entered judgment on the verdicts for all the charges against petitioner and sentenced him to death. The Virginia Supreme Court affirmed, 233 Va. 313, 356 S. E. 2d 157, and we denied certiorari, Gray v. Virginia, 484 U. S. 873 (1987). The Suffolk Circuit Court dismissed petitioner’s state petition for a writ of habeas corpus. The Virginia Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal, and we denied certiorari. Gray v. Thompson, 500 U. S. 949 (1991). C Petitioner then sought a writ of habeas corpus from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. With respect to the Sorrell murders, he argued, inter alia, that he had “never been convicted of any of these crimes nor was he awaiting trial for these crimes,” that the Commonwealth “did not disclose its intentions to use the Sorrell murders as evidence against [him] until such a late date that it was impossible for [his] defense counsel reasonably to prepare or defend against such evidence at trial,” and that Tucker “ ‘sold’ his testimony to the Commonwealth for . . . less than a life sentence.” 1 Joint Appendix in No. 94-4009 (CA4), pp. 32-33 (hereinafter J. A.). The Commonwealth moved to dismiss the petition. To clarify its arguments against petitioner’s Sorrell murder claim, it characterized petitioner’s allegations as seven separate subclaims. The first subclaim asserted that petitioner was given “inadequate notice of the evidence which the Commonwealth intended to introduce to permit him to defend against it,” and the third, relying on Brady v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 83 (1963), asserted that “[t]he Commonwealth failed to disclose evidence tending to prove that someone else had committed the Sorrell murders.” Respondent’s Brief in Support of Motion to Dismiss in No. 3:91CV693 (ED Va.), p. 2. According to the Commonwealth, the notice-of-evidence subclaim was meritless and could not be the basis for relief in federal habeas corpus proceedings because it sought the retroactive application of a new rule of constitutional law. Id., at 18-19, 19-20. The Commonwealth alleged that the Brady subclaim had not been presented to the state courts on direct appeal or in state habeas corpus proceedings, and was thus procedurally barred under Va. Code Ann. § 8.01-654(B)(2) (1992). Respondent’s Brief in Support of Motion to Dismiss, supra, at 19. Initially, the District Court dismissed the habeas petition. The court adopted the Commonwealth’s characterization of petitioner’s Sorrell claim. See 1 J. A. 193. The court held that petitioner was not entitled to relief on the notice-of-evidence subclaim, because he “has no constitutional right to notice of individual items of testimony which the Common wealth intends to introduce at the penalty phase.” Id., at 194. The court declined to review the Brady subclaim because it was procedurally barred. 1 J. A. 194. Later, on petitioner’s motion, the District Court amended its judgment to find within petitioner’s Sorrell claim a specific due process claim about the admissibility of the Sorrell murder evidence. Id., at 252. (In amending this judgment, the court announced that it remained unchanged as to the remaining claims, which it had dismissed. Id., at 251.) After holding an evidentiary hearing on the Sorrell claim, the District Court ordered that petitioner be granted a writ of habeas corpus. The court characterized the claim as an allegation that petitioner “was denied due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution because the Commonwealth failed to provide fair notice that evidence concerning the Sorrell murders would be introduced at his penalty phase.” App. 348. Citing Gardner v. Florida, 430 U. S. 349, 357-359 (1977), the court determined that there was a constitutional defect in petitioner’s penalty phase hearing: “Petitioner was confronted and surprised by the testimony of officer Slezak and Dr. Press-walla.” App. 349. This defect “violated [petitioner’s] right to fair notice and rendered the hearing clearly unreliable,” because petitioner’s attorneys had less than one day’s notice of the additional evidence to be used against their client. Id., at 349-350. The Commonwealth appealed, arguing to the Fourth Circuit that to grant petitioner habeas relief would give him the benefit of a new rule of federal constitutional law, in violation of Teague v. Lane, 489 U. S. 288 (1989). The Fourth Circuit reversed the judgment granting the writ, rejected petitioner’s cross-appeals from the dismissal of several other claims, and remanded with directions that the habeas corpus petition be dismissed. Gray v. Thompson, 58 F. 3d 59, 67 (1995). The court distinguished Gardner, on which the District Court had relied, because petitioner, unlike Gardner, “was not sentenced on the basis of any secret information.” 58 F. 3d, at 64. The court thus concluded that petitioner’s notice-of-evidence claim “was not compelled by existing precedent at the time his conviction became final,” and thus could not be considered in federal habeas proceedings under Teague. 58 F. 3d, at 64. The Commonwealth scheduled petitioner’s execution for December 14, 1995. Petitioner applied for a stay of execution and petitioned for a writ of certiorari from this Court. We granted his stay application on December 13, 1995. 516 U. S. 1034. On January 5, 1996, we granted certiorari, limited to the questions whether petitioner’s notice-of-evidence claim stated a new rule and whether the Commonwealth violated petitioner’s due process rights under Brady by withholding evidence exculpating him from responsibility for the Sorrell murders. 516 U. S. 1037; see Pet. for Cert. i. II We first address petitioner’s Brady claim. The District Court determined that “[t]his claim was not presented to the Supreme Court of Virginia on direct appeal nor in state ha-beas corpus proceedings,” and that “the factual basis of the claim was available to [petitioner] at the time he litigated his state habeas corpus petition,” and dismissed the claim on this basis. 1 J. A. 194. Petitioner does not contest these determinations in this Court. Petitioner’s failure to raise his Brady claim in state court implicates the requirements in habeas of exhaustion and procedural default. Title 28 U. S. C. § 2254(b) bars the granting of habeas corpus relief “unless it appears that the applicant has exhausted the remedies available in the courts of the State.” Because “[t]his requirement... refers only to remedies still available at the time of the federal petition,” Engle v. Isaac, 456 U. S. 107, 126, n. 28 (1982), it is satisfied “if it is clear that [the habeas petitioner’s] claims are now procedurally barred under [state] law,” Castille v. Peoples, 489 U. S. 346, 351 (1989). However, the procedural bar that gives rise to exhaustion provides an independent and adequate state-law ground for the conviction and sentence, and thus prevents federal habeas corpus review of the defaulted claim, unless the petitioner can demonstrate cause and prejudice for the default. Teague v. Lane, supra, at 298; Isaac, supra, at 126, n. 28, 129; Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S. 72, 90-91 (1977). In Virginia, “[n]o writ [of habeas corpus ad subjiciendum] shall be granted on the basis of any allegation the facts of which petitioner had knowledge at the time of filing any previous petition.” Va. Code Ann. § 8.01-654(B)(2) (1992). Because petitioner knew of the grounds of his Brady claim when he filed his first petition, § 8.01-654(B)(2) precludes review of petitioner's claim in any future state habeas proceeding. Because petitioner makes no attempt to demonstrate cause or prejudice for his default in state habeas proceedings, his claim is not cognizable in a federal suit for the writ. Ill A Petitioner makes a separate due process challenge to the manner in which the prosecution introduced evidence about the Sorrell murders. We perceive two separate claims in this challenge. As we will explain in greater detail below, petitioner raises a “notice-of-evidence” claim, which alleges that the Commonwealth deprived petitioner of due process by failing to give him adequate notice of the evidence the Commonwealth would introduce in the sentencing phase of his trial. He raises a separate “misrepresentation” claim, which alleges that the Commonwealth violated due process by misleading petitioner about the evidence it intended to use at sentencing. In Picard v. Connor, 404 U. S. 270 (1971), we held that, for purposes of exhausting state remedies, a claim for relief in habeas corpus must include reference to a specific federal constitutional guarantee, as well as a statement of the facts that entitle the petitioner to relief. We considered whether a habeas petitioner was entitled to relief on the basis of a claim, which was not raised in the state courts or in his federal habeas petition, that the indictment procedure by which he was brought to trial violated equal protection. Id., at 271. In announcing that “the substance of a federal habeas corpus claim must first be presented to the state courts,” id., at 278, we rejected the contention that the petitioner satisfied the exhaustion requirement of 28 U. S. C. § 2254(b) by presenting the state courts only with the facts necessary to state a claim for relief. “The [state court] dealt with the arguments [the habeas petitioner] offered; we cannot fault that court for failing also to consider sua sponte whether the indictment procedure denied [the petitioner] equal protection of the laws.” Id., at 277. We have also indicated that it is not enough to make a general appeal to a constitutional guarantee as broad as due process to present the “substance” of such a claim to a state court. In Anderson v. Harless, 459 U. S. 4 (1982), the habeas petitioner was granted relief on the ground that it violated due process for a jury instruction to obviate the requirement that the prosecutor prove all the elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Id., at 7 (citing Sandstrom v. Montana, 442 U. S. 510 (1979)). The only manner in which the habeas petitioner had cited federal authority was by referring to a state-court decision in which “the defendant ... asserted a broad federal due process right to jury instructions that properly explain state law.” 459 U. S., at 7 (internal quotation marks omitted). r Our review of the record satisfied us that the Sandstrom claim “was never presented to, or considered by, the [state] courts,” but we found it especially significant that the “broad federal due process right” that the habeas petition might have been read to incorporate did not include “the more particular analysis developed in cases such as Sandstrom.” 459 U. S., at 7. The due process challenge in petitioner’s brief relies on two “particular analys[es]” of due process. Ibid. Relying on cases like Gardner v. Florida, 430 U. S. 349 (1977), and Skipper v. South Carolina, 476 U. S. 1 (1986), petitioner argues that he should have been given “‘such notice of the issues involved in the [sentencing] hearing as [would have] reasonably enable[d] him to prepare his case,”’ Brief for Petitioner 32 (quoting B. Schwartz, Administrative Law 283 (2d ed. 1984)), and that he was denied “a fair opportunity to be heard on determinative sentencing issues,” Brief for Petitioner 33. This right stems from the defendant’s “legitimate interest in the character of the procedure which leads to the imposition of sentence” of death, Gardner, 430 U. S., at 358, which justifies giving him an “opportunity to deny” potentially determinative sentencing information, id., at 362. “Yet another way in which the state may unconstitutionally ... deprive [a defendant] of a meaningful opportunity to address the issues, is simply by misinforming him.” Brief for Petitioner 34. Petitioner cites In re Ruffalo, 390 U. S. 544 (1968), Raley v. Ohio, 360 U. S. 423 (1959), and Mooney v. Holohan, 294 U. S. 103 (1935), for this proposition. Ruf-falo was a disbarment proceeding in which this Court held that the disbarred attorney had not been given notice of the charges against him by the Ohio committee which administered bar discipline. 390 U. S., at 550. In Raley, the chairman and members of a state investigating commission assured witnesses that the privilege against self-incrimination was available to them, but when the witnesses were convicted for contempt the Supreme Court of Ohio held that a state immunity statute rendered the Fifth Amendment privilege unavailable. 360 U. S., at 430-434. And in Mooney v. Holohan, the defendant alleged that the prosecution knowingly used perjured testimony at his trial. 294 U. S., at 110. Gardner, Ruffalo, Raley, and Mooney arise in widely differing contexts. Gardner forbids the use of secret testimony in the penalty proceeding of a capital case which the defendant has had no opportunity to consider or rebut. Ruf-falo deals with a defendant’s right to notice of the charges against him. Whether or not Ruffalo might have supported petitioner’s notice-of-evidence claim, see infra, at 169-170, it does not support the misrepresentation claim for which petitioner cites it. Mooney forbade the prosecution to engage in “a deliberate deception of court and jury.” 294 U. S., at 112. Raley, though involving no deliberate deception, held that defendants who detrimentally relied on the assurance of a committee chairman could not be punished for having done so. Mooney, of course, would lend support to petitioner’s claim if it could be shown that the prosecutor deliberately misled him, not just that he changed his mind over the course of the trial. The two claims are separate. B The Commonwealth argues that the misrepresentation claim “was never argued before in any court.” Brief for Respondent 39. If petitioner never presented this claim on direct appeal or in state habeas proceedings, federal habeas review of the claim would be barred unless petitioner could demonstrate cause and prejudice for his failure to raise the claim in state proceedings. Supra, at 161-162. If the claim was not raised or addressed in federal proceedings, below, our usual practice would be to decline to review it. Yee v. Escondido, 503 U. S. 519, 533 (1992). There is some ambiguity as to whether the misrepresentation claim was raised or addressed in the District Court or the Court of Appeals. On the one hand, the District Court ordered relief primarily on the basis of Gardner, i. e., lack of notice. Supra, at 160. On the other hand, some of the District Court findings advert to a deliberate decision by the prosecutor to mislead petitioner’s counsel for tactical advan-° tage. See, e. g., App. 348,350. The ambiguity in the federal record complicates the state-court procedural default issue, because procedural default is an affirmative defense for the Commonwealth. If the misrepresentation claim was addressed at some stage of federal proceedings, the Commonwealth would have been obligated to raise procedural default as a defense, or lose the right to assert the defense thereafter. See Jenkins v. Anderson, 447 U. S. 231, 234, n. 1 (1980); see also Schiro v. Farley, 510 U. S. 222, 227-228 (1994). We remand for the Court of Appeals to determine whether petitioner in fact raised what in his briefs on the merits to this Court he asserts has been his “fundamental complaint throughout this litigation . . . : the Commonwealth’s affirmative misrepresentation regarding its presentation of the Sorrell murders .. . deprived Petitioner of a fair sentencing proceeding.” Reply Brief for Petitioner 4-5. If the misrepresentation claim was raised, the Court of Appeals should consider whether the Commonwealth has preserved any defenses to it and proceed to consider the claim and preserved defenses as appropriate. C We turn to the notice-of-evidence claim, and consider whether the Court of Appeals correctly concluded that this claim sought the retroactive application of a new rule of federal constitutional law. We have concluded that the writ’s purpose may be fulfilled with the least intrusion necessary on States’ interest of the finality of criminal proceedings by applying constitutional standards contemporaneous with the habeas petitioner’s conviction to review his petition. See Teague, 489 U. S., at 309-310 (opinion of O’Connor, J.). Thus, habeas relief is appropriate only if “a state court considering [the petitioner’s] claim at the time his conviction became final would have felt compelled by existing precedent to conclude that the rule [he] seeks was required by the Constitution.” Saffle v. Parks, 494 U. S. 484, 488 (1990). At the latest, petitioner knew at the start of trial that the prosecutor intended to introduce evidence tending to show that he committed the Sorrell murders. He knew then that the Commonwealth would call Tucker to the stand to repeat his statement that petitioner had admitted to committing the murders. See App. 340; 14 Record 8-9. He nonetheless contends that he was deprived of adequate notice of the other witnesses, the police officer and the medical examiner who had investigated the Sorrell murders, whom he was advised that the prosecutor would call only on the evening before the sentencing hearing. App. 342; 18 Record 777. But petitioner did not attempt to cure this inadequacy of notice by requesting more time to respond to this evidence. He instead moved “to have excluded from evidence during this penalty trial any evidence pertaining to any other — any felony for which the defendant has not yet been charged.” Id., at 776. On these facts, for petitioner to prevail on his notice-of-evidence claim, he must establish that due process requires that he receive more than a day’s notice of the Commonwealth’s evidence. He must also establish that due process required a continuance whether or not he sought one, or that, if he chose not to seek a continuance, exclusion was the only appropriate remedy for the inadequate notice. We conclude that only the adoption of a new constitutional rule could establish these propositions. A defendant’s right to notice of the charges against which he must defend is well established. In re Ruffalo, 390 U. S. 544 (1968); Cole v. Arkansas, 333 U. S. 196 (1948). But a defendant’s claim that he has a right to notice of the evidence that the state plans to use to prove the charges stands on quite a different footing. We have said that “the Due Process Clause has little to say regarding the amount of discovery which the parties must be afforded.” Wardius v. Oregon, 412 U. S. 470, 474 (1973). In Weatherford v. Bursey, 429 U. S. 545 (1977), we considered the due process claim of a defendant who had been convicted with the aid of surprise testimony of an accomplice who was an undercover agent. Although the prosecutor had not intended to introduce the agent’s testimony, he changed his mind the day of trial. Id., at 549. To keep his cover, the agent had told the defendant and his counsel that he would not testify against the defendant. Id., at 560. We rejected the defendant’s claim, explaining that “[tjhere is no general constitutional right to discovery in a criminal case, and Brady,” which addressed only exculpatory evidence, “did not create one,” id., at 559. To put it mildly, these cases do not compel a court to order the prosecutor to disclose his evidence; their import, in fact, is strongly against the validity of petitioner’s claim. Petitioner relies principally on Gardner v. Florida, 430 U. S. 349 (1977), for the proposition that a defendant may not be sentenced to death “on the basis of information which he had no opportunity to deny or explain.” Id., at 362 (opinion of Stevens, J.). In Gardner, the trial court sentenced the defendant to death relying in part on evidence assembled in a presentence investigation by the state parole commission; the “investigation report contained a confidential portion which was not disclosed to defense counsel.” Id., at 353. Gardner literally had no opportunity to even see the confidential information, let alone contest it. Petitioner in the present case, on the other hand, had the opportunity to hear the testimony of Officer Slezak and Dr. Presswalla in open court, and to cross-examine them. His claim to notice is much more akin to the one rejected in Weatherford, supra, than to the one upheld in Gardner. Even were our cases otherwise on the notice issue, we have acknowledged that exclusion of evidence is not the sole remedy for a violation of a conceded right to notice of an alibi witness. In Taylor v. Illinois, 484 U. S. 400 (1988), we said that in this situation “a less drastic sanction is always available. Prejudice . . . could be minimized by granting a continuance.” Id., at 413. Here, counsel did not request a continuance; he argued only for exclusion. Counsel argued that the evidence should be excluded not only because he was not prepared to contest the evidence, but also because it exceeded the standard in Virginia, Watkins v. Commonwealth, 229 Va. 469, 331 S. E. 2d 422 (1985), for relevance of unsolved-crime evidence to sentencing. See 18 Record 723. In view of petitioner’s insistence on exclusion of the evidence, the trial court might well have felt that it would have been interfering with a tactical decision of counsel to order a continuance on its own motion. The dissent argues that petitioner seeks the benefit of a well-established rule, that “a capital defendant must be afforded a meaningful opportunity to explain or deny the evidence introduced against him at sentencing.” Post, at 180. Because we disagree with the dissent’s assertion that petitioner moved for a continuance, we disagree with its characterization of the constitutional rule underlying his claim for relief. Compare supra, at 166-167, and n. 4, with post, at 184-185, n. 11. The dissent glosses over the similarities between this case and Weatherford, which “(dictate [s],’ ” post, at 180, the disposition of petitioner’s claim— adversely to petitioner — more clearly than any precedent cited by the dissent. But even without Weatherford and petitioner’s failure to move for a continuance, we would still think the new-rule doctrine “would be meaningless if applied at this level of generality.” Sawyer v. Smith, 497 U. S. 227, 236 (1990). We therefore hold that petitioner’s notice-of-evidence claim would require the adoption of a new constitutional rule. D Petitioner argues that relief should be granted nonetheless, because the new rule he proposes falls within one of Teague’s two exceptions. “The first exception permits the retroactive application of a new rule if the rule places a class of private conduct beyond the power of the State to proscribe.” Parks, 494 U. S., at 494 (citing Teague, 489 U. S., at 311). This exception is not at issue here. “The second exception is for ‘watershed rules of criminal procedure’ implicating the fundamental fairness and accuracy of the criminal proceeding.” Parks, supra, at 495 (citing Teague, supra, at 311; Butler v. McKellar, 494 U. S. 407, 416 (1990)). Petitioner argues that his notice-of-evidence new rule is “mandated by long-recognized principles of fundamental fairness critical to accuracy in capital sentencing determinations.” Brief for Petitioner 47. We observed in Saffle v. Parks that the paradigmatic example of a watershed rule of criminal procedure is the requirement that counsel be provided in all criminal trials for serious offenses. 494 U. S., at 495 (citing Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963)). “Whatever one may think of the importance of [petitioner’s] proposed rule, it has none of the primacy and centrality of the rule adopted in Gideon or other rules which may be thought to be within the exception.” Parks, supra, at 495. The rule in Teague therefore applies, and petitioner may not obtain habeas relief on his notice-of-evidence claim. IV We hold that petitioner’s Brady claim is procedurally defaulted and that his notice-of-evidence claim seeks retroactive application of a new rule. Neither claim states a ground upon which relief may be granted in federal habeas corpus proceedings. However, we vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for consideration of petitioner’s misrepresentation claim in proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. The prosecutor introduced this testimony as evidence of petitioner’s future dangerousness. The prosecutor also introduced into evidence petitioner’s criminal record, which included 18 felony convictions, at least 9 of which were for crimes of violence, including armed robbery and malicious wounding. Petitioner’s record revealed that he had locked a restaurant’s employees in a food freezer while robbing the restaurant, and threatened the lives of two persons other than McClelland. Gray v. Commonwealth, 233 Va. 313, 353, 356 S. E. 2d 157, 179, cert. denied, 484 U. S. 873 (1987). The other five subclaims are not relevant to our review. When petitioner did object later, at the start of the penalty phase, to the admission of all the Sorrell murder evidence, counsel conceded that he would have been prepared to refute such evidence if it had consisted only of testimony by Tucker or petitioner’s fellow inmates that petitioner had admitted to killing the Sorrells. See 18 Record 722, 780. The District Court described petitioner’s counsel as having made a “plea for additional time to prepare.” App. 348. The Court of Appeals found this plea insufficient to have legal effect in court: “If the defense felt unprepared to undertake effective cross-examination, one would think a formal motion for continuance would have been forthcoming, but none was ever made; counsel moved only that the evidence be excluded.” Gray v. Thompson, 58 F. 3d 59, 64 (CA4 1995). We agree with the Court of Appeals. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Blackmun delivered the opinion of the Court. A debt a closely held corporation owed to an indemnifying shareholder-employee became worthless in 1962. The issue in this federal income tax refund suit is whether, for the shareholder-employee, that worthless obligation was a business or a nonbusiness bad debt within the meaning and reach of §§ 166 (a) and (d) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954, as amended, 26 U. S. C. §§ 166 (a) and (d), and of the implementing Regulations § 1.166-5. The issue’s resolution is important for the taxpayer. If the obligation was a business debt, he may use it to offset ordinary income and for carryback purposes under § 172 of the Code, 26 U. S. C. § 172. On the other hand, if the obligation is a nonbusiness debt, it is to be treated as a short-term capital loss subject to the restrictions imposed on such losses by §166 (d)(1)(B) and §§ 1211 and 1212, and its use for carryback purposes is restricted by § 172 (d)(4). The debt is one or the other in its entirety, for the Code does not provide for its allocation in part to business and in part to nonbusiness. In determining whether a bad debt is a business or a nonbusiness obligation, the Regulations focus on the relation the loss bears to the taxpayer’s business. If, at the time of worthlessness, that relation is a “proximate” one, the debt qualifies as a business bad debt and the aforementioned desirable tax consequences then ensue. The present case turns on the proper measure of the required proximate relation. Does this necessitate a “dominant” business motivation on the part of the taxpayer or is a “significant” motivation sufficient? Tax in an amount somewhat in excess of $40,000 is involved. The taxpayer, Allen H. Generes, prevailed in a jury trial in the District Court. See 67-2 U. S. T. C. ¶9754 (ED La.). On the Government’s appeal, the Fifth Circuit affirmed by a divided vote. 427 F. 2d 279 (CA5 1970). Certiorari was granted, 401 U. S. 972 (1971), to resolve a conflict among the circuits. I The taxpayer as a young man in 1909 began work in the construction business. His son-in-law, William F. Kelly, later engaged independently in similar work. During World War II the two men formed a partnership in which their participation was equal. The enterprise proved successful. In 1954 Kelly-Generes Construction Co., Inc., was organized as the corporate successor to the partnership. It engaged in the heavy-construction business, primarily on public works projects. The taxpayer and Kelly each owned 44% of the corporation’s outstanding capital stock. The taxpayer’s original investment in his shares was $38,900. The remaining 12% of the stock was owned by a son of the taxpayer and by another son-in-law. Mr. Generes was president of the corporation and received from it an annual salary of $12,000. Mr. Kelly was executive vice-president and received an annual salary of $15,000. The taxpayer and Mr. Kelly performed different services for the corporation. Kelly worked full time in the field and was in charge of the day-to-day construction operations. Generes, on the other hand, devoted no more than six to eight hours a week to the enterprise. He reviewed bids and jobs, made cost estimates, sought and obtained bank financing, and assisted in securing the bid and performance bonds that are an essential part of the public-project construction business. Mr. Generes, in addition to being president of the corporation, held a full-time position as president of a savings and loan association he had founded in 1937. He received from the association an annual salary of $19,000. The taxpayer also had other sources of income. His gross income averaged about $40,000 a year during 1959-1962. Taxpayer Generes from time to time advanced personal funds to the corporation to enable it to complete construction jobs. He also guaranteed loans made to the corporation by banks for the purchase of construction machinery and other equipment. In addition, his presence with respect to the bid and performance bonds is of particular significance. Most of these were obtained from Maryland Casualty Co. That underwriter required the taxpayer and Kelly to sign an indemnity agreement for each bond it issued for the corporation. In 1958, however, in order to eliminate the need for individual indemnity contracts, taxpayer and Kelly signed a blanket agreement with Maryland whereby they agreed to indemnify it, up to a designated amount, for any loss it suffered as surety for the corporation. Maryland then increased its line of surety credit to $2,000,000. The corporation had over $14,000,000 gross business for the period 1954 through 1962. In 1962 the corporation seriously underbid two projects and defaulted in its performance of the project contracts. It proved necessary for Maryland to complete the work. Maryland then sought indemnity from Generes and Kelly. The taxpayer indemnified Maryland to the extent of $162,104.57. In the same year he also loaned $158,814.49 to the corporation to assist it in its financial difficulties. The corporation subsequently went into receivership and the taxpayer was unable to obtain reimbursement from it. In his federal income tax return for 1962 the taxpayer took his loss on his direct loans to the corporation as a nonbusiness bad debt. He claimed the indemnification loss as a business bad debt and deducted it against ordinary income. Later he filed claims for refund for 1959-1961, asserting net operating loss carrybacks under § 172 to those years for the portion, unused in 1962, of the claimed business bad debt deduction. In due course the claims were made the subject of the jury trial refund suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana. At the trial Mr. Generes testified that his sole motive in signing the indemnity agreement was to protect his $12,000-a-year employment with the corporation. The jury, by special interrogatory, was asked to determine whether taxpayer’s signing of the indemnity agreement with Maryland “was proximately related to his trade or business of being an employee” of the corporation. The District Court charged the jury, over the Government’s objection, that significant motivation satisfies the Regulations’ requirement of proximate relationship. The court refused the Government’s request for an instruction that the applicable standard was that of dominant rather than significant motivation. After twice returning to the court for clarification of the instruction given, the jury found that the taxpayer’s signing of the indemnity agreement was proximately related to his trade or business of being an employee of the corporation. Judgment on this verdict was then entered for the taxpayer. The Fifth Circuit majority approved the significant-motivation standard so specified and agreed with a Second Circuit majority in Weddle v. Commissioner, 325 F. 2d 849, 851 (1963), in finding comfort for so doing in the tort law’s concept of proximate cause. Judge Simpson dissented. 427 F. 2d, at 284. He agreed with the holding of the Seventh Circuit in Niblock v. Commissioner, 417 F. 2d 1185 (1969), and with Chief Judge Lumbard, separately concurring in Weddle, 325 F. 2d, at 852, that dominant and primary motivation is the standard to be applied. II A. The fact responsible for the litigation is the taxpayer’s dual status relative to the corporation. Generes was both a shareholder and an employee. These interests are not the same, and their differences occasion different tax consequences. In tax jargon, Generes’ status as a shareholder was a nonbusiness interest. It was capital in nature and it was composed initially of tax-paid dollars. Its rewards were expectative and would flow, not from personal effort, but from investment earnings and appreciation. On the other hand, Generes’ status as an employee was a business interest. Its nature centered in personal effort and labor, and salary for that endeavor would be received. The salary would consist of pre-tax dollars. Thus, for tax purposes it becomes important and, indeed, necessary to determine the character of the debt that went bad and became uncollectible. Did the debt center on the taxpayer’s business interest in the corporation or on his nonbusiness interest? If it was the former, the taxpayer deserves to prevail here. Trent v. Commissioner, 291 F. 2d 669 (CA2 1961); Jaffe v. Commissioner, T. C. Memo ¶ 67,215; Estate of Saperstein v. Commissioner, T. C. Memo ¶ 70,209; Faucher v. Commissioner, T. C. Memo ¶ 70,217; Rosati v. Commissioner, T. C. Memo ¶ 70,343; Rev. Rul. 71-561, 1971-50 Int. Rev. Bull. 13. B. Although arising in somewhat different contexts, two tax cases decided by the Court in recent years merit initial mention. In each of these cases a major shareholder paid out money to or on behalf of his corporation and then was unable to obtain reimbursement from it. In each he claimed a deduction assertable against ordinary income. In each he was unsuccessful in this quest: 1. In Putnam v. Commissioner, 352 U. S. 82 (1956), the taxpayer was a practicing lawyer who had guaranteed obligations of a labor newspaper corporation in which he owned stock. He claimed his loss as fully deductible in 1948 under § 23 (e) (2) of the 1939 Code. The standard prescribed by that statute was incurrence of the loss “in any transaction entered into for profit, though not connected with the trade or business.” The Court rejected this approach and held that the loss was a nonbusiness bad debt subject to short-term capital loss treatment under §23(k)(4). The loss was deductible as a bad debt or not at all. See Rev. Rul. 60-48, 1960-1 Cum. Bull. 112. 2. In Whipple v. Commissioner, 373 U. S. 193 (1963), the taxpayer had provided organizational, promotional, and managerial services to a corporation in which he owned approximately an 80% stock interest. He claimed that this constituted a trade or business and, hence, that debts owing him by the corporation were business bad debts when they became worthless in 1953. The Court also rejected that contention and held that Whipple’s investing was not a trade or business, that is, that “[djevoting one’s time and energies to the affairs of a corporation is not of itself, and without more, a trade or business of the person so engaged.” 373 U. S., at 202. The rationale was that a contrary conclusion would be inconsistent with the principle that a corporation has a personality separate from its shareholders and that its business is not necessarily their business. The Court indicated its approval of the Regulations’ proximate-relation test: “Moreover, there is no proof (which might be difficult to furnish where the taxpayer is the sole or dominant stockholder) that the loan was necessary to keep his job or was otherwise proximately related to maintaining his trade or business as an employee. Compare Trent v. Commissioner, [291 F. 2d 669 (CA2 1961)].” 373 U. S., at 204. The Court also carefully noted the distinction between the business and the nonbusiness bad debt for one who is both an employee and a shareholder. These two eases approach, but do not govern, the present one. They indicate, however, a cautious and not a free-wheeling approach to the business bad debt. Obviously, taxpayer Generes endeavored to frame his case to bring it within the area indicated in the above quotation from Whipple v. Commissioner. Ill We conclude that in determining whether a bad debt has a “proximate” relation to the taxpayer’s trade or business, as the Regulations specify, and thus qualifies as a business bad debt, the proper measure is that of dominant motivation, and that only significant motivation is not sufficient. We reach this conclusion for a number of reasons: A. The Code itself carefully distinguishes between business and nonbusiness items. It does so, for example, in § 165 with respect to losses, in § 166 with respect to bad debts, and in § 162 with respect to expenses. It gives particular tax benefits to business losses, business bad debts, and business expenses, and gives lesser benefits, or none at all, to nonbusiness losses, nonbusiness bad debts, and nonbusiness expenses. It does this despite the fact that the latter are just as adverse in financial consequence to the taxpayer as are the former. But this distinction has been a policy of the income tax structure ever since the Revenue Act of 1916, § 5 (a), 39 Stat. 759, provided differently for trade or business losses than it did for losses sustained in another transaction entered into for profit. And it has been the specific policy with respect to bad debts since the Revenue Act of 1942 incorporated into § 23 (k) of the 1939 Code the distinction between business and non-business bad debts. 56 Stat. 820. The point, however, is that the tax statutes have made the distinction, that the Congress therefore intended it to be a meaningful one, and that the distinction is not to be obliterated or blunted by an interpretation that tends to equate the business bad debt with the nonbusiness bad debt. We think that emphasis upon the significant rather than upon the dominant would have a tendency to do just that. B. Application of the significant-motivation standard would also tend to undermine and circumscribe the Court’s holding in Whip-ple and the emphasis there that a shareholder’s mere activity in a corporation’s affairs is not a trade or business. As Chief Judge Lumbard pointed out in his separate and disagreeing concurrence in Weddle, supra, 325 F. 2d, at 852-853, both motives— that of protecting the investment and that of protecting the salary — are inevitably involved, and an inquiry whether employee status provides a significant motivation will always produce an affirmative answer and result in a judgment for the taxpayer. C. The dominant-motivation standard has the attribute of workability. It provides a guideline of certainty for the trier of fact. The trier then may compare the risk against the potential reward and give proper emphasis to the objective rather than to the subjective. As has just been noted, an employee-shareholder, in making or guaranteeing a loan to his corporation, usually acts with two motivations, the one to protect his investment and the other to protect his employment. By making the dominant motivation the measure, the logical tax consequence ensues and prevents the mere presence of a business motive, however small and however insignificant, from controlling the tax result at the taxpayer’s convenience. This is of particular importance in a tax system that is so largely dependent on voluntary compliance. D. The dominant-motivation test strengthens and is consistent with the mandate of § 262 of the Code, 26 U. S. C. § 262, that “no deduction shall be allowed for personal, living, or family expenses” except as otherwise provided. It prevents personal considerations from circumventing this provision. E. The dominant-motivation approach to § 166 (d) is consistent with that given the loss provisions in § 165 (c)(1), see, for example, Imbesi v. Commissioner, 361 F. 2d 640, 644 (CA3 1966), and in § 165 (c)(2), see Austin v. Commissioner, 298 F. 2d 583, 584 (CA2 1962). In these related areas, consistency is desirable. See also, Commissioner v. Duberstein, 363 U. S. 278, 286 (1960). F. We see no inconsistency, such as the taxpayer suggests, between the Government’s urging dominant motivation here and its having urged only significant motivation as the appropriate standard for the incurrence of liability for the accumulated-earnings tax under § 531 of the 1954 Code, 26 U. S. C. § 531, and for includability in the gross estate,-for federal estate tax purposes, of a transfer made in contemplation of death under § 2035, 26 U. S. C. § 2035. Sections 531 and 2035 are Congress’ answer to tax avoidance activity. United States v. Donruss Co., 393 U. S. 297, 303 (1969), and Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co. v. Bowers, 98 F. 2d 794 (CA2 1938), cert. denied, 306 U. S. 648 (1939). G. The Regulations’ use of the word “proximate” perhaps is not the most fortunate, for it naturally tempts one to think in tort terms. The temptation, however, is best rejected, and we reject it here. In tort law factors of duty, of foreseeability, of secondary cause, and of plural liability are under consideration, and the concept of proximate cause has been developed as an appropriate application and measure of these factors. It has little place in tax law where plural aspects are not usual, where an item either is or is not a deduction, or either is or is not a business bad debt, and where certainty is desirable. IV The conclusion we have reached means that the District Court's instructions, based on a standard of significant rather than dominant motivation, are erroneous and that, at least, a new trial is required. We have examined the record, however, and find nothing that would support a jury verdict in this taxpayer’s favor had the dominant-motivation standard been embodied in the instructions. Judgment n. o. v. for the United States, therefore, must be ordered. See Neely v. Eby Construction Co., 386 U. S. 317 (1967). As Judge Simpson pointed out in his dissent, 427 F. 2d, at 284-285, the only real evidence offered by the taxpayer bearing upon motivation was his own testimony that he signed the indemnity agreement “to protect my job,” that “I figured in three years’ time I would get my money out,” and that “I never once gave it [his investment in the corporation] a thought.” The statements obviously are self-serving. In addition, standing alone, they do not bear the light of analysis. What the taxpayer was purporting to say was that his $12,000 annual salary was his sole motivation, and that his $38,900 original investment, the actual value of which prior to the misfortunes of 1962 we do not know, plus his loans to the corporation, plus his personal interest in the integrity of the corporation as a source of living for his son-in-law and as an investment for his son and his other son-in-law, were of no consequence whatever in his thinking. The comparison is strained all the more by the fact that the salary is pre-tax and the investment is taxpaid. With his total annual income about $40,000, Mr. Generes may well have reached a federal income tax bracket of 40% or more for a joint return in 1958-1962. §§ 1 and 2 of the 1954 Code, 68A Stat. 5 and 8. The $12,000 salary thus would produce for him only about $7,000 net after federal tax and before any state income tax. This is the figure, and not $12,000, that has any possible significance for motivation purposes, and it is less than % of the original stock investment. We conclude on these facts that the taxpayer’s explanation falls of its own weight, and that reasonable minds could not ascribe, on this record, a dominant motivation directed to the preservation of the taxpayer’s salary as president of Kelly-Generes Construction Co., Inc. The judgment is reversed and the case is remanded with direction that judgment be entered for the United States. It is so ordered. Me. Justice Powell and Mr. Justice Rehnquist took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. “§ 166. Bad debts. “(a) General rule.— “(1) Wholly worthless debts. — There shall be allowed as a deduction any debt which becomes worthless within the taxable year. “(d) Nonbusiness debts.— “(1) General rule. — In the case of a taxpayer other than a corporation— “(A) subsections (a) and (c) shall not apply to any nonbusiness debt; and “(B) where any nonbusiness debt becomes worthless within the taxable year, the loss resulting therefrom shall be considered a loss from the sale or exchange, during the taxable year, of a capital asset held for not more than 6 months. “(2) Nonbusiness debt defined. — For purposes of paragraph (1), the term 'nonbusiness debt’ means a debt other than— “(A) a debt created or acquired (as the case may be) in connection with a trade or business of the taxpayer; or “(B) a debt the loss from the worthlessness of which is incurred in the taxpayer’s trade or business.” Treas. Reg. on Income Tax: “26 CFR § 1.166-5 Nonbusiness debts. “(b) Nonbusiness debt defined. For purposes of section 166 and this section, a nonbusiness debt is any debt other than— “(2) A debt the loss from the worthlessness of which is incurred in the taxpayer’s trade or business. The question whether a debt is a nonbusiness debt is a question of fact in each particular case. . . . For purposes of subparagraph (2) of this paragraph, the character of the debt is to be determined by the relation which the loss resulting from the debt’s becoming worthless bears to the trade or business of the taxpayer. If that relation is a proximate one in the conduct of the trade or business in which the taxpayer is engaged at the time the debt becomes worthless, the debt comes within the exception provided by that subparagraph. . . .” Edna Generes, wife of Allen H. Generes, is a named party because joint income tax returns were filed by Mr. and Mrs. Generes for some of the tax years in question. Compare the decision below and Weddle v. Commissioner, 325 F. 2d 849 (CA2 1963), with Niblock v. Commissioner, 417 F. 2d 1185 (CA7 1969). In Smith v. Commissioner, 55 T. C. 260, 268-271 (1970), reviewed without dissent, the Tax Court felt constrained, under the policy expressed in Golsen v. Commissioner, 54 T. C. 742 (1970), aff’d, 445 E. 2d 985 (CA10 1971), to apply the Fifth Circuit test but stated that it agreed with the Seventh Circuit. Cases where the resolution of the issue was avoided include Stratmore v. United States, 420 F. 2d 461 (CA3 1970), cert. denied, 398 U. S. 951; Kelly v. Patterson, 331 F. 2d 753, 757 (CA5 1964); and Gillespie v. Commissioner, 54 T. C. 1025, 1032 (1970). See, also, Millsap v. Commissioner, 387 F. 2d 420 (CA8 1968). For commentary on the present case, see 3 Sw. U. L. Rev. 135 (1971); 2 Tex. Tech. L. Rev. 318 (1971); and 28 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 161 (1971). This difference in treatment between the loss on the direct loan and that on the indemnity is not explained. See, however, Whipple v. Commissioner, 373 U. S. 193 (1963). “A debt is proximately related to the taxpayer’s trade or business when its creation was significantly motivated by the taxpayer’s trade or business, and it is not rendered a non-business debt merely because there was a non-qualifying motivation as well, even though the non-qualifying motivation was the primary one.” “You must, in short, determine whether Mr. Generes’ dominant motivation in signing the indemnity agreement was to protect his salary and status as an employee or was to protect his investment in the Kelly-Generes Construction Co. “Mr. Generes is entitled to prevail in this case only if he convinces you that the dominant motivating factor for his signing the indemnity agreement was to insure the receiving of his salary from the company. It is insufficient if the protection or insurance of his salary was only a significant secondary motivation for his signing the indemnity agreement. It must have been his dominant or most important reason for signing the indemnity agreement.” “Even if the taxpayer demonstrates an independent trade or business of his own, care must be taken to distinguish bad debt losses arising from his own business and those actually arising from activities peculiar to an investor concerned with, and participating in, the conduct of the corporate business.” 373 U. S., at 202. App. 67 and 59. Rather than Vk, as the taxpayer in his testimony suggested, App. 59, overlooking the pre-tax character of his salaried earnings. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

L

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Clark delivered the opinion of the Court. This appeal presents another clash between state and federal authority in the regulation of intrastate commerce. The Public Service Commission of Utah and the Utah Citizens Rate Association, appellants, seek to set aside an order of the Interstate Commerce Commission entered in a proceeding under § 13 (3) and (4) of the Interstate Commerce Act in which an increase in intrastate freight rates to the general level of interstate rates was granted to railroads operating in Utah. 297 I. C. C. 87. The principal contention here is that the evidence before the Commission was insufficient to support its ultimate finding that existing intrastate rates caused “undue, unreasonable, and unjust discrimination against interstate commerce.” 297 I. C. C., at 105. A three-judge District Court found against appellants on this and all subsidiary issues. 146 F. Supp. 803. Upon direct appeal, 28 U. S. C. § 1253, we noted probable jurisdiction. 352 U. S. 888 (1956). Having concluded that certain findings of the Commission lack sufficient support in the evidence, we reverse the judgment of the District Court. The action of the Commission was limited to freight rates on intrastate traffic in Utah. In Ex Parte No. 175 the Commission had increased interstate freight rates on a national basis by an aggregate of 15%. The appellee railroads applied to the Public Service Commission of Utah for a like increase in intrastate rates. After a full hearing, the Utah Commission dismissed the application on the ground that the railroads had not produced evidence concerning their intrastate operations as required by Utah law. No appeal was taken. Instead, pursuant to 49 U. S. C. § 13 (3) and (4), the railroads filed a petition with the Interstate Commerce Commission which led to the order under attack here. The Commission found the evidence insufficient to establish any undue or unreasonable advantage, preference, or prejudice as between persons or localities in intrastate commerce, on the one hand, and interstate commerce on the other. But in findings patterned after those approved in King v. United States, 344 U. S. 254 (1952), it concluded that the intrastate rates caused “undue, unreasonable, and unjust discrimination against interstate commerce.” 297 I. C. C., at 105. It sought to remove this burden by generally applying to intrastate traffic the 15% interstate increase previously granted in Ex Parte No. 175. Appellants attack two findings of the Commission as not being supported by substantial evidence. The first is that existing intrastate rates were abnormally low and failed to contribute their fair share of the revenue needs of the railroads. Evidence was introduced to show that some of Utah's intrastate rates were lower than corresponding interstate rates for like distances. No showing was made, however, of the comparative costs of performing such services. The second finding under attack is that the conditions incident to intrastate transportation were not more favorable than those incident to interstate movements. The evidence underlying this finding indicated only that goods moving intrastate were handled precisely as were those in interstate transportation, being intermingled on the same trains. Intrastate transportation is primarily the concern of the State. Federal power exists in this area only when intrastate tariffs are so low that an undue or unreasonable advantage, preference, or prejudice is created as between persons or localities in intrastate commerce on the one hand and interstate commerce on the other, or when those rates cast an undue burden on interstate commerce. Proof of such must meet “a high standard of certainty,” Illinois Central R. Co. v. Public Utilities Comm’n, 245 U. S. 493, 510 (1918); before a state rate can be nullified, the justification for the exercise of federal power must “clearly appear.” Florida v. United States, 282 U. S. 194, 211-212 (1931). The Court pointed out in North Carolina v. United States, 325 U. S. 507, 511 (1945), that the findings supporting such an order of the Interstate Commerce Commission must encompass each of the elements essential to federal power. Thereafter, in King v. United States, supra, we stressed the necessity of substantial evidence to support the findings, although we held it unnecessary “to establish for each item in each freight rate a fully developed rate case.” 344 U. S., at 275. In King, however, the insufficiency of the findings rather than of the evidence was urged upon the Court. Those findings, which we held adequate to support an order increasing intrastate rates, were, inter alia, (1) that existing intrastate rates were abnormally low and did not contribute a fair share of the railroads’ revenue needs; (2) that conditions as to the movement of intrastate traffic were not more favorable than those existing in interstate commerce; (3) that the rates cast an undue burden on interstate commerce; (4) that the increase ordered by the Commission would yield substantial revenues; and (5) that such increase would not result in intrastate rates being unreasonable and would remove the existing discrimination against interstate commerce. 344 U. S., at 267-268, footnote 13. We also held in King that the Commission might give weight to deficits in passenger revenue when prescribing intrastate freight rates so as to meet over-all revenue needs. In our most recent review of federal power in this intrastate area, Chicago, M., St. P. & P. R. Co. v. Illinois, 355 U. S. 300 (1958), we relied on the principles of the above cases in striking down an increase in intrastate passenger fares for a suburban commuter service because the Commission had failed to take into account “the carrier’s other intrastate revenues from Illinois traffic, freight and passenger.” 355 U. S., at 308. We do not believe that the evidence here met the exacting standards required by our prior cases. As to the finding that prevailing intrastate rates were abnormally low and failed to contribute a fair share of over-all revenue, we discover no positive evidence to indicate that the relative cost of intrastate traffic was as great as that of interstate shipments. The absence of such evidence is important, for it is not enough to say that interstate rates were higher on similar shipments for like distances, Florida v. United States, supra, at 212, especially where, as here, there was some indication that intrastate traffic moved at lower cost than interstate. The annual reports of the four interstate railroads operating in Utah showed that their Utah operating ratios (freight service cost divided by freight service revenue) and the Utah density statistics (ton miles of traffic per mile of main track) were more favorable than comparable system-wide figures. The Commission discredited the density statistics because of the absence of branch-line inclusion in the totals. This was true, however, in the case of both Utah and system-wide computations, leaving no apparent foundation for the conclusion of unreliability. Other evidence seemed to indicate that those railroads with the larger percentages of total operations within Utah enjoyed higher rates of over-all return for 1953, the year just prior to the hearings in this case. The Denver & Rio Grande, with almost half of its entire operations within Utah, showed a rate of return of 6.06%. The Southern Pacific and Union Pacific, with substantially smaller proportions of Utah operations, showed returns of 3.48% and 3.56%, respectively. Statistics introduced by the railroads as to comparative economic conditions showed recent economic improvement to be greater percentagewise in the West and particularly in Utah than in other sections. The emphasis recently has switched from agriculture to industrial and mining activity, with its resulting increase in traffic — a factor tending to suggest more favorable railroad operating conditions. As to the finding that intrastate conditions were not more favorable than those incident to interstate transportation, the railroad evidence on this point was far from substantial. In essence, it merely showed that intrastate and interstate traffic was handled by the same crews and intermingled in the same movement. This evidence failed to establish that all material factors bearing on the reasonableness of rates were substantially the same. As we have previously noted, appellants offered convincing evidence not only of greater density on intrastate operations, permitting a wider spread of fixed costs, but also of lower operating ratios and higher returns as the percentage of intrastate traffic increased. In the face of this proof the evidence as to general similarity of conditions falls short of the “high standard of certainty” required. It is suggested that the Commission, in granting general interstate increases, frequently proceeds on the assumption that intrastate rates will be raised to the same level. But this assumption is no through ticket permitting it to approach the question of intrastate rates with partiality for a uniform increase. Rate uniformity is not necessarily the goal of federal regulation, nor can the Commission’s wishful thinking be substituted for substantial evidence. Section 13 is not cast in terms of “assumption” or “partiality.” As applied to this case, it contemplates an inquiry into intrastate rates and conditions within Utah, and any conclusion that interstate operating conditions equally exist there must be ticketed on more than assumption. Finally, we note an absence in the findings of any indication that the Commission concerned itself with the revenues derived from, or the conditions incident to, intrastate passenger operations. While a sweeping inquiry into those operations is not required, we believe that in light of our opinion in Chicago, M., St. P. & P. R. Co. v. Illinois, supra, the findings must reflect consideration of these factors in arriving at a general intrastate freight level. “A fair picture of the intrastate operation, and whether the intrastate trafile unduly discriminates against interstate trafile, is not shown ... by limiting consideration to the particular . . . service in disregard of the revenue contributed by the other intrastate services.” 355 U. S., at 308. This issue was not argued by the parties, our opinion in that case having been announced after submission of the instant case. We mention it at this point, however, since further proceedings before the Commission no doubt will ensue. The judgment of the District Court is reversed and the cause is remanded to that court with instructions to set aside the order of the Commission and remand the cause to the Commission for further proceedings in conformity with this opinion. It is so ordered. Sec. 13. “(3) Whenever in any investigation under the provisions of this part, or in any investigation instituted upon petition of the carrier concerned, which petition is hereby authorized to be filed, there shall be brought in issue any rate, fare, charge, classification, regulation, or practice, made or imposed by authority of any State, or initiated by the President during the period of Federal control, the Commission, before proceeding to hear and dispose of such issue, shall cause the State or States interested to be notified of the proceeding. The Commission may confer with the authorities of any State having regulatory jurisdiction over the class of persons and corporations subject to this part or part III with respect to the relationship between rate structures and practices of carriers subject to the jurisdiction of such State bodies and of the Commission; and to that end is authorized and empowered, under rules to be prescribed by it, and which may be modified from time to time, to hold joint hearings with any such State regulating bodies on any matters wherein the Commission is empowered to act and where the rate-making authority of a State is or may be affected by the action taken by the Commission. The Commission is also authorized to avail itself of the cooperation, services, records, and facilities of such State authorities in the enforcement of any provision of this part or part III. “(4) Whenever in any such investigation the Commission, after full hearing, finds that any such rate, fare, charge, classification, regulation, or practice causes any undue or unreasonable advantage, preference, or prejudice as between persons or localities in intrastate commerce on the one hand and interstate or foreign commerce on the other hand, or any undue, unreasonable, or unjust discrimination against interstate or foreign commerce, which is hereby forbidden and declared to be unlawful, it shall prescribe the rate, fare, or charge, or the maximum or minimum, or maximum and minimum, thereafter to be charged, and the classification, regulation, or practice thereafter to be observed, in such manner as, in its judgment, will remove such advantage, preference, prejudice, or discrimination. Such rates, fares, charges, classifications, regulations, and practices shall be observed while in effect by the carriers parties to such proceeding affected thereby, the law of any State or the decision or order of any State authority to the contrary notwithstanding.” 41 Stat. 484, as amended, 49 Stat. 543, 54 Stat. 911, 49 U. S. C. § 13 (3), (4). The increase was accomplished in three separate orders. 280 I. C. C. 179; 281 I. C. C. 557; 284 I. C. C. 589. Appellants challenge the validity of the interstate increases permitted in Ex Parte No. 175. That record, however, was not introduced in this proceeding; moreover, our disposition requires no decision on this phase of the case. See note 1, supra. “Where the conditions under which interstate and intrastate traffic move are found to be substantially the same with respect to all factors bearing on the reasonableness of the rate, and the two classes are shown to be intimately bound together, there is no occasion to deal with the reasonableness of the intrastate rates more specifically, or to separate intrastate and interstate costs and revenues.” Illinois Commerce Comm’n v. United States, 292 U. S. 474, 483-484 (1934); King v. United States, supra, at 273. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Whittaker delivered the opinion of the Court. These tax refund cases present the question whether petitioners, Parsons in No. 218 and Huss in No. 305, are entitled to an allowance for depletion on amounts received by them under contracts with the owners of coal-bearing lands for the strip mining of coal from those lands and the delivery of it to the landowners. The cases were heard by the same courts below. The District Court ruled that petitioners had no depletable interest in the coal in place and rendered judgment for the respondent— collector in each case. The Court of Appeals affirmed both judgments. 255 F. 2d 595, 599. Because of an asserted conflict with the principles applicable under the decisions of this Court, we granted certiorari in both cases. 358 U. S. 814.. , ¿ The pertinent tacts in each case were found by thé District Court and are not challenged here. In substance, they are as follows: . PARSONS, No. 218. Petitioners were members of a partnership (“Parsons”) which, until the transactions involved here, was primarily engaged in road building. Rockhill Coal Co. (“Rockhill”) owned bituminous coal-bearing lands in Pennsylvania. Much of the coal was located relatively near the.surface and was therefore ■removable by the strip mining process. In 1942 Parsons expressed a desire to strip mine coal from RockhilTs lands, but it refused to sign the written contract offered because the firm did not wish to be bound by a contract “which would take a long time, since, if an opportunity opened up, [it] wanted to go back to road building.” It was then agreed that Parsons would, and it did, proceed under an oral agreement. Under that agreement Parsons was to "strip mine coal from such sites and seams, within a generally described area of Rockhill’s lands, as were designated by Rockhill. Parsons was to furnish at its own expense all of the equipment, facilities and labor which it thought necessary to strip mine and deliver the coal to Rockhill’s cars at a fixed point. For each ton of coal so mined and delivered Rockhill was to pay Parsons a stated amount of money. Parsons was not authorized to keep or sell any of the coal but was required to deliver all that was mined to Rockhill. The agreement was not for a definite term, nor did it obligate Parsons to mine the tract to exhaustion, but, to the contrary, it was agreed that “if Parsons or Rockhill wanted to quit, all that was necessary to terminate the arrangement was the giving of a ten-day notice.” However, if Rockhill thus canceled the agreement and if “Parsons had previously gone to the expense of removing the overburden (thereby performing the heavy part of the work, as well as meeting wages and expenses in so doing), then Parsons would have the privilege of taking out the coal [so uncovered] and of being paid for it [even though] this took more than ten days.” Operations continued under the agreement without notice of termination until August 1, 1950, when Parsons gave Rockhill notice that it would “quit” the work on September 1, 1950, and it ceased these operations on or near that date.' Large amounts of strippable coal still remained on the tract and strip mining thereon was continued by another contractor. Parsons’ investment in equipment used in the work ran from a low in 1943 of $60,000 to a high jn 1947 of $250,000. The equipment was movable and there' is no evidence that it was not usable elsewhere or for other purposes. HUSS, No. 305. Petitioners were members of a partnership (“Huss”) engaged in the business of strip mining coal. Philadelphia and Reading Coal & Iron Co. (“Reading”) owned anthracite coal-bearing lands in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. Much of the coal was so located that it could be removed by strip mining. In 1944 Reading and Huss entered into a written contract under which Huss undertook to strip mine the coal from such areas, within a generally described tract of Reading’s land, as might be designated by Reading and that was not lying deeper than a prescribed distance from the surface. Huss was to furnish at its own expense all of the equipment, facilities and labor necessary to mine and deliver the coal to Reading’s colliery. For each ton of coal so mined and delivered Reading was to pay Huss' a stated sum. That sum was agreed to be in “full compensation for the full performance of all work and for the furnishing of all material, labor, power, tools, machinery, implements and equipment.required for the work.” Huss was not authorized to keep or sell any of the coal. The contract was expressly terminable by Reading at any time upon 30 days’ written notice “without specifying any reason therefor” and without liability for “any loss of anticipated profits or any other damages whatever.” This right of termination was not exercised. Operations continued under the contract until July 1947, by which time Huss had mined most of the strippable coal on the lands covered by the contract that lay within the stipulated distance from the surface, and the contract was then canceled by mutual agreement. Huss’ investment in equipment used in the work ran from a low in 1944 of $100,000 to a high in 1947 of $500,000. All of the equipment was movable and usable elsewhere in strip mining and some of it was usable for other purposes. Whether a deduction from gross income shall be permitted for depletion of mineral deposits, or any interest therein, is entirely a matter of grace. We therefore must look, first, to the provisions and purposes .pf the statutes and to the decisions'construing them to see what interests are permitted a deduction for depletion, and, next, to the contracts involved to see whether they gave to petitioners, such an interest. The applicable statutes are §§23 (m) and 114 (b) (4) (A) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1939, 26 U. S. C. (1952 ed.). §.23 (m) and 26 U. S. C. (1946 ed.) § 114 (b) (4) (A): Section 23 (m) directs that a reasonable allowance for depletion shall be made “in the case of mines,... according to the peculiar conditions in each case; such reasonable allowance in all cases to be made under rules and regulations to be prescribed by the Commissioner, with the approval of the Secretary,” and that “[i]n the case of leases the deductions shall be equitably apportioned between the lessor and lessee.” And § 114(b) (4) (A) provides that the allowance shall be, “in the case of coal mines, 5 percentum ... of the gross income from [mining] the property during the taxable year, excluding . . . any rents or royalties paid or incurred by the taxpayer in respect of the property.” The purpose óf the deduction for depletion is plain and has been many times declared by this Court. “It is permitted in recognition of the fact that the mineral deposits are wasting assets and is intended as compensation to the owner for the part used up in production.”. Helvering v. Bankline Oil Co., 303 U. S. 362, 366. And see United States v. Ludey, 274 U. S. 295, 302; Helvering v. Elbe Oil Land Development Co., 303 U. S. 372, 375; Anderson v. Helvering, 310 U. S. 404, 408; Kirby Petroleum Co. v. Commissioner, 326 U. S. 599, 603. “[The depletion] exclusion is designed to permit a recoupment of the owner’s capital investment in the minerals so that when the minerals are exhausted, the owner’s capital is unimpaired.” Commissioner v. Southwest Exploration Co., 350 U. S. 308, 312. Save for its application only to gross income from mineral deposits and standing timber, the purpose of “the deduction for depletion does not differ from the deduction for depreciation.” United States v. Ludey, 274 U. S., at 303. In short, the purpose of the depletion deduction is to permit the owner of a capital interest in mineral in place to make a tax-free recovery of that depleting capital asset. Although the sentence in § 23 (m) that “In the case of leases the deductions shall be equitably apportioned between the lessor and lessee” presupposes “that the deductions may be allowed in other cases” (Palmer v. Bender, 287 U. S. 551, 557), the statute “must be read in the. light of the requirement of apportionment of a single depletion allowance” (Helvering v. Twin Bell Oil Syndicate, 293 U. S. 312, 321), for two or inore persons “cannot be entitled to depletion on the same income” (Commissioner v. Southwest Exploration Co., 350 U. S. 308, 309). It follows that if petitioners áre entitled to a depletion allowance on the amounts earned under their contracts, the amounts allowable to the landowners for the depletion of their coal deposits would be correspondingly reduced. Dealing specifically with the problem of what interests in mineral deposits were permitted a deduction for depletion under the practically identical predecessors of §§23 (m) and 114, this Court said in Palmer v. Bender, 287 U. S. 551, 557: “The language of the statute is broad enough to provide, at least, for every case in which the taxpayer has acquired, by investment, any interest in the oil in place, and secures, by any form of legal relationship, income derived from the extraction of the oil, to which he must look for a return of his capital.” The Court further said that the deduction is not “dependent upon the particular legál form.of the taxpayer’s interest in the property to be depleted,, [and that] [i] t is enough if . . . he has retained a right to share in the oil produced. If so he has an economic interest in the oil, in place, which is depleted by production.” Ibid. (Emphasis added.) The Court went on to hold that lessees of oil producing properties, by reserving from an assignment a royalty of “one-eighth of all the oil produced and saved,” retained an economic interest in the oil in place and were therefore entitled to an allowance for depletion against their gross income from that interest. Five years later, in 1938, the Court in Helvering v. Bankline Oil Co., 303 U. S. 362, reaffirmed the test laid down in Palmer and added: “But the phrase ‘economic interest’ is not to be taken as embracing a mere economic advantage derived from production, through a contractual relation to the owner, by one who has no capital investment in the mineral deposit.” 303 U. S., at 367. Applying that principle, the Court held that a processor who, by contracts with the owners of gas (and oil wells, had acquired the right to take wet gas from the wellheads and to extract and sell the gasoline therefrom, paying the well owners a percentage of the proceeds óf such sales, had not acquired an economic interest in the depleting gas in place but only an economic advantage to be derived from the processing operations, and that therefore the income from those operations was not subject to the depletion deduction. In his first regulations prescribed under the -Internal Revenue Act of 1939, the Commissioner adopted almost literally the language we have quoted from Palmer and Banklihe as the tests to be administratively applied in determining what interests in mineral deposits are em titled to the depletion allowance. See Treas. Reg. 103, § 19.23 (m)-l, August 23, 1939. That language, with immaterial changes, has remained in the regulations ever since. During the years here involved, 1942 through 1950, the regulation in force was Treas. Reg. Ill, § 29.23 (m)-l, which, in pertinent part, provides: “Under [the provisions of §§23 (m) and 114] the owner of an econofnic interest in mineral deposits or standing timber is allowed annual depletion deductions. An economic interest is possessed in every case in which the taxpayer has acquired, by investment, any interest in mineral in place or standing timber and secures, by any form of legal relationship, income .derived from the severance and sale of the .mineral or timber, to which he must look for a return of his capital. But a person who has no capital divestment in the mineral deposit or standing timber does not possess an economic interest merely because, through a contractual relation to the owner, he possesses a mere economic advantage derived from production . . . .” Such are the interests that are permitted a deduction for depletion by the statutes as consistently interpreted by this Court and by the, Commissioner. Petitioners do not dispute that these are the controlling principles, but rather they contend that they come within those that allow the deduction. They argue that by their contracts to mine the coal, and particularly by contributing their equipment, organizations and skills to the mining project as required by those contracts, they, in legal effect, made a capital investment in, and thereby acquired an economic interest in, the coal in place, which was depleta-ble by production, and that they are therefore entitled to take the deduction , against their gross income derived from those mining operations. We take a different view. It stands admitted that before and apart from their contracts, petitioners had no investment or. interest in the coal in place. Their asserted right to the deduction rests entirely upon their contracts. Is there anything in those contracts to indicate that petitioners made a capital investment in, or acquired an economic interest in, the coal in place, as distinguished from the acquisition of a mere economic advantage to be derived from their mining operations? We think it is quite plain that there is not. By their contracts, which were completely terminable without cause on short notice, petitioners simply agreed to provide the equipment and do the work required to strip mine coal from designated lands'of the landowners and to deliver the coal to the latter at stated points, and in full consideration for performance of that undertaking the landowners were to pay to petitioners a-fixed sum per ton. Surely those agreements do not show or suggest that petitioners actually made any capital investment in the coal in place, or that the landowners were to or actually did in any way surrender to petitioners any part of their capital interest in the coal in place. Petitioners do not factually assert otherwise. Their claim to the contrary is based wholly upon an asserted legal fiction. As stated, they claim that their contractual right to mine coal from the designated lands and the use of their equip-, ment," organizations and skills in doing so, should be regarded as the making of a capital investment in, and the acquisition of an economic interest in, the coal' in place. But that fiction cannot be indulged here, for it is negated by the facts. To recapitulate, the asserted fiction is opposed to the facts (1) that petitioners’- investments were in their equipment, all of which was movable — not in the coal in place; (2) that their investments in equipment were recoverable through depreciation — not depletion; (3) that the contracts were completely terminable without cause on short notice; (4) that the landowners did not agree to surrender and did not actually surrender to petitioners any capital interest in the coal in place; (5) that the coal at all times, even'after it was mined, belonged entirely to the landowners, and. that petitioners could not sell or keep any of it but were required to deliver all that they mined to the landowners; (6) that petitioners were not to have any part of the proceeds of the sale of the coal, but, oh the contrary, they were to be paid a fixed sum for each ton mined and delivered, which was, as stated in Huss, agreed to be in “full compensation for the full performance of all work and for the furnishing of all [labor] and equipment required for the work”; and (7) that petitioners, thus, agreed to look only to the landowners for all sums to become due. them under their contracts. The agreement of the landowners to pay a fixed sum per ton for mining and delivering the coal “was a personal covenant and did not purport to grant [petitioners] an interest in the [coal in place].” Helvering v. O’Donnell, 303 U. S. 370, 372. Surely these facts show that petitioners did not actually make any capital investment in, or acquire any economic interest in, the coal in place, and that they may not fictionally be regarded as having done so. “Undoubtedly,, [petitioners] through [their] contracts obtained an economic advantage fronv[their] production of the [coal], but that is not sufficient. The controlling fact is that [petitioners] had no interest in the [coal] in place.” Helvering v. Bankline Oil Co., 303 U. S., at 368. Of course, the parties might have provided in their contracts that petitioners would have some capital interest in the coal in place, but they did not do so — apparently by design. Instead, petitioners simply entered into contracts, terminable without cause on short notice, with the owners of coal-bearing lands to provide the equipment and do the work required to strip mine and deliver coal .from those lands, as independent contractors, for fixed unit prices. “[Petitioners thus] bargained for and obtained an economic advantage from the [mining] operations but that advantage or profit did' not constitute a depletáble interest in the [coal] in place” (Helvering v. O’Donnell, 303 U. S., at 372), and having “no capital investment in the mineral deposit which suffered depletion, [petitioners are] not entitled to the statutory allowance” (Helvering v. Bankline Oil Co., 303 U. S., at 368). The judgments must therefore be Affirmed. Strip mining is done from the surfacé of the earth. In general, it is performed by stripping off the earth, known as overburden, which lies over the coal and then removing the cóal.so uncovered. It was contemplated by the parties that in the event of an increase in the union labor wage scale the amount per ton to be paid to Parsons would be increased and on several occasions it was increased to cover higher costs for both lábor and material used in the work. During the tax years involved, which were 1944 to 1947, other like contracts were entered into by the parties, but they were all identical, except for areas covered and prices per ton to be paid to Huss, and it will therefore be unnecessary to treat with them individually. The contract provided, however, that in the event of an increase in the union labor wage scale the amount per ton to be paid to Huss would be, and on several occasions during the operation it was, increased sufficiently to cover increased labor costs. Helvering v. Bankline Oil Co., 303 U. S. 362, 366; Anderson v. Helvering, 310 U. S. 404, 408; Commissioner v. Southwest Exploration Co., 350 U. S. 308, 312. Section 114 (b) (4) (B) provided that “the term ‘gross income from the property’ means the gross income from mining.” 26 U. S. C. (1946 ed.) §114 (b)(4)(B). The principles declared in the Palmer case have been recognized and applied by every subsequent decision of this Court that has treated with the subject. Helvering v. Bankline Oil Co., 303 U. S. 362, 367, literally adopted the language of the Palmer case upon the point. In Helvering v. O’Donnell, 303 U. S. 370, 371, it was said: “The question is whether respondent had an interest, that is, a capital investment, in the oil' and gas in place. . . . Palmer v. Bender, 287 U. S. 551, 557; Helvering v. Twin Bell Oil Syndicate, 293 U. S. 312, 321; Thomas v. Perkins, 301 U. S. 655, 661; Helvering v. Bankline Oil Co., supra.” Helvering v. Elbe Oil Land Development Co., 303 U. S. 372, 375-376, declared that “The words ‘gross income from the property,’, as used in the statute governing the allowance for depletion, mean gross income received from the operation of the oil and gas wells by one who has a capital investment therein, — not income from the sale of the oil and gas properties themselves.” Anderson v. Helvering, 310 U. S. 404, 408-409, repeated the statement last quoted. In Kirby Petroleum Co. v. Commissioner, 326 U. S. 599, 603, the Court said: “The test of the right .to depletion is whether the taxpayer has a capital investment in the oil in place which is necessarily reduced as the oil is extracted.” In Burton-Sutton Oil Co. v. Commissioner, 328 U. S. 25, 32, the Court said: “It seems generally accepted that it is the owner of a capital investment or economic interest in the oil in place who is entitled to the depletion.” Commissioner v. Southwest Exploration Co., 350 U. S. 308, 314, reannounced substantially the rule declared in the Palmer case. It said “that a taxpayer is entitled to depletion where he has: (1) 'acquired, by investment, any interest in the oil in place,’ and (2) secured by legal relationship ‘income derived from the extraction of the oil, to which he must look for a return of his capital.’. . . These two factors, usually considered together, constitute the requirement of ‘an economic interest.’ ” Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

L

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. These cases raise related questions about the availability of the Fifth Amendment as a defense to convictions for selling narcotic drugs and marihuana without the written order forms required by law. James Minor, petitioner in No. 189, sold heroin on two separate occasions in 1967 to an undercover narcotics agent. Having waived trial by jury, petitioner was convicted in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York of selling narcotics not pursuant to a written order on an official form — a violation of § 2 of the Harrison Narcotics Act, now 26 U. S. C. §4705 (a). Michael Buie, petitioner in No. 271, sold five packages of marihuana in May 1967 to an undercover narcotics agent. The agent did not have the official order form required for such transactions by § 6 of the Marihuana Tax Act, now 26 U. S. C. §4742 (a). A jury in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York convicted petitioner of violating §4742 (a). In separate opinions, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed both convictions over objections in each case that the statutory obligation to sell only in pursuance of an official order form violated petitioner’s Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. United States v. Minor, 398 F. 2d 511 (1968); United States v. Buie, 407 F. 2d 905 (1969). We granted certiorari, 395 U. S. 932 and 976, to consider petitioners’ Fifth Amendment claims, particularly in light of our intervening decision in Leary v. United States, 395 U. S. 6 (1969). For the reasons that follow, we affirm the judgments in both cases. We deal first with No. 271. Under pertinent provisions of the Marihuana Tax Act, 26 U. S. C. §§ 4751-4753, every person who sells, deals in, dispenses, or gives away marihuana must register with the Internal Revenue Service and pay a special occupational tax. The Act also imposes a tax on transfers of marihuana, to be paid by the transferee; the rate for those who have registered and paid the occupational tax is $1 per ounce; for those who have not or who cannot register the rate is $100 per ounce. Under § 4742 (a) it is illegal to transfer marihuana except pursuant to a written order of the transferee on a form obtained by the latter at the time he pays the transfer tax. The order form when issued must carry the name and address of both buyer and seller and the amount of marihuana to be purchased. 26 U. S. C. § 4742 (c). Other provisions of § 4742 require the form to be issued in triplicate, one copy to be retained by the Internal Revenue Service, the other copy to be kept in the buyer’s files, and the original to be delivered to the seller and retained by him. 26 U. S. C. § 4742 (d). Both original and copies are open to inspection by federal and state law enforcement officers. 26 U. S. C. §§ 4742 (d), 4773. Buie argues that because the buyer’s order must be on the form issued by the Secretary of the Treasury and because § 4742 (c) requires the seller’s name and address to be on the form before its issuance to the buyer, the seller is forced to incriminate himself: he is forced to insist on an order form linking him to an illicit transaction and in many instances must furnish one of those links himself by giving his name to the buyer so that the latter will have the data necessary to secure the form. Moreover, it is said that the very act of selling pursuant to the order form forces the seller to admit that he is the person named in the document and to acknowledge the sale of specified amounts of marihuana on a specified date; the sale also leads to the further requirement that both seller and buyer retain a copy of the form open to inspection by law enforcement officials. We have considerable doubt that any of these arguments would withstand close scrutiny, but we find it unnecessary to appraise them in detail because we have concluded that there is no real and substantial possibility that Buie’s purchaser, or purchasers generally, would be willing to comply with the order form requirement even if their seller insisted on selling only pursuant to the form prescribed by law. The situation of the buyer is this: if he applies for the order form he must announce his intention to purchase marihuana — a transaction that, if he is unregistered, will involve a tax of $100 for each ounce of marihuana involved in the impending sale and that is illegal under both federal and state law. We have great difficulty in believing, and nothing in this record convinces us, that one who wishes to purchase marihuana will comply with a seller’s request that he incriminate himself with federal and local authorities and pay $100 per ounce in taxes in order to secure the order form. The possibility is particularly unlikely in view of the fact that the Eifth Amendment relieves unregistered buyers of any duty to pay the transfer tax and secure the incriminating order form. Leary v. United States, 395 U. S. 6 (1969). Except that they are sources of marihuana, sellers have no magic power over, buyers; and the characteristics of marihuana do not suggest that buyers would be driven by such urgent need that to get the drug they would incriminate themselves at the seller’s behest and pay the prohibitive tax imposed on the transfer. As insistent as sellers might be, it is extremely unlikely that buyers would comply. Buie’s situation thus bears little resemblance to the situation that confronted Leary. The vice of the statute in that case — as in Marchetti v. United States, 390 U. S. 39, Grosso v. United States, 390 U. S. 62, and Haynes v. United States, 390 U. S. 85 (1968) — stemmed from the dilemma that confronted the buyer. The statute purported to make all purchases of marihuana legal from the buyer’s viewpoint at his option; all he had to do to avoid the federal penalty was to secure the form and pay the tax. But to exercise that option and avoid the federal penalty, he was forced to incriminate himself under other laws. In the present case, the first horn of this dilemma does not confront the seller. In the face of a buyer’s refusal to secure the order form, the option of making a legal sale under federal law is foreclosed by the buyer’s decision, and “full and literal compliance” with the law by the seller means simply that he cannot sell at all. There is no real and substantial possibility that the § 4742 (a) order form requirement will in any way incriminate sellers for the simple reason that sellers will seldom, if ever, be confronted with an unregistered purchaser who is willing and able to secure the order form. This conclusion is not affected by the fact that there is a tiny number of registered marihuana dealers — some 83 in the entire country according to government figures for 1967. In order to register, dealers must show that they are in compliance with local laws and, when registered, can get order forms by paying a transfer tax of only $1 per ounce. A registered dealer is thus not subject to the deterrent pressures operating on the unregistered dealer. But the possibility that a registered dealer would present an order form to an unregistered seller like Buie is itself a hypothesis more imaginary than real; any buyer who can purchase marihuana from a legitimate source is hardly likely to find it to his advantage to secure the drug instead on the illegal market. In any event, it is quite clear in this case that Buie’s customer was not a registered dealer. Nor is there anything to suggest that he would have been willing or able to get an order form had he been asked. No. 189. The same result must follow in Minor’s case and for similar reasons. The Harrison Narcotics Act, 26 U. S. C. § 4701 et seq., applies to various drugs, including heroin. Dealers must register and pay an occupational tax, 26 U. S. C. §§ 4721-4722; producers or importers who sell must purchase stamps and affix them to the package, 26 U. S. C. §§4701, 4703, 4771 (a)(1); and it is illegal to purchase or sell except from the original stamped package, 26 U. S. C. §4704 (a). As in the case of the Marihuana Tax Act, all transfers, with exceptions not relevant here, must be made pursuant to a written order form issued by the Government. 26 U. S. C. § 4705 (a). Only dealers who are in compliance with state law may register, and only registered dealers may secure order forms. 26 U. S. C. §§4705 (f), (g) ; see 26 U. S. C. § 4721; 26 CFR § 151.24. Order forms are issued in triplicate to proper applicants and are stamped only with the name of the prospective purchaser. 26 U. S. C. § 4705 (f); 26 CFR § 151.161. When a purchaser decides to execute a form, he fills in the exact date of the order and the number and type of drugs requested and signs his name to the form. 26 CFR §§ 151.163-151.165, 151.167. The purchaser retains the duplicate and delivers the original and the triplicate thus executed to the seller, who enters the number and size of the stamped packages furnished and the date when each item is filled. 26 CFR §§ 151.161 (a), 151.185. A regulation, 26 CFR § 151.201, requires the seller to forward the triplicate to the Internal Revenue Service at the end of the month. Section 4705 (d) of the Act requires both seller and buyer to keep their respective copies for a period of two years and to make them accessible to inspection by law enforcement officers. The order form provisions for narcotic drugs thus differ from the marihuana provisions in three principal respects. First, the prospective seller’s name does not have to be given to the Government when the order form is secured, but is filled in only when the form is subsequently executed. Second, although the marihuana seller apparently does not have to add anything to the order form in making the sale, the seller of narcotics must enter the amounts sold and the dates. Finally, unlike the Marihuana Tax Act, which at least in theory permits any person to buy as long as the transfer tax is paid, the Harrison Narcotics Act explicitly forbids the sale of order forms to any but registered dealers and permits registration only by those “lawfully entitled” under the laws of their State to deal in the drug. Like Buie, Minor argues that compliance with the order form provision would compel him to give incriminating information to be preserved in his and the buyer’s files and to be made readily accessible to law enforcement agents. Like Buie’s argument, Minor’s argument assumes that an order form would otherwise be forthcoming if he refused to sell without it and founders if in reality there is no substantial possibility that the buyer would or could have secured an order form. As in Buie’s case, we are convinced that this possibility is an unreal one. Prospective buyers who have either failed to register or cannot register because their dealings in the drug are illicit — and petitioner himself strenuously argues that virtually all dealings in heroin are illicit — simply are not among the class of persons to whom sellers are permitted to sell under any condition. When dealing with buyers in this class, the seller faces no risk of incrimination by reason of § 4705 (a) since there will be and can be no order form involved. Confronted with would-be buyers in this class, “full and literal compliance” with § 4705 (a) leaves the seller only one alternative: not to sell. Since from this record it is clear that Minor’s customer was not a registered buyer, the alleged possibility of incrimination is purely hypothetical. We doubt that our conclusion would be different even if Minor’s customer were registered. It is true that there were some 400,000 registered dealers under the Harrison Narcotics Act in 1967 and that registered dealers can readily get order forms issued in blank. It is conceivable, of course, that a registered dealer would seek to buy heroin on the illegal market, but it is difficult to imagine that he would enter the name of an unregistered seller on the order form and make a record of what would surely be an illegal sale. Such unlikely possibilities present only “imaginary and insubstantial” hazards of incrimination, rather than the “real and appreciable” risks needed to support a Fifth Amendment claim. The judgments in both cases are affirmed. It is so ordered. Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Douglas dissent in No. 271. Section 4705 (a) provides: “It shall be unlawful for any person to sell, barter, exchange, or give away narcotic drugs except in pursuance of a written order of the person to whom such article is sold, bartered, exchanged, or given, on a form to be issued in blank for that purpose by the Secretary or his delegate.” Section 4742 (a) provides: “It shall be unlawful for any person ... to transfer marihuana, except in pursuance of a written order of the person to whom such marihuana is transferred, on a form to be issued in blank for that purpose by the Secretary or his delegate.” Under 26 U. S. C. §7237 (b), any person who violates the provisions of §§ 4705 (a) or 4742 (a) “shall be imprisoned not less than 5 or more than 20 years and, in addition, may be fined not more than $20,000.” The obligation to furnish the necessary information is in terms placed on the buyer; while his compliance with that obligation may “inform” on the seller, it would not ordinarily be thought to result in the latter’s “self-incrimination.” Nor is there anything in the record to suggest that buyers cannot get a seller’s name except through the seller himself, or that the simple act of selling pursuant to an order form — even assuming the act is “testimonial” for purposes of the Fifth Amendment — adds significantly to the information that the Government has already obtained from the buyer. Finally, whatever the merits of a seller’s attempt to assert the privilege in a prosecution for failure to keep and exhibit the order forms, it need not follow that he can similarly dispense with the requirement that he sell only to buyers who first identify themselves, via the order form, as lawful purchasers. Cf. Nigro v. United States, 276 U. S. 332, 351 (1928); United States v. Doremus, 249 U. S. 86, 94 (1919). It would have been no answer in Leary to suggest that the buyer avoid his dilemma by not buying. See Marchetti v. United States, 390 U. S. 39, 51-52. But the buyer in Leary, unlike the seller here, was presented with the possibility of both purchasing and complying with the federal law, if he would only incriminate himself. In the present case, compliance by selling is foreclosed as a viable option, not because the seller might incriminate himself, but because the buyer refuses to meet a specified condition. Nothing in the Fifth Amendment prevents Congress from restricting a seller’s market to specified classes of duly licensed buyers. And although the buyer’s refusal to comply with the Act’s requirements may stem from his fear of incrimination, the buyer’s personal privilege cannot be raised by the seller as an excuse for evading the clear statutory requirement. See George Campbell Painting Corp. v. Reid, 392 U. S. 286 (1968) ; Rogers v. United States, 340 U. S. 367 (1951). U. S. Treasury Department, Bureau of Narcotics, Traffic in Opium and Other Dangerous Drugs 42 (1968). The regulations, 26 CFR §§ 152.22, 152.23, which limit registration to persons whose dealings are legal under relevant state and local laws, are supported by the legislative history and represent what is by now long-established administrative practice. See Leary v. United States, 395 U. S. 6, 24 n. 38 (1969); H. R. Rep. No. 792, 75th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1937); S. Rep. No. 900, 75th Cong., 1st Sess., 3 (1937); Hearings on H. R. 6906 before a subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Finance, 75th Cong., 1st Sess., 6 (1937); Hearings on H. R. 6385 before the House Committee on Ways and Means, 75th Cong., 1st Sess., 8 (1937). It is not specified in either the statute or the regulations when the blank for the seller's name is filled in or by whom. But the form itself is addressed “to” the seller, and the form and the regulations contain provisions that enable a form “made out to” one seller, to be endorsed by him to another if the first seller cannot fill the order. See 26 CFR § 151.189. This suggests that it is the buyer who fills in the seller’s name when he sends in the order. Whether or not that is the case in fact is irrelevant under the analysis in the text. The difference between the availability of order forms under the Harrison Narcotics Act and the Marihuana Tax Act was explicitly recognized by Congress when it passed the latter Act. See Leary v. United States, 395 U. S. 6, 21-22 (1969). The regulation restricting registration to those “lawfully entitled” to deal in narcotic drugs, 26 CFR § 151.24, finds specific support in the language of the Act. See 26 U. S. C. §§4705 (g), 4721. Even if order forms could realistically be secured, Minor’s Fifth Amendment arguments are no more persuasive than Buie’s. See n. 3, supra. See Brief for Petitioner 22-23. Convinced that “[h]eroin has no medical value that is not better served by legitimate drugs,” S. Rep. No. 1997, 84th Cong., 2d Sess., 7 (1956), Congress in 1956 required the surrender of all theretofore lawfully possessed heroin, to be distributed only as approved by the Secretary for purposes of scientific research. 18 U. S. C. § 1402. The Narcotic Drugs Import and Export Act, 35 Stat. 614, as amended, 21 U. S. C. §§ 173, 174, effectively prohibits the importation of heroin or of opium for the purpose of manufacturing heroin, and makes it a felony to traffic in drugs knowing them to have been unlawfully imported. The Narcotics Manufacturing Act of 1960, 74 Stat. 55, 21 U. S. C. § 501 et seq., prohibits the manufacturing of heroin except as authorized for limited scientific purposes. Given the resulting absence of original stamped packages of heroin, 26 U. S. C. § 4704 (a) effectively forbids buying, selling, dispensing, or distributing the drug. Since for ail practical purposes there is thus no legitimate dealing in heroin, any attempt to use an order form to purchase the drug would almost certainly subject the buyer to prosecution under 26 U. S. C. §4705 (g): “It shall be unlawful for any person to obtain by means of said order forms narcotic drugs for any purpose other than the use, sale, or distribution thereof by him in the conduct of a lawful business in said drugs or in the legitimate practice of his profession.” See U. S. Treasury Department, Bureau of Narcotics, Traffic in Opium and Other Dangerous Drugs 22, 42 (1968). Even if the hypothetical became a reality, it is doubtful that the incriminating information would get back to the Government via the buyer, wrho would himself be guilty of a violation of the narcotics laws. See n. 10, supra. See also 26 CFR § 151.181, which provides that order forms may be filled only by registered sellers— a class to which Minor does not belong. It is significant that of the nearly 400,000 registered dealers in 1967, only four were reported during that year for a violation of the narcotics laws. See U. S. Treasury Department, Bureau of Narcotics, Traffic in Opium and Other Dangerous Drugs 22 (1968). The dissent suggests that the courts should refuse to enforce § 4705 (a) as part of a revenue measure. But these very order form provisions were upheld long ago as valid revenue laws even though they operated to prevent large classes of people from obtaining order forms — and hence from acquiring drugs — at all. United States v. Doremus, 249 U. S. 86 (1919); Webb v. United States, 249 U. S. 96 (1919); see Nigro v. United States, 276 U. S. 332 (1928). A statute does not cease to be a valid tax measure because it deters the activity taxed, because the revenue obtained is negligible, or because the activity is otherwise illegal. See, e. g., Marchetti v. United States, 390 U. S. 39, 44 (1968); United States v. Kahriger, 345 U. S. 22, 28 (1953); License Tax Cases, 5 Wall. 462 (1867). Even viewing § 4705 (a) as little more than a flat ban on certain sales, it is sustainable under the powers granted Congress in Art. I, §8. See Yee Hem v. United States, 268 U. S. 178, 183 (1925). Brolan v. United States, 236 U. S. 216, 222 (1915); cf. United States v. Sullivan, 332 U. S. 689 (1948); United States v. Darby, 312 U. S. 100 (1941). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. In November 1968, petitioner brought an action in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, seeking damages and injunctive relief for an alleged breach by respondent of their collective-bargaining agreement. The complaint charged that since June 1, 1966, respondent had “continually violated” the contract by refusing to abide by any of its terms, including wage, hiring hall, and fringe benefit provisions. The agreement, which incorporated the terms of master contracts between petitioner and a local contractors’ association, provided for arbitration of “any difference . . . between the parties hereto which cannot be settled by their representatives, within 48 hours of the occurrence.” The District Court dismissed petitioner’s action for failure to state a claim and noted, but did not pass upon, two additional contentions of the company — “that (1) no contract was ever created, and (2) . . . if consummated, the agreement was subsequently abandoned by the union.” No. 68-C-2091 (April 14, 1969) (unreported). The court suggested that the parties arbitrate the binding effect of their contract. When the company refused to arbitrate either that issue or “the subsequent issues of possible violations,” petitioner filed an amended complaint to compel arbitration. In moving to dismiss the amended complaint, respondent again denied the existence of a binding agreement and argued that the Union’s delay in seeking arbitration constituted laches barring enforcement of the contract. The District Court initially denied the motion, holding that “if the employer consented to the alleged collective bargaining agreement, the laches issue should be decided by the arbitrator rather than the federal courts.” Id. (Aug. 26, 1969) (unreported). But after conducting an evidentiary hearing on the scope of the arbitration clause, the court entered an order dismissing the complaint. Id. (Dec. 4, 1969) (unreported). Though agreeing that respondent “was bound by the memorandum agreement to arbitrate labor disputes within the limits of the arbitration clause,” the court found that there had been no contact between the parties from the time of the signing in 1964 until the summer of 1968. It therefore concluded that the Union was guilty of laches in seeking enforcement: “The master agreement contemplates initiation of arbitration proceedings if any dispute is not settled within 48 hours of its occurrence, and further provides that the Board of Arbitrators shall meet 'within six (6) days.’ Yet demand for arbitration was not made in this case until April, 1969, almost five years from Flair’s first alleged failure to comply with the contract and nearly three years from the inception of the alleged breach sought to be arbitrated. “To require Flair to respond, through arbitration, to general charges of noncompliance with contract provisions allegedly beginning more than two years before this suit was filed would impose an extreme burden on its defense efforts. . . . [T]o compel arbitration would reward plaintiff for its own inaction and subject defendant to the risk of liability because of actions taken or not taken in reliance on plaintiff’s apparent abandonment.” The Court of Appeals affirmed thé order by divided vote. 440 F. 2d 557 (1971). Its opinion read the memorandum of the District Court to hold that the collective-bargaining agreement was still in effect and that therefore the question for decision was “whether a court may properly dismiss the complaint on the basis of laches resulting from dilatory notification of the existence of a dispute in a suit brought to compel arbitration with regard to the dispute.” Id., at 557-558. The court then addressed this Court’s decision in John Wiley & Sons v. Livingston, 376 U. S. 543 (1964). There an employer refused to arbitrate on the ground that the union, among other things, had failed to follow grievance procedures required by the collective-bargaining agreement. We ordered arbitration, holding that “[o]nce it is determined . . . that the parties are obligated to submit the subject matter of a dispute to arbitration, 'procedural’ questions which grow out of the dispute and bear on its final disposition should be left to the arbitrator.” Id., at 557. The Court of Appeals distinguished Wiley on the ground that the procedural question there concerned “intrinsic” untimeliness, relating solely to the requirements of the contract. Here, on the other hand, the question was one of “extrinsic” untimeliness, based not on a violation of contract procedures but on the failure to give timely notice under the equitable doctrine of laches. Therefore, according to the court, the matter was within its province to decide, for “ 'we are not indulging in the judicially unwarranted task of interpreting the collective bargaining agreement.’ ” 440 F. 2d, at 560, quoting Amalgamated Clothing Workers v. Ironall Factories Co., 386 F. 2d 586, 591 (CA6 1967). We granted certiorari. 404 U. S. 982 (1971). Petitioner contends that the Court of Appeals erred in limiting Wiley to cases of “intrinsic” delay because the issue of delay, whether “intrinsic” or not, “necessarily involves a determination of the merits of the dispute and bears directly upon the outcome and is accordingly for an arbitrator and not the federal court to decide.” Brief for Petitioner 21. In other words, petitioner argues that even if the parties have not agreed to arbitrate the laches issue, Wiley requires that the arbitrator resolve the question as an integral part of the underlying contract dispute. We need not reach the question posed by petitioner, for we find that the parties did in fact agree to arbitrate the issue of laches here. Although respondent denies that it ever signed a binding contract with petitioner, the District Court found to the contrary and held that the company “was bound by the memorandum agreement to arbitrate labor disputes within the limits of the arbitration clause.” That clause applies to “any difference,” whatever it may be, not settled by the parties within 48 hours of occurrence. There is nothing to limit the sweep of this language or to except any dispute or class of disputes from arbitration. In that circumstance, we must conclude that the parties meant what they said— that “any difference,” which would include the issue of laches raised by respondent at trial, should be referred to the arbitrator for decision. The District Court ignored the plain meaning of the clause in deciding that issue. Of course, nothing we say here diminishes the responsibility of a court to determine whether a union and employer have agreed to arbitration. That issue, as well as the scope of the arbitration clause, remains a matter for judicial decision. See Atkinson v. Sinclair Refining Co., 370 U. S. 238, 241 (1962). But once a court finds that, as here, the parties are subject to an agreement to arbitrate, and that agreement extends to “any difference” between them, then a claim that particular grievances are barred by laches is an arbitrable question under the agreement. Compare Iowa Beef Packers, Inc. v. Thompson, 405 U. S. 228 (1972). Having agreed to the broad clause, the company is obliged to submit its laches defense, even if “extrinsic,” to the arbitral process. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is Reversed. Respondent’s attorney admitted as much in the hearing before the District Court. Though contending that the binding effect of the contract was an issue for the court, and not the arbitrator, he agreed that “laches is another thing. I can go along on this being an arbitrable question, I suppose, if you have got a contract . . . .” App. 93. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

G

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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice White, joined by The Chief Justice, Justice Sc alia, and Justice Kennedy, delivered an opinion announcing the judgment of the Court in Nos. 87-1697 and 87-1711 and dissenting in No. 87-1622. The issue presented by these three consolidated cases is whether the Yakima Indian Nation or the County of Yakima, a governmental unit of the State of Washington, has the authority to zone fee lands owned by nonmembers of the Tribe located within the boundaries of the Yakima Reservation. hH ut> The Confederated Bands and Tribes of the Yakima Indian Nation are composed of 14 originally distinct Indian Tribes that banded together in the mid-1800’s to negotiate with the United States. The result of those negotiations was a treaty signed in 1855 and ratified by the Senate in 1859. Treaty between the United States and the Yakima Nation of Indians (Treaty with the Yakimas), 12 Stat. 951. By the terms of the treaty, the Yakima Nation ceded vast areas of land to the United States but retained an area, the Yakima Indian Reservation, for its “exclusive use and benefit.” Id., at 952. The reservation is located in the southeastern part of the State of Washington. Approximately 1.3 million acres of land are located within its boundaries. Of that land, roughly 80% is held in trust by the United States for the benefit of the Yakima Nation or individual members of the Tribe. The remaining 20% of the land is owned in fee by Indian or non-Indian owners. Most of the fee land is found in Toppenish, Wapato, and Harrah, the three incorporated towns located in the northeastern part of the reservation. The remaining fee land is scattered throughout the reservation in a “checkerboard” pattern. The parties to this litigation, as well as the District Court and the Court of Appeals, have treated the Yakima Reservation as divided into two parts: a “closed area” and an “open area.” The closed area consists of the western two-thirds of the reservation and is predominantly forest land. Of the approximately 807,000 acres of land in the closed area, 740,000 acres are located in Yakima County. Twenty-five thousand acres of the seven hundred and forty thousand acres are fee land.'The closed area is so named because it has been closed to the general public at least since 1972 when the Bureau of Indian Affairs restricted the use of federally maintained roads in the area to members of the Yakima Nation and to its permittees, who must be record landowners or associated with the Tribe. Access to the open area, as its name suggests, is not likewise restricted to the general public. The open area is primarily rangeland, agricultural land, and land used for residential and commercial development. Almost half of the land in the open area is fee land. B The Yakima Nation adopted its first zoning ordinance in 1970. The ordinance was amended to its present form in 1972. By its terms, the Yakima Nation ordinance applies to all lands within the reservation boundaries, including fee lands owned by Indians or non-Indians. Yakima County adopted its present comprehensive zoning ordinance in 1972, although the county had regulated land use as early as 1946. The county ordinance applies to all real property within county boundaries, except for Indian trust lands. The ordinance establishes a number of use districts, which generally govern agricultural, residential, commercial, industrial, and forest watershed uses. The particular zoning designations at issue are “forest watershed” and “general rural.” The fee lands located in the closed area are zoned by the county ordinance as forest watershed. That designation permits development of single-family dwellings, commercial campgrounds, small overnight lodging facilities, restaurants, bars, general stores and souvenir shops, service stations, marinas, and sawmills. The minimum lot size is one-half acre. None of these uses would be permitted by the zoning designation “reservation restricted area,” which applies to the closed area under the Yakima Nation zoning ordinance. The general rural zoning designation, applicable to land in the open area, is one of three use districts governing agricultural properties. The minimum lot size for land zoned general rural is smaller than that specified for agricultural land in the Yakima Nation ordinance, although the other county use districts for agricultural properties have larger minimum lot sizes than the Yakima Nation ordinance. C 1 Petitioner Philip Brendale, who is part Indian but not a member of the Yakima Nation, owns a 160-acre tract of land near the center of the forested portion of the closed area. The parcel was originally allotted to Brendale’s great aunt, a member of the Yakima Nation. The land passed by inheritance to Brendale’s mother and grandfather, who were issued a fee patent in 1963, and then, on his mother’s death in 1972, to Brendale: The land is zoned as reservation restricted area by the Yakima Nation. It is zoned forest watershed by Yakima County. In January 1982, Brendale filed four contiguous “short plat” applications with the Yakima County Planning Department. After determining that the short platting did not require an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), the department issued a Declaration of Non-Significance. The department requested comments from the Yakima Nation, and after the Tribe did not respond, the short plats were approved. Brendale then submitted in April 1983 a “long plat” application to divide one of his platted 20-acre parcels into 10 2-acre lots to be sold as summer cabin sites. Each lot is to have an individual well and a septic tank. Electric generators would provide electricity. The proposed plat is bordered on the north and east by other lands owned by Brendale, on the south by lands owned in fee by the St. Regis Paper Company, and on the west by lands held in trust by the United States. The proposed development would not have been permissible under the Yakima Nation ordinance. The county planning department again issued a Declaration of Non-Significance. The Yakima Nation appealed the Declaration of Non-Significance to the Yakima County Board of Commissioners on the grounds that the county had no zoning authority over the land and that an EIS was necessary. The commissioners concluded that the appeal was properly before the Board but reversed the planning department and ordered that an EIS be prepared. 2 Petitioner Stanley Wilkinson, a non-Indian and a nonmember of the Yakima Nation, owns a 40-acre tract of land in the open area of the reservation. The tract is located less than a mile from the northern boundary of the reservation and is on a slope overlooking the Yakima Municipal Airport and the city of Yakima. The land is bordered on the north by trust land and on the other three sides by fee land, and is currently vacant sagebrush property. It is zoned agricultural by the Yakima Nation and general rural by Yakima County. In September 1983, Wilkinson applied to the Yakima County Planning Department to subdivide 32 acres of his land into 20 lots. The lots range in size from 1.1 acres to 4.5 acres. Each is to be used for a single-family home and will be served by individual wells and septic systems. The proposed development would not have been permissible under the Yakima Nation ordinance. The planning department initially indicated that an EIS needed to be prepared for the project, but later, after Wilkinson modified his proposal, the department issued a Declaration of Non-Significance. The Yakima Nation thereafter appealed the Declaration of Non-Significance, again challenging the county’s authority to zone the land and alleging that an EIS was necessary. The county board of commissioners concluded that the appeal was properly before it and affirmed the planning department’s conclusion that an EIS was not necessary. D The Yakima Nation then filed separate actions in United States District Court challenging the proposed development of the Brendale and Wilkinson properties and the county’s exercise of zoning authority over the land. The complaints sought a declaratory judgment that the Yakima Nation had exclusive authority to zone the properties at issue and an injunction barring any action or the approval of any action on the land inconsistent with the land-use regulations of the Yakima Nation. The District Court held that the Yakima Nation had exclusive zoning authority over the Brendale property, Yakima Indian Nation v. Whiteside, 617 F. Supp. 735, 744, 747 (ED Wash. 1985) (Whiteside I), but concluded that the Tribe lacked authority over the Wilkinson property, Yakima Indian Nation v. Whiteside, 617 F. Supp. 750, 758 (ED Wash. 1985) (Whiteside II). The District Court looked to this Court’s opinion in Montana v. United States, 450 U. S. 544 (1981), as controlling whether an Indian tribe has authority to regulate activities of nonmembers of the tribe on fee lands. The District Court determined that there was no evidence of any “consensual relationship” between the Yakima Nation and Wilkinson and Brendale that would extend the authority of the Tribe to the fee lands. 617 F. Supp., at 743; 617 F. Supp., at 757. But after making detailed findings of fact, the court concluded that “Brendale’s proposed development does indeed pose a threat to the political integrity, the economic security and the health and welfare of the Yakima Nation,” and therefore the Tribe has authority to impose its zoning regulations on that property. 617 F. Supp., at 744. The District Court then proceeded to determine that Yakima County was pre-empted from exercising concurrent zoning authority over the land in the closed area because its interests in regulating the land were minimal while the Tribe’s interests were substantial. Id., at 747. But because Wilkinson’s proposed development did not impose a similar threat, the Tribe had no authority whatsoever over that property. 617 F. Supp., at 758. On appeal, the Ninth Circuit consolidated the cases and affirmed as to the Brendale property but reversed as to the Wilkinson property. Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakima Indian Nation v. Whiteside, 828 F. 2d 529 (1987). In upholding the Yakima Nation’s zoning authority, the Court of Appeals did not disturb or rely on the findings of the District Court. Instead, it concluded that zoning ordinances by their very nature attempt “to protect against the damage caused by uncontrolled development, which can affect all of the residents and land of the reservation.” Id., at 534. According to the Court of Appeals, zoning ordinances are within the police power of local governments precisely because they promote the health and welfare of the community. Moreover, a “major goal” of zoning is coordinated land-use planning. Because fee land is located throughout the reservation in a checkerboard pattern, denying the Yakima Nation the right to zone fee land “would destroy [its] capacity to engage' in comprehensive planning, so fundamental to a zoning scheme.” This the court was “unwilling” to do. Id., at 534-535. Brendale, Wilkinson, and Yakima County each petitioned for writ of certiorari. We granted the petitions and consolidated the cases for argument. 487 U. S. 1204 (1988). 1 — 1 1 — 1 The present actions were brought by the Yakima Nation to require development occurring on property within the boundaries of its reservation to proceed in accordance with the Yakima Nation zoning ordinance. The Tribe is necessarily contending that it has the exclusive authority to zone all of the property within the reservation, including the projects at issue here. We therefore examine whether the Yakima Nation has the authority, derived either from its treaty with the United States or from its status as an independent sovereign, to zone the fee lands owned by Brendale and Wilkinson. A The Yakima Nation argues first that its treaty with the United States establishes its authority to regulate fee land within the reservation but owned by nonmembers of the Tribe. By its terms, the Treaty with the Yakimas provides that the land retained by the Yakima Nation “shall be set apart... for the exclusive use and benefit” of the Tribe, and no “white man, excepting those in the employment of the Indian Department, [shall] be permitted to reside upon the said reservation without permission of the tribe.” 12 Stat. 951, 952. The Yakima Nation contends that this power to exclude provides the source for its authority over the land at issue here. We disagree. The Yakima Nation no longer retains the “exclusive use and benefit” of all the land within the reservation boundaries established by the Treaty with the Yakimas. Under the Indian General Allotment Act, 24 Stat. 388, significant portions of the Yakima Reservation, including the tracts of land at issue here, were allotted to individual members of the Tribe. The land was held in trust for a period of years, generally 25 although the period was subject to extension, after which fee patents were issued. Id., at 389, §5. Over time, through sale and inheritance, nonmembers of the Tribe, such as petitioners Brendale and Wilkinson, have come to own a substantial portion of the allotted land. We analyzed the effect of the Allotment Act on an Indian tribe’s treaty rights to regulate activities of nonmembers on fee land in Montana v. United States. The treaty language there was virtually identical to the language in the Treaty with the Yakimas, 450 U. S., at 558, and we concluded that “treaty rights with respect to reservation lands must be read in light of the subsequent alienation of those lands.” Id., at 561. See also Puyallup Tribe, Inc. v. Washington Game Dept., 433 U. S. 165, 174 (1977). In Montana, as in the present cases, the lands at issue had been alienated under the Allotment Act, and the Court concluded that “[i]t defies common sense to suppose that Congress would intend that non-Indians purchasing allotted lands would become subject to tribal jurisdiction when an avowed purpose of the allotment policy was the ultimate destruction of tribal government.” 450 U. S., at 560, n. 9. The Yakima Nation argues that we should not consider the Allotment Act because it was repudiated in 1934 by the Indian Reorganization Act, 48 Stat. 984. But the Court in Montana was well aware of the change in Indian policy engendered by the Indian Reorganization Act and concluded that this fact was irrelevant. 450 U. S., at 560, n. 9. Although the Indian Reorganization Act may have ended the allotment of further lands, it did not restore to the Indians the exclusive use of those lands that had already passed to non-Indians or prevent already allotted lands for which fee patents were subsequently issued from thereafter passing to non-Indians. Justice Stevens acknowledges that the Allotment Act eliminated tribal authority to exclude nonmembers from fee lands they owned. Post, at 436-437. Yet he concludes that Brendale and Wilkinson are somehow subject to a tribal power to “determine the character of the tribal community,” post, at 437, unless the Tribe has voluntarily surrendered that power. This view of tribal zoning authority as a sort of equitable servitude, post, at 442, is wholly unsupported by precedent. Justice Stevens begins with a tribe’s power to exclude nonmembers from its land and from that power derives a tribal “power to define the character of” that land, post, at 434, which he asserts as the basis for the Yakima Nation’s exercise of zoning authority over the closed area of its reservation. According to Justice Stevens, the power to exclude “necessarily must include the lesser power to regulate land use in the interest of protecting the tribal community.” Post, at 438. But the Yakima Nation no longer has the power to exclude fee owners from its land within the boundaries of the reservation, as Justice Stevens concedes. Post, at 437. Therefore, that power can no longer serve as the basis for tribal exercise of the lesser included power, a result which is surely not “inconceivable,” post, at 437, but rather which is perfectly straightforward. It is irrelevant that the Tribe had declared the closed area off limits before Brendale obtained title to his property. Once Brendale obtained title to his land that land was no longer off limits to him; the tribal authority to exclude was necessarily overcome by, as Justice Stevens puts it, an “implicit] grant” of access to the land. Ibid. Aside from the alleged inconceivability of the result, Justice Stevens offers no support for his assertion that in enacting the Allotment Act Congress intended tribes to retain the “power to determine the character of the tribal community.” Ibid. Justice Stevens cites only Seymour v. Superintendent of Washington State Penitentiary, 368 U. S. 351 (1962), and Mattz v. Arnett, 412 U. S. 481 (1973), in support of his position. Post, at 441-442. Those cases are irrelevant to the issue at hand, however, concluding merely that allotment is consistent with continued reservation status. Meanwhile, Montana is directly to the contrary: the Court there flatly rejected the existence of a power, derived from the power to exclude, to regulate activities on lands from which tribes can no longer exclude nonmembers. See 450 U. S., at 559. Justice Stevens’ attempts to distinguish Montana are unavailing. The distinctions on which he relies, that the regulation there was discriminatory, posed no threat to the welfare of the Tribe, and infringed on state interests, post, at 443-444, are not even mentioned in the section of the Montana opinion considering the power to exclude, see 450 U. S., at 557-563, and certainly were not considered by the Court in that case as having any relevance to this issue. We would follow Montana and conclude that, for the reasons stated there, any regulatory power the Tribe might have under the treaty “cannot apply to lands held in fee by non-Indians.” Id., at 559. B An Indian tribe’s treaty power to exclude nonmembers of the tribe from its lands is not the only source of Indian regulatory authority. In Merrion v. Jicarilla Apache Tribe, 455 U. S. 130, 141 (1982), the Court held that tribes have inherent sovereignty independent of that authority arising from their power to exclude. Prior to the European settlement of the New World, Indian tribes were “self-governing sovereign political communities,” United States v. Wheeler, 435 U. S. 313, 322-323 (1978), and they still retain some “elements of ‘quasi-sovereign’ authority after ceding their lands to the United States and announcing their dependence on the Federal Government,” Oliphant v. Suquamish Indian Tribe, 435 U. S. 191, 208 (1978). Thus, an Indian tribe generally retains sovereignty by way of tribal self-government and control over other aspects of its internal affairs. Montana, supra, at 564. A tribe’s inherent sovereignty, however, is divested to the extent it is inconsistent with the tribe’s dependent status, that is, to the extent it involves a tribe’s “external relations.” Wheeler, 435 U. S., at 326. Those cases in which the Court has found a tribe’s sovereignty divested generally are those “involving the relations between an Indian tribe and nonmembers of the tribe.” Ibid. For example, Indian tribes cannot freely alienate their lands to non-Indians, Oneida Indian Nation v. County of Oneida, 414 U. S. 661, 667-668 (1974), cannot enter directly into commercial or governmental relations with foreign nations, Worcester v. Georgia, 6 Pet. 515, 559 (1832), and cannot exercise criminal jurisdiction over non-Indians in tribal courts, Oliphant, supra, at 195. This list is by no means exclusive, as Montana makes clear. In Montana, the Crow Tribe sought to prohibit hunting and fishing within its reservation by anyone not a member of the Tribe. The Court held that the Tribe’s inherent sovereignty did not support extending the prohibition on hunting and fishing to fee lands owned by non-Indians. It recognized the general principle that the “exercise of tribal power beyond what is necessary to protect tribal self-government or to control internal relations is inconsistent with the dependent status of the tribes, and so cannot survive without express congressional delegation.” 450 U. S., at 564. Because regulation of hunting and fishing on fee lands owned by nonmembers of the Tribe did not bear any “clear relationship to tribal self-government or internal relations,” ibid., this general principle precluded extension of tribal jurisdiction to the fee lands at issue. The Yakima Nation contends that the Court’s insistence in Montana on an express congressional delegation of tribal power over nonmembers is inconsistent with language in Washington v. Confederated Tribes of Colville Indian Reservation, 447 U. S. 134, 153 (1980), that tribal powers are divested by implication only when “the exercise of tribal sovereignty would be inconsistent with the overriding interests of the National Government.” We do not see this language as inconsistent with Montana. As the opinion in Colville made clear, that case involved “[t]he power to tax transactions occurring on trust lands and significantly involving a tribe or its members.” 447 U. S., at 152. It did not involve the regulation of fee lands, as did Montana. Moreover, the Court in Montana itself reconciled the two cases, citing Colville as an example of the sort of “consensual relationship” that might even support tribal authority over nonmembers on fee lands. 450 U. S., at 565-566. Justice Blackmun takes a slightly different approach, relying particularly on Colville and Wheeler for the proposition that “tribal sovereignty is not implicitly divested except in those limited circumstances principally involving external powers of sovereignty where the exercise of tribal authority is necessarily inconsistent with their dependent status.” Post, at 451-452. But Justice Blackmun ignores what the Court made clear in Wheeler, in a passage immediately preceding the one he cites: that regulation of “the relations between an Indian tribe and nonmembers of the tribe” is necessarily inconsistent with a tribe’s dependent status, and therefore tribal sovereignty over such matters of “external relations” is divested. 435 U. S., at 326. Indeed, it is precisely this discussion that the Court relied upon in Montana as “distinguishing] between those inherent powers retained by the tribes and those divested.” 450 U. S., at 564. There is no contention here that Congress has expressly delegated to the Yakima Nation the power to zone fee lands of nonmembers of the Tribe. Cf. 18 U. S. C. §§ 1151, 1161 (1982 ed., and Supp. V); 33 U. S. C. §§ 1377(e) and (h)(1) (1982 ed., Supp. V). Therefore under the general principle enunciated in Montana, the Yakima Nation has no authority to impose its zoning ordinance on the fee lands owned by petitioners Brendale and Wilkinson. C Our inquiry does not end here because the opinion in Montana noted two “exceptions” to its general principle. First, “[a] tribe may regulate, through taxation, licensing, or other means, the activities of nonmembers who enter consensual relationships with the tribe or its members, through commercial dealing, contracts, leases, or other arrangements.” 450 U. S., at 565. Second, “[a] tribe may also retain inherent power to exercise civil authority over the conduct of non-Indians on fee lands within its reservation when that conduct threatens or has some direct effect on the political integrity, the economic security, or the health or welfare of the tribe.” Id., at 566. The parties agree that the first Montana exception does not apply in these cases. Brendale and Wilkinson do not have a “consensual relationship” with the Yakima Nation simply by virtue of their status as landowners within reservation boundaries, as Montana itself necessarily decided. The Yakima Nation instead contends that the Tribe has authority to zone under the second Montana exception. We disagree. Initially, we reject as overbroad the Ninth Circuit’s categorical acceptance of tribal zoning authority over lands within reservation boundaries. We find it significant that the so-called second Montana exception is prefaced by the word “may” — “[a] tribe may also retain inherent power to exercise civil authority over the conduct of non-Indians on fee lands within its reservation.” Ibid, (emphasis added). This indicates to us that a tribe’s authority need not extend to all conduct that “threatens or has some direct effect on the political integrity, the economic security, or the health or welfare of the tribe,” but instead depends on the circumstances. The Ninth Circuit, however, transformed this indication that there may be other cases in which a tribe has an interest in activities of nonmembers on fee land into a rule describing every case in which a tribe has such an interest. Indeed, the Ninth Circuit equated an Indian tribe’s retained sovereignty with a local government’s police power, which is contrary to Montana itself. Montana rejected tribal sovereignty to regulate hunting and fishing on fee land owned by non-Indians, which clearly is a power within the police power of local governments. It is also evident that a literal application of the second exception would make little sense in the circumstances of these cases. To hold that the Tribe has authority to zone fee land when the activity on that land has the specified effect on Indian properties would mean that the authority would last only so long as the threatening use continued. If it ceased, zoning power would revert to the county. Under the District Court’s interpretation of Montana, not only would regulatory authority depend in the first instance on a factual inquiry into how a tribe’s interests are affected by a particular use of fee land, but as circumstances changed over time, so, too, would the authority to zone. Conceivably, in a case like this, zoning authority could vest variously in the county and the Tribe, switching back and forth between the two, depending on what uses the county permitted on the fee land at issue. Uncertainty of this kind would not further the interests of either the Tribe or the county government and would be chaotic for landowners. Montana should therefore not be understood to vest zoning authority in the tribe when fee land is used in certain ways. The governing principle is that the tribe has no authority itself, by way of tribal ordinance or actions in the tribal courts, to regulate the use of fee land. The inquiry thus becomes whether, and to what extent, the tribe has a protectible interest in what activities are taking place on fee land within the reservation and, if it has such an interest, how it may be protected. Of course, under ordinary law, neighbors often have a protectible interest in what is occurring on adjoining property and may seek relief in an appropriate forum, judicial or otherwise. Montana suggests that in the special circumstances of checkerboard ownership of lands within a reservation, the tribe has an interest under federal law, defined in terms of the impact of the challenged uses on the political integrity, economic security, or the health or welfare of the tribe. But, as we have indicated above, that interest does not entitle the tribe to complain or obtain relief against every use of fee land that has some adverse effect on the tribe. The impact must be demonstrably serious and must imperil the political integrity, the economic security, or the health and welfare of the tribe. This standard will sufficiently protect Indian tribes while at the same time avoiding undue interference with state sovereignty and providing the certainty needed by property owners. Since the tribes’ protectible interest is one arising under federal law, the Supremacy Clause requires state and local governments, including Yakima County zoning authorities, to recognize and respect that interest in the course of their activities. The Tribe in this case, as it should have, first appeared in the county zoning proceedings, but its submission should have been, not that the county was without zoning authority over fee land within the reservation, but that its tribal interests were imperiled. The federal courts had jurisdiction to entertain the Tribe’s suit for declaratory and in-junctive relief, but given that the county has jurisdiction to zone fee lands on the reservation and would be enjoinable only if it failed to respect the rights of the Tribe under federal law, the proper course for the District Court in the Brendale phase of this case would have been to stay its hand until the zoning proceedings had been completed. At that time, a judgment could be made as to whether the uses that were actually authorized on Brendale’s property imperiled the political integrity, the economic security, or the health or welfare of the Tribe. If due regard is given to the Tribe’s protectible interest at all stages of the proceedings, we have every confidence that the nightmarish consequences predicted by Justice Blackmun, post, at 460-461, will be avoided. Of course if practice proves otherwise, Congress can take appropriate'action. Ill The District Court found that Yakima County’s exercise of zoning power over the Wilkinson property would have no direct effect on the Tribe and would not threaten the Tribe’s political integrity, economic security, or health and welfare. Whiteside II, 617 F. Supp., at 755. On the basis of these findings, it is clear that the Wilkinson development and the county’s approval of that development do not imperil any interest of the Yakima Nation. Therefore, I would reverse the judgment of the Ninth Circuit as to the Wilkinson property. The Brendale property presents a different situation. At the time the Tribe filed its suit, the county had agreed with the Tribe that an EIS was required before Brendale’s development could go forward. The zoning proceedings had thus not been concluded, and the District Court’s judgment was that the county had no power to go forward. That judgment was infirm under the approach outlined in this opinion. The zoning proceedings should have been allowed to conclude, and it may be that those proceedings would adequately recognize tribal interests and make unnecessary further action in the District Court. If it were otherwise, the District Court could then decide whether the uses the State permits on the Brendale property would do serious injury to, and clearly imperil, the protectible tribal interests identified in this opinion. This part of the case in my view should therefore be returned to District Court. A majority of this Court, however, disagrees with this conclusion. Accordingly, since with respect to the Wilkinson property, Justice Stevens and Justice O’Connor agree that the judgment of the Court of Appeals in Nos. 87-1697 and 87-1711 should be reversed, that is the judgment of the Court in those cases. With respect to the Brendale property, I would vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case to the Court of Appeals with instructions to vacate the judgment of the District Court and to remand the case to that Court for further proceedings. Because the Court instead affirms the judgment of the Court of Appeals in No. 87-1622, I dissent as to that case. The judgment in Nos. 87-1697 and 87-1711 is Reversed. The treaty further provides that no “white man, excepting those in the employment of the Indian Department, [shall] be permitted to reside upon the said reservation without permission of the tribe and the superintendent and agent.” 12 Stat. 951, 952. At oral argument, counsel arguing for petitioners represented that a decision by the Bureau of Indian Affairs in April 1988, after the Court of Appeals issued its opinion here, has reopened the roads in the closed area to the public. Tr. of Oral Arg. 17. See App. to Brief for Petitioner Brendale la. According to counsel, there is no longer a closed area on the reservation. Tr. of Oral Arg. 17. Counsel for respondents agreed with this characterization, describing what had formerly been the closed area as the “reservation reserved area,” based on the Yakima Nation’s zoning designation for the area. Id, at 28. Despite these developments, Justice Stevens persists in treating the two areas differently, post, at 439-440, a position that is rejected by seven Members of the Court, see also, post, at 468, n. 10 (opinion of BLACKMUN, J.), and continues to rely on the District Court’s findings of fact regarding the Brendale property, which are undermined by the change in circumstances. This opinion will continue to refer to the respective areas as the closed area and the open area, but for convenience only. Preparation of the EIS was underway when the Yakima Nation filed the present action in District Court. In addition to Brendale, Wilkinson, and Yakima County, the Yakima Nation named as defendants Jim Whiteside and two other County Commissioners of Yakima County, the Director of the Planning Department of Yakima County, the codeveloper of the Brendale property, and prospective purchasers of portions of the Wilkinson property. The developer and the prospective purchasers were dismissed as parties by order of the District Court. See Yakima Indian Nation v. Whiteside, 617 F. Supp. 735, 737, n. 1 (ED Wash. 1985) (Whiteside I); Yakima Indian Nation v. Whiteside, 617 F. Supp. 750, 751, n. 1 (ED Wash. 1985) (Whiteside II). The District Court found that Brendale’s proposed development would disrupt soil conditions; cause a deterioration of air quality; change drainage patterns; destroy some trees and natural vegetation; cause a deterioration of wildlife habitat; alter the location and density of human population in the area; increase traffic, light, and the use of fuel wood; and require added police and fire protection as well as new systems for waste disposal. The court also found that a number of places of religious and cultural significance were located in the closed area and that much of the Tribe’s income comes from lumber harvested from lands within the closed area. 617 F. Supp., at 741-742. Unlike the closed area, however, the District Court found that the open area had no unique religious or spiritual importance to the Yakima Nation and that the trust land in the vicinity of the proposed Wilkinson development did not provide a significant source of food for the Tribe. 617 F. Supp., at 755. The Court of Appeals then remanded to the District Court for findings of fact on the respective interests of the Yakima Nation and Yakima County in regulating the Wilkinson property, since the District Court had made such findings only concerning the Brendale property. Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakima Indian Nation v. Whiteside, 828 F. 2d 529, 536 (CA9 1987). Yakima County did not appeal the judgment of the District Court in Whiteside I, respecting the Brendale Property, App. 7, 11, and the only issue presented in its petition for certiorari concerned the Wilkinson property. Brendale and Wilkinson each petitioned for certiorari concerning their own property. Furthermore, the practical consequences of Justice Stevens’ approach will be severe. Justice Stevens’ conception of tribal zoning authority allows Indian tribes to obtain the power to zone by defining areas on their reservations that contain only a “small percentage” of fee lands. Post, at 437-438, n. 2. The uncertainty that would result from the necessarily case-by-case determination of which regulatory body (or bodies, see post, at 440-441, n. 3) has zoning jurisdiction over such land, not to mention the uncertainty as to when a tribe will attempt to assert such jurisdiction, would be far worse than that resulting from the scheme discussed infra, at 430-432, in which the contours of the zoning authority are clearly defined and resort to the courts to protect tribal interests should not often be required. Given our disposition of these cases, we need not address whether the Yakima Nation’s retained sovereignty might also have been divested by treaty or statute. United States v. Wheeler, 435 U. S. 313, 323 (1978). See, e. g., Rice v. Rehner, 463 U. S. 713, 724 (1983). The Yakima Nation’s reliance on Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. In September 1979, respondent Washington Post Co. filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U. S. C. § 552, requesting certain documents from petitioner United States Department of State. The subject of the request was defined as “documents indicating whether Dr. Ali Behzadnia and Dr. Ibrahim Yazdi. . . hold valid U. S. passports.” App. 8. The request indicated that respondent would “accept any record held by the Passport Office indicating whether either of these persons is an American citizen.” Ibid. At the time of the request, both Behzadnia and Yazdi were Iranian nationals living in Iran. The State Department denied respondent’s request the following month, stating that release of the requested information “would be ‘a clearly unwarranted invasion of [the] personal privacy’ of these persons,” id., at 14 (quoting 5 U. S. C. § 552(b)(6)), and therefore was exempt from disclosure under Exemption 6 of the FOIA. Denial of respondent’s request was affirmed on appeal by the Department’s Council on Classification Policy, which concluded that “the privacy interests to be protected are not incidental ones, but rather are such that they clearly outweigh any public interests which might be served by release of the requested information.” Id., at 22-23. While pursuing the administrative appeal, respondent brought an action in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia to enjoin petitioners from withholding the requested documents. Both sides filed affidavits and motions for summary judgment. Petitioners’ affidavit, from the Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs, explained that both Behzadnia and Yazdi were prominent figures in Iran’s Revolutionary Government and that compliance with respondent’s request would “cause a real threat of physical harm” to both men. The District Court nonetheless granted respondent’s motion for summary judgment. Petitioners appealed, and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit affirmed. 207 U. S. App. D. C. 372, 647 F. 2d 197 (1981). As construed by the Court of Appeals, Exemption 6 permits the withholding of information only when two requirements have been met: first, the information must be contained in personnel, medical, or “similar” files, and second, the information must be of such a nature that its disclosure would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. Id,., at 373, 647 F. 2d, at 198. Petitioners argued that the first requirement was satisfied because the information sought by respondent was contained in “similar files.” The Court of Appeals disagreed, holding that the phrase “similar files” applies only to those records which contain information “‘“of the same magnitude — as highly personal or as intimate in nature — as that at stake in personnel and medical records.”’” Id., at 373-374, 647 F. 2d, at 198-199 (quoting Simpson v. Vance, 208 U. S. App. D. C. 270, 273, 648 F. 2d 10, 13 (1980), in turn quoting Board of Trade v. Commodity Futures Trading Comm’n, 200 U. S. App. D. C. 339, 345, 627 F. 2d 392, 398 (1980)). Because it found the citizenship status of Behzadnia and Yazdi to be less intimate than information normally contained in personnel and medical files, the Court of Appeals held that it was not contained in “similar files.” Therefore, the Court of Appeals reasoned, there was no need to consider whether disclosure of the information would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy; having failed to meet the first requirement of Exemption 6, the information had to be disclosed under the mandate of the FOIA. We granted certiorari, 454 U. S. 1030 (1981), to review the Court of Appeals’ construction of the “similar files” language, and we now reverse. The language of Exemption 6 sheds little light on what Congress meant by “similar files.” Fortunately, the legislative history is somewhat more illuminating. The House and Senate Reports, although not defining the phrase “similar files,” suggest that Congress’ primary purpose in enacting Exemption 6 was to protect individuals from the injury and embarrassment that can result from the unnecessary disclosure of personal information. After referring to the “great quantities of [Federal Government] files containing intimate details about millions of citizens,” the House Report explains that the exemption is “general” in nature and seeks to protect individuals: “A general exemption for [this] category of information is much more practical than separate statutes protecting each type of personal record. The limitation of a ‘clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy’ provides a proper balance between the protection of an individual’s right of privacy and the preservation of the public’s right to Government information by excluding those kinds of files the disclosure of which might harm the individual.” H. R. Rep. No. 1497, 89th Cong., 2nd Sess., 11 (1966) (emphasis added). Similarly, the Senate Judiciary Committee reached a “consensus that these [personal] files should not be opened to the public, and . . . decided upon a general exemption rather than a number of specific statutory authorizations for various agencies.” S. Rep. No. 813, 89th Cong., 1st Sess., 9 (1965) (emphasis added). The Committee concluded that the balancing of private against public interests, not the nature of the files in which the information was contained, should limit the scope of the exemption: “It is believed that the scope of the exemption is held within bounds by the use of the limitation of ‘a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.’” Ibid. Thus, “the primary concern of Congress in drafting Exemption 6 was to provide for the confidentiality of personal matters.” Department of Air Force v. Rose, 425 U. S. 352, 375, n. 14 (1976). Respondent relies upon passing references in the legislative history to argue that the phrase “similar files” does not include all files which contain information about particular individuals, but instead is limited to files containing “intimate details” and “highly personal” information. See H. R. Rep. No. 1497, supra, at 11; S. Rep. No. 813, supra, at 9. We disagree. Passing references and isolated phrases are not controlling when analyzing a legislative history. Congress’ statements that it was creating a “general exemption” for information contained in “great quantities of files,” H. R. Rep. No. 1497, supra, at 11, suggest that the phrase “similar files” was to have a broad, rather than a narrow, meaning. This impression is confirmed by the frequent characterization of the “clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy” language as a “limitation” which holds Exemption 6 “within bounds.” S. Rep. No. 813, supra, at 9. See also, H. R. Rep. No. 1497, supra, at 11; S. Rep. No. 1219, 88th Cong., 2d Sess., 14 (1964). Had the words “similar files” been intended to be only a narrow addition to “personnel and medical files,” there would seem to be no reason for concern about the exemption’s being “held within bounds,” and there surely would be clear suggestions in the legislative history that such a narrow meaning was intended. We have found none. A proper analysis of the exemption must also take into account the fact that “personnel and medical files,” the two benchmarks for measuring the term “similar files,” are likely to contain much information about a particular individual that is not intimate. Information such as place of birth, date of birth, date of marriage, employment history, and comparable data is not normally regarded as highly personal, and yet respondent does not disagree that such information, if contained in a “personnel” or “medical” file, would be exempt from any disclosure that would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. The passport information here requested, if it exists, presumably would be found in files containing much of the same kind of information. Such files would contain at least the information that normally is required from a passport applicant. See 22 U. S. C. § 213. It strains the normal meaning of the word to say that such files are not “similar” to personnel or medical files. We agree with petitioners’ argument that adoption of respondent’s limited view of Exemption 6 would produce anomalous results. Under the plain language of the exemption, nonintimate information about a particular individual which happens to be contained in a personnel or medical file can be withheld if its release would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. And yet under respondent’s view of the exemption, the very same information, being non-intimate and therefore not within the “similar files” language, would be subject to mandatory disclosure if it happened to be contained in records other than personnel or medical files. “[T]he protection of an individual’s right of privacy” which Congress sought to achieve by preventing “the disclosure of [information] which might harm the individual,” H. R. Rep. No. 1497, supra, at 11, surely was not intended to turn upon the label of the file which contains the damaging information. In Department of Air Force v. Rose, supra, at 372, we recognized that the protection of Exemption 6 is not determined merely by the nature of the file in which the requested information is contained: “Congressional concern for the protection of the kind of confidential personal data usually included in a personnel file is abundantly clear. But Congress also made clear that nonconfidential matter was not to be insulated from disclosure merely because it was stored by an agency in its ‘personnel’ files.” By the same reasoning, information about an individual should not lose the protection of Exemption 6 merely because it is stored by an agency in records other than “personnel” or “medical” files. In sum, we do not think that Congress meant to limit Exemption 6 to a narrow class of files containing only a discrete kind of personal information. Rather, “[t]he exemption [was] intended to cover detailed Government records on an individual which can be identified as applying to that individual.” H. R. Rep. No. 1497, supra, at 11. When disclosure of information which applies to a particular individual is sought from Government records, courts must determine whether release of the information would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of that person’s privacy. The citizenship information sought by respondent satisfies the “similar files” requirement of Exemption 6, and petitioners’ denial of the request should have been sustained upon a showing by the Government that release of the information would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. The Court of Appeals expressly declined to consider the effect of disclosure upon the privacy interests of Behzadnia and Yazdi, and we think that such balancing should be left to the Court of Appeals or to the District Court on remand. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Justice O’Connor concurs in the judgment. Exemption 6 provides that the disclosure requirements of the FOIA do not apply to “personnel and medical files and similar files the disclosure of which would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.” 5 U. S. C. § 552(b)(6). Petitioners’ original affidavit stated: “There is intense anti-American sentiment in Iran and several Iranian revolutionary leaders have been strongly criticized in the press for their alleged ties to the United States. Any individual in Iran who is suspected of being an American citizen or of having American connections is looked upon with mistrust. An official of the Government of Iran who is reputed to be an American citizen would, in my opinion, be in physical danger from some of the revolutionary groups that are prone to violence. “It is the position of the Department of State that any statement at this time by the United States Government which could be construed or misconstrued to indicate that any Iranian public official is currently a United States citizen is likely to cause a real threat of physical harm to that person.” Affidavit of Harold H. Saunders, Jan. 14, 1980, App. 17. The affidavit reported that Yazdi, who had previously held the position of Foreign Minister, was currently a member of the Revolutionary Council and was responsible for solving problems in various regions of Iran. It also indicated that Behzadnia had been a senior official in the Ministry of National Guidance, but that the State Department had not received any report of his activities in recent weeks. Ibid. A supplemental affidavit, executed three months after the first affidavit, stated that Yazdi had been elected to the Iranian National Assembly, but that the activities of Behzadnia were still unreported. Supplemental Affidavit of Harold H. Saunders, Apr. 22, 1980, App. 41. This view of Exemption 6 was adopted by the Attorney General shortly after enactment of the FOIA in a memorandum explaining the meaning of the Act to various federal agencies: “It is apparent that the exemption is intended to exclude from the disclosure requirements all personnel and medical files, and all -private or personal information contained in other files which, if disclosed to the public, would amount to a clearly unwarranted invasion of the privacy of any person.” Attorney General’s Memorandum on the Public Information Section of the Administrative Procedure Act 36 (June 1967) (emphasis added). This construction of Exemption 6 will not render meaningless the threshold requirement that information be contained in personnel, medical, and similar files by reducing it to a test which fails to screen out any information that will not be screened out by the balancing of private against public interests. As petitioners point out, there are undoubtedly many Government files which contain information not personal to any particular individual, the disclosure of which would nonetheless cause embarrassment to certain persons. Information unrelated to any particular person presumably would not satisfy the threshold test. In holding that “similar files” are limited to those containing intimate details about individuals such as might also be contained in personnel or medical files, the Court of Appeals relied on its decision in Simpson v. Vance, 208 U. S. App. D. C. 270, 648 F. 2d 10 (1980). In Simpson, the Court of Appeals held that portions of the State Department’s Biographical Register could not be considered a “similar file” because such information was currently available to the public. Id., at 275, 648 F. 2d, at 15. At the same time, Simpson held that release of information pertaining to an individual’s marital status and the name of the individual’s spouse “would not be appropriate.” Id., at 277, 648 F. 2d, at 17. Respondent contends that information concerning the citizenship of Behzadnia and Yazdi likewise cannot be withheld as contained in “similar files” because United States citizenship is a matter of public record. Even under the Court of Appeals’ holding in Simpson, however, the fact that citizenship is a matter of public record somewhere in the Nation cannot be decisive, since it would seem almost certain that the information concerning marital status that was withheld in Simpson would likewise be contained in public records. In addition, “personnel” files, which expressly come within Exemption 6, are likely to contain much information that is equally a matter of public record. Place of birth, date of birth, marital status, past criminal convictions, and acquisition of citizenship are some examples. The public nature of information may be a reason to conclude, under all the circumstances of a given case, that the release of such information would not constitute a “clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy,” but it does not militate against a conclusion that files are “similar” to personnel and medical files. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

E

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. In this case we decide the question left open in West Virginia v. United States, 479 U. S. 305, 312-313, n. 5 (1987): whether Congress intended the Debt Collection Act of 1982 to abrogate the United States’ federal common-law right to collect prejudgment interest on debts owed to it by the States. We hold that it did not. Texas incurred the instant debts as a result of participation in the Food Stamp Program, 78 Stat. 703, as amended, 7 U. S. C. §2011 et seq. Under that program, the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) of the United States Department of Agriculture provides food stamp coupons to participating States, and the States then distribute the coupons to qualified individuals and households. §§ 2013(a), 2014. Regulations implementing the Food Stamp Program permit participating States to distribute the coupons either over the counter or through the mail. 7 CFR § 274.3(a) (1986); 7 CFR § 274.3(a)(3) (1992). While mail issuance generally is cheaper and more convenient, States that choose to use that distribution method must reimburse the Federal Government for a portion of the replacement cost for any lost or stolen coupons. 7 U. S. C. § 2016(f). Specifically, a State must reimburse the Government for all such losses above a “tolerance level” set by regulation. Texas, through its Department of Human Services, contractually bound itself to comply with all federal regulations governing the program. See 7 CFR §§ 272.2(a)(2), 272.2(b)(1) (1986). Texas incurred substantial mail issuance losses, in part because United States Postal employees stole food stamps that had been mailed by the Texas Department of Human Services to qualified households. Because those losses exceeded the applicable tolerance level, Texas was bound to reimburse the Federal Government for the excess losses. The FNS notified Texas of its debt in the amount of $412,385, and informed it that prejudgment interest would begin to accrue on the balance unless payment was made within 30 days. Texas sought administrative relief in the form of a waiver of liability. After the Food Stamp Appeals Board denied the requested relief, Texas sued the United States in the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas. In addition to challenging the Appeals Board’s refusal to grant a waiver of liability, Texas argued that the Debt Collection Act precluded the imposition of prejudgment interest on any amount it owed the Federal Government. The District Court granted summary judgment in favor of the United States on both issues. With respect to the prejudgment interest issue, the District Court adopted the approach taken by the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit in Gallegos v. Lyng, 891 F. 2d 788 (1989), which held that the Government’s common-law right to prejudgment interest on debts owed to it by the States survived enactment of the Debt Collection Act. See Civ. Action Nos. A-87-CA-774, A-88-CA-820 (WD Tex., Nov. 13, 1990). The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed the District Court’s decision concerning waiver, but reversed its decision concerning pre judgment interest. 951 F. 2d 645 (1992). Relying on the language of the Debt Collection Act, the court held that the “Act is not silent concerning whether or not state obligations should be subject to pre judgment interest. The Act specifically excludes states from the payment of interest.” Id., at 651. Because Congress did not impose interest through the specific provisions of the Food Stamp Act “diming the time period relevant in this case, the Courts are not free to ‘supplement’ Congress’ enactment.” Ibid, (quoting Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higginbotham, 436 U. S. 618, 625 (1978)). The court rejected the argument that abrogation is inconsistent with the Act’s purpose of enhancing the Government’s ability to collect its debts. In the court’s view, the Federal Government could enforce its claims for unpaid mail issuance losses through the offset procedures built into the Food Stamp Act. Because of a split among the Courts of Appeals on this question, we granted certiorari, 506 U. S. 813 (1992), and now reverse. It is a “longstanding rule that parties owing debts to the Federal Government must pay prejudgment interest where the underlying claim is a contractual obligation to pay money.” West Virginia v. United States, 479 U. S., at 310 (citing Royal Indemnity Co. v. United States, 313 U. S. 289, 295-297 (1941)). In Board of Comm’rs of Jackson County v. United States, 308 U. S. 343 (1939), we held that this common-law right extends to debts owed by state and local governments, but cautioned that a federal court considering the question in an individual case should weigh the federal and state interests involved. We reaffirmed Board of Comm’rs in West Virginia, supra, and upheld the assessment of prejudgment interest on a debt owed by West Virginia to the United States. Just as longstanding is the principle that “[sjtatutes which invade the common law ... are to be read with a presumption favoring the retention of long-established and familiar principles, except when a statutory purpose to the contrary is evident.” Isbrandtsen Co. v. Johnson, 343 U. S. 779, 783 (1952); Astoria Federal Savings & Loan Assn. v. Solimino, 501 U. S. 104, 108 (1991). In such cases, Congress does not write upon a clean slate. Astoria, supra, at 108. In order to abrogate a common-law principle, the statute must “speak directly” to the question addressed by the common law. Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higginbotham, supra, at 625; Milwaukee v. Illinois, 451 U. S. 304, 315 (1981). Texas argues that this presumption favoring retention of existing law is appropriate only with respect to state common law or federal maritime law. Although a different standard applies when analyzing the effect of federal legislation on state law, id., at 316-317, there is no support in our cases for the proposition that the presumption has no application to federal common law, or for a distinction between general federal common law and federal maritime law in this regard. We agree with Texas that Congress need not “affirmatively proscribe” the common-law doctrine at issue. Brief for Respondents 3-4; see Milwaukee, supra, at 315. But as we stated in Astoria, supra, “courts may take it as a given that Congress has legislated with an expectation that the [common law] principle will apply except ‘when a statutory purpose to the contrary is evident.'” 501 U. S., at 108 (quoting Isbrandtsen, supra, at 783). The Debt Collection Act does not speak directly to the Federal Government’s right to collect prejudgment interest on debts owed to it by the States. The Act states that “[t]he head of an executive or legislative agency shall charge a minimum annual rate of interest on an outstanding debt on a United States Government claim owed by a person . . . .” 31 U. S. C. § 3717(a)(1) (emphasis added). Section 3701, in turn, provides that the term “ ‘person’ does not include an agency of the United States Government, of a State government, or of a unit of general local government.” §3701(c). Texas argues that this exemption clearly establishes Congress’ intent to relieve the States of their common-law obligation to pay prejudgment interest. We disagree. The only obligation from which § 3701 exempts the States is the obligation to pay prejudgment interest in accordance with the mandatory provisions of the Act. These impose a stringent minimum interest requirement upon private persons owing money to the Federal Government. The statute is silent as to the obligation of the States to pay prejudgment interest on such debts. We agree with the Solicitor General that “Congress’s mere refusal to legislate with respect to the prejudgment-interest obligations of state and local governments falls far short of an expression of legislative intent to supplant the existing common law in that area.” Brief for Petitioners 16. Our conclusion that the States remain subject to common-law prejudgment interest liability is supported by the fact that the Debt Collection Act is more onerous than the common law. Section 3717(a) requires federal agencies to collect prejudgment interest against persons and specifies the interest rate. The duty to pay prejudgment interest under the common law, however, is by no means automatic. Before imposing prejudgment interest, the courts must weigh the competing federal and state interests. West Virginia, 479 U. S., at 309-311; Board of Comm’rs, 308 U. S., at 350. And instead of imposing a preestablished rate of interest, the district courts retain discretion to choose the appropriate rate in a given case. Unlike the common law, § 3717 also imposes processing fees and penalty charges, 31 U. S. C. §§ 3717(e)(1), (e)(2). Given these differences, it is logical to conclude that the Act was intended to reach only one subset of potential debtors — persons—and to leave the other subset alone. It is reasonable to apply more stringent requirements to debts owed by private persons and to keep the more flexible common law in place for debts owed by state and local governments. The evident purpose of the Debt Collection Act reinforces our reading of the plain language. The Act was designed “[t]o increase the efficiency of Government-wide efforts to collect debts owed the United States and to provide additional procedures for the collection of debts owed the United States.” 96 Stat. 1749; S. Rep. No. 97-378, p. 2 (1982) (the Act responded to “increasing concern .. . expressed in Congress and elsewhere over the increasing backlog of unpaid debts owed the federal government”). This suggests that Congress passed the Act in order to strengthen the Government’s hand in collecting its debts. Yet under the reading proposed by Texas and the Court of Appeals, the Act would have the anomalous effect of placing delinquent States in a position where they had less incentive to pay their debts to the Federal Government than they had prior to its passage. The Court of Appeals reasoned that the States would not have an incentive to delay payment of their debts because the Food Stamp Act makes state agencies liable for actual losses caused by coupon shortages or unauthorized issuances, and permits the Federal Government to recover these debts through an administrative offset procedure. 951 F. 2d, at 650. But the Debt Collection Act applies to all federal agencies, not just the FNS. Thus, the existence of a mechanism in the Food Stamp Act allowing the FNS to collect its debts does nothing to encourage prompt payment of debts govern-mentwide. That the FNS may have already possessed adequate sanctions to compel payment is not a reason to conclude that the generic language in the Debt Collection Act was meant to abrogate the existing common-law obligation of the States generally. Texas concedes that Congress intended to enhance the Government’s debt collection efforts by passing the Act. It argues, however, that Congress was concerned primarily with debts owed by private persons. Accordingly, runs the argument, Congress meant to relieve the States of their duty to pay interest because the States were not the root of the debt collection problem. Part of this argument persuades; Congress in the Act tightened the screws, so to speak, on the prejudgment interest obligations of private debtors to the Government, and not on the States. It may be inferred from this fact that the former were the root of the Government’s debt collection problems which inspired the Act. But it does not at all follow that because Congress did not tighten the screws on the States, it therefore intended that the screws be entirely removed. The more logical conclusion is that it left the screws in place, untightened. As a last-ditch argument, Texas contends that its liability for losses in the mail is not a contractual debt for which it owes prejudgment interest, but rather a penalty unilaterally imposed by Congress. See Rodgers v. United States, 332 U. S. 371, 374-376 (1947) (penalties are not normally subject to prejudgment interest). This argument fails because the obligation of Texas to reimburse the Government for a portion of the stamps lost in the mail is quite different from that involved in Rodgers. There the penalties in question were unilaterally imposed by the Agricultural Adjustment Act on farmers who exceeded their production quotas; there was no suggestion that the farmers ever consented to such penalties. Here, on the other hand, Texas signed a Federal/State Agreement, the express terms of which bound the State to act in accordance with the implementing regulations. 7 CFR § 272.2(a)(2) (1986); see also n. 2, supra. Thus, 7 CFR § 274.3(c)(4) (1986), which imposed liability for mail issuance losses above a specified tolerance level, was incorporated into Texas’ Federal/State Agreement. The requirement that the States reimburse the Federal Government for a certain portion of mail issuance losses is not a penalty, but a contractual obligation which the State assumed. For these reasons, we hold that the Debt Collection Act left in place the federal common law governing the obligation of the States to pay prejudgment interest on debts owed to the Federal Government. The judgment of the Court of Appeals to the contrary is accordingly Reversed. The regulatory tolerance level in place for the mail issuance losses in this case was 0.5% of each reporting area’s total mail issuances for each calendar quarter. 7 CFR § 274.3(c)(4)(i) (1986). Title 7 CFR § 272.2(a)(2) (1992) provides in pertinent part: “The basic components of the State Plan of Operation are the Federal/ State Agreement, the Budget Projection Statement, and the Program Activity Statement.... The Federal/State Agreement is the legal agreement between the State and the Department of Agriculture. This Agreement is the means by which the State elects to operate the Food Stamp Program and to administer the program in accordance with the Food Stamp Act of 1977, as amended, regulations issued pursuant to the Act and the FNS-approved State Plan of Operations.” Subsection (b)(1) sets out the exact wording of the preprinted Federal/ State Agreement. The provisions relevant to this dispute are as follows: “The State of — and the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS), U. S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), hereby agree to act in accordance with the provisions of the Food Stamp Act of 1977, as amended, implementing regulations and the FNS-approved State Plan of Operation. The State and FNS (USDA) further agree to fully comply with any changes in Federal law and regulations. This agreement may be modified with the mutual written consent of both parties. “The State agrees to: 1. Administer the program in accordance with the provisions contained in the Food Stamp Act of 1977, as amended, and in the manner prescribed by regulations issued pursuant to the Act; and to implement the FNS-approved State Plan of Operation.” 7 CFR § 272.2(b)(1) (1992)'. The Tenth Circuit holds that the Debt Collection Act of 1982 did not abrogate the Federal Government’s common-law right to collect prejudgment interest against the States. Gallegos v. Lyng, 891 F. 2d 788 (1989). The Second, Third, and Eighth Circuits all hold to the contrary. See Perales v. United States, 751 F. 2d 96 (CA2 1984) (per curiam); Pennsylvania Dept. of Public Welfare v. United States, 781 F. 2d 334 (CA3 1986); Arkansas by Scott v. Block, 825 F. 2d 1254 (CA8 1987). Both Texas and the Court of Appeals rely on Congress’ authority to impose interest obligations on the States through specific statutes, such as the Medicaid Act, 42 U. S. C. § 1396b(d)(5), and the Social Security Act, 42 U. S. C. § 418(j) (1982 ed.), to support the proposition that the Debt Collection Act extinguished the Federal Government’s common-law right to collect prejudgment interest. Both statutes, however, codified and made mandatory the common-law right to collect prejudgment interest at a specified interest rate. Like the Debt Collection Act, these statutes changed the common law. Congress’ obvious desire to enhance the common law in specific, well-defined situations does not signal its desire to extinguish the common law in other situations. Texas also relies on the recent amendment to 7 U. S. C. § 2022 adding a provision requiring prejudgment interest on specific obligations arising under the Food Stamp Act of 1977. Pub. L. 100-435, § 602, 102 Stat. 1674 (1988). But “subsequent legislative history is a ‘hazardous basis for inferring the intent of an earlier’ Congress.” Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation v. LTV Corp., 496 U. S. 633, 650 (1990) (quoting United States v. Price, 361 U. S. 304, 313 (I960)). Texas’ argument also fails because, like the Medicaid Act and the Social Security Act provisions, the Food Stamp Act of 1977 did not merely codify the common law without change. Rather, it contains a mandatory provision requiring prejudgment interest at a specified rate. The interest rate required under § 3717 is “the average investment rate for the Treasury tax and loan accounts for the 12-month period ending on September 30 of each year, rounded to the nearest whole percentage point.” 31 U. S. C. § 3717(a)(1). Both Texas and the Court of Appeals rely upon our decision in Penn-hurst State School and Hospital v. Halderman, 451 U. S. 1 (1981), for the proposition that the Federal Government may not collect prejudgment interest because neither the Debt Collection Act nor the Food Stamp Act expressly require prejudgment interest. This reliance is misplaced. In Pennhurst, we held that in order to impose conditions on the receipt of federal funds, Congress must speak unambiguously. Id., at 17. This makes sense because the States cannot voluntarily and knowingly agree to a condition that is not clearly expressed. Ibid. Because the duty to pay prejudgment interest on debts owed to the United States existed long before either the Food Stamp Program or the Debt Collection Act was created, the rule in Pennhurst does not apply. See Bell v. New Jersey, 461 U. S. 773, 790, n. 17 (1983). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

J

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. The petitioner was convicted for willful refusal to submit to induction'into the Armed Forces. 62 Stat. 622, as amended, 50 U. S. C. App. § 462 (a) (1964 ed., Supp. V). The judgment .of conviction was affirmed by the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit We granted certiorari, 400 U. S. 990, to consider whether the induction notice was invalid because grounded upon-an erroneous denial of the petitioner’s claim to be classified as a conscientious objector. I . The petitioner’s application for classification as a conscientious objector was turned down by his local draft board, ana he took, an administrative appeal. The State Appeal Board tentatively classified him I-A (eligible for unrestricted military service) and referred his filé" to the Department of Justice for an advisory recommenda-. tion, in accordance with then-applicable procedures. 50 U. S. C. App. § 456 (j) (1964 ed., Supp. V). The FBI then conducted an “inquiry” as required by the statute, interviewing some 35 persons, including members of the petitioner’s family and many of his friends, neighbors, and business and religious associates. There followed a hearing on “the character and good faith of the [petitioner’s]" objections” before a hearing officer appointed by the Department. The hearing officer, a retired judge of many years’ experience, heard testimony from the petitioner’s mother and father, from one of his attorneys, from a minister of his religion, and from the petitioner himself. He also had the benefit of a full report from the FBI. On the basis of this record the hearing officer concluded that the registrant was sincere in his objection on religious grounds to participation in war in any form, and he recommended that the conscientious objector claim be sustained. Notwithstanding this recommendation, the Department of Justice wrote a letter to the Appeal Board, advising it that the petitioner’s conscientious objector claim should be denied. Upon receipt of this letter of advice, the Board denied the petitioner’s claim without a statement of reasons. After various further proceedings which it is not necessary to recount here, the petitioner was ordered to report for induction; He refused, to take the traditional step forward, and this prosecution and conviction followed. II In order to qualify for classification as a conscientious objector, a registrant.must satisfy three basic tests. He must show that he is conscientiously opposed to war in any form. Gillette v. United States, 401 U. S. 437. He must show that this opposition is based upon religious training and belief, as the term has been construed in our decisions. United States v. Seeger, 380 U. S. 163; Welsh v. United States, 398 U. S. 333. And he must show that this objection is sincere. Witmer v. United States, 348 U. S. 375. In applying these tests, the Selective Service .System must be concerned with the registrant as an individual, not with its own interpretation of the dogma of the religious sect, if any, to which he may belong. United States v. Seeger, supra; Gillette v. United States, supra; Williams v. United States, 216 F. 2d 350, 352. In asking us to affirm the judgment of conviction, the Government argues that there was a “basis in fact,” cf. Estep v. United States, 327 U. S. 114, for holding that the petitioner is not opposed to “war in any form,” but is only selectively opposed to certain wars. See Gillette v. United States, supra. Counsel for the petitioner, needless to say, takes the opposite position. The issue is one that need not be resolved in this case. For we have concluded that even if the Government’s position on this question is correct, the conviction before us must still be set aside for another quite independent reason. Ill 'f'he petitioner’s criminal conviction stemmed from the Selective Service System’s denial of his appeal seeking conscientious objector status. That denial, for which no reasons were ever given, was, as we have said, based on a recommendation of the Department of Justice, overruling its hearing officer and advising the Appeal Board that it “finds that the registrant’s conscientious-objector claim is not sustained and recommends to your Board that he be not [so] classified.” This finding was contained in a long letter of explanation, from which it is evident that Selective Service officials were led to believe that the Department had found that the petitioner had failed to satisfy each of the three basic tests for qualification as a conscientious objector. As to the requirement that a registrant must be opposed to war in any form, the Department letter said that the petitioner’s expressed beliefs “do not appear to preclude military service in any form, but rather are limited to military service in the Armed Forces of the United States. . . . These Constitute only objections to certain types of war in certain circumstances, rather than a general scruple against participation in war in any form. However, only a general scruple against participation in war in any form can support an exemption as a conscientious objector under the Act. United States v. Kauten, 133 F. 2d 703.” As to the requirement that a registrant’s opposition must be based upon religious training and belief, the Department letter said: “It seems clear that the teachings of the Nation of Islam preclude fighting for the United States not because of objections to participation in war in any form' but rather because of political and racial objections to policies of the United States as interpreted by Elijah Muhammad. ... It is therefore our conclusion that registrant’s claimed objections to participation in war insofar as they are based upon the teachings of the Nation of Islam, rest on grounds which primarily are political and racial.” As to the requirement that a registrant’s opposition to war must be sincere, that part of the letter began by stating that “the registrant has not consistently manifested his conscientious-objector claim. Such a course of overt manifestations is requisite to establishing a subjective state of mind and belief.” There followed several paragraphs reciting the timing and circumstances of the petitioner’s conscientious objector claim, and a concluding paragraph seeming to state a rule of law — that “a registrant has not shown overt manifestations sufficient to establish his subjective belief where, as here, his conscientious-objector claim was not asserted jmtil military service became imminent. Campbell v. United States, 221 F. 2d 454. " United States v. Corliss, 280 F. 2d 808, cert. denied, 364 U. S. 884.” In this Court the Government has now fully conceded that the petitioner’s beliefs are based upon “religious training and belief,” as defined in United States v. Seeger, supra: “There is no dispute that petitioner’s professed beliefs were founded on basic tenets of the Muslim religion, as he understood them, and derived in substantial part from his devotion to Allah as the Supreme Being. Thus, under this Court’s decision in United States v. Seeger, 380 U. S. 163, his claim unquestionably was within the 'religious training and belief’ clause of the exemption provision.” This concession is clearly correct. For the record shows that the petitioner’s beliefs are founded on tenets of the Muslim- religion as he understands them. They are surely no less religiously based- than those of the three registrants before this Court in Seeger. See also Welsh v. United States, 398 U. S. 333. The Government in this Court has also made clear that it no longer questions the sincerity of the petitioner’s beliefs. This concession, is also correct. The Department hearing officer — the only person at the administrative appeal level who carefully examined the petitioner and other witnesses in person and who had the benefit of the full FBI filé — found “that the registrant is sincere in his objection.” The Department of Justice was wrong in advising the Board in terms of a purported rule of law that it should disregard this finding simply because of the circumstances and timing of the petitioner’s- claim. See Ehlert v. United States, 402 U. S. 99, 103-104; United States ex rel. Lehman v. Laird, 430 F. 2d 96, 99; United States v. Abbott, 425 F. 2d 910, 915; United States ex rel. Tobias v. Laird, 413 F. 2d 936, 939-940; Cohen v. Laird, 315 F. Supp. 1265, 1277-1278. Since the Appeal Board gave no reasons for its denial of the petitioner’s claim, there is absolutely no way of knowing upon which of the three grounds offered in the Department’s letter it relied. Yet the Government now acknowledges that two of those grounds were not valid. And, the Government’s concession aside, it is indisputably clear, for the reasons stated, that the Department was simply wrong as a matter of law in advising that the petitioner’s beliefs were not religiously based ¿nd were not sincerely held. This case, therefore, falls squarely within the four corners of this Court’s decision in Sicurella v. United States, 348 U. S. 385. There as here the Court was asked to hold that an error in an advice letter prepared by the Department of Justice did not require reversal of a criminal conviction because there was a ground on which the Appeal Board might properly have denied a conscientious objector classification. This Court refused to consider the proffered alternative ground: “[W]e feel that this error of law by the Department, to which the Appeal Board might naturally look for guidance on such questions, must vitiate the entire proceedings at least where it is not clear that' the Board relied on some legitimate ground. Here, where it is impossible to determine on exactly which grounds the Appeal Board decided, the integrity of the Selective Service System demands, at least, that the Government not recommend illegal grounds. There is an impressive body of lower court cases taking this position and we believe that they state the correct rule.” Id., at 392. The doctrine thus articulated 16 years ago in Sicurella was hardly new. It was long ago established as essential to the administration of criminal justice. Stromberg v. California, 283 U. S. 359. In Stromberg the Court reversed a conviction for violation of a California statute containing three separate clauses, finding one of the three clauses constitutionally invalid. As Chief Justice Hughes put the matter, “[I]t is impossible to say under which clause of the statute the conviction was obtained.” Thus, “if any of the clauses in question is invalid under the Federal Constitution, the conviction cannot be upheld.” Id., at 368. The application of this doctrine in the area of Selective Service law goes back at least to 1945, and Judge Learned Hand’s opinion for the Second Circuit in United States v. Cain, 149 F. 2d 338. It is a doctrine that has been • consistently and repeatedly followed by the federal courts in dealing with the criminal sanctions of the selective service laws. See, e. g., United States v. Lemmens, 430 F. 2d 619, 623-624 (CA7 1970); United States v. Broyles, 423 F. 2d 1299, 1303-1304 (CA4 1970); United States v. Haughton, 413 F. 2d 736 (CA9 1969); United States v. Jakobson, 325 F. 2d 409, 416-417 (CA2 1963), aff’d sub nom. United States v. Seeger, 380 U. S. 163; Kretchet v. United States, 284 F. 2d 561, 565-566 (CA9 1960); Ypparila v. United States, 219 F. 2d 465, 469 (CA10 1954); United States v. Englander, 271 F. Supp. 182 (SDNY 1967); United States v. Erikson, 149 F. Supp. 576, 578-579 (SDNY 1957). In every one of the above cases the defendant was acquitted or the conviction set aside under the Sicurella application of the Stromberg doctrine. The long established rule of law embodied in these settled precedents thus clearly requires that the judgment before us be reversed. . It is so ordered. Mr. Justice Marshall took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. The original judgment of affirmance, 397 F. 2d 901, was set aside by this Court on a ground wholly unrelated to the issues now before us, sub norm. Giordano v. United States, 394 U. S. 310. Upon remand, the Court of Appeals again affirmed the conviction. 430 F. 2d 165. The hearing officer was Judge Lawrence Grauman, who had served on a Kentucky circuit court for some 25 years. Applicable regulations, 32 CFR § 1626.25 (1967 ed.), did not require that the hearing officer’s report be transmitted to the Appeal Board, and the Government declined to disclose it to the petitioner. The statements in text are taken from the description of that report in the letter of advice from the Department of Justice, recommending denial of the petitioner’s claim. Brief for the United States 12. “We do not here seek to support the denial of petitioner’s claim on the ground of insincerity .-. . .” Id., at 33. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

C

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. We granted writs of certiorari in these cases, 338 U. S. 814, to review a decision of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, 174 F. 2d 7, affirming judgments of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida in favor of the United States on claims arising under the Federal Tort Claims Act. Before argument, petitioners and the Solicitor General submitted a joint application for approval of proposed settlements of the claims, citing 28 U. S. C. § 2677, which reads as follows: “The Attorney General, with the approval of the court, may arbitrate, compromise, or settle any claim cognizable under section 1346 (b) of this title [suits under the Tort Claims Act], after the commencement of an action thereon.” We construe § 2677 as imposing on the District Court the authority and responsibility for passing on proposed compromises, notwithstanding the judgments of the Court of Appeals affirming the judgments of the District Court heretofore entered herein. The application and stipulations are therefore referred to the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida with authority to consider and dispose of the same. It is so ordered. Mr. Justice Douglas took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. In this case, we decide that a bankruptcy court has the aur thority to order the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to treat tax payments made by Chapter 11 debtor corporations as trust fund payments where the bankruptcy court determines that this designation is necessary for the success of a reorganization plan. I The Internal Revenue Code requires employers to withhold from their employees’ paychecks money representing employees’ personal income taxes and Social Security taxes.' 26 U. S. C. §§ 3102(a), 3402(a). Because federal law requires employers to hold these funds in “trust for the United States,” 26 U. S. C. § 7501(a), these taxes are commonly referred to as “trust fund” taxes. Slodov v. United States, 436 U. S. 238, 242-243 (1978). Should employers fail to pay trust fund taxes, the Government may collect an equivalent sum directly from the officers or employees of the employer who are responsible for collecting the tax. 26 U. S. C. § 6672. These individuals are commonly referred to as “responsible” individuals. Slodov, supra, at 244-245. This case involves corporations that have filed petitions for reorganization under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code, 11 U. S. C. §§ 1101-1174. Newport Offshore, Ltd., filed a petition for reorganization on November 13, 1985; the Bankruptcy Court approved a reorganization plan in June 1986, creating Newport Oil Offshore, Inc. Over the IRS’ objection, that plan included a provision stating that the reorganized Newport Offshore would pay its tax debts (totaling about $300,000) over a period of about six years and that the payments would be applied to extinguish all trust fund tax debts “ ‘prior to the commencement of payment of the non-trust fund portion’ ” of the tax debts owed. In re Energy Resources Co., 871 F. 2d 223, 226 (CA1 1989). The IRS appealed to the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island, which reversed in an unpublished opinion. The debtor then sought review in the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. Energy Resources Co., Inc., petitioned for reorganization under Chapter 11 in January 1983. In September 1984, the Bankruptcy Court confirmed a reorganization plan that created a special trust which, among other things, was to pay Energy Resources’ federal tax debt of approximately $1 million over roughly five years. In November 1985, the trustee of the special trust sent approximately $358,000 in payment to the IRS. The trustee asked the IRS to apply the money to Energy Resources’ trust fund tax debt. After the IRS refused to do so, the trustee successfully petitioned the Bankruptcy Court to order the IRS to apply the money to the trust fund tax liabilities. Id., at 226-227. The IRS ap: pealed this order to the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, which affirmed the Bankruptcy Court in an oral opinion. The Government then appealed to the First Circuit. Consolidating the two cases, the First Circuit reversed in In re Newport Offshore Ltd. and affirmed in In re Energy Resources Co. Id., at 234. The court first considered whether a tax payment made pursuant to a Chapter 11 reorganization plan is “voluntary” or “involuntary” as those terms are used in the IRS’ own rules. IRS policy permits taxpayers who “voluntarily” submit payments to the IRS to designate the tax liability to which the payment will apply. See id., at 227, citing Rev. Rul. 79-284, 1979-2 Cum. Bull. 83, modifying Rev. Rul. 73-305, 1973-2 Cum. Bull. 43, superseding Rev. Rul. 58-239, 1958-1 Cum. Bull. 94. The taxpayer corporations argued that tax payments within a Chapter 11 reorganization are best characterized as “voluntary” and therefore that the IRS’ own rules bind the agency to respect the debtors’ designation of the tax payments. Granting deference to the agency’s interpretation of its own rules, the First Circuit accepted the IRS’ view that payments made pursuant to the Chapter 11 plan are involuntary for purposes of the IRS’ rules. 871 F. 2d, at 230. The First Circuit concluded, however, that even if the payments were properly characterized as involuntary under the IRS’ regulations, the Bankruptcy Courts nevertheless had the authority to order the IRS to apply an “involuntary” payment made by a Chapter 11 debtor to trust fund tax liabilities if the Bankruptcy Court concluded that this designation was necessary to ensure the success of the reorganization. Id., at 230-234. We granted certiorari because the First Circuit’s conclusion on this issue conflicts with decisions in other Circuits. 493 U. S. 963 (1989); see, e. g., In re Ribs-R-Us, Inc., 828 F. 2d 199 (CA3 1987). We affirm the judgment below, for whether or not the payments at issue are rightfully considered to be involuntary, a bankruptcy court has the authority to order the IRS to apply the payments to trust fund liabilities if the bankruptcy court determines that this designation is necessary to the success of a reorganization plan. II The Bankruptcy Code does not explicitly authorize the bankruptcy courts to approve reorganization plans designating tax payments as either trust fund or nontrust fund. The Code, however, grants the bankruptcy courts residual authority to approve reorganization plans including “any . . . appropriate provision not inconsistent with the applicable provisions of this title.” 11 U. S. C. § 1123(b)(5); see also §1129. The Code also states that bankruptcy courts may “issue any order, process, or judgment that is necessary or appropriate to carry out the provisions” of the Code. § 105 (a). These statutory directives are consistent with the traditional understanding that bankruptcy courts, as courts of equity, have broad authority to modify creditor-debtor relationships. See Pepper v. Litton, 308 U. S. 295, 303-304 (1939); United States National Bank v. Chase National Bank, 331 U. S. 28, 36 (1947); Katchen v. Landy, 382 U. S. 323, 327 (1966). The Government suggests that, in this case, the Bankruptcy Courts have transgressed one of the limitations on their equitable power. Specifically, the Government contends that the orders conflict with the Code’s provisions protecting the Government’s ability to collect delinquent taxes. As the Government points out, the Code provides a priority for specified tax claims, including those at issue in this case, and makes those tax debts nondischargeable. See 11 U. S. C. §§ 507(a)(7), 523(a)(1)(A). The Code, moreover, requires a bankruptcy court to assure itself that reorganization will succeed, § 1129(a)(ll), and therefore that the IRS, in all likelihood, will collect the tax debt owed. The tax debt must be paid off within six years. § 1129(a)(9)(C). It is evident that these restrictions on a bankruptcy court’s authority do not preclude the court from issuing orders of the type at issue here, for those restrictions do not address the bankruptcy court’s ability to designate whether tax payments are to be applied to trust fund or non-trust-fund tax liabilities. The Government is correct that, if it can apply a debtor corporation’s tax payments to non-trust-fund liability before trust fund liability, it stands a better chance of debt discharge because the debt that is not guaranteed will be paid off before the guaranteed debt. While this result might be desirable from the Government’s standpoint, it is an added protection not specified in the Code itself: Whereas the Code gives it the right to be assured that its taxes will be paid in six years, the Government wants an assurance that its taxes will be paid even if the reorganization fails — i. e., even if the bankruptcy court is incorrect in its judgment that the reorganization plan will succeed. Even if consistent with the Code, however, a bankruptcy court order might be inappropriate if it conflicted with another law that should have been taken into consideration in the exercise of the court’s discretion. The Government maintains that the orders at issue here contravene § 6672 of the Internal Revenue Code, the provision permitting the IRS to collect unpaid trust fund taxes directly from the personal assets of “responsible” individuals. The Government contends that § 6672 reflects a congressional decision to protect the Government’s tax revenues by ensuring an additional source from which trust fund taxes might be collected. It is true that § 6672 provides that, if the Government is unable to collect trust fund taxes from a corporate taxpayer, the Government has an alternative source for this revenue. Here, however, the Bankruptcy Courts’ orders do not prevent the Government from collecting trust fund revenue; to the contrary, the orders require the Government to collect trust fund payments before collecting non-trust-fund payments. As the Government concedes, § 6672 remains both during and after the corporate Chapter 11 filing as an alternative collection source for trust fund taxes. The Government nevertheless contends that the Bankruptcy Courts’ orders contravene § 6672 because, if the IRS cannot designate a debtor corporation’s tax payments as non-trust-fund, the debtor might be able to pay only the guaranteed debt, leaving the Government at risk for non-trust-fund taxes. This may be the case, but § 6672, by its terms, does not protect against this eventuality. That section plainly does not require us to hold that the orders at issue here, otherwise wholly consistent with a bankruptcy court’s authority under the Bankruptcy Code, were nonetheless improvident. Ill In this case, the Bankruptcy Courts have not transgressed any limitation on their broad power. We therefore hold that they may order the IRS to apply tax payments to offset trust fund obligations where it concludes that this action is necessary for a reorganization’s success. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore Affirmed. Justice Blackmun dissents. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. This matter was presented to Justice Powell on the morning of April 22, 1983, on an application for an order vacating a stay of execution, and by him referred to the Court. It is helpful to review briefly the sequence of events that preceded this application. On April 8, 1983, the Alabama Supreme Court ordered that respondent John Louis Evans III be executed on April 22, 1983, at 12:01 a. m., c. s. t. On April 19, 1983, respondent filed a petition here for a writ of certiorari to the Alabama Supreme Court and an application for stay of execution addressed to Justice Powell as Circuit Justice. At approximately 5:45 p. m., e. s. t., on April 21, 1983, Justice Powell, acting in his capacity as Circuit Justice, and with the concurrence of six other Members of the Court, denied respondent’s application for a stay of execution pending disposition of his writ of certiorari to the Alabama Supreme Court. (See post, p. 1301.) At 5:23 p. m., c. s. t., on April 21, respondent filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the District Court for the Southern District of Alabama. At approximately 9:30 p. m., c. s. t., the District Court, stating that “the time available does not permit this Court to make a meaningful review or study,” temporarily stayed the execution. The State sought an order from the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit vacating the stay. At 12:25 a. m., e. s. t., the court denied the motion, stating that “[b]ased upon the telephonic oral presentation by both parties to the Court we are unable to conclude that the District Judge has abused his discretion in granting the temporary stay . . . .” Pursuant to Alabama law, the warrant to carry out the execution expires at 11:59 p. m., c. s. t., on April 22, 1983. The State seeks an order vacating the District Court’s temporary stay. Respondent has filed a response in opposition to the State’s application. Justice Powell’s order of April 21, 1983, denying respondent’s application for a stay of execution, described the lengthy proceedings that have followed respondent’s conviction and death sentence for first-degree murder committed during the course of a robbery in 1977. Respondent has exhausted his review by way of direct appeal and by way of the petition for a writ of habeas corpus filed in April Í979. He also has had his claims heard a second time by the Alabama Supreme Court acting on a petition for a new sentencing hearing. In sum, respondent’s “constitutional challenges to Alabama’s capital-sentencing procedures have been reviewed exhaustively and repetitively by several courts in both the state and federal systems.” Post, at 1302 (Powell, J., in chambers). Following a brief hearing on the evening of April 21, 1983, the District Court found that “counsel for petitioner conceded that all issues raised in the petition were raised in the petition previously filed before [the United States District Court] except for the issue asserted in section 12 of the petition.” Thus, in the latest petition for habeas corpus filed in this case, all but one of the grounds presented have been presented before and rejected. The one new issue now raised by respondent is a claim that the Alabama courts applied a statutory aggravating factor in an unconstitutionally broad manner. The trial court found that on numerous prior occasions respondent “knowingly created a great risk of death to many persons. By Mr. Evans’ testimony, he was involved in thirty armed robberies and nine kidnappings with [codefendant] Mr. Ritter, and further claims to have been involved in approximately 250 armed robberies prior to associating with Mr. Ritter.” Evans v. State, 361 So. 2d 654, 663 (Ala. Crim. App. 1977). Respondent contends that by construing this statutory aggravating factor to encompass acts not involving the offense for which he was found guilty, the trial court construed the statute in an unconstitutionally broad manner. Respondent does not appear to have raised this challenge at any time in any of the many prior state and federal proceedings in his case. Nor was the existence of this claim made known to this Court in any of the papers filed by respondent before Justice Powell’s denial of respondent’s application for a stay of execution. The claim thus was raised for the first time in respondent’s second petition for a writ of habeas corpus, filed approximately seven hours before his scheduled execution. His only justification for raising this issue now is that, in his view, the decision in Proffitt v. Wainwright, 685 F. 2d 1227, 1265-1266 (CA11), decided in September 1982, some seven months ago, has changed the applicable law. Proffitt, however, does not address the question whether this particular aggravating factor may be applied to acts unrelated to the capital offense itself. The decision in that case only applies the principle established in Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U. S. 420 (1980), that aggravating factors must be construed and applied in a nonarbitrary manner. On the facts of respondent’s case, there was no violation of the Godfrey principle in finding this particular aggravating circumstance. Nor is there any question that application of this aggravating factor was proper under the Alabama statute as construed by the Alabama courts. After carefully reviewing the record, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals, in sustaining respondent’s death sentence, stated: “The aggravating circumstances were here averred and proved at trial, and also determined by the trial judge in a public hearing, as required by law. In addition, this Court has weighed the aggravating and mitigating circumstances independently.” 361 So. 2d, at 662. Respondent’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus filed on April 21, 1983, thus seeks to litigate several issues conclusively resolved in prior proceedings and a claim never before raised. This new claim, challenging the validity of one of the aggravating circumstances found to exist in this case, is a question of law as to which no further hearing is required. For the reasons stated above, we conclude that the claim is without merit. Accordingly, the application of the State of Alabama to dissolve and vacate the stay ordered by the United States District Court is granted. It is so ordered. Justice Brennan would deny the application. In a ease of this kind, a district court normally should find and state substantive grounds for granting a stay of execution. In the circumstances of this case, however, we understand the difficult situation in which the District Court found itself. Judge Cox was not the judge who had reviewed this case on the previous habeas corpus petition. Apparently without notice, this second habeas corpus petition and application for a stay of execution, filed by the same counsel who had filed the previous application for a stay in this Court, was not filed until about seven hours prior to the scheduled execution time. No explanation has been offered by counsel for the timing of these applications. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. The motion to dismiss is granted and the appeal is dismissed for want of jurisdiction. Treating the papers whereon the appeal was taken as a petition for writ of certiorari, certiorari is denied. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Thomas delivered the opinion of the Court. In this case, a District Court purported to extend a party’s time for filing an appeal beyond the period allowed by statute. We must decide whether the Court of Appeals had jurisdiction to entertain an appeal filed after the statutory period but within the period allowed by the District Court’s order. We have long and repeatedly held that the time limits for filing a notice of appeal are jurisdictional in nature. Accordingly, we hold that petitioner’s untimely notice — even though filed in reliance upon a District Court’s order— deprived the Court of Appeals of jurisdiction. I In 1999, an Ohio jury convicted petitioner Keith Bowles of murder for his involvement in the beating death of Ollie Gipson. The jury sentenced Bowles to 15-years-to-life imprisonment. Bowles unsuccessfully challenged his conviction and sentence on direct appeal. Bowles then filed a federal habeas corpus application on September 5, 2002. On September 9, 2003, the District Court denied Bowles habeas relief. After the entry of final judgment, Bowles had 30 days to file a notice of appeal. Fed. Rule App. Proc. 4(a)(1)(A); 28 U.S.C. §2107(a). He failed to do so. On December 12, 2003, Bowles moved to reopen the period during which he could file his notice of appeal pursuant to Rule 4(a)(6), which allows district courts to extend the filing period for 14 days from the day the district court grants the order to reopen, provided certain conditions are met. See § 2107(c). On February 10, 2004, the District Court granted Bowles’ motion. But rather than extending the time period by 14 days, as Rule 4(a)(6) and § 2107(c) allow, the District Court inexplicably gave Bowles 17 days — until February 27 — to file his notice of appeal. Bowles filed his notice on February 26 — within the 17 days allowed by the District Court’s order, but after the 14-day period allowed by Rule 4(a)(6) and § 2107(c). On appeal, respondent Russell argued that Bowles’ notice was untimely and that the Court of Appeals therefore lacked jurisdiction to hear the ease. The Court of Appeals agreed. It first recognized that this Court has consistently held the requirement of filing a timely notice of appeal is “mandatory and jurisdictional.” 432 F. 3d 668, 673 (CA6 2005) (citing Browder v. Director, Dept. of Corrections of Ill., 434 U. S. 257, 264 (1978)). The court also noted that Courts of Appeals have uniformly held that Rule 4(a)(6)’s 180-day period for filing a motion to reopen is also mandatory and not susceptible to equitable modification. 432 F. 3d, at 673 (collecting eases). Concluding that “the fourteen-day period in Rule 4(a)(6) should be treated as strictly as the 180-day period in that same Rule,” id., at 676, the Court of Appeals held that it was without jurisdiction. We granted certiorari, 549 U. S. 1092 (2006), and now affirm. II According to 28 U. S. C. § 2107(a), parties must file notices of appeal within 30 days of the entry of the judgment being appealed. District courts have limited authority to grant an extension of the 30-day time period. Relevant to this case, if certain conditions are met, district courts have the statutory authority to grant motions to reopen the time for filing an appeal for 14 additional days. § 2107(c). Rule 4 of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure carries §2107 into practice. In accord with § 2107(c), Rule 4(a)(6) describes the district court’s authority to reopen and extend the time for filing a notice of appeal after the lapse of the usual 30 days: “(6) Reopening the Time to File an Appeal. “The district court may reopen the time to file an appeal for a period of 14 days after the date when its order to reopen is entered, but only if all the following conditions are satisfied: “(A) the motion is filed within 180 days after the judgment or order is entered or within 7 days after the moving party receives notice of the entry, whichever is earlier; “(B) the court finds that the moving party was entitled to notice of the entry of the judgment or order sought to be appealed but did not receive the notice from the district court or any party within 21 days after entry; and “(C) the court finds that no party would be prejudiced.” (Emphasis added.) It is undisputed that the District Court’s order in this case purported to reopen the filing period for more than 14 days. Thus, the question before us is whether the Court of Appeals lacked jurisdiction to entertain an appeal filed outside the 14-day window allowed by § 2107(c) but within the longer period granted by the District Court. A This Court has long held that the taking of an appeal within the prescribed time is “mandatory and jurisdictional.” Griggs v. Provident Consumer Discount Co., 459 U. S. 56, 61 (1982) (per curiam) (internal quotation marks omitted); accord, Hohn v. United States, 524 U. S. 236, 247 (1998); Tor res v. Oakland Scavenger Co., 487 U. S. 312, 314-315 (1988); Browder, 434 U. S., at 264. Indeed, even prior to the creation of the circuit courts of appeals, this Court regarded statutory limitations on the timing of appeals as limitations on its own jurisdiction. See Scarborough v. Pargoud, 108 U. S. 567, 568 (1883) (“[T]he writ of error in this case was not brought within the time limited by law, and we have consequently no jurisdiction”); United States v. Curry, 6 How. 106, 113 (1848) (“[A]s this appeal has not been prosecuted in the manner directed, within the time limited by the acts of Congress, it must be dismissed for want of jurisdiction”). Reflecting the consistency of this Court’s holdings, the courts of appeals routinely and uniformly dismiss untimely appeals for lack of jurisdiction. See, e. g., Atkins v. Medical Dept. of Augusta Cty. Jail, No. 06-7792, 2007 WL 1048810 (CA4, Apr. 4, 2007) (per curiam) (unpublished); see also 15A C. Wright, A. Miller, & E. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure § 3901, p. 6 (2d ed. 1992) (“The rule is well settled that failure to file a timely notice of appeal defeats the jurisdiction of a court of appeals”). In fact, the author of today’s dissent recently reiterated that “[t]he accepted fact is that some time limits are jurisdictional even though expressed in a separate statutory section from jurisdictional grants, see, e.g., . . . §2107 (providing that notice of appeal in civil cases must be filed ‘within thirty days after the entry of such judgment’).” Barnhart v. Peabody Coal Co., 537 U. S. 149, 160, n. 6 (2003) (majority opinion of Souter, J., joined by Stevens, Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ., inter alios). Although several of our recent decisions have undertaken to clarify the distinction between claims-processing rules and jurisdictional rules, none of them calls into question our longstanding treatment of statutory time limits for taking an appeal as jurisdictional. Indeed, those decisions have also recognized the jurisdictional significance of the fact that a time limitation is set forth in a statute. In Kontrick v. Ryan, 540 U. S. 443 (2004), we held that failure to comply with the time requirement in Federal Rule of Bankruptcy Procedure 4004 did not affect a court’s subject-matter jurisdiction. Critical to our analysis was the fact that “[n]o statute . . . specifies a time limit for filing a complaint objecting to the debtor’s discharge.” 540 U. S., at 448. Rather, the filing deadlines in the Bankruptcy Rules are “ ‘procedural rules adopted by the Court for the orderly transaction of its business’” that are “‘not jurisdictional.’” Id., at 454 (quoting Schacht v. United States, 398 U. S. 58, 64 (1970)). Because “[o]nly Congress may determine a lower federal court’s subject-matter jurisdiction,” 540 U. S., at 452 (citing U. S. Const., Art. III, § 1), it was improper for courts to use “the term ‘jurisdictional’ to describe emphatic time prescriptions in rules of court,” 540 U. S., at 454. See also Eberhart v. United States, 546 U. S. 12 (2005) (per curiam). As a point of contrast, we noted that §2107 contains the type of statutory time constraints that would limit a court’s jurisdiction. 540 U. S., at 453, and n. 8. Nor do Arbaugh v. Y & H Corp., 546 U. S. 500 (2006), or Scarborough v. Principi, 541 U. S. 401 (2004), aid petitioner. In Arbaugh, the statutory limitation was an employee-numerosity requirement, not a time limit. 546 U. S., at 505. Scarborough, which addressed the availability of attorney’s fees under the Equal Access to Justice Act, concerned “a mode of relief . . . ancillary to the judgment of a court” that already had plenary jurisdiction. 541 U. S., at 413. This Court’s treatment of its certiorari jurisdiction also demonstrates the jurisdictional distinction between court-promulgated rules and limits enacted by Congress. According to our Rules, a petition for a writ of certiorari must be filed within 90 days of the entry of the judgment sought to be reviewed. See this Court’s Rule 13.1. That 90-day period applies to both civil and criminal cases. But the 90-day period for civil cases derives from both this Court’s Rule 13.1 and 28 U. S. C. § 2101(c). We have repeatedly held that this statute-based filing period for civil cases is jurisdictional. See, e. g., Federal Election Comm’n v. NRA Political Victory Fund, 513 U. S. 88, 90 (1994). Indeed, this Court’s Rule 13.2 cites § 2101(c) in directing the Clerk not to file any petition “that is jurisdictionally out of time.” (Emphasis added.) On the other hand, we have treated the rule-based time limit for criminal cases differently, stating that it may be waived because “[t]he procedural rules adopted by the Court for the orderly transaction of its business are not jurisdictional and can be relaxed by the Court in the exercise of its discretion ....” Schacht, supra, at 64. Jurisdictional treatment of statutory time limits makes good sense. Within constitutional bounds, Congress decides what cases the federal courts have jurisdiction to consider. Because Congress decides whether federal courts can hear cases at all, it can also determine when, and under what conditions, federal courts can hear them. See Curry, 6 How., at 113. Put another way, the notion of “‘subject-matter’” jurisdiction obviously extends to “ ‘classes of cases ... falling within a court’s adjudicatory authority,’” Eberhart, supra, at 16 (quoting Kontrick, supra, at 455), but it is no less “jurisdictional” when Congress prohibits federal courts from adjudicating an otherwise legitimate “class of cases” after a certain period has elapsed from final judgment. The resolution of this ease follows naturally from this reasoning. Like the initial 30-day period for filing a notice of appeal, the limit on how long a district court may reopen that period is set forth in a statute, 28 U. S. C. § 2107(c). Because Congress specifically limited the amount of time by which district courts can extend the notice-of-appeal period in § 2107(c), that limitation is more than a simple “claim-processing rule.” As we have long held, when an “appeal has not been prosecuted in the manner directed, within the time limited by the acts of Congress, it must be dismissed for want of jurisdiction.” Curry, supra, at 113. Bowles’ failure to file his notice of appeal in accordance with the statute therefore deprived the Court of Appeals of jurisdiction. And because Bowles’ error is one of jurisdictional magnitude, he cannot rely on forfeiture or waiver to excuse his lack of compliance with the statute’s time limitations. See Arbaugh, supra, at 513-514. B Bowles contends that we should excuse his untimely filing because he satisfies the “unique circumstances” doctrine, which has its roots in Harris Truck Lines, Inc. v. Cherry Meat Packers, Inc., 371 U. S. 215 (1962) (per curiam). There, pursuant to then-Rule 73(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, a District Court entertained a timely motion to extend the time for filing a notice of appeal. The District Court found the moving party had established a showing of “excusable neglect,” as required by the Rule, and granted the motion. The Court of Appeals reversed the finding of excusable neglect and, accordingly, held that the District Court lacked jurisdiction to grant the extension. Harris Truck Lines, Inc. v. Cherry Meat Packers, Inc., 303 F. 2d 609, 611-612 (CA7 1962). This Court reversed, noting “the obvious great hardship to a party who relies upon the trial judge’s finding of ‘excusable neglect.’ ” 371 U. S., at 217. Today we make clear that the timely filing of a notice of appeal in a civil case is a jurisdictional requirement. Because this Court has no authority to create equitable exceptions to jurisdictional requirements, use of the “unique circumstances” doctrine is illegitimate. Given that this Court has applied Harris Truck Lines only once in the last half century, Thompson v. INS, 375 U. S. 384 (1964) (per curiam), several courts have rightly questioned its continuing validity. See, e. g., Panhorst v. United States, 241 F. 3d 367, 371 (CA4 2001) (doubting “the continued viability of the unique circumstances doctrine”). See also Houston v. Lack, 487 U. S. 266, 282 (1988) (Scalia, J., dissenting) (“Our later cases ... effectively repudiate the Harris Truck Lines approach . . . ”); Osterneck v. Ernst & Whinney, 489 U. S. 169, 170 (1989) (referring to “the so-called ‘unique circumstances’ exception” to the timely appeal requirement). We see no compelling reason to resurrect the doctrine from its 40-year slumber. Accordingly, we reject Bowles’ reliance on the doctrine, and we overrule Harris Truck Lines and Thompson to the extent they purport to authorize an exception to a jurisdictional rule. C If rigorous rules like the one applied today are thought to be inequitable, Congress may authorize courts to promulgate rules that excuse compliance with the statutory time limits. Even narrow rules to this effect would give rise to litigation testing their reach and would no doubt detract from the clarity'of the rule. However, congressionally authorized rule-making would likely lead to less litigation than court-created exceptions without authorization. And in all events, for the reasons discussed above, we lack present authority to make the exception petitioner seeks. Ill The Court of Appeals correctly held that it lacked jurisdiction to consider Bowles’ appeal. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed. It is so ordered. The Rule was amended, effective December 1, 2005, to require that notice be pursuant to Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 77(d). The substance is otherwise unchanged. Griggs and several other of this Court’s decisions ultimately rely on United States v. Robinson, 361 U. S. 220, 229 (1960), for the proposition that the timely filing of a notice of appeal is jurisdictional. As the dissent notes, we have recently questioned Robinson’s use of the term “jurisdictional.” Post, at 215-216 (opinion of Souter, J.). Even in our cases criticizing Robinson, however, we have noted the jurisdictional significance of the fact that a time limit is set forth in a statute, see infra, at 210-&11, and have even pointed to § 2107 as a statute deserving of jurisdictional treatment, infra, at 211. Additionally, because we rely on those cases in reaching today’s holding, the dissent’s rhetoric claiming that we are ignoring their reasoning is unfounded. Regardless of this Court’s past careless use of terminology, it is indisputable that time limits for filing a notice of appeal have been treated as jurisdictional in American law for well over a century. Consequently, the dissent’s approach would require the repudiation of a century’s worth of precedent and practice in American courts. Given the choice between calling into question some dicta in our recent opinions and effectively overruling a century’s worth of practice, we think the former option is the only prudent course. At least one Federal Court of Appeals has noted that Kontrick and Eberhart “called . . . into question” the “longstanding assumption” that the timely filing of a notice of appeal is a jurisdictional requirement. United States v. Sadler, 480 F. 3d 932, 935 (CA9 2007). That court nonetheless found that “[t]he distinction between jurisdictional rules and inflexible but not jurisdictional timeliness rules drawn by Eberhart and Kontrick turns largely on whether the timeliness requirement is or is not grounded in a statute.” Id., at 936. The dissent minimizes this argument, stating that the Court understood § 2101(c) as jurisdictional “in the days when we used the term imprecisely.” Post, at 218, n. 4. The dissent’s apathy is surprising because if our treatment of our own jurisdiction is simply a relic of the old days, it is a relic with severe consequences. Just a few months ago, the Clerk, pursuant to this Court’s Rule 13.2, refused to accept a petition for certiorari submitted by Ryan Heath Dickson because it had been filed one day late. In the letter sent to Dickson’s counsel, the Clerk explained that “[w]hen the time to file a petition for a writ of certiorari in a civil case ... has expired, the Court no longer has the power to review the petition.” Letter from William K. Suter, Clerk of Court, to Ronald T. Spriggs (Dec. 28, 2006). Dickson was executed on April 26, 2007, without any Member of this Court having even seen his petition for certiorari. The rejected certiorari petition was Dickson’s first in this Court, and one can only speculate as to whether denial of that petition would have been a foregone conclusion. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Black delivered the opinion of the Court. The question in this case is whether a State’s unfair competition law can, consistently with the federal patent laws, impose liability for or prohibit the copying of an article which is protected by neither a federal patent nor a copyright. The respondent, Stiffel Company, secured design and mechanical patents on a “pole lamp” — a vertical tube having lamp fixtures along the outside, the tube being made so that it will stand upright between the floor and ceiling of a room. Pole lamps proved a decided commercial success, and soon after Stiffel brought them on the market Sears, Roebuck & Company put on the market a substantially identical lamp, which it sold more cheaply, Sears’ retail price being about the same as Stiffel’s wholesale price. Stiffel then brought this action against Sears in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, claiming in its first count that by copying its design Sears had infringed Stiffel’s patents and in its second count that by selling copies of Stiffel’s lamp Sears had caused confusion in the trade as to the source of the lamps and had thereby engaged in unfair competition under Illinois law. There was evidence that identifying tags were not attached to the Sears lamps although labels appeared on the cartons in which they were delivered to customers, that customers had asked Stiffel whether its lamps differed from Sears’, and that in two cases customers who had bought Stiffel lamps had complained to Stiffel on learning that Sears was selling substantially identical lamps at a much lower price. The District Court, after holding the patents invalid for want of invention, went on to find as a fact that Sears’ lamp was “a substantially exact copy” of Stiffel’s and that the two lamps were so much alike, both in appearance and in functional details, “that confusion between them is likely, and some confusion has already occurred.” On these findings the court held Sears guilty of unfair competition, enjoined Sears “from unfairly competing with [Stiffel] by selling or attempting to sell pole lamps identical to or confusingly similar to” Stiffel’s lamp, and ordered an accounting to fix profits and damages resulting from Sears’ “unfair competition.” The Court of Appeals affirmed. 313 F. 2d 115. That court held that, to make out a case of unfair competition under Illinois law, there was no need to show that Sears had been “palming off” its lamps as Stiffel lamps; Stiffel had only to prove that there was a “likelihood of confusion as to the source of the products” — that the two articles were .sufficiently identical that customers could not tell who had made a particular one. Impressed by the “remarkable sameness of appearance” of the lamps, the Court of Appeals upheld the trial court’s findings of likelihood of confusion and some actual confusion, findings which the appellate court construed to mean confusion “as to the source of the lamps.” The Court of Appeals thought this enough under Illinois law to sustain the trial court’s holding of unfair competition, and thus held Sears liable under Illinois law for doing no more than copying and marketing an unpatented article. We granted certiorari to consider whether this use of a State’s law of unfair competition is compatible with the federal patent law. 374 U. S. 826. Before the Constitution was adopted, some States had granted patents either by special act or by general statute, but when the Constitution was adopted provision for a federal patent law was made one of the enumerated powers of Congress because, as Madison put it in The Federalist No. 43, the States “cannot separately make effectual provision” for either patents or copyrights. That constitutional provision is Art. I, § 8, cl. .8, which empowers Congress “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” Pursuant to this constitutional authority, Congress in 1790 enacted the first federal patent and copyright law, 1 Stat. 109, and ever since that time has fixed the conditions upon which patents and copyrights shall be granted, see 17 U. S. C. §§ 1-216; 35 U. S. C. §§ 1-293. These laws, like other laws of the United States enacted pursuant to constitutional authority, are the supreme law of the land. See Sperry v. Florida, 373 U. S. 379 (1963). When state law touches upon the area of these federal statutes, it is “familiar doctrine” that the federal policy “may not be set at naught, or its benefits denied” by the state law. Sola Elec. Co. v. Jefferson Elec. Co., 317 U. S. 173, 176 (1942). This is true, of course, even if the state law is enacted in the exercise of otherwise undoubted state power. The grant of a patent is the grant of a statutory monopoly; indeed, the grant of patents in England was an explicit exception to the statute of James I prohibiting monopolies. Patents are not given as favors, as was the case of monopolies given by the Tudor monarchs, see The Case of Monopolies (Darcy v. Allein), 11 Co. Rep. 84 b., 77 Eng. Rep. 1260 (K. B. 1602), but are meant to encourage invention by rewarding the inventor with the right, limited to a term of years fixed by the patent, to exclude others from the use of his invention. During that' period of time no one may make, use, or sell the patented product without the patentee’s authority. 35 U. S. C. § 271. But in rewarding useful invention, the “rights and welfare of the community must be fairly dealt with and effectually guarded.” Kendall v. Winsor, 21 How. 322, 329 (1859). To that end the prerequisites to obtaining a patent are strictly observed, and when the patent has issued the limitations on its exercise are equally strictly enforced. To begin with, a genuine “invention” or “discovery” must be demonstrated “lest in the constant demand for new appliances the heavy hand of tribute be laid on each slight technological advance in an art.” Cuno Engineering Corp. v. Automatic Devices Corp., 314 U. S. 84, 92 (1941); see Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. v. Supermarket Equipment Corp., 340 U. S. 147, 152-153 (1950); Atlantic Works v. Brady, 107 U. S. 192,199-200 (1883). Once the patent issues, it is strictly construed, United States v. Masonite Corp., 316 U. S. 265, 280 (1942), it cannot be used to secure any monopoly beyond that contained in the patent, Morton Salt Co. v. G. S. Suppiger Co., 314 U. S. 488, 492 (1942), the pat-entee’s control over the product when it leaves his hands is sharply limited, see United States v. Univis Lens Co., 316 U. S. 241, 250-252 (1942), and the patent monopoly may not be used in disregard of the antitrust laws, see International Business Machines Corp. v. United States, 298 U. S. 131 (1936); United Shoe Machinery Corp. v. United States, 258 U. S. 451, 463-464 (1922). Finally, and especially relevant here, when the patent expires the monopoly created by it expires, too, and the right to make the article — including the right to make it in precisely the shape it carried when patented — passes to the public. Kellogg Co. v. National Biscuit Co., 305 U. S. 111, 120-122 (1938); Singer Mfg. Co. v. June Mfg. Co., 163 U. S. 169, 185 (1896). Thus the patent system is one in which uniform federal standards are carefully used to promote invention while at the same time preserving free competition. Obviously a State could not, consistently with the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution, extend the life of a patent beyond its expiration date or give a patent on an article which lacked the level of invention required for federal patents. To do either would run counter to the policy of Congress of granting patents only to true inventions, and then only for a limited time. Just as a State cannot encroach upon the federal patent laws directly, it cannot, under some other law, such as that forbidding unfair competition, give protection of a kind that clashes with the objectives of the federal patent laws. In the present case the “pole lamp” sold by Stiffel has been held not to be entitled to the protection of either a mechanical or a design patent. An unpatentable article, like an article on which the patent has expired, is in the public domain and may be made and sold by whoever chooses to do so. What Sears did was to copy Stiffens design and to sell lamps almost identical to those sold by Stiffel. This it had every right to do under the federal patent laws. That Stiffel originated the pole lamp and made it popular is immaterial. “Sharing in the goodwill of an article unprotected by patent or trade-mark is the exercise of a right possessed by all — and in the free exercise of which the consuming public is deeply interested.” Kellogg Co. v. National Biscuit Co., supra, 305 U. S., at 122. To allow a State by use of its law of unfair competition to prevent the copying of an article which represents too slight an advance to be patented would be to permit the State to block off from the public something which federal law has said belongs to the public. The result would be that while federal law grants only 14 or 17 years’ protection to genuine inventions, see 35 U. S. C. §§ 154, 173, States could allow perpetual protection to articles too lacking in novelty to merit any patent at all under federal constitutional standards. This would be too great an encroachment on the federal patent system to be tolerated. Sears has been held liable here for unfair competition because of a finding of likelihood of confusion based only on the fact .that Sears’ lamp was copied from Stiffel’s unpatented lamp and that consequently the two looked exactly alike. Of course there could be “confusion” as to who had manufactured these nearly identical articles. But mere inability of the public to tell two identical articles apart is not enough to support an injunction against copying or an award of damages for copying that which the federal patent laws permit to be copied. Doubtless a State may, in appropriate circumstances, require that goods, whether patented or unpatented, be labeled or that other precautionary steps be taken to prevent customers from being misled as to the source, just as it may protect businesses in the use of their trademarks, labels, or distinctive dress in the packaging of goods so as to prevent others, by imitating such markings, from misleading purchasers as to the source of the goods. But because of the federal patent laws a State may not, when the article is unpatented and uncopyrighted, prohibit the copying of the article itself or award damages for such copying. Cf. G. Ricordi & Co. v. Haendler, 194 F. 2d 914, 916 (C. A. 2d Cir. 1952). The judgment below did both and in so doing gave Stiffel the equivalent of a patent monopoly on its unpatented lamp. That was error, and Sears is entitled to a judgment in its favor. Reversed. [For concurring opinion of Mr. Justice Harlan, see post, p. 239.] No review is sought here of the ruling affirming the District Court’s holding that the patent is invalid. 313 F. 2d, at 118 and nn. 6,7. At least one Illinois case has held in an exhaustive opinion that unfair competition under the law of Illinois is not proved unless the defendant is shown to have “palmed off” the article which he sells-as that of another seller; the court there said that “[t]he courts in this State do not treat the ‘palming off’ doctrine as merely the designation of a typical class of cases of unfair competition, but they announce it as the rule of law itself — the test by which it is determined whether a given state of facts constitutes unfair competition as a matter of law. . . . The ‘palming off’ rule is expressed in a positive, concrete form which will not admit of ‘broadening’ or ‘widening’ by any proper judicial process.” Stevens-Davis Co. v. Mather & Co., 230 Ill. App. 45, 65-66 (1923). In spite of this the Court of Appeals in its opinions both in this case and in Day-Brite Lighting, Inc., v. Compco Corp., 311 F. 2d 26, rev’d, post, p. 234, relied upon one of its previous decisions in a trade-name case, Independent Nail & Packing Co. v. Stronghold Screw Products, 205 F. 2d 921 (C. A. 7th Cir. 1953), which concluded that as to use of trade names the Stevens-Davis rule had been overruled by two subsequent Illinois decisions. Those two cases, however, discussed only misleading,use of trade names, not copying of articles of trade. One prohibited the use of a name so similar to that of another seller as to deceive or -confuse customers, even though the defendant company did not sell the same products as the plaintiff and so in one sense could not be said to have palmed off its goods as those of a competitor, since the plaintiff was not a competitor. Lady Esther, Ltd., v. Lady Esther Corset Shoppe, Inc., 317 Ill. App. 451, 46 N. E. 2d 165 (1943). The other Illinois case on which the Court of Appeals relied was a mandamus action which held that under an Illinois statute a corporation was properly denied registration in the State when its name was “deceptively similar” to that of a corporation already registered. Investors Syndicate of America, Inc., v. Hughes, 378 Ill. 413, 38 N. E. 2d 754 (1941). The Court of Appeals, by holding that because Illinois forbids misleading use of trade names it also forbids as unfair competition the mere copying of an article of trade without any palming off, thus appears to have extended greatly the scope of the Illinois law of unfair competition beyond the limits indicated in the Illinois cases and beyond any previous decisions of the Seventh Circuit itself. Because of our disposition of these cases we need not decide whether it was correct in doing so. See I Walker, Patents (Deller ed. 1937), § 7. The Federalist (Cooke ed. 1961) 288. Patent rights exist only by virtue of statute. Wheaton v. Peters, 8 Pet. 591, 658 (1834). The Statute of Monopolies, 21 Jac. I, c. 3 (1623), declared all monopolies “contrary to the Laws of this Realm” and “utterly void and of none Effect.” Section VI, however, excepted patents of 14 years to “the true and first Inventor and Inventors” of “new Manufactures” so long as they were “not contrary to the Law, nor mischievous to the State, by raising Prices of Commodities at home, or Hurt of Trade, or generally inconvenient . . . .” Much American patent law derives from English patent law. See Pennock v. Dialogue, 2 Pet. 1, 18 (1829). The purpose of Congress to have national uniformity in patent and copyright laws can be inferred from such statutes as that which vests exclusive jurisdiction to hear patent and copyright cases in federal courts, 28 U. S. C. § 1338 (a), and that section of the Copyright Act which expressly saves state protection of unpublished writings but does not include published writings, 17 U. S. C. § 2. U. S. Const., Art. VI. It seems apparent that Illinois has not seen fit to impose liability on sellers who do not label their goods. Neither the discussions in the opinions below nor the briefs before us cite any Illinois statute or decision requiring labeling. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Jackson delivered the opinion of the Court. The appellants sought review by this Court of a decision by the Supreme Court of Utah on the ground that the State convicted them in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution. In the trial court a motion to dismiss the charge at the close of the evidence broadly indicated reliance on the Fourteenth as well as the First Amendment, and such reliance was indicated in requests for instructions. A preliminary motion to quash the information was stated in broad terms which it is claimed admitted argument of any federal grounds. Trial resulted in conviction and the Supreme Court of the State overruled all constitutional objections and affirmed. On argument in this Court, inquiries from the bench suggested a federal question which had not been specifically assigned by defendants in this Court, nor in any court below, although general transgression of the Fourteenth Amendment had been alleged. This question is whether the Utah statute, for violation of which the appellants are amerced, is so vague and indefinite that it fails adequately to define the offense or to give reasonable standards for determining guilt. The question grew out of these circumstances: Defendants were tried on an information which charged violation of § 103-11-1, Utah Code Ann. 1943, in that they conspired “to commit acts injurious to public morals as follows, to-wit: . . . It then specified acts which amount briefly to conspiring to counsel, advise, and practice polygamous or plural marriage, and it set forth a series of overt acts in furtherance thereof. The Supreme Court considered that the prosecution was under Paragraph (5) of 103-11-1 which, so far as relevant, defines conspiracy, “(5) to commit any act injurious to the public health, to public morals, or to trade or commerce, or for the perversion or obstruction of justice or the due administration of the laws . . . .” It is obvious that this is no narrowly drawn statute. We do not presume to give an interpretation as to what it may include. Standing by itself, it would seem to be warrant for conviction for agreement to do almost any act which a judge and jury might find at the moment contrary to his or its notions of what was good for health, morals, trade, commerce, justice or order. In some States the phrase “injurious to public morals” would be likely to punish acts which it would not punish in others because of the varying policies on such matters as use of cigarettes or liquor and the permissibility of gambling. This led to the inquiry as to whether the statute attempts to cover so much that it effectively covers nothing. Statutes defining crimes may fail of their purpose if they do not provide some reasonable standards of guilt. See, for example, United States v. Cohen Grocery Co., 255 U. S. 81. Legislation may run afoul of the Due Process Clause because it fails to give adequate guidance to those who would be law-abiding, to advise defendants of the nature of the offense with which they are charged, or to guide courts in trying those who are accused. When the adequacy of this statute in these respects was questioned, the State asked and was granted reargument here. Rehearing convinces us that questions are inherent in this appeal which were not presented to or considered by the Utah Supreme Court and which involve determination of state law. We recognize that the part of the statute we have quoted does not stand by itself as the law of Utah but is part of the whole body of common and statute law of that State and is to be judged in that context. It is argued that while Paragraph (5) as quoted is admittedly very general, the present charge is sustainable under Paragraph (1) thereof which makes a crime of any conspiracy to commit a crime and that the sweep of Paragraph (5) is or may be so limited by its context or by judicial construction as to supply more definite standards for determining guilt. It is also said that the point, so far as this case is concerned, has been waived or lost because there was no timely or sufficient assignment of it as ground for dismissal to comply with state practice. We believe we should not pass upon the questions raised here until the Supreme Court of Utah has had opportunity to deal with this ultimate issue of federal law and with any state law questions relevant to it. This trial was not conducted in federal court nor for violation of federal law. It is a prosecution by the State, in its courts, to vindicate its own laws. Our sole concern with it is to see that no conviction contrary to a valid objection raised under the Fourteenth Amendment is upheld. What the statutes of a State mean, the extent to which any provision may be limited by other Acts or by other parts of the same Act, are questions on which the highest court of the State has the final word. The right to speak this word is one which State courts should jealously maintain and which we should scrupulously observe. In order that the controversy may be restored to the control of the Supreme Court of Utah, its present judgment is vacated and the cause is remanded for proceedings not inconsistent herewith. Vacated and remanded. Mr. Justice Black concurs in the result. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. In 1976, Congress authorized the noneonsensual referral to magistrates for a hearing and recommended findings “of prisoner petitions challenging conditions of confinement.” 28 U. S. C. § 636(b)(1)(B). We granted certiorari to decide whether that authorization includes cases alleging a specific episode of unconstitutional conduct by prison administrators or encompasses only challenges to ongoing prison conditions. 498 U. S. 1011 (1990). In this case, petitioner brought suit against various prison officials alleging that, in violation of his constitutional rights, they used excessive force when they transferred him from one cell to another on July 13, 1982. App. 11-24. Petitioner waived a jury trial and initially consented to have a magistrate try the entire case pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 636(c)(1). See App. 7-8, 28-29. On the first day of trial, however, petitioner sought to withdraw his consent. Petitioner was permitted to withdraw his consent, but the Magistrate ruled that he was nonetheless authorized to conduct an evidentiary hearing and to submit proposed findings of fact and a recommended disposition to the District Court. See id., at 30-31. After a hearing, the Magistrate recommended detailed findings and a judgment for defendants. Id., at 33-49. The District Court accepted the Magistrate’s recommendation and overruled petitioner’s objection to the Magistrate’s role. Id., at 54-55. The Court of Appeals affirmed the District Court’s determination that the Magistrate was authorized by § 636(b)(1)(B) to hold the hearing and to recommend findings. 906 F. 2d 835 (CA2 1990). Petitioner contends that § 636(b)(1)(B) permits nonconsen-sual referrals to a magistrate only when a prisoner challenges ongoing prison conditions. Suits alleging that administrators acted unconstitutionally in an isolated incident, petitioner suggests, are not properly classified as “petitions challenging conditions of confinement.” § 636(b)(1)(B). Petitioner advances two reasonable arguments for his construction of the statute. First, he maintains that the ordinary meaning of the words “conditions of confinement” includes continuous conditions and excludes isolated incidents. Second, he suggests that because a prisoner is constitutionally entitled to a jury trial in a damages action arising out of a specific episode of misconduct, it seems unlikely that Congress would authorize a nonconsensual reference to a magistrate in such a case. In our judgment, however, these arguments, although not without force, are overcome by other considerations. We do not quarrel with petitioner’s claim that the most natural reading of the phrase “challenging conditions of confinement,” when viewed in isolation,' would not include suits seeking relief from isolated episodes of unconstitutional conduct. However, statutory language must always be read in its proper context. “In ascertaining the plain meaning of [a] statute, the court must look to the particular statutory language at issue, as well as the language and design of the statute as a whole.” K mart Corp. v. Cartier, Inc., 486 U. S. 281, 291 (1988). See also Crandon v. United States, 494 U. S. 152, 158 (1990) (“In determining the meaning of the statute, we look not only to the particular statutory language, but to the design of the statute as a whole and to its object and policy”). The text of the statute does not define the term “conditions of confinement” or contain any language suggesting that prisoner petitions should be divided into subcategories. On the contrary, when the relevant section is read in its entirety, it suggests that Congress intended to authorize the nonconsen-sual reference of all prisoner petitions to a magistrate. In pertinent part, the statute provides: “(b)(1) Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary— “(B) a judge may . . . designate a magistrate to conduct hearings, including evidentiary hearings, and to submit to a judge of the court proposed findings of fact and recommendations for the disposition, by a judge of the court, ... of applications for posttrial relief made by individuals convicted of criminal offenses and of prisoner petitions challenging conditions of confinement.” § 636(b)(1)(B) (emphasis added). This description suggests Congress intended to include in their entirety the two primary categories of suits brought by prisoners — applications for habeas corpus relief pursuant to 28 U. S. C. §§2254 and 2255 and actions for monetary or in-junctive relief under 42 U. S. C. § 1983. Petitioner attempts to bolster his plain meaning argument with the suggestion that this Court has interpreted the words “conditions of confinement” to include the limitation that he suggests. We certainly presume that in 1976, when Congress selected this language, our elected representatives were familiar with our recently announced opinions concerning prisoner petitions. See Cannon v. University of Chicago, 441 U. S. 677, 696-697 (1979). However, the possibility that Congress was influenced in its choice of language by our opinions cuts against, rather than in favor of, the statutory reading advanced by petitioner. All but one of the cases that petitioner claims support his reading were decided well after the enactment of § 636(b) (1)(B). The sole case identified by petitioner that predates the statute’s enactment did not even use the phrase “conditions of confinement” much less expound a narrow definition of it. See Procunier v. Martinez, 416 U. S. 396 (1974). Just three years before the statute was drafted, however, our opinion in Preiser v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S. 475 (1973), had described two broad categories of prisoner petitions: (1) those challenging the fact or duration of confinement itself; and (2) those challenging the conditions of confinement. The statu-t.ory language from ,§ 636(b)(1)(B) that we emphasized above describes these same two categories. Significantly, our description in Preiser of the latter category unambiguously embraced the kind of single episode cases that petitioner’s construction would exclude. We wrote: “The respondents place a great deal of reliance on our recent decisions upholding the right of state prisoners to bring federal civil rights actions to challenge the conditions of their confinement. Cooper v. Pate, 378 U. S. 546 (1964); Houghton v. Shafer, 392 U. S. 639 (1968); Wilwording v. Swenson, 404 U. S. 249 (1971); Haines v. Kerner, 404 U. S. 519 (1972). But none of the state prisoners in those cases was challenging the fact or duration of his physical confinement itself, and none was seeking immediate release or a speedier release from that confinement — the heart of habeas corpus. In Cooper, the prisoner alleged that, solely because of his religious beliefs, he had been denied permission to purchase certain religious publications and had been denied other privileges enjoyed by his fellow prisoners. In Houghton, the prisoner’s contention was that prison authorities had violated the Constitution by confiscating legal materials which he had acquired for pursuing his appeal, but which, in violation of prison rules, had been found in the possession of another prisoner. In Wilwording, the prisoners’ complaints related solely to their living conditions and disciplinary measures while confined in maximum security. And in Haines, the prisoner claimed that prison officials had acted unconstitutionally by placing him in solitary confinement as a disciplinary measure, and he sought damages for claimed physical injuries sustained while so segregated. It is clear, then, that in all those cases, the prisoners’ claims related solely to the States’ alleged unconstitutional treatment of them while in confinement. None sought, as did the respondents here, to challenge the very fact or duration of the confinement itself. Those cases, therefore, merely establish that a §1983 action is a proper remedy for a state prisoner who is making a constitutional challenge to the conditions of his prison life, but not to the fact or length of his custody. ” Id., at 498-499. The denial of religious publications in Cooper v. Pate, 378 U. S. 546 (1964), the confiscation of legal materials in Houghton v. Shafer, 392 U. S. 639 (1968), and, most definitely, the placement of the prisoner in solitary confinement in Haines v. Kerner, 404 U. S. 519 (1972), were all challenges to specific instances of unconstitutional conduct, and the Preiser Court described them as challenges to “conditions of confinement.” Petitioner also claims that his narrow reading is supported by the fact that, in other legislation, Congress used the term “conditions of confinement” to mean ongoing situations. However, the fact that Congress may have used the term “conditions of confinement” in a different sense in legislation having a different purpose cannot control our interpretation of the language in this Act that so clearly parallels our Preiser opinion. The broader reading we adopt also comports with the policy behind the Act. The central purpose of the 1976 amendment to the Magistrate’s Act was to authorize greater use of magistrates to assist federal judges “in handling an ever-increasing caseload.” S. Rep. No. 94-625, p. 2 (1976). The adoption of the definition of “conditions of confinement” that we had used in Preiser is consistent with this purpose because it will allow referral of a broader category of cases. Our reading also furthers the policy of the Act because its simplicity avoids the litigation that otherwise would inevitably arise in trying to identify the precise contours of petitioner’s suggested exception for single episode cases. Petitioner’s definition would generate additional work for the district courts because the distinction between cases challenging ongoing conditions and those challenging specific acts of alleged misconduct will often be difficult to identify. The complaint filed by petitioner in this case illustrates the point. On the one hand, he alleged that the defendants injured him by making improper use of a chemical agent “commonly referred to by correctional sadists as ‘Big Red,’” App. 14, but on the other hand, he also complained of the absence of prison regulations governing the use of tear gas, and sought in-junctive relief as well as damages. Thus, this complaint, like many other prisoner petitions, could fairly be characterized as challenging both ongoing practices and a specific act of alleged misconduct. We are not persuaded to alter our reading of the statute by petitioner’s argument based on the constitutional right to a jury trial. First, petitioner’s statutory reading would not eliminate the potential constitutional difficulty that he identifies. Petitioner concedes that, in some actions that would be considered “petitions challenging conditions of confinement” under his definition, the prisoner would nonetheless have a constitutional right to a jury trial that would render noncon-sensual referral constitutionally suspect. See Reply Brief for Petitioner 5, n. 3. Second, and, more important, the statute properly interpreted is not constitutionally infirm. No constitutional question arises in cases like this one, in which the plaintiff has waived the right to a jury trial. And, in cases in which the jury right exists and is not waived, the lower courts, guided by the principle of constitutional avoidance, have consistently held that the statute does not authorize reference to a magistrate. See, e. g., Hall v. Sharpe, 812 F. 2d 644, 647-649 (CA11 1987); Archie v. Christian, 808 F. 2d 1132, 1136-1137 (CA5 1987) (en banc); Wimmer v. Cook, 774 F. 2d 68, 73-74 (CA4 1985). The judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed. It is so ordered. Title 28 U. S. C. § 636(b)(1)(B) provides in relevant part: “(b)(1) Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary— “(B) a judge may . . . designate a magistrate to conduct hearings, including evidentiary hearings, and to submit to a judge of the court proposed findings of fact and recommendations for the disposition, by a judge of the court,... of applications for posttrial relief made by individuals convicted of criminal offenses and of prisoner petitions challenging conditions of confinement. ” Title 28 U. S. C. § 636(e)(1) provides in relevant part: “Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary— “(1) Upon the consent of the parties, a full-time United States magistrate or a part-time United States magistrate who serves as a full-time judicial officer may conduct any or all proceedings in a jury or nonjury civil matter and order the entry of judgment in the case, when specially designated to exercise such jurisdiction by the district court or courts he serves." See 18 U. S. C. § 4013(a)(4) (authorizing Attorney General to enter into contracts “to establish acceptable conditions of confinement” in state facilities housing federal detainees); 42 U. S. C. §§1997a(a), 1997c(a)(1) (authorizing Attorney General to initiate, or intervene in, injunctive actions challenging “egregious or flagrant conditions” in state prisons); 42 U. S. C. §§ 37C9a(b), 3769b(a)(1) (requiring state governments to develop a “plan for . . . improving conditions of confinement” as a precondition to receiving federal funds to “reliev[e] overcrowding [and] substandard conditions”). “27. There is no standard reporting form for any chemical weapon other than mace used at [the Connecticut Correctional Institute at Somers, Connecticut (CCI-Somers)].” App. 15. “30. There were no written directives governing the use of chemical weapons other than mace at the time this incident occurred.” Id., at 16. “32. Written policy and procedure of the Department of Corrections and the Institution did not provide for the use of the tear gas duster." Id., at 17. “42. At the time of the incident, neither the Administrative Directives nor the CCI-Somers Operational Directives contained a use of force doctrine. Neither addressed the use of the tear gas duster or other chemical weapons, except mace.” Id., at 18. The complaint included a prayer for an injunction asking that defendants “immediately formulate and adopt rigid Directives restricting the use of Tear Gas and the weapon known as the Tear Gas Duster to riot situations involving multiple inmates or to situations where there exist barriers obstructing the use of mace[;] immediately formulate and adopt rigid Directives requiring the immediate post-incident treatment of inmates sprayed with tear gas including adequate medical treatment and shower facilities.” 7d.,at23. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

D

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court. These cases concern the Tax Court’s employment of special trial judges, auxiliary officers appointed by the Chief Judge of the Tax Court to assist in the work of the court. See 26 U. S. C. § 7443A(a). Unlike Tax Court judges, who are appointed by the President for 15-year terms, see § 7443(b), (e), special trial judges have no fixed term of office, § 7443A(a). Any case before the Tax Court may be assigned to a special trial judge for hearing. Ultimate decision in cases involving tax deficiencies that exceed $50,000, however, is reserved for the Tax Court. § 7443A(c). Tax Court Rule 183 governs the two-tiered proceedings in which a special trial judge hears the case, but the Tax Court itself renders the final decision. The Rule directs that, after trial and submission of briefs, the special trial judge “shall submit a report, including findings of fact and opinion, to the Chief Judge, and the Chief Judge will assign the case to a Judge... of the Court.” Tax Ct. Rule 183(b), 26 U. S. C. App., p. 1619. In acting on the report, the Tax Court judge to whom the case is assigned must give “[d]ue regard... to the circumstance that the [sjpecial [t]rial [j]udge had the opportunity to evaluate the credibility of the witnesses.” Rule 183(c), ibid. Further, factfindings contained in the report “shall be presumed to be correct.” Ibid. The final Tax Court decision “may adopt the [s]pecial [t]rial [jjudge’s report or may modify it or may reject it in whole or in part.” Ibid. Until 1983, special trial judge reports, as submitted to the Chief Judge, were made public and were included in the record on appeal. A rule revision that year deleted the requirement that, upon submission of the special trial judge’s report, “a copy... shall forthwith be served on each party.” See Rule 183 note, 81 T. C. 1069-1070 (1984). Correspondingly, the revision deleted the prior provision giving parties an opportunity to set forth “exceptions” to the report. Ibid. Coincident with those rule changes, the Tax Court significantly altered its practice in cases referred for trial, but not final decision, to special trial judges. Since the January 16,1984 effective date of the rule revision, the post-trial report submitted to the Chief Judge, then transmitted to the Tax Court judge assigned to make the final decision, has been both withheld from the public and excluded from the record on appeal. Further, since that time, Tax Court judges have refrained from disclosing, in any case, whether the final decision in fact “modifies]” or “reject[s] [the special trial judge’s initial report] in whole or in part.” Cf. Rule 183(c), 26 U. S. C. App., p. 1619. Instead, the final decision invariably begins with a stock statement that the Tax Court judge “agrees with and adopts the opinion of the [s]pecial [t]rial [j]udge.” See, e. g., Investment Research Assoc., Ltd. v. Commissioner, 78 TCM 951, 963 (1999), ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, pp. 2562-2563. Whether and how the opinion thus adopted deviates from the special trial judge’s original report is never made public. Petitioners are taxpayers who were unsuccessful in the Tax Court and on appeal. They object to the concealment of the special trial judge’s initial report and, in particular, exclusion of the report from the record on appeal. They urge that, under the Tax Court’s current practice, the parties and the Court of Appeals lack essential information: One cannot tell whether, as Rule 183(c) requires, the final decision reflects “[d]ue regard” for the special trial judge’s “opportunity to evaluate the credibility of [the] witnesses,” and presumes the correctness of that judge’s initial factfindings. We agree that no statute authorizes, and the current text of Rule 183 does not warrant, the concealment at issue. We so hold, mindful that it is routine in federal judicial and administrative decisionmaking both to disclose the initial report of a hearing officer, and to make that report part of the record available to an appellate forum. A departure of the bold character practiced by the Tax Court — the creation and attribution solely to the special trial judge of a superseding report composed in unrevealed collaboration with a regular Tax Court judge — demands, at the very least, full and fair statement in the Tax Court’s own Rules. I After repeated Internal Revenue Service audits spanning several years, taxpayers Claude Ballard, Burton W. Kanter, and Robert Lisle received multiple notices of deficiency from the Commissioner of Internal Revenue (Commissioner). The Commissioner charged that during the 1970’s and 1980’s, Ballard and Lisle, real estate executives at the Prudential Life Insurance Company of America (Prudential), had an arrangement with Kanter, a tax lawyer and business entrepreneur, under which people seeking to do business with Prudential made payments to corporations controlled by Kanter. Those payments, the Commissioner alleged, were then distributed to Kanter, Ballard, and Lisle, or to entities they controlled. Ballard, Kanter, and Lisle did not report the payments on their individual tax returns. See Investment Research Assoc., 78 TCM, at 1058, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, pp. 2672-2673; Ballard v. Commissioner, 321 F. 3d 1037, 1038-1039 (CA11 2003); Brief for Petitioner Ballard 3-4; Brief for Petitioner Kanter 11. After the initial deficiency notices, the Commissioner, in 1994, additionally charged that the taxpayers’ actions were fraudulent. See Investment Research Assoc., 78 TCM, at 966, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, p. 2693. As to each asserted deficiency, Ballard, Kanter, and Lisle filed petitions for redetermination in the Tax Court. See Ballard, 321 F. 3d, at 1040. The Tax Court is composed of 19 regular judges appointed by the President for 15-year terms, and several special trial judges appointed, from time to time, by the Tax Court’s Chief Judge. See 26 U. S. C. §§ 7443(a)-(b), (e), 7443A(a). The statute governing the appointment and competence of special trial judges, §7443A, prescribes no term of office for them, but sets their salaries at 90% of the salary paid to regular judges of the Tax Court, see §7443A(d). The Tax Court may authorize special trial judges to hear and render final decisions in declaratory judgment proceedings, “small tax cases,” and levy and lien proceedings. See § 7443A(b)(1)-(4), (c); Tax Ct. Rule 182, 26 U. S. C. App., p. 1619; Brief for Respondent 3. If the amount of the taxes at issue exceeds $50,000, a special trial judge may be assigned to preside over the trial and issue a report containing recommended factfindings and conclusions as to the taxpayers’ liability, but decisional authority is reserved for the Tax Court. See § 7443A(b)(5), (c); Freytag v. Commissioner, 501 U. S. 868, 881-882 (1991) (noting that special trial judges “take testimony, conduct trials, [and] rule on the admissibility of evidence,” but “lack authority to enter a final decision” in certain cases). Tax Court Rule 183 governs the Tax Court’s review of the special trial judge’s findings and opinion. See supra, at 44-45. After Ballard, Kanter, and Lisle sought review in the Tax Court, the Chief Judge assigned the consolidated case to Special Trial Judge D. Irvin Couvillion for trial. Judge Couvillion presided over a five-week trial during the summer of 1994, and the parties’ briefing was completed in May 1995. App. 7; see also Ballard, 321 F. 3d, at 1040. The post-trial proceedings in the case are not fully memorialized in either the Tax Court’s docket records or its published orders, but certain salient events can be traced. On or before September 2, 1998, Judge Couvillion submitted to the Chief Judge a report containing his findings of fact and opinion, “as required by [Tax Court] Rule 183(b).” Order of Dec. 15, 1999, in No. 43966-85 etc. (TC), App. to Kanter Pet. for Cert. 113a-114a. On September 2, 1998, the Chief Judge assigned the case to Tax Court Judge Howard A. Dawson, Jr., “for review [of the special trial judge’s report] and, if approved, for adoption.” Id., at 114a. Fifteen months later, on December 15, 1999, the Chief Judge “reassigned” the case “from [Judge] Couvillion to [Judge] Dawson.” Id., at 113a. That same day, Judge Dawson issued the decision of the Tax Court. Judge Dawson found that Ballard, Kanter, and Lisle had acted with intent to deceive the Commissioner, and held them liable for underpaid taxes and substantial fraud penalties. See, e.g., Investment Research Assoc., 78 TCM, at 1071,1075,1085, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, pp. 2689,2692-2693, 2705-2706. In so ruling, Judge Dawson purported to adopt the findings contained in the report submitted by Judge Couvillion: “The Court agrees with and adopts the opinion of the Special Trial Judge, which is set forth below.” Id., at 963, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, pp. 2562-2563. Judge Dawson’s decision consists in its entirety of a document, over 600 pages in length, labeled “Opinion of the Special Trial Judge.” Ibid. The taxpayers came to believe that the document titled “Opinion of the Special Trial Judge” was not in fact a reproduction of Judge Couvillion’s Rule 183(b) report. A declaration, dated August 21, 2000, submitted by Ranter’s attorney, Randall G. Dick, accounts for this belief. Dick attested to conversations with two Tax Court judges regarding the Tax Court’s decision. According to the declaration, the judges told Dick that in the Rule 183(b) report submitted to the Chief Judge, Judge Couvillion had concluded that Ballard, Kanter, and Lisle did not owe taxes with respect to payments made by certain individuals seeking to do business with Prudential, and that the fraud penalty was not applicable. App. to Ballard Pet. for Cert. 308a-309a, ¶ 4. Attorney Dick’s declaration further stated: “In my conversations with the judges of the Tax Court, I was told the following: That substantial sections of the opinion were not written by Judge Couvillion, and that those sections containing findings related to the credibility of witnesses and findings related to fraud were wholly contrary to the findings made by Judge Couvil-lion in his report. The changes to Judge Couvillion’s findings relating to credibility and fraud were made by Judge Dawson.” Id., at 309a, ¶ 5. Concerned that Judge Dawson had modified or rejected special trial judge findings tending in their favor, see Tax Ct. Rule 183(c), the taxpayers filed three successive motions in the Tax Court; each motion sought access to the report Special Trial Judge Couvillion had submitted to the Chief Judge or, in the alternative, permission to place the special trial judge’s report under seal in the record on appeal. See Order of Aug. 30, 2000, App. to Kanter Pet. for Cert. 99a-101a; Motion of May 25, 2000, id., at 105a. The Tax Court denied the motions. See Order of Aug. 30, 2000, id., at 100a-101a, 103a. In response to the taxpayers’ third motion, filed in August 2000, the Tax Court elaborated: “Judge Dawson states and Special Trial Judge Couvillion agrees, that, after a meticulous and time-consuming review of the complex record in these cases, Judge Dawson adopted the findings of fact and opinion of Special Trial Judge Couvil-lion,... Judge Dawson presumed the findings of fact recommended by Special Trial Judge Couvillion were correct, and... Judge Dawson gave due regard” to Judge Couvil-lion’s credibility findings. Id., at 102a. To the extent that the taxpayers sought “any preliminary drafts” of the special trial judge’s report, the Tax Court added, such documents are “not subject to production because they relate to the internal deliberative processes of the Court.” Id., at 101a (quoting Order of Apr. 26, 2000, id., at 109a). Appeals from Tax Court decisions are taken to the court of appeals for the circuit in which the taxpayer resides. 26 U. S. C. § 7482(b)(1)(A). Ballard therefore appealed to the Eleventh Circuit, Kanter to the Seventh Circuit, and Lisle to the Fifth Circuit. All three Courts of Appeals accepted the Commissioner’s argument that the special trial judge’s signature on the Tax Court’s final decision rendered that decision in fact Special Trial Judge Couvillion’s report. Estate of Kanter v. Commissioner, 337 F. 3d 833, 840-841 (CA7 2003); Ballard, 321 F. 3d, at 1042; accord Estate of Lisle v. Commissioner, 341 F. 3d 364, 384 (CA5 2003) (adopting the reasoning of the Seventh and Eleventh Circuits without elaboration). The appeals courts further agreed with the Commissioner that the special trial judge’s original report, submitted to the Chief Judge pursuant to Rule 183(b), qualified as a confidential document, shielded as part of the Tax Court’s internal deliberative process. See Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 841-844; Ballard, 321 F. 3d, at 1042-1043; accord Estate of Lisle, 341 F. 3d, at 384. Having rejected the taxpayers’ objection to the absence of the special trial judge’s Rule 183(b) report from the record on appeal, the Seventh and Eleventh Circuits proceeded to the merits of the Tax Court’s final decision and affirmed that decision in principal part. See Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 873-874; Ballard, 321 F. 3d, at 1044. The Fifth Circuit’s judgment, which is not before this Court, reversed the fraud penalties assessed against Lisle for evidentiary insufficiency but upheld the Tax Court’s determination of tax deficiencies for certain years. See Estate of Lisle, 341 F. 3d, at 384-385. Seventh Circuit Judge Cudahy dissented on the issue of the special trial judge’s initial report, maintaining that intelligent review of the Tax Court’s decision required inclusion of that report in the record on appeal. See Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 874, 884-888. We granted certiorari, 541 U. S. 1009 (2004), to resolve the question whether the Tax Court may exclude from the record on appeal Rule 183(b) reports submitted by special trial judges. We now reverse the decisions of the Seventh and Eleventh Circuits upholding the exclusion. II Central to these cases is Tax Court Rule 183, which delineates the procedural framework and substantive standards governing Tax Court review of special trial judge findings. Rule 183(b), captioned “Special Trial Judge’s Report,” provides that after the trial of a case and submission of the parties’ briefs, “the Special Trial Judge shall submit a report, including findings of fact and opinion, to the Chief Judge, and the Chief Judge will assign the case to a Judge... of the Court.” 26 U. S. C. App., p. 1619. Rule 183(c), directed to the Tax Court judge to whom the case is assigned for final decision, reads: “Action on the Report: The Judge to whom... the case is assigned may adopt the Special Trial Judge’s report or may modify it or may reject it in whole or in part, or may direct the filing of additional briefs or may receive further evidence or may direct oral argument, or may recommit the report with instructions. Due regard shall be given to the circumstance that the Special Trial Judge had the opportunity to evaluate the credibility of witnesses, and the findings of fact recommended by the Special Trial Judge shall be presumed to be correct.” The Tax Court judge assigned to take action on the special trial judge’s report in these cases invoked none of the means Rule 183(c) provides to supplement the record. He did not “direct the filing of additional briefs[,] receive further evidence or... direct oral argument.” See ibid. Nor does the record show, or the Commissioner contend, see Brief for Respondent 14-15, that the Tax Court judge “recommitted] the [special trial judge’s] report with instructions.” Rule 183(c). From all that appears on the record, then, Judge Dawson’s review of the factfindings contained in Judge Couvillion’s report rested on the Rule 183(b) report itself, the trial transcript, and the other documents on file. Rule 183(c) guides the appraisal of those filed materials. Rule 183(c)’s origin confirms the clear understanding, from the start, that deference is due to factfindings made by the trial judge. Commenting in 1973 on then newly adopted Rule 182(d), the precursor to Rule 183(c), the Tax Court observed that the Rule was modeled on Rule 147(b) of the former Court of Claims. Tax Ct. Rule 182 note, 60 T. C. 1150 (Tax Court review procedures were to be “comparable” to those used in the Court of Claims). Rule 182(d)’s “[d]ue regard” and “presumed to be correct” formulations were taken directly from that earlier Rule, which the Court of Claims interpreted to require respectful attention to the trial judge’s findings of fact. See Hebah v. United States, 456 F. 2d 696, 698 (Ct. Cl. 1972) (per curiam) (challenger must make “a strong affirmative showing” to overcome the presumption of correctness that attaches to trial judge findings). The Tax Court’s acknowledgment of Court of Claims Rule 147(b) as the model for its own Rule, indeed the Tax Court’s adoption of nearly identical language, lead to the conclusion the Tax Court itself expressed: Under the Rule formerly designated Rule 182(b), now designated 188(c), special trial judge findings carry “special weight insofar as those findings are determined by the opportunity to hear and observe the witnesses.” Tax Ct. Rule 182 note, 60 T. C. 1150 (1973); see Stone v. Commissioner, 865 F. 2d 342, 345 (CADC 1989). Under Rule 182 as it was formulated in 1973, the Tax' Court’s review of the special trial judge’s report was a transparent process. Rule 182(b) provided for service of copies of the special trial judge’s report on the parties and Rule 182(c) allowed parties to file exceptions to the report. 60 T. C., at 1149. The process resembled a district court’s review of a magistrate judge’s report and recommendation: The regular Tax Court judge reviewed the special trial judge’s report independently, on the basis of the record and the parties’ objections to the report. See Rule 182(c), (d), id., at 1149-1150. In years before 1984, the Tax Court acknowledged instances in which it “disagree[d] with the Special Trial Judge,” see Rosenbaum v. Commissioner, 45 TCM 825, 827 (1983), ¶ 83,113 P-H Memo TC, p. 373, or modified the special trial judge’s findings, see Taylor v. Commissioner, 41 TCM 539 (1980), ¶ 80,552 P-H Memo TC, p. 2344 (adopting special trial judge’s report with “some modifications”). Parties were therefore equipped to argue to an appellate court that the Tax Court failed to give the special trial judge’s findings the measure of respect required by Rule 182(d)’s “[d]ue regard” and “presumed to be correct” formulations. In 1983, the Tax Court amended the Rule, which it simultaneously renumbered as Rule 183. The 1983 change eliminated the provision, formerly in Rule 182(b), for service of copies of the special trial judge’s report on the parties; it also eliminated the procedure, formerly in Rule 182(c), permitting the parties to file exceptions to the report. See Rule 183 note, 81 T. C., at 1069-1070. The Tax Court left intact, however, the Rule’s call for “[d]ue regard” to the special trial judge’s credibility determinations and the instruction that “the findings of fact recommended by the Special Trial Judge shall be presumed to be correct.” Rule 183(c), id., at 1069. Further, the 1983 amendments did not purport to change the character of the action the Tax Court judge could take on the special trial judge’s report; as before, the Tax Court could “adopt” the report, “modify it,” or “reject it in whole or in part.” Ibid. In practice, however, the Tax Court stopped acknowledging instances in which it rejected or modified special trial judge findings. Judge Cudahy, in dissent in the Seventh Circuit, commented on the “extraordinary unanimity” that has prevailed since the 1983 amendments: “Never, in any instance since the adoption of the current Rule 183 that I could find,” Judge Cudahy reported, “has a Tax Court judge not agreed with and adopted the [special trial judge’s] opinion.” Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 876; cf. Tr. of Oral Arg. 44 (Counsel for the Commissioner, in response to the Court’s question, stated: “We’re not aware of any eases in which the Tax Court judge has rejected the [special trial judge’s] findings... It appears from these cases and from the Commissioner’s representations to this Court that the Tax Court, following the 1983 amendments to Rule 183, inaugurated a novel practice regarding the report the special trial judge submits post-trial to the Chief Judge. No longer does the Tax Court judge assigned to the case alone review the report and issue a decision adopting it, modifying it, or rejecting it in whole or in part. Instead, the Tax Court judge treats the special trial judge’s report essentially as an in-house draft to be worked over collaboratively by the regular judge and the special trial judge. See id., at 38 (Counsel for the Commissioner acknowledged that the special trial judge and regular Tax Court judge engage in “a collegial deliberative process,” and that such a process, “involving more than one person... in the decision-making,” is “unusual”); see also id., at 29-30 (referring to “the deliberative process” occurring after the special trial judge submits his report to the Chief Judge); Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 876-877 (Cudahy, J, dissenting). Nowhere in the Tax Court’s Rules is this joint enterprise described. When the collaborative process is complete, the Tax Court judge issues a decision in all cases “agreeing] with and adopting] the opinion of the Special Trial Judge.” See supra, at 46. The extent to which that “opinion” modifies or rejects the special trial judge’s Rule 183(b) findings and opinion, and is in significant part prompted or written by the regular Tax Court judge, is undisclosed. Cf. Order of Apr. 26, 2000, App. to Kanter Pet. for Cert. 108a (denying motion for access to original special trial judge report prepared under Rule 183(b), Tax Court Judge Dawson stated: “Special Trial Judge Couvillion submitted his report... pursuant to Rule 183(b), which ultimately became the Memorandum Findings of Fact and Opinion... filed on December 15, 1999. ”). Judge Cudahy appears accurately to have described the process operative in the Tax Court: “[TJhere are two ‘[special trial judge’s] reports’ in many... Tax Court cases — the original ‘report’ filed under Rule 183 with the Chief Judge of the Tax Court, which is solely the work product of the [special trial judge] (and which represented the [special trial judge’s] views at the end of trial) and the later ‘opinion’ of the [special trial judge], which is a collaborative effort, but which the Tax Court then ‘agrees with and adopts’ as the opinion of the Tax Court.” Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 876. Notably, however, the Tax Court Rules refer only once to a special trial judge “opinion”: “[T]he Special Trial Judge shall submit a report, including findings of fact and opinion, to the Chief Judge.” Tax Ct. Rule 183(b), 26 U. S. C. App., p. 1619 (emphasis added). That opinion, included in a report completed and submitted before a regular Tax Court judge is assigned to the case, is the sole opinion properly ascribed to the special trial judge under the current Rules. Correspondingly, it is the Rule 183(b) report, not some subsequently composed collaborative report, that Rule 183(c), tellingly captioned “Action on the Report,” instructs the Tax Court judge to review and adopt, modify, or reject. See Rule 183(c) (the Tax Court judge “may adopt the Special Trial Judge’s report”). In the review process contemplated by Rule 183(c), the Tax Court judge must accord deference to the special trial judge’s findings. Ibid. One would be hard put to explain, however, how a final decision-maker, here the Tax Court judge, would give “[d]ue regard” to, and “presum[e] to be correct,” an opinion the judge himself collaborated in producing. However efficient the Tax Court’s current practice may be, we find no warrant for it in the Rules the Tax Court publishes. The Tax Court, like all other decisionmaking tribunals, is obliged to follow its own Rules. See Service v. Dulles, 354 U. S. 363, 388 (1957) (Secretary of State “could not, so long as the Regulations remained unchanged, proceed without regard to them”); see also Vitarelli v. Seaton, 359 U. S. 535, 540 (1959) (Secretary bound by regulations he promulgated “even though without such regulations” he could have taken the challenged action); id., at 546-547 (Frankfurter, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part) (observing that an agency, all Members of the Court agreed, and “rightly so,” “must be rigorously held to the standards by which it professes its action to be judged”). Although the Tax Court is not without leeway in interpreting its own Rules, it is unreasonable to read into Rule 183 an unprovided-for collaborative process, and to interpret the formulations “[d]ue regard” and “presumed to be correct” to convey something other than what those same words meant prior to the 1983 rule changes. See supra, at 54-56. The Tax Court’s practice of not disclosing the special trial judge’s original report, and of obscuring the Tax Court judge’s mode of reviewing that report, impedes fully informed appellate review of the Tax Court’s decision. In directing the Tax Court judge to give “[d]ue regard” to the special trial judge’s credibility determinations and to “pre-sum [e]... correct” the special trial judge’s factfindings, Rule 183(c) recognizes a well-founded, commonly accepted understanding: The officer who hears witnesses and sifts through evidence in the first instance will have a comprehensive view of the case that cannot be conveyed full strength by a paper record. Fraud cases, in particular, may involve critical credibility assessments, rendering the appraisals of the judge who presided at trial vital to the Tax Court’s ultimate determinations. These cases are illustrative. The Tax Court’s decision repeatedly draws outcome-influencing conclusions regarding the credibility of Ballard, Kanter, and several other witnesses. See, e. g., Investment Research Assoc., 78 TCM, at 1060, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, p. 2675 (“We find Ranter’s testimony to be implausible.”); id., at 1083, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, p. 2703 (“[W]e find Ballard’s testimony vague, evasive, and unreliable.”); id., at 1079, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, p. 2698 (“The testimony of Thomas Lisle, Melinda Ballard, Hart, and Albrecht is not credible.”); id., at 1140, ¶ 99,407 RIA Memo TC, p. 2776 (“[T]he witnesses presented on behalf of [Investment Research Associates] in this case were obviously biased, and their testimony was not credible.”). Absent access to the special trial judge’s Rule 183(b) report in this and similar cases, the appellate court will be at a loss to determine (1) whether the credibility and other findings made in that report were accorded “[d]ue regard” and were “presumed... correct” by the Tax Court judge, or (2) whether they were displaced without adherence to those standards. See Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 886 (Cudahy, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part) (“I can think of no single item of more significance in evaluating a Tax Court’s decision on fraud than the unfiltered findings of the [special trial judge] who stood watch over the trial.”). The Commissioner urges, however, that the special trial judge’s report is an internal draft, a mere “step” in a “confidential decisional process,” and therefore properly withheld from a reviewing court. See Brief for Respondent 16-17 (courts should not “probe the mental processes” of decisional authorities (quoting United States v. Morgan, 313 U. S. 409, 422 (1941))); accord Order of Aug. 30, 2000, App. to Kanter Pet. for Cert. 101a. Our conclusion that Rule 183 does not authorize the Tax Court to treat the special trial judge’s Rule 183(b) report as a draft subject to collaborative revision, see supra, at 59-60, disposes of this argument. The Commissioner may not rely on the Tax Court’s arbitrary construction of its own rules to insulate special trial judge reports from disclosure. Cf. Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 888 (Cudahy, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part) (access on appeal to the special trial judge’s Rule 183(b) report should not be blocked by the Tax Court’s “concealment of [its] revision process behind th[e] verbal formula” through which the Tax Court judge purports to “agre[e] with and adop[t]” the opinion of the special trial judge (internal quotation marks omitted)). We are all the more resistant to the Tax Court’s concealment of the only special trial judge report its Rules authorize given the generally prevailing practice regarding a tribunal’s use of hearing officers. The initial findings or recommendations of magistrate judges, special masters, and bankruptcy judges are available to the appellate court authorized to review the operative decision of the district court. See 28 U. S. C. § 636(b)(1)(C) (magistrate judge’s proposed findings must be filed with the court and mailed to the parties); Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 53(f) (special masters); Fed. Rule Bkrtcy. Proc. 9033(a), (d) (bankruptcy judges); Fed. Rule App. Proc. 10(a) (record on appeal includes the original papers filed in the district court). And the Administrative Procedure Act provides: “All decisions, including initial, recommended, and tentative decisions, are a part of the record” on appeal. 5 U. S. C. § 557(c); see also § 706 (the reviewing court shall evaluate the “whole record”). In comparison to the nearly universal practice of transparency in forums in which one official conducts the trial (and thus sees and hears the witnesses), and another official subsequently renders the final decision, the Tax Court’s practice is anomalous. As one observer asked: “[I]f there are policy reasons that dictate transparency for everyone else, why do these reasons not apply to the Tax Court?” Kanter, 337 F. 3d, at 874 (Cudahy, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part); cf. Mazza v. Cavicchia, 15 N. J. 498, 519, 105 A. 2d 545, 557 (1954) (“We have not been able to find a single case in any state... justifying or attempting to justify the use of secret reports by a hearer to the head of an administrative agency.”). The Commissioner asserts, however, that the Tax Court’s practice of replacing the special trial judge’s initial report with a “collaborative” report and refusing to disclose the initial report is neither “unique” nor “aberrational.” Brief for Respondent 31. As a “direct statutory analog,” ibid., the Commissioner points to 26 U. S. C. § 7460(b), the provision governing cases reviewed by the full Tax Court. Section 7460(b) instructs that when the full Tax Court reviews the decision of a single Tax Court judge, the initial one-judge decision “shall not be a part of the record.” For several reasons, we reject the Commissioner’s endeavor to equate proceedings that differ markedly. First, as the Commissioner himself observes, omission of the single Tax Court judge’s opinion from the record when full court review occurs has been the statutory rule “[f]rom the earliest days of the Tax Court’s predecessor.” Brief for Respondent 31 (citing Revenue Act of 1928, ch. 852, § 601, 45 Stat. 871). To this day, Congress has ordered no corresponding omission of special trial judge initial reports. Understandably so. Full Tax Court review is designed for the resolution of legal issues, not for review of findings of fact made by the judge who presided at trial. See L. Leder-man & S. Mazza, Tax Controversies: Practice and Procedure 247 (2000). When the full Tax Court reviews, it is making a de novo determination of the legal issue presented. In contrast, findings of fact are key to special trial judge reports. See Tax Ct. Rule 183(c), 26 U. S. C. App., p. 1619. And those findings, under Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Me. Justice Clark delivered the opinion of the Court. The Congress has'provided in the Tariff Act of 1930, 46 Stat. 590, as amended, that imported articles be marked to indicate to an ultimate purchaser in the United States the English name of the country of origin. 19 U. S. C. § 1304. Pursuant to the Act, the. Secretary of. the Treasury adopted implementing regulations. This case tests the application of these provisions to the importation of 10 violins from the Soviet Zone of Germany. Appellees were charged with removing the labels from the violins with intent to conceal from, the ultimate purchasers in the United States the identity of the violins’ country of origin. The District Court dismissed the information, holding that the changing of the labels did not violate the Act because the applicable regulation appeared to require the Soviet Zone' marking only for tariff purposes rather than to apprise the ultimate purchasers of the place of origin. In any event, the court found, the intent of the regulation was not “manifested in a manner sufficiently clear and unambiguous to justify a criminal prosecution.” On appeal by the Government, the Court of Appeals held that the District Court’s opinion, interpreting the regulation, was tantamount to a construction of the statute upon which the information was founded; and hence, under the Criminal Appeals Act, 18 U. S. C. § 373Í, the order of dismissal was appealable directly to this Court rather than to the Court of Appeals. It was also of the opinion that the effect of the dismissal was to sustain a motion in bar, which, under § 3731, likewise required appeal to this Court. Accordingly, it certified the appeal, 261 F. 2d 40, and we postponed the question of jurisdiction to a hearing on the merits, 359 U. S. 951. We have concluded to accept the certification of the Court of Appeals and, on the merits, to affirm’ the- District Court judgment dismissing the information. Appellees, dealers in musical instruments in the United States, had purchased the violins' from importers and thereafter sold them to other dealers. Upon obtaining possession of the violins from the importers, appellees replaced labels marked “Germany/USSR Occupied,” then on each of the violins, with others inscribed “Made in Germany.” After resale of the violins,' an information was filed against appellees, charging that they removed the original labels attached to the violins with intent to conceal from the ultimate purchasers the identity of the country of origin. The Government’s theory was that the removal of the labels violated 19 U, S. C. § 1304 and its implementing regulations. I. Our first consideration is the jurisdictional issue. The Criminal Appeals Act specifies several conditions, any one of which permits a direct appeal by the Government to this Court, and makes our jurisdiction in such cases exclusive. ' In the event that-an appeal which should have been taken here is erroneously effected to a Court of Appeals, that court is directed to certify it here. Prior to 1907, the date of the original Act, the United States had no appeal whatever in criminal cases. As passed by the House, the bill gave the Government “the same right of review by writ of error-'that is given to the defendant.” However, in the Senate, the bill was amended so as to allow review from judgments setting aside indictments, “where the ground for such motion or demurrer is the invalidity or construction of the statute upon which the indictment is founded.” 41 Cong. Rec. 2819. The final language emerged from the Conference Committee of the two Houses. See H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 8113, 59th Cong., 2d Sess. As was stated by Senator Knox, one of. the proponents of the measure, a member of the Judiciary Committee and a former Attorney General .of the United' States, the bill “only proposed to give it [the Government] an appeal upon questions of law raised by the defendant to defeat the trial . . . .” 41 Cong. Rec. 2752. The bill was intended to create “the opportunity to settle important questions of law,” its “great purpose” being, “to secure the ultimate decision of the court of final resort on questions of law.” The situation sought to be remedied was outlined by Senator Patterson, also of the Judiciary Committee and a proponent óf the bill, in these words: “We have a district court in one jurisdiction holding that a law is ineffective for one reason or another— it may be that it is unconstitutional, or for some other reason — and we have a district court in another jurisdiction holding the reverse; and as the cases multiply in the several sections of the country we may find one half of the courts of the country arrayed against the other half of the courts of the country upon the same identical law; one half holding that it is entirely constitutional and the other half holding that it is unconstitutional.' So, Mr. President;- that confusion, that ridiculous condition, exists and must continue to exist, because, as the law now stands, . until a case involving the question shall go to the Supreme Court and it is brought there by the defendant, there can be no adjudication' by a court whose decision and judgment is controlling. . . . The bill is intended to cure a defect in the administration of justice . It therefore appears abundantly clear that the remedial purpose of the Act was to avert “the danger of frequent conflicts, real or apparent, in the decisions of the various district or circuit courts, and the unfortunate results thereof”; and to eliminate “the impossibility of the government’s obtaining final and uniform rulings by recourse to a higher court.” 20 Harv. L. Rev. 219. Moreover, the desirability of expedition in the determination of the validity of Acts of Congress, which is pointed to as a desideratum for direct appeal, applies equally to regulations. In practical operation, correction of a regulation by agency revision invariably awaits judicial action. The.information charged violations of 19 U. S. C. § 1304 “and the.regulations promulgated thereunder.” This section requires imported articles kr be marked “to indicate to an ultimate purchaser . . . the country of origin,” and imposes criminal sanctions on anyone who removes such a mark with intent to conceal the information contained therein.- The Secretary of the Treasury is authorized to implement it by appropriate regulations. The term “country,” as used by the Congress in requiring the markings, was defined by regulation to mean “the political entity known as a nation.” 19 CFR § 11.8. By Treasury Decision 51527, August 28,1946, Germany was to be considered the country of origin of articles manüfáctured or produced in all parts of Germany. Following a change in duty rates applicable to Soviet Zone products, T. D. 53210 was issued in 1953, providing that articles from Eastern Germany should be “marked to indicate Germany (Soviet occupied).” The issue posed to the District Court wás whether this last regulation carried with it the sanctions of § 1304. As we see it, a construction of the. regulation necessarily is an interpretation of the statute. An administrative regulation, of course, is not a “statute.” While in practical effect regulations may be called “little. laws,” they are at most but offspring of statutes. Congress alone may pass a statute,, and the Criminal Appeals Act calls, for direct appeals if the District Court’s dismissal is based upon the invalidity or construction of a statute. See United States v. Jones, 345 U. S. 377 (1953). This, Court has always construed the Criminal Appeals Act narrowly, limiting it strictly “to the instances specified.” United States v. Borden Co., 308 U. S. 188, 192 (1939). See also United States v. Swift & Co., 318 U. S. 442 (1943). Here the statute is not complete by itself, since it merely declares the range- of its operation and leaves to its progeny the means to be utilized in the effectuation of its command. But. it is the statute which creates the offense of the willful removal of the labels of origin and provides the punishment for violations. The regulations, on the other hand, prescribe the identifying language of the label itself, and assign the resulting tags to their respective geographical areas. Once promulgated, these regulations, called for by the statute itself, have the force of law, and violations thereof incur criminal prosecutions, just as if all the details had been incorporated into the congressional language. • The result is that neither the statute nor the regulations are complete without the other, and only together do they have, any force. In effect, therefore, the construction of one necessarily involves the construction of the other. The charges in the information are founded on § 1304 and its accompanying regulations, and the information was dismissed solely because its allegations did not state an offense under § 1304, as amplified by the regulations. When the statute and regulations are so inextricably intertwined, the dismissal must be held to involve the construction of the statute. This, we believe, gives recognition to the congressional purpose to give the Government the right of appeal upon “questions of law raised by the defendant to defeat the trial” and thus promptly to “secure the ultimate decision” of this Court, affording a desired “uniform enforcement of the law throughout the entire limits of the United States”’ In view of this conclusion, we. need not pass upon the claim that the District Court sustained in effect a “motion in bar.” Our disposition requires that the case come directly here, and accordingly we accept the certificate of the Court of Appeals and now turn to the merits. , II. , In 1946, the Treasury implemented the country-of-origin provisions of § 1304 by issuance of T. D. 51527, which provided that, “For the purposes of the marking provisions of the Tariff Act of 1930, . . . Germany shall bfe considered the country of origin of articles mamifac-tured ... in all parts of the German area subject to the authority of the Allied Control Commission and the United States, British, Soviet, and French zone Commanders . . . Thus the marking on articles produced in the Soviet Zone were required to be labeled “Made in Germany.” In 1951 the Congress directed the President to suspend or withdraw any reduction in the rates of custom duties or other concessions then applicable to the importation of articles manufactured in any areas dominated by the Soviet Union. 65 Stat. 73; 19 U. S. C. § 1362. In Proclamation No. 2935, 65 Stat. C25, the President suspended any reduction in rates of duty applicable to any articles manufactured in the Soviet Zone of Germany and the Soviet Sector of Berlin. Treasury Decision 52788, issued the same day, changed the rate of duty as provided in this proclamation. ' In 1953 the Secretary issued T. D. 53210, the regulation in controversy. This Treasury Decision is headed: “Tariff status, marking to indicate the name of the country of origin, and customs valuation of products of Germany, Poland, and Danzig.” The first paragraph of T. D. 53210 refers to the-presidential proclamation changing the structure of the rates of duty. The second paragraph specifies that, “For the purposes of the value provisions of section 402, Tariff Act of 1930,” Western Germany shall be treated as ono country, and “the Soviet Zone . . . shall be treated as another ‘country.’ ” The third paragraph is the one crucial to this prosecution: it provides that products of Western Germany shall be “marked to indicate Germany as the ‘country of origin,’ but products of th§ Soviet Zone . . . shall be marked to indicate Germany ('Soviet occupied) as the ‘country of origin.’ ” The District Court-concluded that T. D. 53210 was “issued primarily to establish mark; ings for purposes of the differences in the duties appl¿ cable”; thus the indication of Soviet Zone origin would not be required beyond entry into this country, the stage at which duty is payable. We agree with the District -Court, It appears that T. D. 53210, unlike T. D. 51527, is aimed at the collection of duties rather than the protection of the ultimate purchaser in the United States. Its caption indicates that it deals with “tariff status” and “customs valuation,” and the marking requirements are but aids thereof. Taking up the body of the document, we note that the first paragraph deals entirely with the fact that Soviet-dominated areas “shall not receive reduced rates of duty,” while Western Germany and the Western Sectors of Berlin shall “continue to receive most-favored-nation treatment.” The second paragraph is introduced by the phrase, “For the purposes of the value provisions” of the Tariff Act, and provides that “the Soviet Zone . . . shall be treated as another ‘country.’ ” This language, as well as the make-up of the regulation, suggests that the third paragraph (the one involved here), requiring distinctive marking for Soviet Zone products, is but another step, in the implementation of .the tariff changes. It contains no reference to the requirement of § 1304 that the article be marked in a “conspicuous place,” “legibly, indelibly, and permanently,” so that an “ultimate purchaser in the United States”' would’ be on notice. We note that •appellees placed on the violins the labels “Made in Germany” as required by T. D. 51527. In the context of criminal prosecution, we must apply the rule of strict construction when interpreting this regulation and statute. United States v. Halseth, 342 U. S. 277, 280 (1952); United States v. Wiltberger, 5 Wheat. 76, 95-96 (1820). A reading of the regulation leaves the distinct impression that it was intended to protect and expedite the collection of customs duties. Certainly its emphasis on duties and its silence on the protection of the public from deceit support the conclusion that the old provisions were to continue insofar as markings after importation are concerned. If the intent were otherwise, it should not have been left to implication. There must be more to support criminal sanctions: businessmen must not .be left to guess the meaning of regulations. The appellees insist that they changed the labels in good faith, believing their actions to be permissible under the law. There is nothing in the record to the contrary. A United States district .judge concurred in their reading of the regulation. In the framework of criminal prosecution, unclarity alone is enough to resolve the doubts in favor of defendants. Accordingly, the judgment of the District Court is Affirmed. “19 U. S. C. § 1304. Marking of imported articles and containers. “(a) Marking of articles. , "... [E] very article of foreign origin . . . imported into the United States shall be marked in a conspicuous place as legibly,, indelibly, and permanently as the nature of the article (or container) will permit in such manner as to indicate to an ultimate purchaser in’¡the United States the English name of the country of origin of the article. The Secretary of. the Treasury may by regulations— “(1) Determine the character of words and phrases or abbreviations thereof which shall be acceptable as indicating the country of origin . . . ; “ (2) Require the addition of any other words or symbols which may be appropriate to prevent’ deception or mistake as to the origin of the article ....■■ “(e) Penalties. “If any person shall, with intent to conceal the information given thereby or contained therein, deface, destroy,' remove, alter, cover, obscure, or obliterate any mark required under the provisions of this chapter, he shall, upon conviction, be fined not more than $5,000 or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.” 18 U. S. C. § 3731xprovides, in part: “An appeal may be taken by and on behalf of the United States from the district courts direct to the Supreme Court of the United States in all' criminal cases in the following instances:- “From a decision or judgment setting aside, or dismissing any indictment or information, or any count thereof, where such decision or judgment is based upon the invalidity or construction of the statute upon which the indictment or information is founded. “From the decision or judgment sustaining a motion in bar, when the defendant has not been put in jeopardy. “If an appeal shall be taken pursuant to this section to any court of appeals which, in the opinion of such court, should have been taken directly to the Supreme Court’ of the United States, such court shall certify the case to the Supreme Court of the United States, which shall thereupon have jurisdiction to hear and determine the case to, the same extent as if an appeal had been taken directly to that Court.” In addition to the substantive charges, there was a count alleging conspiracy so to alter the labels. Senator Bacon, a member of the Judiciary Committee. 41 Cong. Rec. 2195-2196. 41 Cong. Rec. 2753. See also comments of Senator Clarke, who, after discussing the matter with Senator Nelson, the manager of the bill on the floor, stated: “[W]henever the validity of a statute has been adversely decided by a trial court . . . the Government ought to have the right to promptly submit that to the tribunal having authority, to. dispose of such questions in order that there may be a uniform enforcement of the-.law throughout the entire-limits of the United States.” 41 Cong. Rec. 2820. Several months later, T. D. 53281 was issued, providing alternative wordings for the Soviet Zone labels. Vom Baur, Federal Administrative Law, § 490, at 489. Since we hold that T. D. 53210 deals only with the collection of duties, its marking provisions supersede those of T. D.-51527'only as thé latter relate thereto. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mb. Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. This litigation was initiated by respondents Wilderness Society, Environmental Defense Fund, Inc., and Friends of the Earth in an attempt to prevent the issuance of permits by the Secretary of the Interior which were required for the construction of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline. The Court of Appeals awarded attorneys’ fees to respondents against petitioner Alyeska Pipeline Service Co. based upon the court’s equitable powers and the theory that respondents were entitled to fees because they were performing the services of a “private attorney general.” Certiorari was granted, 419 U. S. 823 (1974), to determine whether this award of attorneys’ fees was appropriate. We reverse. I A major oil field was discovered in the North Slope of Alaska in 1968. In June 1969, the oil companies constituting the consortium owning Alyeska submitted an application to the Department of the Interior for rights-of-way for a pipeline that would transport oil from the North Slope across land in Alaska owned by the United States, a major part of the transport system which would carry the oil to its ultimate markets in the lower 48 States. A special interdepartmental task force studied the proposal and reported to the President. Federal Task Force on Alaskan Oil Development: A Preliminary Report to the President (1969), in App. 78-89. An amended application was submitted in December 1969, which requested a 54-foot right-of-way, along with applications for “special land use permits” asking for additional space alongside the right-of-way and for the construction of a road along one segment of the pipeline. Respondents brought this suit in March 1970, and sought declaratory and injunctive relief against the Secretary of the Interior on the grounds that he intended to issue the right-of-way and special land-use permits in violation of § 28 of the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920, 41 Stat. 449, as amended, 30 U. S. C. § 185, and without compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA), 83 Stat. 852, 42 U. S. C. § 4321 et seq. On the basis of both the Mineral Leasing Act and the NEPA, the District Court granted a preliminary injunction against issuance of the right-of-way and permits. 325 F. Supp. 422 (DC 1970). Subsequently the State of Alaska and petitioner Alyeska were allowed to intervene. On March 20, 1972, the Interior Department released a six-volume Environmental Impact Statement and a three-volume Economic and Security Analysis. After a period of time set aside for public comment, the Secretary announced that the requested permits would be granted to Alyeska. App. 105-138. Both the Mineral Leasing Act and the NEPA issues were at that point fully briefed and argued before the District Court. That court then decided to dissolve the preliminary injunction, to deny the permanent injunction, and to dismiss the complaint. Upon appeal, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed, basing its decision solely on the Mineral Leasing Act. 156 U. S. App. D. C. 121, 479 F. 2d 842 (1973) (en banc). Finding that the NEPA issues were very complex and important, that deciding them was not necessary at that time since pipeline construction would be enjoined as a result of the violation of the Mineral Leasing Act, that they involved issues of fact still in dispute, and that it was desirable to expedite its decision as much as possible, the Court of Appeals declined to decide the merits of respondents’ NEPA contentions which had been rejected by the District Court. Certiorari was denied here. 411 U. S. 917 (1973). Congress then enacted legislation which amended the Mineral Leasing Act to allow the granting of the permits sought by Alyeska and declared that no further action under the NEPA was necessary before construction of the pipeline could proceed. With the merits of the litigation effectively terminated by this legislation, the Court of Appeals turned to the questions involved in respondents’ request for an award of attorneys’ fees. 161 U. S. App. D. C. 446, 495 F. 2d 1026 (1974) (en banc). Since there was no applicable statutory authorization for such an award, the court proceeded to consider whether the requested fee award fell within any of the exceptions to the general “American rule” that the prevailing party may not recover attorneys’ fees as costs or otherwise. The exception for an award against a party who had acted in bad faith was inapposite, since the position taken by the federal and state parties and Alyeska “was manifestly reasonable and assumed in good faith....” Id., at 449, 495 F. 2d, at 1029. Application of the “common benefit” exception which spreads the cost of litigation to those persons benefiting from it would “stretch it totally outside its basic rationale....” Ibid. The Court of Appeals nevertheless held that respondents had acted to vindicate “important statutory rights of all citizens...,” id., at 452, 495 F. 2d, at 1032; had ensured that the governmental system functioned properly; and were entitled to attorneys’ fees lest the great cost of litigation of this kind, particularly against well-financed defendants such as Alyeska, deter private parties desiring to see the laws protecting the environment properly enforced. Title 28 U. S. C. § 2412 was thought to bar taxing any attorneys’ fees against the United States, and it was also deemed inappropriate to burden the State of Alaska with any part of the award. But Alyeska, the Court of Appeals held, could fairly be required to pay one-half of the full award to which respondents were entitled for having performed the functions of a private attorney general. Observing that “[t]he fee should represent the reasonable value of the services rendered, taking into account all the surrounding circumstances, including, but not limited to, the time and labor required on the case, the benefit to the public, the skill demanded by the novelty or complexity of the issues, and the incentive factor,” 161 U. S. App. D. C., at 456, 495 F. 2d, at 1036, the Court of Appeals remanded the case to the District Court for assessment of the dollar amount of the award. II In the United States, the prevailing litigant is ordinarily not entitled to collect a reasonable attorneys’ fee from the loser. We are asked to fashion a far-reaching exception to this “American Rule”; but having considered its origin and development, we are convinced that it would be inappropriate for the Judiciary, without legislative guidance, to reallocate the burdens of litigation in the manner and to the extent urged by respondents and approved by the Court of Appeals. At common law, costs were not allowed; but for centuries in England there has been statutory authorization to award costs, including attorneys’ fees. Although the matter is in the discretion of the court, counsel fees are regularly allowed to the prevailing party. During the first years of the federal-court system, Congress provided through legislation that the federal courts were to follow the practice with respect to awarding attorneys’ fees of the courts of the States in which the federal courts were located, with the exception of district courts under admiralty and maritime jurisdiction which were to follow a specific fee schedule. Those statutes, by 1800, had either expired or been repealed. In 1796, this Court appears to have ruled that the Judiciary itself would not create a general rule, independent of any statute, allowing awards of attorneys’ fees in federal courts. In Arcambel v. Wiseman, 3 Dali. 306, the inclusion of attorneys’ fees as damages was overturned on the ground that “[t]he general practice of the United States is in oposition [sic] to it; and even if that practice were not strictly correct in principle, it is entitled to the respect of the court, till it is changed, or modified, by statute.” This Court has consistently adhered to that early holding. See Day v. Woodworth, 13 How. 363 (1852); Oelrichs v. Spain, 15 Wall. 211 (1872); Flanders v. Tweed, 15 Wall. 450 (1873); Stewart v. Sonneborn, 98 U. S. 187 (1879); Fleischmann Distilling Corp. v. Maier Brewing Co., 386 U. S. 714, 717-718 (1967); F. D. Rich Co., Inc. v. United States ex rel. Industrial Lumber Co., Inc., 417 U. S. 116, 126-131 (1974). The practice after 1799 and until 1853 continued as before, that is, with the federal courts referring to the state rules governing awards of counsel fees, although the express legislative authorization for that practice had expired. By legislation in 1842, Congress did give this Court authority to prescribe the items and amounts of costs which could be taxed in federal courts, but the Court took no action under this statutory mandate. See S. Law, The Jurisdiction and Powers of the United States Courts 271 n. 1 (1852). In 1853, Congress undertook to standardize the costs allowable in federal litigation. In support of the proposed legislation, it was asserted that there was great diversity in practice among the courts and that losing litigants were being unfairly saddled with exorbitant fees for the victor’s attorney. The result was a far-reaching Act specifying in detail the nature and amount of the taxable items of cost in the federal courts. One of its purposes was to limit allowances for attorneys’ fees that were to be charged to the losing parties. Although the Act disclaimed any intention to limit the amount of fees that an attorney and his client might agree upon between themselves, counsel fees collectible from the losing party were expressly limited to the amounts stated in the Act: “That in lieu of the compensation now allowed by law to attorneys, solicitors, and proctors in the United States courts, to United States district attorneys, clerks of the district and circuit courts, marshals, witnesses, jurors, commissioners, and printers, in the several States, the following and no other compensation shall be taxed and allowed. But this act shall not be construed to prohibit attorneys, solicitors, and proctors from charging to and receiving from their clients, other than the Government, such reasonable compensation for their services, in addition to the taxable costs, as may be in accordance with general usage in their respective States, or may be agreed upon between the parties.” Act of Feb. 26,1853, lOStat. 161. The Act then proceeds to list specific sums for the services of attorneys, solicitors, and proctors. The intention of the Act to control the attorneys’ fees recoverable by the prevailing party from the loser was repeatedly enforced by this Court. In The Baltimore, 8 Wall. 377 (1869), a $500 allowance for counsel was set aside, the Court reviewing the history of costs in the United States courts and concluding: “Fees and costs, allowed to the officers therein named, are now regulated by the act of the 26th of February, 1853, which provides, in its 1st section, that in lieu of the compensation now allowed by law to attorneys, solicitors, proctors, district attorneys, clerks, marshals, witnesses, jurors, commissioners, and printers, the following and no other compensation shall be allowed. “Attorneys, solicitors, and proctors may charge their clients reasonably for their services, in addition to the taxable costs, but nothing can be taxed as cost against the opposite party, as an incident to the judgment, for their services, except the costs and fees therein described and enumerated. They may tax a docket fee of twenty dollars on a final hearing in admiralty, if the libellant recovers fifty dollars, but if he recovers less than fifty dollars, the docket fee of the proctor shall be but ten dollars.” Id., at 392 (footnotes omitted). In Flanders v. Tweed, 15 Wall. 450 (1872); a counsel’s fee of $6,000 was included by the jury in the damages award. The Court held the Act forbade such allowances: “Fees and costs allowed to officers therein named are now regulated by the act of Congress passed for that purpose, which provides in its first section, that, in lieu of the compensation previously allowed by law to attorneys, solicitors, proctors, district attorneys, clerks, marshals, witnesses, jurors, commissioners, and printers, the following and no other compen-° sation shall be allowed. Attorneys, solicitors, and proctors may charge their clients reasonably for their services, in addition to the taxable costs, but nothing can be taxed or recovered as cost against the opposite party, as an incident to the judgment, for their services, except the costs and fees therein described and enumerated. They may tax a docket fee of twenty dollars in a trial before a jury, but they are restricted to a charge of ten dollars in cases at law, where judgment is rendered without a jury.” Id., at 452-453 (footnote omitted). See also In re Paschal, 10 Wall. 483, 493-494 (1871). Although, as will be seen, Congress has made specific provision for attorneys’ fees under certain federal statutes, it has not changed the general statutory rule that allowances for counsel fees are limited to the sums specified by the costs statute. The 1853 Act was carried forward in the Revised Statutes of 1874 and by the Judicial Code of 1911. Its substance, without any apparent intent to change the controlling rules, was also included in the Revised Code of 1948 as 28 U. S. C. §§ 1920 and 1923 (a). Under § 1920, a court may tax as costs the various items specified, including the “docket fees” under § 1923 (a). That section provides that “[attorney's and proctor’s docket fees in courts of the United States may be taxed as costs as follows....” Against this background, this Court understandably declared in 1967 that with the exception of the small amounts allowed by § 1923, the rule “has long been that attorney’s fees are not ordinarily recoverable... Fleischmann Distilling Corp., 386 U. S., at 717. Other recent cases have also reaffirmed the general rule that, absent statute or enforceable contract, litigants pay their own attorneys’ fees. See F. D. Rich Co., 417 U. S., at 128-131; Hall v. Cole, 412 U. S. 1, 4(1973). To be sure, the fee statutes have been construed to allow, in limited circumstances, a reasonable attorneys’ fee to the prevailing party in excess of the small sums permitted by § 1923. In Trustees v. Greenough, 105 U. S. 527 (1882), the 1853 Act was read as not interfering with the historic power of equity to permit the trustee of a fund or property, or a party preserving or recovering a fund for the benefit of others in addition to himself, to recover his costs, including his attorneys’ fees,, from the fund or property itself or directly from the other parties enjoying the benefit. That rule has been consistently followed. Central Railroad & Banking Co. v. Pettus, 113 U. S. 116 (1885); Harrison v. Perea, 168 U. S. 311, 325-326 (1897); United States v. Equitable Trust Co., 283 U. S. 738 (1931); Sprague v. Ticonic National Bank, 307 U. S. 161 (1939); Mills v. Electric Auto-Lite Co., 396 U. S. 375 (1970); Hall v. Cole, supra; cf. Hobbs v. McLean, 117 U. S. 567, 581-582 (1886). See generally Dawson, Lawyers and Involuntary Clients: Attorney Fees From Funds, 87 Harv. L. Rev. 1597 (1974). Also, a court may assess attorneys’ fees for the “willful disobedience of a court order... as part of the fine to be levied on the defendant^] Toledo Scale Co. v. Computing Scale Co., 261 U. S. 399, 426-428 (1923),” Fleischmann Distilling Corp. v. Maier Brewing Co., supra, at 718; or when the losing party has “acted in bad faith, vexatiously, wantonly, or for oppressive reasons...” F. D. Rich Co., 417 U. S., at 129 (citing Vaughan v. Atkinson, 369 U. S. 527 (1962)); cf. Universal Oil Products Co. v. Root Refining Co., 328 U. S. 575, 580 (1946). These exceptions are unquestionably assertions of inherent power in the courts to allow attorneys’ fees in particular situations, unless forbidden by Congress, but none of the exceptions is involved here. The Court of Appeals expressly disclaimed reliance on any of them. See supra, at 245. Congress has not repudiated the judicially fashioned exceptions to the general rule against allowing substantial attorneys’ fees; but neither has it retracted, repealed, or modified the limitations on taxable fees contained in the 1853 statute and its successors. Nor has it extended any roving authority to the Judiciary to allow counsel fees as costs or otherwise whenever the courts might deem them warranted. What Congress has done, however, while fully recognizing and accepting the general rule, is to make specific and explicit provisions for the allowance of attorneys’ fees under selected statutes granting or protecting various federal rights. These statutory allowances are now available in a variety of circumstances, but they also differ considerably among themselves. Under the antitrust laws, for instance, allowance of attorneys’ fees to a plaintiff awarded treble damages is mandatory. In patent, litigation, in contrast, “[t]he court in exceptional cases may award reasonable attorney fees to the prevailing party.” 35 U. S. C. §285 (emphasis added). Under Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U. S. C. § 2000a-3 (b), the prevailing party is entitled to attorneys’ fees, at the discretion of the court, but we have held that Congress intended that the awrard should be made to the successful plaintiff absent exceptional circumstances. Newman v. Piggie Park Enterprises, Inc., 390 U. S. 400, 402 (1968). See also Northcross v. Board of Education of the Memphis City Schools, 412 U. S. 427 (1973). Under this scheme of things, it is apparent that the circumstances under which attorneys’ fees are to be awarded and the range of discretion of the courts in making those awards are matters for Congress to determine. It is true that under some, if not most, of the statutes providing for the allowance of reasonable fees, Congress has opted to rely heavily on private enforcement to implement public policy and to allow counsel fees so as to encourage private litigation. Fee shifting in connection with treble-damages awards under the antitrust laws is a prime example; cf. Hawaii v. Standard Oil Co., 405 U. S. 251, 265-266 (1972); and we have noted that Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was intended “not simply to penalize litigants who deliberately advance arguments they know to be untenable but, more broadly, to encourage individuals injured by racial discrimination to seek judicial relief under Title II.” Newman, supra, at 402 (footnote omitted). But congressional utilization of the private-attorney-general concept can in no sense be construed as a grant of authority to the Judiciary to jettison the traditional rule against nonstatutory allowances to the prevailing party and to award attorneys’ fees whenever the courts deem the public policy furthered by a particular statute important enough to warrant the award. Congress itself presumably has the power and judgment to pick and choose among its statutes and to allow attorneys’ fees under some, but not others. But it would be difficult, indeed, for the courts, without legislative guidance, to consider some statutes important and others unimportant and to allow attorneys’ fees only in connection with the former. If the statutory limitation of right-of-way widths involved in this case is a matter of the gravest importance, it would appear that a wide range of statutes would arguably satisfy the criterion of public importance and justify an award of attorneys’ fees to the private litigant. And, if any statutory policy is deemed so important that its enforcement must be encouraged by awards of attorneys' fees, how could a court deny attorneys’ fees to private litigants in actions under 42 U. S. C. § 1983 seeking to vindicate constitutional rights? Moreover, should courts, if they were to embark on the course urged by respondents, opt for awards to the prevailing party, whether plaintiff or defendant, or only to the prevailing plaintiff? Should awards be discretionary or mandatory? Would there be a presumption operating for or against them in the ordinary case? See Newman, supra. As exemplified by this case itself, it is also evident that the rational application of the private-attorney-general rule would immediately collide with the express provision of 28 U. S. C. § 2412. Except as otherwise provided by statute, that section permits costs to be taxed against the United States, “but not including the fees and expenses of attorneys,” in any civil action brought by or against the United States or any agency or official of the United States acting in an official capacity. If, as respondents argue, one of the main functions of a private attorney general is to call public officials to account and to insist that they enforce the law, it would follow in such cases that attorneys’ fees should be awarded against the Government or the officials themselves. Indeed, that very claim was asserted in this case. But § 2412 on its face, and in light of its legislative history, generally bars such awards, which, if allowable at all, must be expressly provided for by statute, as, for example, under Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U. S. C. § 2000&-3 (b). We need labor the matter no further. It appears to us that the rule suggested here and adopted by the Court of Appeals would make major inroads on a policy matter that Congress has reserved for itself. Since the approach taken by Congress to this issue has been to carve out specific exceptions to a general rule that federal courts cannot award attorneys’ fees beyond the limits of 28 U. S. C. § 1923, those courts are not free to fashion drastic new rules with respect to the allowance of attorneys’ fees to the prevailing party in federal litigation or to pick and choose among plaintiffs and the statutes under which they sue and to award fees in some cases but not in others, depending upon the courts’ assessment of the importance of the public policies involved in particular cases. Nor should the federal courts purport to adopt on their own initiative a rule awarding attorneys’ fees based on the private-attorney-general approach when such judicial rule will operate only against private parties and not against the Government. We do not purport to assess the merits or demerits of the “American Rule” with respect to the allowance of attorneys’ fees. It has been criticized in recent years, and courts have been urged to find exceptions to it. It is also apparent from our national experience that the encouragement of private action to implement public policy has been viewed as desirable in a variety of circumstances. But the rule followed in our courts with respect to attorneys’ fees has survived. It is deeply rooted in our history and in congressional policy; and it is not for us to invade the legislature’s province by redistributing litigation costs in the manner suggested by respondents and followed by the Court of Appeals. The decision below must therefore be reversed. So ordered. Mr. Justice Douglas and Mr. Justice Powell took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. For a discussion and chronology of the events surrounding this litigation, see Dominick & Brody, The Alaska Pipeline: Wilderness Society v. Morton and the Trans-Alaska Pipeline Authorization Act, 23 Am. U. L. Rev. 337 (1973). In 1968, Atlantic Richfield Co., Humble Oil & Refining Co., and British Petroleum Corp. formed the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System, and it was this entity which submitted the applications for the permits. Federal Task Force on Alaskan Oil Development: A Preliminary Report to the President (1969), in App. 80; Dominick & Brody, supra, n. 1, at 337-338, n. 3. In 1970, the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System was replaced by petitioner Alyeska. Alyeska’s stock is owned by ARCO Pipeline Co., Sohio Pipeline Co., Humble Pipeline Co., Mobil Pipeline Co., Phillips Petroleum Co., Amerada Hess Corp., and Union Oil Co. of California. See id., at 338 n. 3; App. 105. The application requested a primary right-of-way of 54 feet, an additional parallel, adjacent right-of-way for construction purposes of 46 feet, and another right-of-way of 100 feet for a construction road between Prudhoe Bay on the North Slope to the town of Livengood, a distance slightly less than half the length of the proposed pipeline. See Wilderness Society v. Morton, 156 U. S. App. D. C. 121, 128, 479 F. 2d 842, 849 (1973). The amended application asked for a single 54-foot right-of-way, a special land-use permit for an additional 11 feet on one side and 35 feet on the other side of the right-of-way, and another special land-use permit for a space 200 feet in width between Prudhoe Bay and Livengood. Id., at 128-129, 479 F. 2d, at 849-850; App. 89-98. Title 30 U. S. C. § 185 provided in pertinent part: “Rights-of-way through the public lands, including the forest reserves of the United States, may be granted by the Secretary of the Interior for pipe-line purposes for the transportation of oil or natural gas to any applicant possessing the [prescribed] qualifications... to the extent of the ground occupied by the said pipe line and twenty-five feet on each side of the same under such regulations and conditions as to survey, location, application, and use as may be prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior and upon the express condition that such pipe lines shall be constructed, operated, and maintained as common carriers and shall accept, convey, transport, or purchase without discrimination, oil or natural gas produced from Government lands in the vicinity of the' pipe line in such proportionate amounts as the Secretary of the Interior may, after a full hearing with due notice thereof to the interested parties and a proper finding of facts, determine to be reasonable:... Provided further, That no right-of-way shall hereafter be granted over said lands for the transportation of oil or natural gas except under and subject to the provisions, limitations, and conditions of this section. Failure to comply with the provisions of this section or the regulations and conditions prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior shall be ground for forfeiture of the grant by the United States district court for the district in which the property, or some part thereof, is located in an appropriate proceeding.” The Court of Appeals described the heart of respondents’ NEPA contention to be that the Secretary did not adequately consider the alternative of a trans-Canada pipeline. 156 U. S. App. D. C., at 166-168, 479 F. 2d, at 887-889. The interventions occurred in September 1971, approximately 17 months after the District Court had granted the preliminary injunction preventing issuance of the right-of-way and permits by the Secretary. The Department of the Interior had released a draft impact statement in January 1971. The decision is not reported. See id., at 130, 479 F. 2d, at 851. At the same time, the Court of Appeals upheld the grant of certain rights-of-way to the State of Alaska. Id., at 158-163, 479 F. 2d, at 879-884. It also considered a challenge to a special land-use permit issued by the Forest Supervisor to Alyeska’s predecessor, but did not find the issue ripe for adjudication. Id., at 163-166, 479 F. 2d, at 884-887. Pub. L. 93-153, Tit. I, § 101, 87 Stat. 576, 30 U. S. C. § 185 (1970 ed., Supp. III). Trans-Alaska Pipeline Authorization Act, Pub. L. 93-153, Tit. II, 87 Stat. 584, 43 U. S. C. § 1651 et seq. (1970 ed., Supp. III). Respondents’ bill of costs includes a total of 4,455 hours of attorneys’ time spent on the litigation. App. 209-219. “[T] his litigation may well have provided substantial benefits to particular individuals and, indeed, to every citizen’s interest in the proper functioning of our system of government. But imposing attorneys’ fees on Alyeska will not operate to spread the costs of litigation proportionately among these beneficiaries....” 161 U. S. App. D. C., at 449, 495 F. 2d, at 1029. See n. 40, infra. “In the circumstances of this case it would be inappropriate to tax fees against appellee State of Alaska. The State voluntarily participated in this suit, in effect to present to the court a different version of the public interest implications of the trans-Alaska pipeline. Taxing attorneys’ fees against Alaska would in our view undermine rather than further the goal of ensuring adequate spokesmen for public interests.” 161 U. S. App. D. C., at 456 n. 8, 495 F. 2d, at 1036 n. 8. The Court of Appeals also directed that “[t]he fee award need not be limited... to the amount actually paid or owed by [respondents]. It may well be that counsel serve organizations like [respondents] for compensation below that obtainable in the market because they believe the organizations further a public interest. Litigation of this sort should not have to rely on the charity of counsel any more than it should rely on the charity of parties volunteering to serve as private attorneys general. The attorneys who worked on this case should be reimbursed the reasonable value of their services, despite the absence of any obligation on the part of [respondents] to pay attorneys’ fees.” Id., at 457, 495 F. 2d, at 1037. “As early as 1278, the courts of England were authorized to award counsel fees to successful plaintiffs in litigation. Similarly, since 1607 English courts have been empowered to award counsel fees to defendants in all actions where such awards might be made to plaintiffs. Rules governing administration of these and related provisions have developed over the years. It is now customary in England, after litigation of substantive claims has terminated, to conduct separate hearings before special ‘taxing Masters’ in order to determine the appropriateness and the size of an award of counsel fees. To prevent the ancillary proceedings from becoming unduly protracted and burdensome, fees which may be included in an award are usually prescribed, even including the amounts that may be recovered for letters drafted on behalf of a client.” Fleischmann Distilling Corp. v. Maier Brewing Co., 386 U. S. 714, 717 (1967) (footnotes omitted). See generally Goodhart, Costs, 38 Yale L. J. 849 (1929); C. McCormick, Law of Damages 234-236 (1935). The Federal Judiciary Act of Sept. 24, 1789, 1 Stat. 73, touched upon costs in §§ 9, 11-12, 20-23, but as to counsel fees provided specifically only that the United States Attorney in each district “shall receive as a compensation for his services such fees as shall be taxed therefor in the respective courts before which the suits or prosecutions shall be.” §35. Five days later, however, Congress enacted legislation regulating federal-court processes, which provided: “That until further provision shall be made, and except where by this act or other statutes of the United States is otherwise provided... rates of fees, except fees to judges, in the circuit and district courts, in suits at common law, shall be the same in each state respectively as are now used or allowed in the supreme courts of the same. And... [in causes of equity and of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction] the rates of fees [shall be] the same as are or were last allowed by the states respectively in the court exercising supreme jurisdiction in such causes.” Act of Sept. 29, 1789, § 2, 1 Stat. 93. That legislation was to be in effect only until the end of the next congressional session, § 3, but it was extended twice. See Act of May 26, 1790, c. 13, 1 Stat. 123; Act of Feb. 18, 1791, c. 8, 1 Stat. 191. It was repealed, however, by legislation enacted on May 8, 1792, § 8, 1 Stat. 278. Prior to the time of that repeal, other legislation had been passed providing for additional compensation for United States Attorneys to cover traveling expenses. Act of Mar. 3, 1791, c. 22, § 1, 1 Stat. 216. That legislation was also repealed by the Act of May 8, 1792, supra. The latter enactment substituted a new provision for the compensation of United States Attorneys; they would be entitled to "such fees in each state respectively as are allowed in the supreme courts of the same...” plus certain traveling expenses, § 3, 1 Stat. 277. That provision was repealed on February 28, 1799. § 9, 1 Stat. 626. That same statute provided new, specific rates of compensation for United States Attorneys. See § 4. See also § 5. On March 1, 1793, Congress enacted a general provision governing the awarding of costs to prevailing parties in federal courts: “That there be allowed and taxed in the supreme, circuit and district courts of the United States, in favour of the parties obtaining judgments therein, such compensation for their travel and attendance, and for attornies and counsellors’ fees, except in the district courts in cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, as are allowed in the supreme or superior courts of the respective states.” §4, 1 Stat. 333. This provision was to be in force, for one year and then to the end of the next session of Congress, § 5, but it was continued in effect in 1795, Act of Feb. 25, 1795, c. 28, 1 Stat. 419, and again in 1796, Act of Mar. 31, 1796, 1 Stat. 451, for a period of two years and then until the end of the next session of Congress; at that point, it expired. After 1799 and until 1853, no other congressional legislation dealt with the awarding of attorneys’ fees in federal courts except for the Act of 1842, n. 23, injra, which gave this Court authority to prescribe taxable attorneys’ fees, and for legislation dealing Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

F

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Jackson delivered the opinion of the Court. The only issue presented by this case turns on the finality of a judgment for purposes of appeal, a subject on which the volume of judicial writing already is formidable. The Court of Appeals resolved against finality of the decree in question, saying, however, that it did so against the unanimous conviction of the court as constituted but in deference to a precedent established by a differently constituted court of the same Circuit. 173 F. 2d 738. Because of this intracircuit conflict, we made a limited grant of certiorari. 338 U. S. 811. That we cannot devise a form of words that will settle this recurrent problem seems certain; but in this case we agree with the convictions of the court below and reverse its judgment. Something over a decade ago, Dickinson sued Lloyd, with whom he had been associated in promoting the Petroleum Conversion Corporation, along with others, to impress an equitable lien upon certain of the Corporation’s shares then in Lloyd’s name and possession. The District Court dismissed the complaint but the Court of Appeals reversed and directed a new trial. Dickinson v. Rinke, 132 F. 2d 805. Before retrial, Burnham and Vaughan, on behalf of themselves and such other stockholders as subscribed to a fund to aid the company or its predecessor in its embarrassment, were allowed to intervene. They set up a claim against both plaintiff Dickinson and defendant Lloyd that the stock involved in the controversy between them had been fraudulently issued and demanded that this stock be canceled. They also sought recovery of $87,310.28 from them as unlawful profits secretly realized by breach of their fiduciary duty. Petroleum Conversion Corporation also intervened, making the same general allegations and demands for relief. The Corporation and the class of subscribers thus joined forces to get for one or the other substantially the same remedy against both Dickinson and Lloyd. This triangular controversy was tried and a decree dated April 10, 1947, was entered. The issue here turns on the character of that decree. It recites twenty-three days of trial, the filing of a decision, opinion, findings of fact and conclusions of law, and it “ordered, adjudged and decreed” that all of the plaintiff Dickinson’s claims be dismissed on the merits; that all of the defendant Lloyd’s claims there pressed by his administrator be dismissed on the merits; that the class intervenors have judgment of $174,620.56 against both Dickinson and Lloyd’s administrator, and that a concourse of all these subscribers be provided by which their several claims could be liquidated and the share of each in the recovery fixed; that Petroleum Conversion Corporation receive 8,200 shares of its stock in the hands of Lloyd’s administrator but that its claim to 12,596 additional such shares and its claim to over 244,000 of its shares in possession of the court be dismissed; and Petroleum Conversion Corporation was directed to issue new shares to stockholders of another corporation, provided that, if any shares were not distributed for any reason, they be redeposited with the court subject to its further order with jurisdiction retained by the court to supervise the distribution of such shares. It dismissed all other claims of Petroleum Conversion Corporation. From this decree Petroleum took no appeal. The District Court went ahead with hearings to determine claims of over seventy members of the class to share in the aggregate recovery against Dickinson and Lloyd’s administrator. On August 3, 1948, the court signed a “final decree” which apportioned the recovery as between those claimants. It recited that “the issues reserved in the decree herein dated the 10th day of April, 1947, having been determined by the Court . . . the said decree is hereby made final.” It made no decision as to any issue involving Petroleum and in no way changed the 1947 decree as to it. It also awarded costs which had not been settled in the earlier decree, but made no award against Petroleum. Thereupon Petroleum’s receiver in bankruptcy appealed from so much of this 1948 decree as dismissed the claims of Petroleum. On motion to dismiss the appeal, the chief question and the only one we granted review, was whether the Corporation could have appealed from the 1947 decree, or whether it could only appeal from the 1948 decree. In deciding this motion, the court said: “In the view of all members of the court, as it is now constituted, this should make no difference for the whole counterclaim of the Petroleum Conversion Corporation had been finally disposed of on April tenth, 1947; and as to it the action was at an end as much as though it had been denied the right to intervene at all; indeed, the judgment was more final, so to say, because, unlike the denial of a petition to intervene, it was a bar to any effort to relitigate the claims determined.” 173 F. 2d at 740. But because it could find no basis for distinguishing Clark v. Taylor, 163 F. 2d 940, in which a differently composed court in the same Circuit had sustained what appears to be a contrary position, it held the earlier order not appealable and hence no bar to the present appeal. 173 F. 2d at 740-741. Half a century ago this Court lamented, “Probably no question of equity practice has been the subject of more frequent discussion in this court than the finality of decrees. . . . The cases, it must be conceded, are not altogether harmonious.” McCourkey v. Toledo & Ohio Cent. R. Co., 146 U. S. 536, 544-45. This lamentation is equally fitting to describe the intervening struggle of the courts; sometimes to devise a formula that will encompass all situations and at other times to take hardship cases out from under the rigidity of previous declarations; sometimes choosing one and sometimes another of the considerations that always compete in the question of appealability, the most important of which are the inconvenience and costs of piecemeal review on the one hand and the danger of denying justice by delay on the other. The liberalization of our practice to allow more issues and parties to be joined in one action and to expand the privilege of intervention by those not originally parties has increased the danger of hardship and denial of justice through delay if each issue must await the determination of all issues as to all parties before a final judgment can be had. In recognition of this difficulty, present Rule 54 (b), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, was promulgated. It provides: “When more than one claim for relief is presented in an action, whether as a claim, counterclaim, cross-claim, or third-party claim, the court may direct the entry of a final judgment upon one or more but less than all of the claims only upon an express determination that there is no just reason for delay and upon an express direction for the entry of judgment. In the absence of such determination and direction, any order or other form of decision, however designated, which adjudicates less than all the claims shall not terminate the action as to any of the claims, and the order or other form of decision is subject to revision at any time before the entry of judgment adjudicating all the claims.” The obvious purpose of this section, as indicated by the notes of the advisory committee, is to reduce as far as possible the uncertainty and the hazard assumed by a litigant who either does or does not appeal from a judgment of the character we have here. It provides an opportunity for litigants to obtain from the District Court a clear statement of what that court is intending with reference to finality, and if such a direction is denied, the litigant can at least protect himself accordingly. But this new rule — which became effective on March 19, 1948 — was not in effect at the time of the 1947 decree in this case and it would not be appropriate to attempt to determine its effect on cases of this kind beyond observing that it may do much to prevent them from coming here. We will not, therefore, try to lay down rules to embrace any case-but this. We have held that an order denying intervention to a person having an absolute right to intervene is final and appealable. Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co., 331 U. S. 519; Missouri-Kansas Pipe Line Co. v. United States, 312 U. S. 502. When the application for intervention is denied, the would-be intervenor is foreclosed from further action in the case and its proceedings cannot affect him nor can he affect them. As the court below observed, it is hard to see why the exclusion of an intervenor from the case should be less final when it is based upon the evidence than when it is based upon pleadings. In either case, the lawsuit is all over so far as the intervenor is concerned. When its claims were dismissed by the decree of April 1947, any grievance that Petroleum Conversion Corporation had was fully matured. At that point Petroleum was out of the case. The decree was not tentative, informal nor incomplete as to it; and the case was concluded and closed as to its counterclaims. The court’s reservation of jurisdiction to supervise the distribution of the shares of stock and the provision for further proceedings to determine the individual shares in the aggregate recovery allowed did not in any manner affect Petroleum’s rights. What the court reserved was essentially supervisory jurisdiction over the distribution among the class of the recovery awarded the intervenors as the class’ representatives. The only questions were, so to speak, internal to the intervening interest. Petroleum no longer had any concern with these questions and, however they were resolved, Petroleum could not possibly have been affected. The court obviously selected with deliberation the issues it would close by the decree and those it would reserve for future decision. If it had any purpose to leave open any issue concerning Petroleum’s contentions, or affecting its interests, half a line in the decree would have done so. But that half-line was not written. We hold the decree of April 10, 1947, to have been a final one as to Petroleum and one from which it could have appealed and that its failure to appeal therefrom forfeits its right of review. Its attempt to review the earlier decree by appealing from the later one is ineffective, and its appeal should be dismissed. Reversed. Mr. Justice Douglas took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. As we have already indicated, however, the 1948 decree did not dismiss or decide any of Petroleum’s claims except insofar as it may be construed to finalize the 1947 decree. If the 1947 decree was final as to Petroleum for purposes of appeal, Petroleum could not appeal from the 1948 decree. Hill v. Chicago & Evanston R. Co., 140 U. S. 52. The cases and the policy considerations underlying them are collected and discussed in 3 Moore’s Federal Practice, 1948 Supp., 172-187; Moore’s Commentary on the U. S. Judicial Code, 495-501, 507-518 (1949); Note to Rule 54 (b), Advisory Committee’s Report of Proposed Amendments to Rules of Civil Procedure (1946); Reformulation of the “Final Decision” Rule—Proposed Amendment to Rule 54 (b), 56 Yale L. J. 141; The Final Judgment Rule in the Federal Courts, 47 Col. L. Rev. 239; Federal Rule 54 (b) and the Final Judgment Rule, 47 Mich. L. Rev. 233. Note to Rule 54 (b), Advisory Committee’s Report of Proposed Amendment to Rules of Civil Procedure (1946) 70-72. See also authorities cited in n. 3, supra. While it should make no difference as to the law that governs finality, it is fair to the law and to the court to dispel the impression that this decision makes the creditors of Petroleum Conversion Corporation “victims of this jungle of doubt,” or victims of any kind, or that they are in this predicament from a “failure to guess right on a legal question.” This calls for some further detail irrelevant to the issue of law. The decree of April 10, 1947, awards the recovery of $176,245.24, with interest from 1926, to the Rinke Agency Subscribers, as their several shares might be determined. These were the persons who in 1926 put up the funds, amounting to some $600,000, out of which Dickinson and Lloyd withdrew secret profits in breach of their fiduciary duty to those subscribers. The Petroleum Conversion Corporation had not been organized at the time of this breach of faith and its claim was derived from its predecessor corporation for the financial relief of which this fund was subscribed. It will thus be seen that Petroleum Conversion's claims as to the existence of fraud and secret illegal profits were not based upon any depletion of its own treasury, but of a separate fund subscribed, of which it might ultimately be a beneficiary. The repayment of the secret profits was awarded to those who had put up the money of which they had been defrauded and was not awarded to the Corporation. The decree which it now wants to review was entered on motion of Petroleum’s own attorney. Its interests and those of the intervening subscriber class were handled by the same attorney at the trial. A single brief and proposed findings of fact and conclusion of law were jointly submitted by Petroleum and other intervenors to the trial court, which left it to the court, if recovery were allowed, whether the judgment should be in favor of the Corporation or the subscribers. The court decided the recovery belonged to the subscribers. It was deliberately decided not to appeal the court’s dismissal of Petroleum’s claims under these circumstances. The attorney now seeking to prosecute an appeal sought in March of 1948 to intervene in District Court on behalf of preferred stockholders. He attacked this cooperation between counsel for the two intervenors and particularly the failure of counsel to appeal the April 10, 1947 decree. As to this charge, the trial judge said: “In so far as their petition for leave to intervene is based on the charge that the corporation’s [Petroleum Conversion Corporation] rights in respect to the $176,000 claim have not been fully and honestly presented, the history of this litigation, as set forth in the Court's opinion of October, 1946, and the trial record show that any such charge is baseless.” It was in that connection that the trial court suggested that "In my opinion it was not a final decree and was not appealable, at least in so far as it involved the claim for $176,000." But the time to appeal was then long past and failure to appeal was not influenced by this statement, nor, so far as appears, by any bewilderment as to the finality of the decree. No appeal was prosecuted because counsel who had fought and won the principal issues in the case thought justice had been done by the decree as it stood. After the final decree, counsel, having been thus criticized, filed on September 1, 1948, a notice of appeal from the final decree. This was on behalf of the trustee for Petroleum, which meanwhile was adjudged bankrupt. But the trustee at once laid the inadvisability of the appeal before the bankruptcy court. He advised the court that “The Trustee is satisfied from his investigation that Judge Leibell had sufficient evidence and supporting authorities for finding as he did and believes that an appeal to the Court of Appeals would probably be fruitless.” He pointed out that the attorney who now proposes to prosecute the appeal had objected to its abandonment, but reported that “The Trustee accordingly proposes not to prosecute said appeal and petitions the approval of this court.” Notice was given to all creditors of the Corporation and, “no creditors having objected to the recommendations of the trustee,” it was approved. It was provided, however, that, if any creditor desired to prosecute the appeal, without liability upon the bankrupt’s estate for costs or 'expenses unless the appeal was successful, he might do so under § 64 (a) (1) of the Bankruptcy Act. 60 Stat. 330, 11 U. S. C. § 104 (a) (1). Thereafter, permission so to prosecute this appeal was granted. Counsel has also moved to amend both the notice of appeal and the pleadings, without which he claims the appeal might be irreparably prejudiced. What new issues he would raise we cannot learn from the record before us. Some of us are unable to see that this case exemplifies any such injustice in the rule of finality that the practice should be remolded to allow an appeal from either decree in order to save this appellant. The judgment required repayment of money to seventy and more claimants who were defrauded of it in 1926. The purpose of the appellant is to divert this same money recovery through the trusteeship of a bankrupt corporation, where it would be subject to renewed litigation as to how it shall be distributed and to multiple fees. If the rule of finality we apply means that amends for a 1926 fraud shall be concluded as early as 1950, we do not think that condemns the rule as unjust. The parties have not tendered to this Court, and we did not take by certiorari, any issue as to any appeal by Dickinson. What its fate will be if such an appeal is pending we do not know and the record is not compiled to inform us of its merits. Dickinson, we only know, was a party to the original action; not as Petroleum, an intervenor. The last decree of the court, we know too, awarded costs against him which the former decree did not. And it awarded against him money judgments for specific amounts in favor of particular claimants, whereas the earlier decree adjudged only a general liability to a class. The Court of Appeals will be able to deal with any contentions that the Dickinson appeal should be dismissed, and until it has acted, we draw no inferences from obviously incomplete information on unlitigated issues. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Harlan delivered the opinion of the Court. This case, presenting a difficult question of bankruptcy-law on which the circuits have differed, arises out of the following facts. On September 27, 1961, voluntary bankruptcy petitions were filed in a federal court in Texas by Gerald Segal, Sam Segal, and their business partnership, Segal Cotton Products. A single trustee, Rochelle, was designated to serve in all three proceedings. After the close of that calendar year, loss-carryback tax refunds were sought and obtained from the United States on behalf of Gerald and Sam Segal under Internal Revenue Code § 172. The losses underlying the refunds had been suffered by the partnership during 1961 prior to the filing of the bankruptcy petitions; the losses were carried back to the years 1959 and 1960 to offset net income on which the Segals had both paid taxes. By agreement, Rochelle deposited the refunds in a special account, and the Segals applied to the referee in bankruptcy to award the refunds to them on the ground that bankruptcy had not passed the refund claims to the trustee. Concluding that the refund claims had indeed passed under § 70a (5) of the Bankruptcy Act as “property ... which prior to the filing of the petition . . . [the bankrupt] could by any means have transferred,” the referee denied the Segals’ application. The. District Court affirmed the denial, and the Segals and their partnership appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. That court too rejected the Segals’ contention. As the Court of Appeals here recognized, the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Fournier v. Rosenblum, 318 F. 2d 525, and the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in In re Sussman, 289 F. 2d 76, have both ruled squarely that a bankrupt’s loss-carryback refund claims based on losses in the year of bankruptcy do not pass to the trustee but instead the bankrupt is entitled to the refunds when they are ultimately paid. Concedédly, under § 70a (5) the trustee must acquire the bankrupt’s “property” as of the date the petition is filed and property subsequently acquired belongs to the bankrupt. See note 1, supra; 4 Collier, Bankruptcy ¶ 70.09 (14th ed. 1962). Since the tax laws allow a loss-carryback refund claim to be made only when the year has closed, see I. R. C. §§ 172 (a), (c), 6411, both the First and Third Circuits reasoned that prior to the year’s end a loss-carryback refund claim was too tenuous to be classed as “property” which would pass under § 70a (5). Alternatively, the Third Circuit stated that because of the federal anti-assignment statute, inchoate refund claims were not in any event property “which prior to the filing of the petition . . . [the bankrupt] could by any means have transferred,” as § 70a (5) also requires. Both circuits felt the result to be unfortunate, not least because the very losses generating the refunds often help precipitate the bankruptcy and injury to the creditors, but both believed the statutory language left no option. After detailed discussion of the problems, the Court of Appeals in this case resolved that the loss-carryback refund claims were both “property” and “transferable” at the time of the bankruptcy petition and hence had passed to the trustee. 336 F. 2d 298. We granted cer-tiorari because of the conflict and the significance of the issue in bankruptcy administration. 380 U. S. 931. Conceding the question to be close, we are persuaded by the reasoning of the Fifth Circuit and we affirm its decision. I. We turn first to the question whether on the date the bankruptcy petitions were filed, the potential claims for loss-carryback refunds constituted “property” as § 70a (5) employs that term. Admittedly, in interpreting this section “[i]t is impossible to give any categorical definition to the word ‘property/ nor can we attach to it in certain relations the limitations which would be attached to it in others.” Fisher v. Cushman, 103 F. 860, 864. Whether an item is classed as “property” by the Fifth Amendment’s Just-Compensation Clause or for purposes of a state taxing statute cannot decide hard cases under the Bankruptcy Act, whose own purposes must ultimately govern. The main thrust of § 70a (5) is to secure for creditors everything of value the bankrupt may possess in alienable or leviable form when he files his petition. To this end the term “property” has been construed most generously and an interest is not outside its reach because it is novel or contingent or because enjoyment must be postponed. E. g., Horton v. Moore, 110 F. 2d 189 (contingent, postponed interest in a trust); Kleinschmidt v. Schroeter, 94 F. 2d 707 (limited interest in future profits of a joint venture); see 3 Remington, Bankruptcy §§ 1177-1269 (Henderson ed. 1957). However, limitations on the term do grow out of other purposes of the Act; one purpose which is highly prominent and is relevant in this case is to leave the bankrupt free after the date of his petition to accumulate new wealth in the future. Accordingly, future wages of the bankrupt do not constitute “property” at the time of bankruptcy nor, analogously, does an intended bequest to him or a promised gift — even though state law might permit all of these to be alienated in advance. E. g., In re Coleman, 87 F. 2d 753; see 4 Collier, Bankruptcy ¶¶ 70.09, 70.27 (14th ed. 1962). Turning to the loss-carryback refund claim in this case, we believe it is sufficiently rooted in the pre-bankruptcy past and so little entangled with the bankrupts’ ability to make an unencumbered fresh start that it should be regarded as “property” under § 70a (5). Temporally, two key elements pointing toward realization of a refund existed at the time these bankruptcy petitions were filed: taxes had been paid on net income within the past three years, and the year of bankruptcy at that point exhibited a net operating loss. The Segals stress in this Court that under the statutory scheme no refund could be claimed from the Government until the end of the year, but as cases already cited indicate, postponed enjoyment does not disqualify an interest as “property.” That earnings by the bankrupt after filing the petition might diminish or eliminate the loss-carryback refund claim does further qualify the interest, but we have already noted that contingency in the abstract is no bar and the actual risk that the refund claims may be erased is quite far from a certainty. Unlike a pre-bankruptcy promise of a gift or bequest, passing title to the trustee does not make it unlikely the gift or bequest will be effected. Nor does passing the claim hinder the bankrupt from starting out on a clean slate, for any administrative inconvenience to the bankrupt will not be prolonged, see 110 U. Pa. L. Rev., at 279-280, and the bankrupt without a refund claim to preserve has more reason to earn income rather than less. We are told that if this loss-carryback refund claim is “property,” that label must also attach to loss-carryovers, that is, the application of pre-bankruptcy losses to earnings in future years. Since losses may be carried forward five years and in some cases even seven or ten years, I. R. C. §§ 172 (b)(1) (B)-(D), great hardship for the estate is foreseen by petitioners in keeping it open for this length of time. While in fact the trustee can obviate this detriment to the estate — by selling a contingent claim in some instances or simply forgoing it — inconvenience and hindrance might be caused for the bankrupt individual. Without ruling in any way on a question not before us, it is enough to say that a carryover into post-bankruptcy years can be distinguished conceptually as well as practically. The bankrupts in this case had both prior net income and a net loss when their petitions were filed and apparently would have deserved an immediate refund had their tax year terminated on that date; by contrast, the supposed loss-carryover would still need to be matched in some future year by earnings, earnings that might never eventuate at all. II. Having concluded that the loss-carryback refund claims in this case constituted “property” at the time of the bankruptcy petitions, it remains for us to decide whether in addition they were property “which prior to the filing of the petition . ; . [the bankrupt] could by any means have transferred . . . .” The prime obstacle to an affirmative answer is 31 U. S. C. § 203, which renders “absolutely null and void” all transfers of any claim against the United States unless among other conditions the claim has been allowed and the amount ascertained. See n. 3, supra. Plainly since the tax laws calculate the refund only on the full year’s experience after the year has closed, the claims in the present instance could not have been'allowed or ascertained at the time the petitions were filed. The respondent argues that the transferability requirement of § 70a (5) can be met by relying on the long-established rule that § 203 does not apply to prevent transfers by “operation of law.” See United States v. Aetna Surety Co., 338 U. S. 366, 373-374; Goodman v. Niblack, 102 U. S. 556, 560. The phrasing of § 70a (5), however, suggests that it contemplates a voluntary transfer and is not satisfied simply because property could have been transferred by operation of law, such as by death, bankruptcy, or judicial process. Not only is there practically no form of property that would not be transferable under the broader reading, but such a reading also makes redundant the alternative route for complying with § 70a (5) through showing that the property “might have been levied upon and sold under judicial process . . . .” Admittedly, the Bankruptcy Act defines the word “transfer” in its general definitional section to include at least certain transfers that are “involu ntary,” but legislative history indicates that the introduction of this latter term into the Act 40 years after its framing was not aimed at § 70a (5) at all. See H. R. Rep. No. 1409, 75th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 5; Analysis of H. R. 12889, 74th Cong., 2d Sess., p. 7 (House Judiciary Comm. Print). Difficulty in defining the term “transfer” is enhanced by the absence of any explanation for Congress’ having made transferability a condition in the 'first place. Bankruptcy Acts prior to the present one enacted in 1898 had no like limitation on the trustee’s succession to property, see Bankruptcy Acts of 1867, § 14, 14 Stat. 522; of 1841, § 3, 5 Stat. 442; and of 1800, §§ 5, 13, 2 Stat. 23, 25, and under the predecessor Act claims against the Government passed without impediment to the trustee. See, e. g., Erwin v. United States, 97 U. S. 392. This history and the chance that the 1898 limitation sought only to respect state policies against alienating property such as a contingent remainder or spendthrift trust fund argue for flatly ignoring the limitation in this instance. See 14 Stan. L. Rev., at 383-386. Nevertheless, we have been shown no legislative history on the point, and an uncertain guess at Congress’ intent provides dubious ground for disregarding its plain language. In any event, we are not prepared to accept this argument, just as we cannot now go beyond a narrow definition of the term “transfer,” in a case in which these points have not been thoroughly briefed by the parties. The Court of Appeals determined that despite § 203 a sufficient voluntary transfer of the loss-carryback refund claim could have been made prior to bankruptcy to satisfy § 70a (5), and on balance we share this view. In Martin v. National Surety Co., 300 U. S. 588, 596, a unanimous Court held that § 203, in spite of its broad language, “must be interpreted in the light of its purpose to give protection to the Government” so that between the parties effect might still be given to an assignment that failed to comply with the statute. The opinion reasoned that after claims have been collected by the assignor, requiring compliance with the invalid assignment by transfer of the recovery to the assignee presented no danger that the Government might become “embroiled in conflicting claims, with delay and embarrassment and the chance of multiple liability.” 300 U. S., at 594. While other circumstances encouraged Martin to uphold the assignment and this Court has not faced the problem head-on since that time, we find no reason to retreat now from the basic holding in Martin which was both anticipated and followed by a number of other courts, state and federal. See California Bank v. United States Fid. & Guar. Co., 129 F. 2d 751; Royal Indem. Co. v. United States, 93 F.Supp. 891; Leonard v. Whaley, 91 Hun 304, 36 N. Y. Supp. 147; Ann., 12 A. L. R. 2d 460, 468-475 (1950). Among these States is Texas, whose precedents leave little doubt that an assignment of the claims at issue would be enforced in equity in the normal case. Trinity Univ. Ins. Co. v. First State Bank, 143 Tex. 164, 183 S.W.2d 422; see United Hay Co. v. Ford, 124 Tex. 213, 76 S.W.2d 480 (dictum). It should not be pretended that this contemplated “transfer” is one in the fullest sense that term permits. For example, this Court has ruled that one holding a claim invalidly assigned under § 203 may not sue the Government upon it though he join his assignor as well. United States v. Shannon, 342 U. S. 288. Yet it remains true that a Texas court of equity could and would compel the assignment of any refund received, if indeed it might not try to compel a reluctant assignor to collect the claim or make it over by a valid assignment when that became possible. This, we believe, suffices to make the Segals’ claims transferable within the meaning of § 70a (5). Cf. 4 Collier, Bankruptcy ¶ 70.37, at 1293, n. 6 (14th ed. 1962). Affirmed. 30 Stat. 565, as amended, 11 U. S. C. § 110 (a)(5) (1964 ed.). In relevant part that section provides: “(a) The trustee of the estate of a bankrupt . . . shall ... be vested by operation of law with the title of the bankrupt as of the date of the filing of the petition initiating a proceeding under this title, except insofar as it is to property which is held to be exempt, to all of the following kinds of property wherever located ... (5) property, including rights of action, which prior to the filing of the petition he could by any means have transferred or which might have been levied upon and sold under judicial process against him, or otherwise seized, impounded, or sequestered . . . .” The wife of Gerald Segal and the estate of the deceased wife of Sam Segal had unsuccessfully urged before the referee their own contingent rights to half the refunds, but review on this issue was not sought. Rev. Stat. §3477, as amended, 31 U. S. C. §203 (1964 ed.). The section, so far as relevant, states: “All transfers and assignments made of any claim upon the United States, or of any part or share thereof, or interest therein, whether absolute or conditional, and whatever may be the consideration therefor . . . shall be absolutely null and void, unless they are freely made and executed in the presence of at least two attesting witnesses, after the allowance of such a claim, the ascertainment of the amount due, and the issuing of a warrant for the payment thereof.” Considerable commentary has been directed to the problem. Practically all the writers agree that it is desirable for the trustee to receive the refunds although a minority contend that existing law will not permit this result. See Herzog, Bankruptcy Law — Modern Trends, 36 Ref. J. 18 (1962); 60 Nw. U. L. Rev. 122 (1965); 40 Notre Dame Law. 118 (1964); 14 Stan. L. Rev. 380 (1962); 40 Tex. L. Rev. 569 (1962); 42 Tex. L. Rev. 542 (1964); 17 U. Fla. L. Rev. 241 (1964); 16 U. Miami L. Rev. 345 (1961); 110 U. Pa. L. Rev. 275 (1961). So far as losses by the bankrupt after filing but before the year’s end might increase the refund — a situation not claimed to be present in this case — the Court of Appeals suggested “[a] proration of the refund in the ratio of the losses before and after the filing date would be indicated . . . .” 336 F. 2d, at 302, n. 5. The “choice of law” rules relevant to this question are not in dispute. What would constitute a “transfer” is a matter of federal law. 4 Collier, Bankruptcy ¶ 70.15, at 1035-1036 and n. 25 (14th ed. 1962). Whether an item could have been so transferred is determined generally by state law, save that on rare occasions overriding federal law may control this determination or bear upon it. Id., at 1034^1035 and n. 22. The Segals were Texas residents, the business was apparently based in Texas, and the bankruptcy court was located there; no other State’s law is claimed to be relevant. This exception is the simplest reason why § 203 does not interfere with the vesting in the trustee of property coming within § 70a (5), for all transfers under § 70a are explicitly by “operation of law,” see n. 1, supra; but of course property must still qualify as transferable within the meaning of § 70a (5). See n. 1, supra. The respondent has not argued that under Texas law the Segals’ inchoate refund claims would be subject to such judicial process, and apparently in Texas the claims’ contingent status would render this argument quite doubtful. See 26 Tex. Jur. 2d, Garnishment § 17 (1961), and cases there cited. Bankruptcy Act §1(30), as amended by the Chandler Act, 52 Stat. 842, as amended, 11 U. S. C. § 1 (30) (1964 ed.), pertinently reads: “ ‘Transfer’ shall include the sale and every other and different mode, direct or indirect, of disposing of or of parting with property or with an interest therein or with the possession thereof or of fixing a lien upon property or upon an interest therein, absolutely or conditionally, voluntarily or involuntarily, by or without judicial proceedings, as a conveyance, sale, assignment, payment, pledge, mortgage, lien, encumbrance, gift, security, or otherwise . . . .” Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Black delivered the opinion of the Court. The Interstate Commerce Act confers broad powers upon the Interstate Commerce Commission to regulate railroad transportation in the United States or to or from a foreign country, “but only insofar as such transportation . . . takes place within the United States.” In this case, here on appeal under 28 U. S. C. §§ 1253 and 2101 (b), a three-judge District Court set aside a Commission order on the ground that the Commission was attempting to regulate railroad transportation in Canada in excess of the Commission’s jurisdiction. The Province of Quebec, Canada, is a principal source of asbestos for manufacturers of asbestos products in this country. It is transported by Canadian railroads through southern Canada to points in Vermont three to five miles south of the border and carried from there by the various appellee railroads to other points in the United States. Canadian and American carriers have joined in the publication of joint through rates available to consignees in “official territory” in the Northeastern States, which rates are substantially lower than the combination of separate or local rates that are published and available as combination through rates for consignees in the Southern States. On the basis of these and other facts the Commission found after hearings that the higher combination rates to complainants in the South were: (a) “unjust and unreasonable” and therefore in violation of § 1 (6) of the Act, and (b) “unduly prejudicial” to the southern consignees and “unduly preferential” to the northern consignees enjoying the lower joint rates, and therefore in violation of § 3 (1). The Commission then entered its order directing the railroads to cease and desist from continuing to practice the undue prejudice and preference it had found and to establish, post and maintain rates and practices which would thereafter “prevent and avoid” such prejudice and preference. The District Court’s holding that the Commission was without jurisdiction was based on its assumption that the Commission’s order attempted to control the Canadian part of the transportation. But the order did not run against any transportation except that taking place “within the United States.” The order directed the defendant railroads, “according as they participate in the transportation within the United States,” to take action within their power to cease their participation in a transportation practice that the Commission had found to be prejudicial in violation of §3 (1). The affected transportation within this country was that “from a foreign country” over which §1(1) (a) specifically gives the Commission jurisdiction, and the order did nothing more than direct railroads engaged in that transportation to adjust their transportation practices “within the United States” in such a way as to eliminate illegal discriminations. These railroads operating within the United States undoubtedly have complete power to stop these discriminations. Mere withdrawal by the American railroads from the preferential joint through-rate agreements would be an obvious way to do so, and an alternative method would be to lower the combination through rates to southern territory by reduction of the rates from the Vermont interchange points to the South. It has long been settled that the Commission’s power to forbid unlawful rate discriminations is in no way diminished because the rates are published as joint through rates or combination through rates. This power likewise is not lost merely because the particular transportation by railroads carrying goods in this country happens to be a continuation of carriage from another country. Otherwise the Commission’s mandate to protect shippers against all undue discriminations would be frustrated with respect to rates that in part include payment for transportation that takes place in a foreign country. It was error to set aside the Commission’s order for lack of jurisdiction, and therefore the District Court’s judgment is Reversed. 49 U. S. C. § 1 (1)(a) and §1 (2). 182 F. Supp. 516. “Official territory” is in general that .area of the United States lying east of the Mississippi River and north of the Potomac and Ohio Rivers. See Class Rate Investigation, 1939, 262 I. C. C. 447, 457. 49 U. S. C. §1 (5). 49 U. S. C. §3 (1). Since the challenged order prescribed no “reasonable rates” to be observed, we have no occasion to consider the contention that the Commission was without jurisdiction to prescribe such rates. Nor did the Commission enter any final order that a complainant is entitled to an award of damages because it had been charged unlawful rates. Such an order, when and if made, can be challenged before a single judge under 49 U. S. C. § 16 (2). See United States v. I. C. C., 337 U. S. 426, 442-443; Pennsylvania R. Co. v. United States, 363 U. S. 202, 205. See United States v. Illinois Central R. Co., 263 U. S. 515, 527. Cf. Commissioner Eastman’s concurring opinion in Cyanamid and Crude Cyanide from Niagara Falls, Ontario, 155 I. C. C. 488, 501-502. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. Petitioner brought this suit under § 17 of the Fair Labor Standards Act (52 Stat. 1060, as amended, 63 Stat. 910, 29 U. S. C. § 201 et seq.) to enjoin respondent from violating § 15 (a) (2) and § 15 (a) (5) of the Act. Those sections make unlawful violation of § 7 and § 11 (c) of the Act. Section 7 requires one and a half times the regular rate of pay for work in excess of 40 hours a week; and § 11 (c) requires the keeping of the records that are prescribed by regulations. 29 CFR, 1954 Cum. Supp., § 516.1 et seq. The contention is that respondent’s violations of § 7 and § 11 (c) relate to work performed in the construction of an earthwork embankment and concrete platform for the Algiers Lock in Orleans Parish, Louisiana, a unit in the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, extending from Florida to the Mexican border. The Algiers Lock is designed to furnish better passage into and across the Mississippi than is provided by the present Harvey Lock and Canal. Respondent concedes that some of its employees on the Algiers Lock were employed for more than 40 hours per week without payment for overtime. Its defense is that its employees working on the Algiers Lock were not engaged in interstate commerce, and thus were not covered by the Act. The evidence at the trial was primarily directed to the question whether those working on the Algiers Lock were engaged in commerce within the meaning of § 7 of the Act. As already noted, the Algiers Lock will form part of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway. It is designed to serve as an alternate route to the Harvey Lock and Canal. Relying on our decision in Raymond v. Chicago, M. & St. P. R. Co., 243 U. S. 43, the District Court held that respondent’s employees were not engaged in commerce and denied injunctive relief. 113 F. Supp. 235. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed per curiam. 214 F. 2d 132. To resolve an apparent conflict with Tobin v. Pennington-Winter Const. Co., 198 F. 2d 334, we granted certiorari. 348 U. S. 886. Section 7 of the Act makes the 40-hour week and the overtime provisions applicable to the Algiers Lock and Canal project if the respondent’s employees at work on it are "engaged in commerce.” It is argued that they are not engaged “in commerce,” since the Algiers Lock is new construction and therefore in the category of the new tunnel that was being constructed in Raymond v. Chicago, M. & St. P. R. Co., supra. In the latter case, the Court held that an employee at work on a new tunnel for an interstate carrier was not subject to the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, even though the tunnel, when completed, would be an interstate facility. We do not think that case should control this one. We are dealing with a different Act of another vintage — one that has been given a liberal construction from Kirschbaum Co. v. Walling, 316 U. S. 517, to Alstate Construction Co. v. Durkin, 345 U. S. 13. The question whether an employee is engaged “in commerce” within the meaning of the present Act is determined by practical considerations, not by technical conceptions. See Walling v. Jacksonville Paper Co., 317 U. S. 564, 570; Overstreet v. North Shore Corp., 318 U. S. 125, 128, 130. The test is whether the work is so directly and vitally related to the functioning of an instrumentality or facility of interstate commerce as to be, in practical effect, a part of it, rather than isolated, local activity. See McLeod v. Threlkeld, 319 U. S. 491, 497. Repair of facilities of interstate commerce is activity “in commerce” within the meaning of the Act, as we held in Fitzgerald Co. v. Pedersen, 324 U. S. 720. And we think the work of improving existing facilities of interstate commerce, involved in the present case, falls in the same category. The Gulf Intracoastal Waterway is an existing instrumentality of commerce. Without Algiers Lock, it has proved inadequate where it crosses the Mississippi. Harvey Lock cannot handle the traffic. Use of Harvey Lock entails travel through some five miles of the New Orleans harbor, already heavy with traffic. It is impractical to widen Harvey Lock because it is located in a highly developed industrial section of New Orleans. Algiers Lock is conceived as the practical alternative for relieving the congestion of the Waterway at this point. See S. Doc. No. 188, 78th Cong., 2d Sess., pp. 1-4. The work on Algiers Lock seems to us to have as intimate a relation to improvement of navigation on the Waterway as the dredging of Harvey Lock would have. It is part of the redesigning of an existing facility of interstate commerce. Those working on the Algiers Lock are therefore “engaged in commerce” within the meaning of § 7 of the Act. Reversed. Mr. Justice Harlan took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. The only question presented and argued here concerns § 7 of the Act. The construction work held in Murphey v. Reed, 335 U. S. 865, not to be under the Act was the building of a Navy base, not the improvement of a facility or instrumentality of interstate commerce. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

G

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. The 1970 self-reapportionment of the. Louisiana Legislature was challenged in this lawsuit on the dual grounds that it offended both the one-man, one-vote principle and the prohibition against voting arrangements designed to dilute the voting strength of racial minorities. After the United States Attorney General interposed an objection to. the election law change under § 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 79 Stat. 439, 42 U. S. C. § 1973c, the District Court appointed a Special Master to prepare a court-imposed plan. The Master was verbally instructed to hold hearings and to devise a proposal to maintain the integrity of political subdivisions and to observe natural or historical boundaries “as nearly as possible.” He was also instructed, that “[n]o consideration whatsoever was to be given to the location of the residence of either incumbents in'office or of. announced or prospective candidates.” Opinion of Judge West, Civil Action No. 71-234,. Aug. 24, 1971. The Special Master held four days of hearings, during which over 100 persons were heard. Proposed plans were received by him. No one was denied a hearing. He then submitted his recommendation to the District Court and after a hearing it was adopted by the court. This dispute involves only four state senate' seats affected by the reapportionment. At the hearing held by the District Judge on the Master’s proposal, the State Attorney General presented a counterplan which differed from the 'Master’s only with respect to four senatorial districts in the New Orleans area. Although the judge found that both plans satisfied the one-man, one-vote requirement, he found that the two schemes differed in their racial composition of the four districts, as is set out in greater detail in the margin. Under the State Attorney General’s scheme, four “safe” white districts were proposed whereas the Master’s design would have created two districts of slight majorities of black voters. Also, under the counterplan each incumbent would continue to reside in his “own” district, whereas under the Master’s proposal the residences of the four incuinbents would fall evenly between the two districts to bé composed primarily of white voters, ensuring defeat for two of the four incumbents. At the hearing the State Attorney General contended that the court’s plan would make hash of the traditional ward-and-precinct lines. The District Court acknowledged that there would be some departure from the historical patterns but concluded that the “ ‘historical’ boundaries of voting districts in Louisiana reflect [ed]. a history of racial discrimination. Adherence to the historical boundaries alluded to by objectors [had] been the prime reason why only two negroes [had] been allowed to sit in the Louisiana Legislature in the last 75 years.” 333 F. Supp.. 452, 462. The court found that the alternative proposal would “operate to diversify the negro voting population throughout the four districts and thus significantly dilute their vote” and would practically eliminate “the possibility of a negro being elected from any of the four districts,” while the court-approved plan would at least give blacks “a fair chance in two out of the four districts. . . \” Id., at 457. The court-approved plan sought “to protect the rights of the people while the primary purpose of the Senators’ plan appear[ed] to be the protection of incumbent office holders.” Id., at. 458. Accordingly, as mentioned, the District Court adopted- the Master’s recommendation. Despite the District Court’s findings, however, the Court of Appeals reversed without opinion and adopted the Attorney General’s alternative division of New Orleans. The petitioners are the original plaintiffs and they now seek review of this summary reversal. An examination. of the record in this case suggests that the Court of Appeals may have believed that benign districting by federal judges is itself unconstitutional gerrymandering even where (a) it is employed to overcome the residual effects of past state dilution of Negro voting strength and (b) the only alternative is to leave intact the traditional “safe” white districts. If that were in fact the reasoning of the lower court, then this petition would present an important federal question of the extent to which the broad equitable powers of a federal court, Swarm v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, 402 U. S. 1, 15, are limited by the colorblind concept of Gomillion v. Lightfoot, 364 U. S. 339, and Wright v. Rockefeller, 376 U. S. 52, 57, 67 (Douglas, J., dissenting). In reapportionment . cases, as Justice Stewart has observed, “the federal courts are often going to be faced with hard remedial problems” in minimizing friction between their remedies and legitimate state policies. Sixty-Seventh Minnesota State Senate v. Beens, 406 U. S. 187, 204 (dissenting opinion). Because this record does not fully inform us of the precise nature of the litigation and because we have not had the benefit of the insight of the Court of Appeals, we grant the petition for writ of certiorari, vacate the judgment below, and remand the case to the Court of Appeals for proceedings in conformity with this opinion. Mr. Justice Blackmun concurs in the Court’s, judgment. According to the District Judge’s opinion, the percentages of black registered voters in each of the four districts under each of the competing plans would be: Master’s Attorney General’s Plan Plan- District 2. 51% 37.6% District 3.'. 1,8% .25.7% District 4. 58% 44.3% District .5. 20% 24.0% It is possible, but unlikely, that the Court of Appeals believed that benign districting, although permissible, was achievable here with less violence to the parish’s historical district lines. But had that been its view presumably the. court would have remanded' for the construction of a less drastic alternative rather than simply directing the adoption of the Attorney General’s counterplan. Although similar in some respects, this case is not controlled by Whitcomb v. Chavis, 403 U. S. 124. To be sure, in both cases the District Courts were writing on clean’ slates in .the sense that they were fashioning court-imposed reapportionment plans. And, in each case the equitable remedy of the court conflicted with a state policy. (There the state policy favored multi-member districts whereas here the policy favors maintenance of traditional boundaries.) The important difference, however, is that ini Whitcomb it was conceded that the State’s preference for multi-member districts was not rooted in racial discrimination, 403 U. S., at 149. Here, however, there has been no such concession and, indeed, the District Court found a long “history” of bias and franchise dilution in the State’s traditional drawing of district lines. Cf. id., at 155. We, of course, agree that the courts of appeals should have wide latitude in their decisions of whether or how to write opinions.- That is especially true with respect to summary affirmances. See Rule 21, Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. But here the lower court summarily reversed without any opinion' on a point that had been considered at length by the District- Judge. Under the special circumstances of this case, we are loath to impute to the Court of Appeals reasoning that would raise a substantial federal question when it is plausible that its actual ground of decision was of more limited importance. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Blackmun delivered the opinion of the Court. The concept of a federal general common law, lurking (to use Justice Holmes’ phrase) as a “brooding omnipresence in the sky,” was questioned for some time before being firmly rejected in Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U. S. 64 (1938). See Southern Pacific Co. v. Jensen, 244 U. S. 205, 222 (1917) (Holmes, J., dissenting); Black & White Taxicab & Transfer Co. v. Brown & Yellow Taxicab & Transfer Co., 276 U. S. 518, 533 (1928) (dissenting opinion). Erie mandates that a federal court sitting in diversity apply the substantive law of the forum State, absent a federal statutory or constitutional directive to the contrary. 304 U. S., at 78. See also 28 U. S. C. §1652 (“The laws of the several states, except where the Constitution or treaties of the United States or Acts of Congress otherwise require or provide, shall be regarded as rules of decision in civil actions in the courts of the United States, in cases where they apply”). In decisions after Erie, this Court made clear that state law is to be determined in the same manner as a federal court resolves an evolving issue of federal law: “with the aid of such light as [is] afforded by the materials for decision at hand, and in accordance with the applicable principles for determining state law.” Meredith v. Winter Haven, 320 U. S. 228, 238 (1943). See also Ruhlin v. New York Life Ins. Co., 304 U. S. 202, 208-209 (1938) (“Application of the ‘State law’ to the present case . . . does not present the disputants with duties difficult or strange”). In this case, we must decide specifically whether a federal court of appeals may review a district court’s determination of state law under a standard less probing than that applied to a determination of federal law. r — I The issue presented arises out of a contract dispute between a college and one of its students. Petitioner Salve Regina College is an institution of higher education located in Newport, R. I. Respondent Sharon L. Russell was admitted to the college and began her studies as a freshman in 1982. The following year, respondent sought admission to the college’s nursing department in order to pursue a bachelor of science degree in nursing. She was accepted by the department and began her nursing studies in the fall of 1983. Respondent, who was 5'6" tall, weighed in excess of 300 pounds when she was accepted in the nursing program. Immediately after the 1983 school year began, respondent’s weight became a topic of commentary and concern by officials of the nursing program. Respondent’s first year in the program was marked by a series of confrontations and negotiations concerning her obesity and its effect upon her ability to complete the clinical requirements safely and satisfactorily. During her junior year, respondent signed a document that was designated as a “contract” and conditioned her further participation in the nursing program upon weekly attendance at a weight-loss seminar and a realized average loss of two pounds per week. When respondent failed to meet these commitments, she was asked to withdraw from the program and did so. She transferred to a nursing program at another college, but had to repeat her junior year in order to satisfy the transferee institution’s 2-year residency requirement. As a consequence, respondent’s nursing education took five years rather than four. She also underwent surgery for her obesity. In 1987, respondent successfully completed her nursing education, and she is now a registered nurse. Soon after leaving Salve Regina College, respondent filed this civil action in the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island. She asserted, among others, claims based on (1) intentional infliction of emotional distress, (2) invasion of privacy, and (8) nonperformance by the college of its implied agreement to educate respondent. Subject-matter jurisdiction in the District Court was based on diversity of citizenship. See 28 U. S. C. §1332. The parties agree that the law of Rhode Island applies to all substantive aspects of the action. See Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, supra. At the close of plaintiff-respondent’s case in chief, the District Court directed a verdict for the individual defendants on all three of the remaining claims, and for the college on the claims for intentional infliction of emotional distress and invasion of privacy. App. 82. The court, however, denied the college’s motion for a directed verdict on the breach-of-contract claim, reasoning that “a legitimate factual issue” remained concerning whether “there was substantial performance by the plaintiff in her overall contractual relationship at Salve Regina.” Id., at 88. At the close of all the evidence, the college renewed its motion for a directed verdict. It argued that under Rhode Island law the strict commercial doctrine of substantial performance did not apply in the general academic context. Therefore, according to petitioner, because respondent admitted she had not fulfilled the terms of the contract, the college was entitled to judgment as a matter of law. The District Court denied petitioner’s motion. Id., at 92. Acknowledging that the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, to that point, had limited the application of the substantial-performance doctrine to construction contracts, the District Court nonetheless concluded, as a matter of law, that the Supreme Court of Rhode Island would apply that doctrine to the facts of respondent’s case. Id., at 90-91. The Federal District Judge based this conclusion, in part, on his observation that “I was a state trial judge for 18 and !4 years, and I have a feel for what the Rhode Island Supreme Court will do or won’t do.” Id., at 91. Accordingly, the District Court submitted the breach-of-contract claim to the jury. The court instructed the jury: “The law provides that substantial and not exact performance accompanied by good faith is what is required in a ease of a contract of this type. It is not necessary that the plaintiff have fully and completely performed every item specified in the contract between the parties. It is sufficient if there has been substantial performance, not necessarily full performance, so long as the substantial performance was in good faith and in compliance with the contract, except for some minor and relatively unimportant deviation or omission.” Id., at 97. The jury returned a verdict for respondent, and determined that the damages were $30,513.40. Id., at 113. Judgment was entered. Id., at 115. Both respondent and petitioner appealed. The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed. 890 F. 2d 484 (1989). It first upheld the District Court’s directed verdict dismissing respondent’s claims for intentional infliction of emotional distress and invasion of privacy. Id., at 487-488. It then turned to petitioner’s argument that the District Court erred in submitting the breach-of-contract claim to the jury. Rejecting petitioner’s argument that, under Rhode Island law, the doctrine of substantial performance does not apply in the college-student context, the court stated: “In this case of first impression, the district court held that the Rhode Island Supreme Court would apply the substantial performance standard to the contract in question. In view of the customary appellate deference accorded to interpretations of state law made by federal judges of that state, Dennis v. Rhode Island Hospital Trust Nat’l Bank, 744 F. 2d 893, 896 (1st Cir. 1984); O’Rourke v. Eastern Air Lines Inc., 730 F. 2d 842, 847 (2d Cir. 1984), we hold that the district court’s determination that the Rhode Island Supreme Court would apply standard contract principles is not reversible error.” Id., at 489. Petitioner college sought a writ of certiorari from this Court. It alleged that the Court of Appeals erred in deferring to the District Court’s determination of state law. A majority of the Courts of Appeals, although varying in their phraseology, embrace a rule of deference similar to that articulated by the Court of Appeals in this case. See, e. g., Norton v. St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins. Co., 902 F. 2d 1355, 1357 (CA8 1990) (“In general, we accord substantial deference to a district court’s interpretation of the law of the state in which it sits”), and Self v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 885 F. 2d 336, 339 (CA6 1989) (“[W]e should give ‘considerable weight’ to the trial court’s views on such questions of local law”). Two Courts of Appeals, however, have broken ranks recently with their sister Circuits. They have concluded that a district-court determination of state law is subject to plenary review by the appellate court. See Craig v. Lake Asbestos of Quebec, Ltd., 843 F. 2d 145, 148 (CA3 1988), and In re McLinn, 739 F. 2d 1395 (CA9 1984) (en banc, with a divided vote). We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict. 497 U. S. 1023 (1990). II We conclude that a court of appeals should review de novo a district court’s determination of state law. As a general matter, of course, the courts of appeals are vested with plenary appellate authority over final decisions of district courts. See 28 U. S. C. § 1291. The obligation of responsible appellate jurisdiction implies the requisite authority to review independently a lower court’s determinations. Independent appellate review of legal issues best serves the dual goals of doctrinal coherence and economy of judicial administration. District judges preside alone over fast-paced trials: Of necessity they devote much of their energy and resources to hearing witnesses and reviewing evidence. Similarly, the logistical burdens of trial advocacy limit the extent to which trial counsel is able to supplement the district judge’s legal research with memoranda and briefs. Thus, trial judges often must resolve complicated legal questions without benefit of “extended reflection [or] extensive information.” Coenen, To Defer or Not to Defer: a Study of Federal Circuit Court Deference to District Court Rulings on State Law, 73 Minn. L. Rev. 899, 923 (1989). Courts of appeals, on the other hand, are structurally suited to the collaborative juridical process that promotes de-cisional accuracy. With the record having been constructed below and settled for purposes of the appeal, appellate judges are able to devote their primary attention to legal issues. As questions of law become the focus of appellate review, it can be expected that the parties’ briefs will be refined to bring to bear on the legal issues more information and more comprehensive analysis than was provided for the district judge. Perhaps most important, courts of appeals employ multijudge panels, see 28 U. S. C. §§ 46(b) and (e), that permit reflective dialogue and collective judgment. Over 30 years ago, Justice Frankfurter accurately observed: “Without adequate study there cannot be adequate reflection; without adequate reflection there cannot be adequate discussion; without adequate discussion there cannot be that fruitful interchange of minds which is indispensable to thoughtful, unhurried decision and its formulation in learned and impressive opinions.” Dick v. New York Life Ins. Co., 359 U. S. 437, 458-459 (1959) (dissenting opinion). Independent appellate review necessarily entails a careful consideration of the district court’s legal analysis, and an efficient and sensitive appellate court at least will naturally consider this analysis in undertaking its review. Petitioner readily acknowledges the importance of a district court’s reasoning to the appellate court’s review. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 11,19-22. Any expertise possessed by the district court will inform the structure and content of its conclusions of law and thereby become evident to the reviewing court. If the court of appeals finds that the district court’s analytical sophistication and research have exhausted the state-law inquiry, little more need be said in the appellate opinion. Independent review, however, does not admit of unreflective reliance on a lower court’s inarticulable intuitions. Thus, an appropriately respectful application of de novo review should encourage a district court to explicate with care the basis for its legal conclusions. See Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 52(a) (requiring the district court to “state separately its conclusions of law”). Those circumstances in which Congress or this Court has articulated a standard of deference for appellate review of district-court determinations reflect an accommodation of the respective institutional advantages of trial and appellate courts. In deference to the unchallenged superiority of the district court’s factfinding ability, Rule 52(a) commands that a trial court’s findings of fact “shall not be set aside unless clearly erroneous, and due regard shall be given to the opportunity of the trial court to judge of the credibility of the witnesses.” In addition, it is “especially common” for issues involving supervision of litigation to be reviewed for abuse of discretion. See Pierce v. Underwood, 487 U. S. 552, 558, n. 1 (1988). Finally, we have held that deferential review of mixed questions of law and fact is warranted when it appears that the district court is “better positioned” than the appellate court to decide the issue in question or that probing appellate scrutiny will not contribute to the clarity of legal doctrine. Miller v. Fenton, 474 U. S. 104, 114 (1985); see also Cooter & Gell v. Hartmarx Corp., 496 U. S. 384, 402 (1990) (“[T]he district court is better situated than the court of appeals to marshal the pertinent facts and apply the fact-dependent legal standard mandated by Rule 11”); Pierce, 487 U. S., at 562 (“[T]he question whether the Government’s litigating position has been ‘substantially justified’ is . . . a multifarious and novel question, little susceptible, for the time being at least, of useful generalization”). Nothing about the exercise of diversity jurisdiction alters these functional components of decisionmaking or otherwise warrants departure from a rule of independent appellate review. Actually, appellate deference to the district court’s determination of state law is inconsistent with the principles underlying this Court’s decision in Erie. The twin aims of the Erie doctrine — “discouragement of forum-shopping and avoidance of inequitable administration of the laws,” Hanna v. Plumer, 380 U. S. 460, 468 (1965)—are components of the goal of doctrinal coherence advanced by independent appellate review. As respondent has conceded, deferential appellate review invites divergent development of state law among the federal trial courts even within a single State. Tr. of Oral Arg. 34-36. Moreover, by denying a litigant access to meaningful review of state-law claims, appellate courts that defer to the district courts’ state-law determinations create a dual system of enforcement of state-created rights, in which the substantive rule applied to a dispute may depend on the choice of forum. Cf. Erie, 304 U. S., at 74-75 (“[The rule of Swift v. Tyson, 16 Pet. 1 (1842)] made rights enjoyed under the unwritten ‘general law’ vary according to whether enforcement was sought in the state or in the federal court”). Neither of these results, unavoidable in the absence of independent appellate review, can be reconciled with the commands of Erie. Although some might say that this Court has not spoken with a uniformly clear voice on the issue of deference to a district judge’s determination of state law, a careful consideration of our cases makes apparent the duty of appellate courts to provide meaningful review of such a determination. In a series of cases decided soon after Erie, the Court noted that the appellate courts had applied general federal law instead of the law of the respective States, and remanded to the Courts of Appeals for consideration of the applicable principles of state law. See, e. g., New York Life Ins. Co. v. Jackson, 304 U. S. 261 (1938), and Rosenthal v. New York Life Ins. Co., 304 U. S. 263 (1938). It is true that in Bernhardt v. Polygraphic Co. of America, 350 U. S. 198 (1956), this Court remanded the case to the District Court for application of state law. The Court noted, however, that the law of the State was firmly settled, and emphasized: “Were the question in doubt or deserving further canvass, we would of course remand the case to the Court of Appeals to pass on this question of [state] law.” Id., at 205. III In urging this Court to adopt the deferential standard embraced by the majority of the Courts of Appeals, respondent offers two arguments. First, respondent suggests that the appellate courts professing adherence to the rule of deference actually are reviewing de novo the district-court determinations of state law. Second, respondent presses the familiar contention that district judges are better arbiters of unsettled state law because they have exposure to the judicial system of the State in which they sit. We reject each of these arguments. A Respondent primarily contends that the Courts of Appeals that claim to accord special consideration to the District Court’s state-law expertise actually undertake plenary review of a determination of state law. According to respondent, this is simply de novo review “cloth[ed] in ‘deferential’ robes.” Brief for Respondent 15. In support of this contention, respondent refers to several decisions in which the appellate court has announced that it is bound to review deferentially a district court’s determination of state law, yet nonetheless has found that determination to constitute reversible error. Afram Export Corp. v. Metallurgiki Halyps, S. A., 772 F. 2d 1358, 1370 (CA7 1985); Norton v. St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins. Co., 902 F. 2d 1355 (CA8 1990). Respondent also relies on eases in which the Courts of Appeals, while articulating a rule of deference, acknowledge their obligation to scrutinize closely the District Court’s legal conclusions. See Foster v. National Union Fire Ins. Co. of Pittsburgh, 902 F. 2d 1316 (CA8 1990). See also In re McLinn, 739 F. 2d, at 1405 (dissenting opinion) (“The majority overreacts to a problem that is basically one of terminology”). We decline the invitation to assume that courts of appeals craft their opinions disingenuously. The fact that an appellate court overturns an erroneous determination of state law in no way indicates that the appellate court is not applying the rule of deference articulated in the opinion. The cases cited by respondent confirm this. In Foster, for example, the Court of Appeals articulated a rule of deference, yet cautioned: “We have not, however, failed to closely examine the matter ourselves.” 902 F. 2d, at 1318. Respondent would have us interpret this caveat as an acknowledgment of the appellate court’s obligation to review the state-law question de novo. See Brief for Respondent 17-18, and n. 23. The Court of Appeals, however, expressly acknowledged that it would not reverse the District Court’s determination “unless its analysis is ‘fundamentally deficient . . . , without a reasonable basis, or contrary to a reported state-court opinion.’” Foster, 902 F. 2d, at 1318 (citations omitted). After reviewing the applicable law in some detail, the Court of Appeals concluded: “[T]he district court’s interpretation of the applicable Arkansas law is certainly not deficient in analysis and is reasonable.” Id., at 1320. This neither purports to be, nor is, a conclusion following from de novo review. Nor does it suffice to recognize that little substantive difference may separate the form of deference articulated and applied by the several Courts of Appeals and the independent appellate review urged by petitioner. Respondent argues that the subtle differences between these standards are insufficient to warrant intrusion into the manner in which appellate courts review state-law determinations. A variation of this argument forms the framework upon which the dissent in McLinn rests. See 739 F. 2d, at 1404 (“By giving ‘substantial deference,’ or. . . ‘great weight,’ to the decisions of the district courts, appellate courts do not suspend their own thought processes”). As a practical matter, respondent and the dissent in McLinn frequently may be correct. We do not doubt that in many cases the application of a rule of deference in lieu of independent review will not affect the outcome of an appeal. In many diversity cases the controlling issues of state law will have been squarely resolved by the state courts, and a district court’s adherence to the settled rule will be indisputably correct. See, e. g., Bernhardt, 350 U. S., at 204-205. In a case where the controlling question of state law remains unsettled, it is not unreasonable to assume that the considered judgment of the court of appeals frequently will coincide with the reasoned determination of the district court. Where the state-law determinations of the two courts diverge, the choice between these standards of review is of no significance, if the appellate court concludes that the district court was clearly wrong. Thus, the mandate of independent review will alter the appellate outcome only in those few cases where the appellate court would resolve an unsettled issue of state law differently from the district court’s resolution, but cannot conclude that the district court’s determination constitutes clear error. See, e. g., In re McLinn, 739 F. 2d, at 1397 (“The panel indicated that if the question of law were reviewed under the deferential standard that we have applied in the past, which permits reversal only for clear error, then they would affirm; but if they were to review the determination under an independent de novo standard, they would reverse”). These few instances, however, make firm our conviction that the difference between a rule of deference and the duty to exercise independent review is “much more than a mere matter of degree.” Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union of United States, Inc., 466 U. S. 485, 501 (1984). When de novo review is compelled, no form of appellate deference is acceptable. B Respondent and her amicus also argue that de novo review is inappropriate because, as a general matter, a district judge is better positioned to determine an issue of state law than are the judges on the court of appeals. This superior capacity derives, it is said, from the regularity with which a district judge tries a diversity case governed by the law of the forum State, and from the extensive experience that the district judge generally has had as practitioner or judge in the forum State. See Brief for Respondent 7-10; Brief for Ford Motor Co. as Amicus Curiae 9-11. We are unpersuaded. As an initial matter, this argument seems to us to be founded fatally on overbroad generalizations. Moreover, and more important, the proposition that a district judge is better able to “intuit” the answer to an unsettled question of state law is foreclosed by our holding in Erie. The very essence of the Erie doctrine is that the bases of state law are presumed to be communicable by the parties to a federal judge no less than to a state judge. Almost 35 years ago, Professor Kurland stated: “Certainly, if the law is not a brooding omnipresence in the sky over the United States, neither is it a brooding omnipresence in the sky of Vermont, or New York or California.” Kurland, Mr. Justice Frankfurter, the Supreme Court and the Erie Doctrine in Diversity Cases, 67 Yale L. J. 187, 217 (1957). See Southern Pacific Co., 244 U. S., at 222 (Holmes, J., dissenting) (“The common law is not a brooding omnipresence in the sky but the articulate voice of some sovereign or quasi-sovereign that can be identified”). Similarly, the bases of state law are as equally communicable to the appellate judges as they are to the district judge. To the extent that the available state law on a controlling issue is so unsettled as to admit of no reasoned divination, we can see no sense in which a district judge’s prior exposure or nonexposure to the state judiciary can be said to facilitate the rule of reason. > The obligation of responsible appellate review and the principles of a cooperative judicial federalism underlying Erie require that courts of appeals review the state-law determinations of district courts de novo. The Court of Appeals in this case therefore erred in deferring to the local expertise of the District Court. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. The amended complaint named the college and five faculty members as defendants and alleged discrimination in violation of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, 87 Stat. 355, as amended, 29 U. S. C. § 701 et seq.; denial of due process and unconstitutional interference with her liberty and property interests; negligent and intentional infliction of emotional distress; invasion of privacy; wrongful dismissal; violation of express and implied covenants of good faith and fair dealing; and breach of contract. The District Court entered summary judgment for the defendants except as to the three state-law claims for intentional infliction of emotional distress, invasion of privacy, and breach of contract. 649 F. Supp. 391, 407 (1986). It determined that it need not consider “the plausibility of federal question jurisdiction.” Id., at 393, n. 1. See Coenen, To Defer or Not to Defer: A Study of Federal Circuit Court Deference to District Court Rulings on State Law, 73 Minn. L. Rev. 899 (1989), and the many cases cited therein. See also Note, What is the Proper Standard for Reviewing a District Court’s Interpretation of State Substantive Law?, 54 U. Cin. L. Rev. 215 (1985), and Note, A Nondeferen-tial Standard for Appellate Review of State Law Decisions by Federal District Courts, 42 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 1311 (1985). See, however, Woods, The Erie Enigma: Appellate Review of Conclusions of Law, 26 Ariz. L. Rev. 755 (1984), and Note, The Law/Fact Distinction and Unsettled State Law in the Federal Courts, 64 Texas L. Rev. 157 (1985). The dissent inexplicably relies on several cases in which this Court declined to review de novo questions of state law to support the dissent’s contention that it is “quite natural” for appellate judges to rely on the “experience” of district judges. See post, at 241-242. We are not persuaded that the manner in which this Court chooses to expend its limited resources in the exercise of its discretionary jurisdiction has any relevance to the obligation of courts of appeals to review de novo those legal issues properly before them. Of course, a question of state law usually can be resolved definitively if the litigation is instituted in state court and is not finally removed to federal court, or if a certification procedure is available and is successfully utilized. Rhode Island provides a certification procedure. See Rhode Island Supreme Court Rule 6 (1989). See, however, Lehman Brothers v. Schein, 416 U. S. 386, 390-391 (1974) (“We do not suggest that where there is doubt as to local law and where the certification procedure is available, resort to it is obligatory. It does, of course, in the long run save time, energy, and resources and helps build a cooperative judicial federalism. Its use in a given case rests in the sound discretion of the federal court”) (footnote omitted). “As a general proposition, a federal court judge who sits in a particular state, especially one who has practiced before its courts, may be better able to resolve complex questions as to the law of that state than is a federal judge who has no such personal acquaintance with the law of the state. For this reason federal appellate courts frequently have voiced reluctance to substitute their own view of the state law for that of the district judge. As a matter of judicial administration, this seems defensible. But there is some tendency to go beyond that proposition and to say that if the trial court has reached a permissible conclusion under state law, the appellate court cannot reverse even if it thinks the state law to be otherwise, thereby treating the question of state law much as if it were a question of fact. The determination of state law, however, is a legal question, and although the considered decision of a district judge experienced in the law of a state naturally commands the respect of an appellate court, a party is entitled to meaningful review of that decision just as he is of any other legal question in the case, and just as he would have been if the case had been tried in a state court.” 19 C. Wright, A. Miller, & E. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure § 4507, pp. 106-110 (1982) (footnotes omitted). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice O’Connor delivered the opinion of the Court. Under 28 U. S. C. § 2254(d), state-court findings of fact “shall be presumed to be correct” in a federal habeas corpus proceeding unless one of eight enumerated exceptions applies. The question presented is whether the voluntariness of a confession is an issue of fact entitled to the § 2254(d) presumption. I On the morning of August 13, 1973, a stranger approached the rural New Jersey home of 17-year-old Deborah Margolin and told her that a heifer was loose at the foot of her driveway. She set out alone to investigate and never returned. Later that day, her mutilated body was found in a nearby stream. The victim’s brothers were able to provide a description of the stranger’s car and clothing. Based on this information, officers of the New Jersey State Police tentatively identified petitioner and, later that evening, found him at his place of employment. Petitioner responded to the officers’ preliminary inquiries and agreed to return to the police barracks for further questioning. Approximately two hours later, Detective Charles Boyce led petitioner to an interrogation room and informed him of his Mimnda rights. Petitioner inquired about the scope of his privilege to remain silent and then executed a written waiver, the validity of which is not at issue. A 58 minute long interrogation session ensued. During the course of the interview, Detective Boyce told petitioner that Ms. Margolin had just died. That statement, which Boyce knew to be untrue, supported another officer’s earlier, and equally false, suggestion that the victim was still alive and could identify her attacker. App. 16-17; Record 109 and 305. Detective Boyce also told petitioner that he had been identified at the Margolin home earlier in the day. In fact, Ms. Margolin’s brothers had only provided a general description of the stranger’s car and clothing. Finally, Detective Boyce indicated that blood stains had been found on petitioner’s front stoop. No such evidence was introduced at trial, and respondents do not now contend that it ever in fact existed. Throughout the interview, Detective Boyce presented himself as sympathetic to petitioner’s plight. On several occasions, he stated that he did not consider petitioner to be a criminal because the perpetrator of the deed had a “mental problem” and needed medical help rather than punishment. App. 19. Eventually, petitioner fully confessed to the crime. After doing so, he lapsed into what Detective Boyce described as a “state of shock.” Record 84-85. Repeated efforts to rouse him from his stupor failed, and the police summoned an ambulance to transport him to the hospital. The trial court rejected petitioner’s motion to suppress the confession, and the jury found petitioner guilty of murder in the first degree. The Superior Court Appellate Division reversed, finding as a matter of law that the confession was the result of “intense and mind bending psychological compulsion” and therefore was impermissible under the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of due process. App. 53. Over three dissents, the Supreme Court of New Jersey reversed again. State v. Miller, 76 N. J. 392, 388 A. 2d 218 (1978). After examining the “totality of all the surrounding circumstances,” including petitioner’s educational level, age, and awareness of his Miranda rights, the court found that the interrogation “did not exceed proper bounds,” and that the resulting confession, being voluntary, had been properly admitted into evidence. Id., at 402-405, 388 A. 2d, at 223-224. Petitioner then sought a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey. That court dismissed the application without an evidentiary hearing. A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed. 741 F. 2d 1456 (1984). Relying on Circuit precedent, the court held that the voluntariness of a confession is a “factual issue” within the meaning of 28 U. S. C. § 2254(d). Accordingly, federal review of the New Jersey Supreme Court’s determination that petitioner’s confession was voluntary was “limited to whether the state court applied the proper legal test, and whether [its] factual conclusions . . . [were] supported on the record as a whole.” 741 F. 2d, at 1462. Under this standard, the court concluded, the District Court’s denial of the petition for habeas relief was proper. Because the Courts of Appeals have reached differing conclusions on whether state-court voluntariness determinations are entitled to the § 2254(d) presumption of correctness, and because of the issue’s importance to the administration of criminal justice, we granted certiorari. 471 U. S. 1003 (1985). Compare Brantley v. McKaskle, 122 F. 2d 187, 188 (CA5 1984) “([V]oluntariness of a confession is a mixed question of law and fact”), with Alexander v. Smith, 582 F. 2d 212, 217 (CA2) (state-court voluntariness determination entitled to § 2254(d) presumption), cert. denied, 439 U. S. 990 (1978). We now reverse and remand. I — i HH This Court has long held that certain interrogation techniques, either in isolation or as applied to the unique characteristics of a particular suspect, are so offensive to a civilized system of justice that they must be condemned under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Brown v. Mississippi, 297 U. S. 278 (1936), was the wellspring of this notion, now deeply embedded in our criminal law. Faced with statements extracted by beatings and other forms of physical and psychological torture, the Court held that confessions procured by means “revolting to the sense of justice” could not be used to secure a conviction. Id., at 286. On numerous subsequent occasions the Court has set aside convictions secured through the admission of an improperly obtained confession. See, e. g., Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U. S. 385 (1978); Haynes v. Washington, 373 U. S. 503 (1963); Ashcraft v. Tennessee, 322 U. S. 143 (1944); Chambers v. Florida, 309 U. S. 227, 235-238 (1940). Although these decisions framed the legal inquiry in a variety of different ways, usually through the “convenient shorthand” of asking whether the confession was “involuntary,” Blackburn v. Alabama, 361 U. S. 199, 207 (1960), the Court’s analysis has consistently been animated by the view that “ours is an accu-satorial and not an inquisitorial system,” Rogers v. Richmond, 365 U. S. 534, 541 (1961), and that, accordingly, tactics for eliciting inculpatory statements must fall within the broad constitutional boundaries imposed by the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of fundamental fairness. Indeed, even after holding that the Fifth Amendment privilege against compulsory self-incrimination applies in the context of custodial interrogations, Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436, 478 (1966), and is binding on the States, Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U. S. 1, 6 (1964), the Court has continued to measure confessions against the requirements of due process. See, e. g., Mincey v. Arizona, supra, at 402; Beecher v. Alabama, 389 U. S. 35, 38 (1967) (per curiam). Without exception, the Court’s confession cases hold that the ultimate issue of “voluntariness” is a legal question requiring independent federal determination. See, e. g., Haynes v. Washington, supra, at 515-516; Ashcraft v. Tennessee, supra, at 147-148. As recently as 1978, the Court reaffirmed that it was “not bound by” a state-court volun-tariness finding and reiterated its historic “duty to make an independent evaluation of the record.” Mincey v. Arizona, supra, at 398. That duty, as Mincey makes explicit, is not limited to instances in which the claim is that the police conduct was “inherently coercive.” Ashcraft v. Tennessee, supra, at 154. It applies equally when the interrogation techniques were improper only because, in the particular circumstances of the case, the confession is unlikely to have been the product of a free and rational will. See Mincey v. Arizona, supra, at 401. Because the ultimate issue in both categories of cases is the same — whether the State has obtained the confession in a manner that comports with due process — the decisions leave no doubt that our independent obligation to decide the constitutional question is identical. Mincey, Ashcraft, and many of the early decisions applying the independent-determination rule in confession cases came to the Court on direct appeal from state-court judgments. The rule, however, is no less firmly established in cases coming to the federal system on application for a writ of habeas corpus. Davis v. North Carolina, 384 U. S. 737 (1966), resolved the issue with unmistakable clarity. There, the State had admitted into evidence a confession elicited from an impoverished, mentally deficient suspect who had been held incommunicado for 16 days with barely adequate nourishment. Expressly relying on the direct-appeal cases, the Court stated unequivocally that state-court determinations concerning the ultimate question of the voluntariness of a confession are not binding in a federal habeas corpus proceeding. Id., at 741-742. Davis was decided four months before 28 U. S. C. § 2254(d) was signed into law. Act of Nov. 2, 1966, Pub. L. 89-711, 80 Stat. 1105. Respondent contends that, whatever may have been the ease prior to 1966, the enactment of § 2254(d) in that year fundamentally altered the nature of federal habeas review of state voluntariness findings. That suggestion finds no support in this Court’s decisions. See, e. g., Boulden v. Holman, 394 U. S. 478, 480 (1969) (finding confession voluntary after making “an independent study of the entire record”); Frazier v. Cupp, 394 U. S. 731, 739 (1969) (examining “totality of the circumstances” to assess admissibility of confession). More importantly, the history of § 2254(d) undermines any argument that Congress intended that the ultimate question of the admissibility of a confession be treated a “factual issue” within the meaning of that provision. The 1966 amendment was an almost verbatim codification of the standards delineated in Townsend v. Sain, 372 U. S. 293 (1963), for determining when a district court must hold an evidentiary hearing before acting on a ha-beas petition. When a hearing is not obligatory, Townsend held, the federal court “ordinarily should . . . accept the facts as found” in the state proceeding. Id., at 318. Congress elevated that exhortation into a mandatory presumption of correctness. But there is absolutely no indication that it intended to alter Townsend’s understanding that the “ultimate constitutional question” of the admissibility of a confession was a “mixed questio[n] of fact and law” subject to plenary federal review. Id., at 309, and n. 6. In short, an unbroken line of cases, coming to this Court both on direct appeal and on review of applications to lower federal courts for a writ of habeas corpus, forecloses the Court of Appeals’ conclusion that the “voluntariness” of a confession merits something less than independent federal consideration. To be sure, subsidiary factual questions, such as whether a drug has the properties of a truth serum, id., at 306, or whether in fact the police engaged in the intimidation tactics alleged by the defendant, LaVallee v. Delle Rose, 410 U. S. 690, 693-695 (1973) (per curiam), are entitled to the § 2254(d) presumption. And the federal habeas court, should, of course, give great weight to the considered conclusions of a coequal state judiciary. Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U. S. 568, 605 (1961) (opinion of Frankfurter, J.). But, as we now reaffirm, the ultimate question whether, under the totality of the circumstances, the challenged confession was obtained in a manner compatible with the requirements of the Constitution is a matter for independent federal determination. h-H HH The Court of Appeals recognized that treating the volun-tariness of a confession as an issue of fact was difficult to square with “fifty years of caselaw” in this Court. 741F. 2d, at 1462. It believed, however, that this substantial body of contrary precedent was not controlling in light of our more recent decisions addressing the scope of the § 2254(d) presumption of correctness. See Wainwright v. Witt, 469 U. S. 412, 429 (1985) (trial court’s determination that a prospective juror in a capital case was properly excluded for cause entitled to presumption); Patton v. Yount, 467 U. S. 1025 (1984) (impartiality of an individual juror); Rushen v. Spain, 464 U. S. 114 (1983) (per curiam) (effect of ex parte communication on impartiality of individual juror); Maggio v. Fulford, 462 U. S. 111 (1983) (per curiam) (competency to stand trial); Marshall v. Lonberger, 459 U. S. 422, 431-437 (1983) (determination that defendant received and understood sufficient notice of charges against him to render guilty plea voluntary). We acknowledge that the Court has not charted an entirely clear course in this area. We reject, however, the Court of Appeals’ conclusion that these case-specific holdings tacitly overturned the longstanding rule that the voluntariness of a confession is a matter for independent federal determination. In the § 2254(d) context, as elsewhere, the appropriate methodology for distinguishing questions of fact from questions of law has been, to say the least, elusive. See Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union of United States, Inc., 466 U. S. 485 (1984); Baumgartner v. United States, 322 U. S. 665, 671 (1944). A few principles, however, are by now well established. For example, that an issue involves an inquiry into state of mind is not at all inconsistent with treating it as a question of fact. See, e. g., Maggio v. Fulford, supra. Equally clearly, an issue does not lose its factual character merely because its resolution is dispositive of the ultimate constitutional question. See Dayton Board of Education v. Brinkman, 443 U. S. 526, 534 (1979) (finding of intent to discriminate subject to “clearly erroneous” standard of review). But beyond these elemental propositions, negative in form, the Court has yet to arrive at “a rule or principle that will unerringly distinguish a factual finding from a legal conclusion.” Pullman-Standard v. Swint, 456 U. S. 273, 288 (1982). Perhaps much of the difficulty in this area stems from the practical truth that the decision to label an issue a “question of law,” a “question of fact,” or a “mixed question of law and fact” is sometimes as much a matter of allocation as it is of analysis. See Monaghan, Constitutional Fact Review, 85 Colum. L. Rev. 229, 237 (1985). At least in those instances in which Congress has not spoken and in which the issue falls somewhere between a pristine legal standard and a simple historical fact, the fact/law distinction at times has turned on a determination that, as a matter of the sound administration of justice, one judicial actor is better positioned than another to decide the issue in question. Where, for example, as with proof of actual malice in First Amendment libel cases, the relevant legal principle can be given meaning only through its application to the particular circumstances of a case, the Court has been reluctant to give the trier of fact’s conclusions presumptive force and, in so doing, strip a federal appellate court of its primary function as an expositor of law. See Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union of United States, Inc., 466 U. S., at 503. Similarly, on rare occasions in years past the Court has justified independent federal or appellate review as a means of compensating for “perceived shortcomings of the trier of fact by way of bias or some other factor. ...” Id., at 518 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting). See, e. g., Haynes v. Washington, 373 U. S., at 516; Watts v. Indiana, 338 U. S. 49, 52 (1949) (opinion of Frankfurter, J.). Cf. Norris v. Alabama, 294 U. S. 587 (1935). In contrast, other considerations often suggest the appropriateness of resolving close questions concerning the status of an issue as one of “law” or “fact” in favor of extending deference to the trial court. When, for example, the issue involves the credibility of witnesses and therefore turns largely on an evaluation of demeanor, there are compelling and familiar justifications for leaving the process of applying law to fact to the trial court and according its determinations presumptive weight. Patton v. Yount, supra, and Wainwright v. Witt, supra, are illustrative. There the Court stressed that the state trial judge is in a position to assess juror bias that is far superior to that of federal judges reviewing an application for a writ of habeas corpus. Principally for that reason, the decisions held, juror bias merits treatment as a “factual issue” within the meaning of § 2254(d) notwithstanding the intimate connection between such determinations and the constitutional guarantee of an impartial jury. For several reasons we think that it would be inappropriate to abandon the Court’s longstanding position that the ultimate question of the admissibility of a confession merits treatment as a legal inquiry requiring plenary federal review. We note at the outset that we do not write on a clean slate. “Very weighty considerations underlie the principle that courts should not lightly overrule past decisions.” Moragne v. States Marine Lines, Inc., 398 U. S. 375, 403 (1970). Thus, even assuming that contemporary considerations supported respondent’s construction of the statute, nearly a half century of unwavering precedent weighs heavily against any suggestion that we now discard the settled rule in this area. Moreover, as previously noted, Congress patterned § 2254(d) after Townsend v. Sain, 372 U. S. 293 (1963), a case that clearly assumed that the voluntariness of a confession was an issue for independent federal determination. Thus, not only are stare decisis concerns compelling, but, unlike in Marshall v. Lonberger, 459 U. S. 422 (1983), Rushen v. Spain, 464 U. S. 114 (1983), or any of our other recent § 2254(d) cases, in the confession context we have the benefit of some congressional guidance in resolving whether the disputed issue falls outside of the scope of the § 2254(d) presumption. Although the history of that provision is not without its ambiguities, it is certainly clear enough to tip the scales in favor of treating the voluntariness of a confession as beyond the reach of § 2254(d). In addition to considerations of stare decisis and congressional intent, the nature of the inquiry itself lends support to the conclusion that “voluntariness” is a legal question meriting independent consideration in a federal habeas corpus proceeding. Although sometimes framed as an issue of “psychological fact,” Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U. S., at 603, the dispositive question of the voluntariness of a confession has always had a uniquely legal dimension. It is telling that in confession cases coming from the States, this Court has consistently looked to the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to test admissibility. See, e. g., Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U. S., at 402. The locus of the right is significant because it reflects the Court’s consistently held view that the admissibility of a confession turns as much on whether the techniques for extracting the statements, as applied to this suspect, are compatible with a system that presumes innocence and assures that a conviction will not be secured by inquisitorial means as on whether the defendant’s will was in fact overborne. See, e. g., Gallegos v. Colorado, 370 U. S. 49, 51 (1962) (suggesting that “a compound of two influences” requires that some confessions be condemned); Culombe v. Connecticut, supra, at 605 (describing voluntariness as an “amphibian”). This hybrid quality of the volun-tariness inquiry, subsuming, as it does, a “complex of values,” Blackburn v. Alabama, 361 U. S., at 207, itself militates against treating the question as one of simple historical fact. Putting to one side whether “voluntariness” is analytically more akin to a fact or a legal conclusion, the practical considerations that have led us to find other issues within the scope of the § 2254(d) presumption are absent in the confession context. First, unlike the impartiality of a given juror, Patton v. Yount, 467 U. S., at 1036, or competency to stand trial, Maggio v. Fulford, 462 U. S., at 117, assessments of credibility and demeanor are not crucial to the proper resolution of the ultimate issue of “voluntariness.” Of course, subsidiary-questions, such as the length and circumstances of the interrogation, the defendant’s prior experience with the legal process, and familiarity with the Miranda warnings, often require the resolution of conflicting testimony of police and defendant. The law is therefore clear that state-court findings on such matters are conclusive on the habeas court if fairly supported in the record and if the other circumstances enumerated in § 2254(d) are inapplicable. But once such underlying factual issues have been resolved, and the moment comes for determining whether, under the totality of the circumstances, the confession was obtained in a manner consistent with the Constitution, the state-court judge is not in an appreciably better position than the federal habeas court to make that determination. Second, the allocution of a guilty plea, Marshall v. Lonberger, supra, the adjudication of competency to stand trial, Maggio v. Fulford, supra, and the determination of juror bias, Wainwright v. Witt, 469 U. S. 412 (1985), take place in open court on a full record. In marked contrast, the critical events surrounding the taking of a confession almost invariably occur in a secret and inherently more coercive environment. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S., at 458. These circumstances, standing alone, cannot be dispositive of the question whether a particular issue falls within the reach of § 2254(d). However, together with the inevitable and understandable reluctance to exclude an otherwise reliable admission of guilt, Jackson v. Denno, 378 U. S. 368, 381 (1964), they elevate the risk that erroneous resolution of the voluntariness question might inadvertently frustrate the protection of the federal right. See Haynes v. Washington, 373 U. S., at 516; Ward v. Texas, 316 U. S. 547 (1942). We reiterate our confidence that state judges, no less than their federal counterparts, -will properly discharge their duty to protect the constitutional rights of criminal defendants. We note only that in the confession context, independent federal review has traditionally played an important parallel role in protecting the rights at stake when the prosecution secures a conviction through the defendant’s own admissions. r-H <1 After defending at length its conclusion that the voluntariness of a confession was entitled to the § 2254(d) presumption, and after carefully analyzing the petitioner’s confession under that standard, the Court of Appeals suggested in a brief footnote that it “would reach the same result” even were it to give the issue plenary consideration. 741 F. 2d, at 1467, n. 21. Inasmuch as it is not clear from this language that the court did in fact independently evaluate the admissibility of the confession, and because, in any event, we think that the case warrants fuller analysis under the appropriate standard, we reverse the decision below and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. In pertinent part, 28 U. S. C. § 2254(d) provides: “In any proceeding instituted in a Federal Court by an application for a writ of habeas corpus by a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court, a determination after a hearing on the merits of a factual issue, made by a State court of competent jurisdiction . . . shall be presumed to be correct, unless . . . “(8) . . . the Federal court. . . concludes that such factual determination is not supported by the record as a whole.” The following exchange is representative of the tone of the interrogation. “Boyce: ‘Frank, look, you want help, don’t you, Frank?’ “Miller: ‘Yes, uh huh, yes, but yet I’m, I’m not going to admit to something that, that I wasn’t involved in.’ “Boyce: “We don’t want you to, all I want you to do is talk to me, that’s all. I’m not talking about admitting to anything Frank. I want you to talk to me. I want you to tell me what you think. I want you to tell me how you think about this, what you think about this?’ “Miller: ‘What I think about it?’ “Boyce: ‘Yeah.’ “Miller: T think whoever did it really needs help.’ “Boyce: ‘And that’s what I think and that’s what I know. They don’t, they don’t need punishment, right? Like you said, they need help.’ “Miller: ‘Right.’ “Boyce: ‘Now, don’t you think it’s better if someone knows that he or she has a mental problem to come forward with it and say, look, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve done these acts, I’m responsible for this, but I want to be helped, I couldn’t help myself, I had no control of myself and if I’m examined properly you’ll find out that’s the case.’ “ ‘Okay. [LJisten Frank, [i]f I promise to, you know, do all I can with the psychiatrist and everything, and we get the proper help for you . . . will you talk to me about it.’ “Miller: T can’t talk to you about something I’m not. . .’ “Boyce: ‘Alright, listen Frank, alright, honest. I know, I know what’s going on inside you, Frank. I want to help you, you know, between us right now. . . . You’ve got to talk to me about it. This is the only way we’ll be able to work it out. I mean, you know, listen, I want to help you, because you are in my mind, you are not responsible. You are not responsible, Frank. Frank, what’s the matter?’ “Miller: T feel bad.’” App. 17-22. The Court of Appeals relied on an earlier decision of that court holding that the “voluntariness” of a waiver of Miranda rights was entitled to the § 2254(d) presumption. Patterson v. Cuyler, 729 F. 2d 925, 930 (1984). The present case presents no occasion for us to address the question whether federal habeas courts must accord the statutory presumption of correctness to state-court findings concerning the validity of a waiver. The voluntariness rubric has been variously condemned as “useless,” Paulson, The Fourteenth Amendment and the Third Degree, 6 Stan. L. Rev. 411, 430 (1954); “perplexing,” Grano, Voluntariness, Free Will, and the Law of Confessions, 65 Va. L. Rev. 859, 863 (1979); and “legal ‘doubletalk,’ ” A. Beisel, Control Over Illegal Enforcement of the Criminal Law: Role of the Supreme Court 48 (1955). See generally Y. Kamisar, Police Interrogation and Confessions 1-25 (1980). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. A now-repealed statute, 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d), provided, inter alia, that certain narcotics offenders sentenced to mandatory minimum prison terms should be ineligible for parole under the general parole statute, 18 TJ. S. C. § 4202. Section 7237 (d) was repealed, effective May 1, 1971, 84 Stat. 1292, by the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, which makes parole under § 4202 available for almost all narcotics offenders. The question for decision in this case is whether the parole ineligibility provision of 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d) survives the repealer, so that a narcotics offender who has served more than one-third of a sentence imposed before May 1, 1971, remains ineligible for parole consideration under 18 U. S. C. § 4202. Respondent was convicted of narcotics offenses and, as a second offender, was sentenced before May 1, 1971, to concurrent terms of 10 years' imprisonment on each of two counts. 450 F. 2d 373, 374-375 (CA2 1971). On February 24,1972, respondent sought habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, claiming that, since 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d) had been repealed, he should be eligible for consideration for parole under 18 U. S. C. § 4202 when one-third of his sentence had been served. The District Court denied relief on the ground that the prohibition on parole eligibility of 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d) had been preserved by § 1103 (a) of the 1970 statute and by 1 U. S. C. § 109. 347 F. Supp. 99. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit reversed, holding that neither § 1103 (a) of the 1970 statute nor 1 U. S. C. § 109 continued the prohibition on eligibility for parole consideration in 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d). 483 F. 2d 656 (1973). We granted certiorari to resolve a conflict among the Courts of Appeals. 414 U. S. 1128 (1974). We agree with the District Court and reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals. Bradley v. United States, 410 U. S. 605, 611 (1973), expressly reserved decision of the question now before us. Bradley involved the conviction and sentencing after May 1, 1971, of offenders who committed narcotics offenses before that date. We held that sentencing is a part of the concept of “prosecution” and therefore that the provision of § 1103 (a) of the 1970 Act that “[p]ros-ecutions for any violation of law occurring [before May 1, 1971] shall not be affected” by the repeal of 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d), barred the sentencing judge from suspending the sentences of, or granting probation to, the Bradley petitioners and also barred him from making them eligible for early parole, before they had served one-third of their sentences, under 18 U. S. C. §4208 (a). Although stating in a footnote that “[t]he decision to grant parole under [18 U. S. C.] §4202 lies with the Board of Parole, not with the District Judge, and must be made long after sentence has been entered and the prosecution terminated,” we concluded that “[w]hether § 1103 (a) or the general saving statute, 1 U. S. C. § 109, limits that decision is a question we cannot consider in this case.” 410 U. S., at 611 n. 6. I We hold that § 1103 (a) bars the Board of Parole from considering respondent for parole under 18 TJ. S. C. § 4202. In concluding in Bradley that ineligibility for early parole under 18 U. S. C. § 4208 (a) was part of the “prosecution,” we reasoned that, since a District Judge's decision to make an offender eligible for early parole is made at the time of entering a judgment of conviction, the decision was part of the sentence and therefore also part of the “prosecution.” 410 U. S., at 611. Similarly, a pragmatic view of sentencing requires the conclusion that parole eligibility under 18 U. S. C. § 4202 is also determined at the time of sentence. Since, under § 4202, an offender becomes eligible for parole after serving one-third of his sentence, see n. 2, supra, parole eligibility is a function of the length of the sentence fixed by the district judge. • Although, of course, the precise time at which the offender becomes eligible for parole is not part of the sentence, as it is in the case of § 4208 (a), it is implicit in the terms of the sentence. And because it could not be seriously argued that sentencing decisions are made without regard to the period of time a defendant must spend in prison before becoming eligible for parole, or that such decisions would not be drastically affected by a substantial change in the proportion of the sentence required to be served before becoming eligible, parole eligibility can be properly viewed as being determined— and deliberately so — by the sentence of the district judge. Eligibility for parole under § 4202 is thus determined at the time of sentencing and, under the teaching of Bradley, is part of the “prosecution” saved by § 1103 (a). We therefore reject respondent’s argument that our Bradley footnote should be read as holding that, because the decision to grant parole under § 4202 is for the Board of Parole, not the trial judge, and is arrived at after the sentence has been entered and the prosecution has come to an end, the parole eligibility decision is not part of the “prosecution” for purposes of § 1103 (a). Apart from the obvious answer that the Court could not reasonably be thought to have decided in a footnote a question “on which” we said in the text, “we express no opinion,” 410 U. S., at 611, respondent’s reliance upon the footnote both proves too little and too much. It proves too little, because the fact that the Board of Parole, not the sentencing judge, finally determines whether and when an offender should be released on parole does not undercut our conclusion that the district judge, at the time of sentencing, determines when the offender will become eligible for consideration for parole and the Board’s action simply implements that determination. It proves too much, because, if — as the respondent would have it — the proper focus is upon the time at which release on parole is actually granted or denied, the parole decision, whether made under 18 U. S. C. § 4208 (a) or 18 U. S. C. § 4202, is made long after the “prosecution” terminates; for under both provisions, the Board of Parole ultimately decides whether and when the offender is to be released. But, as previously mentioned, we held in Bradley that the district judge’s decision to deny early parole under § 4208 (a) was part of the sentence, and therefore part of the “prosecution.” II We hold further that the general saving clause, 1 U. S. C. § 109, also bars the Board of Parole from considering respondent for parole. Congress enacted its first general saving provision, c. 71, 16 Stat. 432 (1871), to abolish the common-law presumption that the repeal of a criminal statute resulted in the abatement of “all prosecutions which had not reached final disposition in the highest court authorized to review them.” Bradley v. United States, 410 U. S., at 607; see Bell v. Maryland, 378 U. S. 226, 230 (1964). Common-law abatements resulted not only from unequivocal statutory repeals, but also from repeals and re-enactments with different penalties, whether the re-enacted legislation increased or decreased the penalties. See Bradley v. United States, supra, at 607-608; Lindzey v. State, 65 Miss. 542, 5 So. 99 (1888); Hartung v. People, 22 N. Y. 95 (1860); Comment, Today's Law and Yesterday’s Crime: Retroactive Application of Ameliorative Criminal Legislation, 121 U. Pa, L. Rev. 120, 121-126 (1972). To avoid such abatements — often the product of legislative inadvertence — Congress enacted 1 U. S. C. § 109, the general saving clause, which provides in pertinent part that “[t]he repeal of any statute shall not have the effect to release or extinguish any penalty, forfeiture, or liability incurred under such statute.” See n. 5, supra. The determinative question is thus whether the prohibition of 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d) against the offender’s eligibility for parole under 18 U. S. C. § 4202 is a “penalty, forfeiture, or liability” saved from release or extinguishment by 1 U. S. C. § 109. United States v. Reisinger, 128 U. S. 398 (1888), held that the saving clause’s use of the words “penalty,” “liability,” and “forfeiture” required the conclusion that the clause covered criminal statutes. Those words, the Court found, were “used by the great masters of crown law and the elementary writers as synonymous with the word 'punishment,’ in connection with crimes of the highest grade.” Id., at 402. Thus, the Court agreed with the construction of the clause by Mr. Justice Miller, as Circuit Justice, in United States v. Ulrici, 28 F. Cas. 328, 329 (No. 16,594) (CCED Mo. 1875), that those terms “were used by Congress to include all forms of punishment for crime.” See 128 U. S., at 402-403. In consequence, the saving clause has been held to bar application of ameliorative criminal sentencing laws repealing harsher ones in force at the time of the commission of an offense. See, e. g., Jones v. United States, 117 U. S. App. D. C. 169, 327 F. 2d 867 (1963); United States v. Kirby, 176 F. 2d 101 (CA2 1949); Lovely v. United States, 175 F. 2d 312 (CA4 1949). Although the general saving clause does not ordinarily preserve discarded remedies or procedures, see Hertz v. Woodman, 218 U. S. 205, 218 (1910); United States v. Obermeier, 186 F. 2d 243, 253 (CA2 1950), the legislative history of § 7237 (d) reveals that Congress meant ineligibility for parole to be treated as part of the “punishment” for the narcotics offenses for which respondent was convicted. Section 7237 (d) was enacted as part of the Narcotic Control Act of 1956. The statute embodied congressional acceptance of the approach that effective combat against the contagion of drug addiction required the imposition of severe penalties for certain narcotics offenses. Congress therefore enacted lengthy mandatory minimum sentences as a means of decreasing both drug addiction and trafficking. See, e. g., S. Rep. No. 1997, 84th Cong., 2d Sess., 5 (1956); H. R. Rep. No. 2388, 84th Cong., 2d Sess., 10 (1956). But Congress believed that longer sentences would not achieve the desired results unless the offender remained imprisoned for his full term. “In evaluating the effectiveness of the presently prescribed penalties, it must be recognized that special incentives in our penal system serve to decrease the actual time spent in a penal institution under a sentence imposed by a court. The violator is eligible for parole after serving one-third of his sentence. . . . Available data from the Bureau of Prisons, indicates that a narcotics violator actually serves an average of less than two-thirds of the sentence imposed by the court. This mitigation of sentence tends to defeat the purposes of [existing legislation] . . . .” Id., at 10-11. Accordingly, Congress expressly provided in § 7237 (d) that parole under 18 U. S. C. § 4202 would be unavailable for narcotics offenders. There are additional reasons for believing that the no-parole provision is an element of respondent’s “punishment.” First, only an unusual prisoner could be expected to think that he was not suffering a penalty when he was denied eligibility for parole. See United States v. Ross, 464 F. 2d 376, 379 (CA2 1972); United States v. De Simone, 468 F. 2d 1196, 1199 (CA2 1972). For the confined prisoner, parole — even with its legal constraints — is a long step toward regaining lost freedom. An observation made in somewhat .different context is apt: “It may be ‘legislative grace' for Congress to provide for parole but when it expressly removes all hope of parole upon conviction and sentence for certain offences, . . . this is in the nature of an additional penalty.” Durant v. United States, 410 F. 2d 689, 691 (CA5 1969). Second, a repealer of parole eligibility previously available to imprisoned offenders would clearly present the serious question under the ex post facto clause of Art. I, § 9, cl. 3, of the Constitution, of whether it imposed a “greater or more severe punishment than was prescribed by law at the time of the .. . offense,” Rooney v. North Dakota, 196 U. S. 319, 325 (1905) (emphasis added). See Love v. Fitzharris, 460 F. 2d 382 (CA9 1972); cf. Lindsey v. Washington, 301 U. S. 397 (1937); Holden v. Minnesota, 137 U. S. 483, 491-492 (1890); Colder v. Bull, 3 Dall. 386, 390 (1798); United States ex rel. Umbenhowar v. McDonnell, 11 F. Supp. 1014 (ND Ill. 1934). Thus, at least where, as in the case of respondent’s narcotics offenses, Congress has barred parole eligibility as a punitive measure, we hold that the no-parole provision of § 7237 (d) is a “penalty, forfeiture, or liability” saved by § 109. Ill Respondent emphasizes that Congress completely changed its approach to regulation of narcotics offenses in the 1970 Act, jettisoning the retributive approach of the 1956 law in favor of emphasis in the 1970 Act upon rehabilitation of the narcotics offender. He argues that, in light of this basic change, little purpose iá served by denying respondent eligibility for parole, indeed that such denial frustrates the current congressional goal of rehabilitating narcotics offenders. Undeniably this argument has force, but it is addressed to the wrong governmental branch. Punishment for federal crimes is a matter for Congress, subject to judicial veto only when the legislative judgment oversteps constitutional bounds. See Gore v. United States, 357 U. S. 386, 393 (1958); Bell v. United States, 349 U. S. 81, 82 (1955). Section 1103 (a) of the 1970 Act and 1 U. S. C. § 109 saved from repeal the bar of parole eligibility under § 7237 (d), and, however severe the consequences for respondent, Congress trespassed no constitutional limits. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is Reversed. Title 26 U. S. C. §7237 (d) (1964 ed. and Supp. V) provided: “Upon conviction— “(1) of any offense the penalty for which is provided in subsection (b) of this section, subsection (c), (h), or (i) of section 2 of the Narcotic Drugs Import and Export Act, as amended, or such Act of July 11, 1941, as amended, or “(2) of any offense the penalty for which is provided in subsection (a) of this section, if it is the offender’s second or subsequent offense, "the imposition or execution of sentence shall not be suspended, probation shall not be granted, section 4202 of title 18 of the United States Code shall not apply, and the Act of July 15, 1932 (47 Stat. 696; D. C. Code 24r-201 and following), as amended, shall not apply.” Title 18 U. S. C. § 4202 provides: “A Federal prisoner, other than a juvenile delinquent or a committed youth offender, wherever confined and serving a definite term or terms of over one hundred and eighty days, whose record shows that he has observed the rules of the institution in which he is confined, may be released on parole after serving one-third of such term or terms or after serving fifteen years of a life sentence or of a sentence of over forty-five years.” Respondent was convicted of violating 21 U. S. C. § 173 (1964 ed.) and 26 U. S. C. §§ 4701, 4703, 4704 (a), and 4771 (a) (1964 ed.). His sentences were imposed under 21 U. S. C. § 174 and 26 U. S.'C. § 7237 (a). Section 174 explicitly incorporated the provisions-' of 26 U. S. C. §7237 (d), which was directly applicable to the sentence imposed under §7237 (a). Section 1103 (a) provides: “Prosecutions for any violation of law occurring prior to the effective date of [the Act] shall not be affected by the repeals or amendments made by [it] ... or abated by reason thereof.” Title 1 U. S. C. § 109 provides in relevant part: “The repeal of any statute shall not have the effect to release or extinguish any penalty, forfeiture, or liability incurred under such statute, unless the repealing Act shall so expressly provide, and such statute shall be treated as still remaining in force for the purpose of sustaining any proper action or prosecution for the enforcement of such penalty, forfeiture, or liability.” The mandate was issued before the Circuit Justice signed a stay. The stay was treated, however, as staying all proceedings under the mandate. Respondent’s motion to dismiss the writ of certiorari as moot is therefore denied. The Courts of Appeals for the Second and Tenth Circuits have held that narcotics offenders are ineligible for parole. United States v. De Simone, 468 F. 2d 1196 (CA2 1972) (but see United States v. Huguet, 481 F. 2d 888 (CA2 1973)); Perea v. United States Board of Parole, 480 F. 2d 608 (CA10 1973). In addition to the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, in this case, the Courts of Appeals for the Fourth, Fifth, Seventh, and District of Columbia Circuits have held that narcotics offenders are eligible for parole. See Alvarado v. McLaughlin, 486 F. 2d 541 (CA4 1973); Amaya v. United States Board of Parole, 486 F. 2d 940 (CA5 1973); United States v. McGarr, 461 F. 2d 1 (CA7 1972); United States v. Marshall, 158 U. S. App. D. C. 283, 485 F. 2d 1062 (1973). Title 18 U. S. C. § 4208 (a) provides: “(a) Upon entering a judgment of conviction, the court having jurisdiction to impose sentence, when in its opinion the ends of justice arid best interests of the public require that the defendant be sentenced to imprisonment for a term exceeding one year, may (1) designate in the sentence of imprisonment imposed a minimum term at the expiration of which the prisoner shall become eligible for parole, which term may be less than, but shall not be more than one-third of the maximum sentence imposed by the court, or (2) the court may fix the maximum sentence of imprisonment to be served in which event the court may specify that the prisoner may become eligible for parole at such time as the board of parole may determine.” The statement in Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U. S. 471, 480 (1972), that “[p] aróle arises after the end of the criminal prosecution, including imposition of sentence” was addressed to the decision determining the time of release on parole as distinguished from the decision determining eligibility. Respondent argues that, since the 1970 Act contains its own saving clause, §1103 (a), that specific directive should be read to supersede the general clause § 109. But only if § 1103 (a) can be said by fair implication or expressly to conflict with § 109 would there be reason to hold that § 1103 (a) superseded § 109. See Great Northern R. Co. v. United States, 208 U. S. 452, 465-466 (1908). We find no conflict. The Court of Appeals, relying on statements in opinions of this Court that § 109 is intended to obviate “mere technical abatement[s],” see Hamm v. Rock Hill, 379 U. S. 306, 314 (1964), held that, since respondent’s conviction and sentence would remain intact even if he were released on parole, the purposes of 1 U. S. C. § 109 would not be served by applying it to save the no-parole provision of 26 U. S. C. §7237 (d). 483 F. 2d 656, 663; see United States v. Stephens, 449 F. 2d 103, 105-106 (CA9 1971). This analysis, it seems to us, begs the relevant question. The no-parole provision of 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d) was directly incorporated into the sentencing provisions of 21 U. S. C. § 174 and 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (a), see n. 3, supra, and if the repeal of 26 U. S. C. § 7237 (d) can be viewed as mitigating respondent’s punishment under those sections, his conviction and sentence would not be left intact by the repealer and his prosecution would “technically” abate under the common-law rule. Thus, the appropriate inquiry is whether parole ineligibility is a “penalty, forfeiture, or liability” for his offense that survives the repealer. In Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U. S., at 482, in determining that parole may not be revoked without affording the parolee procedural due process, we observed: “The liberty of a parolee enables him to do a wide range of things open to persons who have never been convicted of any crime. . . . Subject to the conditions of his parole, he can be gainfully employed and is free to be with family and friends and to form the other enduring attachments of normal life. Though the State properly subjects him to many restrictions not applicable to other citizens, his condition is very different from that of confinement in a prison.” (Footnote omitted.) Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Me. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. Between March and June 1971 the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) made assessments of federal taxes in the amount of $140,831.59 against Chicagoland Ideel Cleaners, Inc. Chicagoland failed to pay the taxes after formal demand. Instead, on June 28, 1971, Chicago-land transferred its assets to an assignee for the benefit of creditors. The assignee promptly converted the assets into cash of approximately $38,000. On August 25, 1971, the IRS filed a notice of tax lien respecting the March-June assessments in the office of the Recorder of Deeds of Cook County, Ill., and on the same day served a notice of levy on the assignee. The notice of levy stated that the proceeds in the assignee’s hands “are hereby levied upon and seized for satisfaction” of the taxes, “and demand is hereby made upon you for the [proceeds].” On September 14, 1971, an involuntary petition in bankruptcy was filed against Chicagoland. Chicagoland was adjudicated bankrupt and petitioner Phelps was appointed receiver in bankruptcy. Petitioner receiver, on October 19, 1971, filed an application with the Referee in Bankruptcy for an order requiring the assignee, who had not complied with the IRS demand for payment, to turn over to petitioner the $38,000 proceeds from the sale of Chicagoland’s assets. The IRS opposed the application on the ground that “[t]his court of bankruptcy lacks jurisdiction over the subject matter of the application because the United States is entitled to the possession of the moneys now held by [the] assignee of the bankrupt. . . .” The Referee in Bankruptcy rejected the contention, holding that “the assignment . . . passed inalienable title to the assets of Chicagoland ... to the assignee” and therefore “the notice of levy of the Internal Revenue Service is a nullity . . . .” The Referee accordingly entered an order directing the assignee to “surrender and turn over to” petitioner “all sums in his possession . ...” The District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, on petition for review on behalf of the IRS, approved the Referee’s turnover order. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversed. 495 F. 2d 1283 (1974). The Court of Appeals held: “Since possession of the property resided in the United States as against the [petitioner] receiver, the bankruptcy court lacked jurisdiction summarily to adjudicate the controversy without the Government’s consent. . . . The United States is now entitled to have its claim adjudicated in a plenary suit. We respectfully decline to follow the contrary holding [of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit] in In re United General Wood Products Corp., 483 F. 2d 975 (9th Cir. 1973).” 495 F. 2d, at 1285-1286. We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict between the Courts of Appeals, 419 U. S. 1068 (1974). We agree with the holding of the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and affirm its judgment. I The assignee claims no interest in the proceeds of the $38,000. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in In re United General Wood Products Corp., 483 F. 2d 975, 976 (1973), held that that circumstance, without more, subjected property to the bankruptcy court’s summary jurisdiction to enter a turnover order. Wood Products Corp. relied on the statement in Taubel-Scott-Kitzmiller Co. v. Fox, 264 U. S. 426, 432-433 (1924), that constructive possession of the property by the bankruptcy court “exists . . . where the property is held by some other person who makes no claim to it.” That reliance is misplaced. The statement read in the context of the facts of that case and its holding applied only to property in the hands of a nonadverse third person who was not holding it as agent for a bona fide adverse claimant. Taubel itself held that the bankruptcy court had not been given jurisdiction by summary proceedings to avoid a lien created by levy under a judgment of a state court where the sheriff possessed the property for the judgment creditor, and neither he nor the judgment creditor had consented to adjudication of the controversy by the bankruptcy court. Similarly, in this case the United States is a bona fide adverse claimant to the $38,000 proceeds held by the assignee and has not consented to adjudication of its claim by the bankruptcy court. The levy of August 25, 1971, created a custodial relationship between the assignee and the United States and thereby reduced the $38,000 to the United States’ constructive possession. Neither Chicagoland nor the petioner as receiver could assert a claim to the proceeds in that circumstance. For when Chicagoland failed to pay the taxes after assessment and demand, a lien in favor of the United States attached to “all property and rights to property, whether real or personal, belonging to [the taxpayer].” 26 U. S. C. § 6321. The assignee took Chicagoland’s property subject to this lien. The lien attached to the proceeds of the sale. See Sheppard v. Taylor, 5 Pet. 675, 710 (1831); Loeber v. Leininger, 175 Ill. 484, 51 N. E. 703 (1898). “The lien reattaches to the thing and to whatever is substituted for it. . . . The owner and the lien holder, whose claims have been wrongfully displaced, may follow the proceeds wherever they can distinctly trace them.” Sheppard v. Taylor, supra, at 710. The notice of levy and demand served on the assignee were an authorized means of collecting the taxes from the $38,000 held by him. Title 26 U. S. C. § 6331 (a) provides: “[I]f any person liable to pay any tax neglects or refuses to pay the same within 10 days after notice and demand, it shall be lawful for the Secretary ... to collect such tax ... by levy upon all property ... on which there is a [tax] lien . . “[t]he term ‘levy’ . . . includes the power of distraint and seizure by any means.” § 6331 (b). Treasury Regulations, 26 CFR § 301.6331-1 (a) (1) (1974), provide that a “[ljevy may be made by serving a notice of levy,” and that levy gave the United States thé right to the proceeds. See United States v. Pittman, 449 F. 2d 623, 627 (CA7 1971). Title 26 U. S. C. § 6332 (a) requires that any person holding property levied upon must surrender it to the Government, or become liable for the tax, § 6332 (c). With surrender, however, any duty owed the taxpayer is extinguished. § 6332 (d). Thus, following the levy of August 26, 1971, actual possession of the $38,000 was held by the assignee on behalf of the United States and “where possession is assertedly held not for the bankrupt, but for others prior to bankruptcy . . . the holder is not subject to summary jurisdiction.” 2 J. Moore & R. Oglebay, Collier on Bankruptcy ¶ 23.06 [3], pp. 506.2-506.3 (14th ed. 1975); Cline v. Kaplan, 323 U. S. 97 (1944); Galbraith v. Vallely, 256 U. S. 46 (1921). The receiver’s recourse is limited to a plenary suit under § 23 of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U. S. C. § 46. See Taubel-Scott-Kitzmiller Co. v. Fox, supra. Petitioner argues, however, that actual possession is necessary to remove the Government’s tax liens from the subordinate priority accorded them under § 67c (3) of the Bankruptcy Act. The argument is without merit. United States v. Eiland, 223 F. 2d 118 (CA4 1955); Rosenblum v. United States, 300 F. 2d 843 (CA1 1962). Section 67c (3) has no bearing on the question of summary jurisdiction; it relates only to the priority that is accorded tax liens on property that has already been determined to be within the bankruptcy court’s jurisdiction as part of the bankrupt estate. Here we are concerned not with priority of tax liens but with the effect of a tax levy. Historically, service of notice has been sufficient to seize a debt, Miller v. United States, 11 Wall. 268> 297 (1871), and notice of levy and demand are equivalent to seizure. See, e. g., Sims v. United States, 359 U. S. 108 (1959). The levy, therefore, gave the United States full legal right to the $38,000 levied upon as against the claim of the petitioner receiver. Petitioner’s final contention is that the general restriction on a bankruptcy court’s summary jurisdiction was altered by the enactment in 1938 of § 2a (21) of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U. S. C. § 11 (a) (21), which grants bankruptcy courts jurisdiction to “[r]equire ... assignees for the benefit of creditors ... to deliver the property in their possession or under their control to the receiver . . . .” This provision, however, was designed to “clarif[y] the jurisdiction of the [bankruptcy] court,” S. Rep. No. 1916, 75th Cong., 3d Sess., 12 (1938), and was “simply declaratory of prior case law,” 1 Collier on Bankruptcy, supra, ¶ 2.78 [3], p. 390.26. Under that case law, an assignee for the benefit of creditors who holds assets as “a mere naked bailee for the creditors ... has no right to retain the possession as against the trustee in bankruptcy.” In re McCrum, 214 F. 207, 209 (CA2 1914). Here the assignee held as custodian for the United States, a bona fide adverse claimant. Galbraith v. Vallely, supra, Affirmed. The grant was limited to the following questions presented in the petition: “1. ‘Whether the Court of Appeals incorrectly granted to the United States a priority based upon the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 for taxes in violation of and contrary to the priorities for payment of claims established by the Bankruptcy Act?’ “2. ‘Whether the Court of Appeals incorrectly held that service of a Notice of Levy upon an assignee for the benefit of creditors subsequent to the assignment reduced the bankrupt’s property then held by the assignee to the constructive possession of the United States?’ “3. ‘Whether the Court of Appeals incorrectly determined that the Bankruptcy Court lacked summary jurisdiction to adjudicate the controversy before it without the consent of the United States?”’ There is a significant difference in the result of a summary adjudication of the tax claim in the bankruptcy court and the result of. its adjudication in a plenary suit: “The difference between a summary and plenary proceeding in this context is not merely a matter of the relative formality of the respective procedures. The consequence of a summary turnover order is to subject the property in question to administration as part of the bankrupt estate. Where the government has a tax lien on the property, the consequence of the turnover is to subordinate that lien to the expenses of administration and priority wage claims. See Section 67c (3) of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U. S. C. [§] 107 (c) (3). In contrast, if the property is not subject to summary turnover, it may be brought into the bankrupt estate only if the receiver is able to defeat the government’s underlying tax claim in a plenary proceeding, i. e., a suit for refund. Thus, in a case where the .underlying tax claim is sound, for the government the difference between a summary and a plenary proceeding is the difference between holding the property subject to prior payment of administrative and priority wage claims and holding it outright.” Brief for United States 19. The unified tax lien was valid against all persons except purchasers, holders of security interests, mechanic’s lienors, and judgment lien creditors. 26 U. S. C. § 6323 (a). Petitioner concedes that the assignee did not fall within any of these categories. The Government does not contend that the unfiled lien followed the property into the hands of good-faith purchasers from the assignee. Brief ' for United States 14 n. 6. As indicated in n. 3, supra, an unfiled tax lien is invalid against purchasers. United States v. Bess, 357 U. S. 51 (1958), is not to the contrary. Bess held that a tax lien effected during an insured’s life against the cash surrender value of a life insurance policy attached after his death to insurance proceeds in the hands of the beneficiary but only in the amount of the cash surrender value. The limitation recognized that the taxpayer in his lifetime could not have realized a larger amount and thus there was no greater “property” or “rights to property” to which the lien could have attached ab initio. Id., at 55-56. The claimant may, however, consent to summary adjudication in the bankruptcy court. Cline v. Kaplan, 323 U. S. 97, 99 (1944). The United States refused consent in this case. Section 67c (3) of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U. S. C. § 107 (c) (3), provides in pertinent part: “Every tax lien on personal property not accompanied by possession shall be postponed in payment to the debts specified in clauses (1) and (2) of subdivision (a) of section 104 of this title ....” Section 64,of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U. S. C. § 104, provides in pertinent part: “(a) The debts to have priority, in advance of the payment of dividends to creditors, and to be paid in full out of bankrupt estates, and the order of payment, shall be (1) the costs and expenses of administration ... , (2) wages and commissions, not to exceed $600 to each claimant, which have been earned within three months before the date of the commencement of the proceeding, due to workmen, servants, clerks, or traveling, or city salesmen . . . .” Petitioner also relies on § 70a (8) of the Bankruptcy Act, 11 U. S. C. §110 (a)(8). Section 70a (8) vests the trustee of the bankrupt’s estate “with the title of the bankrupt as of the date of the filing of the petition ... to ... property held by an assignee for the benefit of creditors.” Even petitioner argues, however, that Chicago-land on September 1, 1971, had no title to the property conveyed to the assignee. Brief for Petitioner 14. In any event, the prebankruptcy levy displaced any title of Chicagoland, and § 70a (8) is therefore inapplicable. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

L

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. In most of the United States, not including California, the minimum price paid to dairy farmers producing raw milk is regulated pursuant to federal marketing orders. Those orders guarantee a uniform price for the producers, but through pooling mechanisms require the processors of different classes of dairy products to pay different prices. Thus, for example, processors of fluid milk pay a premium price, part of which goes into an equalization pool that provides a partial subsidy for cheese manufacturers who pay a net price that is lower than the farmers receive. See West Lynn Creamery, Inc. v. Healy, 512 U. S. 186, 189, n. 1 (1994). The California Legislature has adopted a similar program to regulate the minimum prices paid by California processors to California producers. In the cases before us today, out-of-state producers are challenging the constitutionality of a 1997 amendment to that program. They present us with two questions: (1) whether § 144 of the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of 1996, 110 Stat. 917, 7 U. S. C. § 7254, exempts California’s milk pricing and pooling regulations from scrutiny under the Commerce Clause; and (2) whether the individual petitioners’ claim under the Privileges and Immunities Clause is foreclosed because those regulations do not discriminate on their face on the basis of state citizenship or state residence. I Government regulation of the marketing of raw milk has been continuous since the Great Depression. In California, three related statutes establish the regulatory structure for milk produced, processed, or sold in California. First, in 1935, the State enacted the Milk Stabilization and Marketing Act, Cal. Food & Agric. Code Ann. §§61801-62403 (West 2001), “to establish minimum producer prices at fair and reasonable levels so as to generate reasonable producer incomes that will promote the intelligent and orderly marketing of market milk . . . § 61802(h). Then, California created requirements for composition of milk products in the Milk and Milk Products Act of 1947. §§ 32501-39912. The standards created under this Act mandate minimum percentages of fat and solids-not-fat in dairy products and often require fortification of milk by adding solids-not-fat. In 1967, California passed another milk pricing Act, the Gonsalves Milk Pooling Act, §§ 62700-62731, to address deficiencies in the existing pricing scheme. Together, these three Acts (including numerous subsequent revisions) create the state milk marketing structure: The 1935 and 1967 Acts establish the milk pricing and pooling plans, while the 1947 Act governs the composition of milk products sold in California. While it serves the same purposes as the federal marketing orders, California’s regulatory program is more complex. Federal orders typically guarantee all producers the same minimum price and create only two or three classes of end uses to determine the processors’ contributions to, or withdrawals from, the equalization pools, whereas under the California scheme some of the farmers’ production commands a “quota price” and some receives a lower “overbase price,” and the processors’ end uses of the milk are divided into five different classes. The complexities of the California scheme are not relevant to these cases; what is relevant is the fact California processors of fluid milk pay a premium price (part of which goes into a pool) that is higher than either of the prices paid to the producers. During the early 1990’s, market conditions made it profitable for some California processors to buy raw milk from out-of-state producers at prices that were higher than either the quota prices or the overbase prices guaranteed to California farmers yet lower than the premium prices they had to pay when making in-state purchases. The regulatory scheme was at least partially responsible for the advantage enjoyed by out-of-state producers because it did not require the processors to make any contribution to the equalization pool on such purchases. In other words, whereas an in-state purchase of raw milk resold as fluid milk required the processor both to pay a guaranteed minimum to the farmer and also to make a contribution to the pool, an out-of-state purchase at a higher price would often be cheaper because it required no pool contribution. In 1997, the California Department of Food and Agriculture amended its plan to require that contributions to the pool be made on some out-of-state purchases. It is the imposition of that requirement that gave rise to this litigation. Petitioners in No. 01-950 operate dairy farms in Nevada; petitioners in No. 01-1018 operate such farms in Arizona. They contend that the 1997 amendment discriminates against them. In response, the California officials contend that it merely eliminated an unfair competitive advantage for out-of-state producers that was the product of the regulatory scheme itself. Without reaching the merits of petitioners’ constitutional claims, the District Court dismissed both cases and the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed. 259 F. 3d 1148 (2001). Relying on its earlier decision in Shamrock Farms Co. v. Veneman, 146 F. 3d 1177 (1998), the court held that a federal statute enacted in 1996 had immunized California’s milk pricing and pooling laws from Commerce Clause challenge. It also held that the corporate petitioners had no standing to raise a claim under the Privileges and Immunities Clause, and that the individuals’ claim under that Clause failed because the 1997 plan amendments did not, “on their face, create classifications based on any individual’s residency or citizenship.” 259 F. 3d, at 1156. We granted certiorari to review those two holdings, 537 U. S. 1099 (2003), but in doing so we do not reach the merits of either constitutional claim. II In some respects, the State’s composition standards set forth in the 1947 Act exceed those set by the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA). For example, California’s minimum standard for reduced fat milk requires that it contain at least 10 percent solids-not-fat (which include protein, calcium, lactose, and other nutrients). Cal. Food & Agric. Code Ann. §38211 (West 2001). Federal standards require that reduced fat milk contain only 8.25 percent solids-not-fat. See 21 CFR §§131.110, 101.62 (2002). Some of California’s standards were arguably pre-empted by Congress’ enactment of the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990, 104 Stat. 2353, which contains a prohibition against the application of state quality standards to foods moving in interstate commerce. See 21 U. S. C. § 343-l(a). The District Court so held in Shamrock Farms Co. v. Veneman, No. Civ-S-95-318 (ED Cal., Sept. 25, 1996). In response to that decision, California sought an exemption from both the FDA and Congress. See Shamrock Farms, 146 F. 3d, at 1180. Before the FDA acted, Congress responded favorably with the enactment of the statute that governs our disposition of these cases. That statute, § 144 of the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of 1996, provides: “Nothing in this Act or any other provision of law shall be construed to preempt, prohibit, or otherwise limit the authority of the State of California, directly or indirectly, to establish or continue to effect any law, regulation, or requirement regarding— “(1) the percentage of milk solids or solids not fat in fluid milk products sold at retail or marketed in the State of California; or “(2) the labeling of such fluid milk products with regard to milk solids or solids not fat.” 7 U. S. C. § 7254. Thereafter, Shamrock Farms brought another suit against the Secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture challenging the validity of both the State’s compositional standards and its milk pricing and pooling laws. In that case, the Court of Appeals held that § 144 had immunized California’s marketing programs as well as the compositional standards from a negative Commerce Clause chai-lenge. Shamrock Farms, 146 F. 3d, at 1182. In adhering to that ruling in the cases before us today, the Ninth Circuit erred. The text of the federal statute plainly covers California laws regulating the composition and labeling of fluid milk products, but does not mention laws regulating pricing. Congress certainly has the power to authorize state regulations that burden or discriminate against interstate commerce, Prudential Ins. Co. v. Benjamin, 328 U. S. 408 (1946), but we will not assume that it has done so unless such an intent is clearly expressed. South-Central Timber Development, Inc. v. Wunnicke, 467 U. S. 82, 91-92 (1984). While § 144 unambiguously expresses such an intent with respect to California’s compositional and labeling laws, that expression does not encompass the pricing and pooling laws. This conclusion is buttressed by the separate California statutes addressing the composition and labeling of milk products, on the one hand, and the pricing and pooling of milk on the other. See supra, at 62-65 and this page. The mere fact that the composition and labeling laws relate to the sale of fluid milk is by no means sufficient to bring them within the scope of §144. Because §144 does not clearly express an intent to insulate California’s pricing and pooling laws from a Commerce Clause challenge, the Court of Appeals erred in relying on § 144 to dismiss the challenge. III Article IV, § 2, of the Constitution provides: “The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States.” Petitioners, who include both individual dairy farmers and corporate dairies, have alleged that California’s milk pricing laws violate that provision. The Court of Appeals held that the corporate petitioners have no standing to advance such a claim, and it rejected the individual petitioners’ claims because the California laws “do not, on their face, create classifications based on any individual’s residency or citizenship.” 259 F. 3d, at 1156. Petitioners do not challenge the first holding, but they contend that the second is inconsistent with our decision in Chalker v. Birmingham & Northwestern R. Co., 249 U. S. 522 (1919). We agree. In Chalker, we held that a Tennessee tax imposed on a citizen and resident of Alabama for engaging in the business of constructing a railroad in Tennessee violated the Privileges and Immunities Clause. The tax did not on its face draw any distinction based on citizenship or residence. It did, however, impose a higher rate on persons who had their principal offices out of State. Taking judicial notice of the fact that “the chief office of an individual is commonly in the State of which he is a citizen,” we concluded that the practical effect of the provision was discriminatory. Id., at 527. Whether Chalker should be interpreted as merely applying the Clause to classifications that are but proxies for differential treatment against out-of-state residents, or as prohibiting any classification with the practical effect of discriminating against such residents, is a matter we need not decide at this stage of these cases. Under either interpretation, we agree with petitioners that the absence of an express statement in the California laws and regulations identifying out-of-state citizenship as a basis for disparate treatment is not a sufficient basis for rejecting this claim. In so holding, however, we express no opinion on the merits of petitioners’ Privileges and Immunities Clause claim. * * * The judgment of the Court of Appeals is vacated, and these cases are remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. The history and purpose of federal regulation of milk marketing is described in some detail in Zuber v. Allen, 396 U. S. 168, 172-187 (1969). Because processors of fluid milk typically manufacture some other products as well, their respective pool contributions reflect the relative amounts of those end uses. Each processor’s mix of end uses produces an individual monthly “blend price” that is multiplied by its total purchases. Under federal orders the term “blend price” has a different meaning; it usually refers to the price that the producer receives. See West Lynn Creamery, Inc. v. Healy, 512 U. S. 186, 189, n. 1 (1994). After the 1997 amendment, processors whose blend price exceeds the quota price must make contributions to the pool on their out-of-state purchases as well as their in-state purchases. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. Respondent Ernest C. Brown, a former employee of petitioner Bath Iron Works Corp., learned after he retired that he suffered from a work-related hearing loss. The parties agree that under the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act (LHWCA or Act), 44 Stat. 1424, as amended, 33 U. S. C. § 901 et seq., respondent is entitled to disability benefits on account of his injury. They disagree, however, as to the proper method of calculating those benefits. There are essentially three “systems” for compensating partially disabled workers under the Act, two of which are at issue in this case. The “first” system provides for compensation for partially disabled claimants who have suffered certain statutorily “scheduled” injuries, one of which is hearing loss. The “third” system provides for compensation for retirees who suffer from occupational diseases that do not become disabling until after retirement. In most, but not all, cases, benefits for scheduled injuries are more generous than those provided retirees suffering from latent occupational diseases. The question presented in this case is whether a claimant who discovers, after retirement, that he suffers from a work-related hearing loss should be compensated under the first system, because loss of hearing is a scheduled injury, or under the third system, because he did not become aware of the disabling condition until after retirement. I Prior to 1984, the LHWCA provided that compensation for a permanent partial disability should be determined in one of two ways. If the injury was of a kind specifically identified in the schedule set forth in § 8(c) of the Act, 33 U. S. C. §§ 908(c)(1) — (20) (1982 ed.), the injured employee was entitled to two-thirds of his average weekly wage at the time of the injury for a specific number of weeks, regardless of whether his earning capacity had actually been impaired. See Potomac Electric Power Co. v. Director, Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs, 449 U. S. 268, 269-270 (1980). Loss of hearing was among those specified injuries. In all other cases, the Act authorized compensation equal to two-thirds of the difference between the employee’s average weekly wage and his postinjury earning capacity. 33 U. S. C. §908(c)(21). In those cases, unlike the scheduled-injury cases in which disability was presumed, it was necessary for the employee to prove that his injury had actually decreased his earning capacity. In early 1984, the Benefits Review Board was confronted with a case in which the claimant had contracted asbestosis, a latent occupational disease that did not manifest itself until after his retirement. Because the disease did not qualify as a scheduled benefit, the claimant was not entitled to a presumption of disability; moreover, because it did not affect his actual earnings, he could not establish “disability” as defined in § 902(10). Therefore, the Board held, the claimant was not entitled to any compensation under the Act. Aduddell v. Owens-Corning Fiberglass, 16 BRBS 131, 134 (1984). Three weeks after the Aduddell decision, the Board followed its reasoning in a case involving a hearing loss claim filed after the claimant’s retirement. Redick v. Bethlehem Steel Corp., 16 BRBS 155 (1984). Although the ALJ in Redick had made a finding of disability because “scheduled awards are conclusive presumptions of loss of wage-earning capacity and cannot be rebutted,” id., at 156, the Board vacated the award of benefits, reasoning that the “voluntary retirement was prior to manifestation of the injury, and was unrelated to his hearing loss,” id., at 157. In 1984, Congress amended the Act by adding the “third” compensation system that unquestionably provides compensation for the type of claim rejected in Aduddell and the other asbestos cases. With the 1984 amendments, Congress authorized the payment of benefits to retirees suffering from occupational diseases that become manifest only after retirement. More precisely, a new §10(i) addresses claims for death or disability “due to an occupational disease which does not immediately result in death or disability.” 33 U.S. C. §9100). As is the case under the first two compensation systems, compensation under the third system turns in large part on the “average weekly wage” used to calculate benefits. When the “time of injury” — defined as “the date on which the employee or claimant becomes aware, or ... should have been aware, of the relationship between the employment, the disease, and the death or disability,” ibid. — is within the first year of retirement, the claimant’s average weekly wage is based upon the claimant’s wages just prior to retirement. § 910(d)(2)(A). When the “time of injury” is more than one year after retirement, the average weekly wage is deemed to be the national average weekly wage at that time. § 910(d)(2)(B). Once the “average weekly wage” is determined, a claimant’s benefits are calculated under § 8 of the Act. For claims in which “the average weekly wages are determined under section 910(d)(2),” that is, for retirees with claims involving “an occupational disease which does not immediately result in death or disability,” 33 U. S. C. § 910(i), a new § 8(c)(23) provides that compensation shall be two-thirds of the applicable average weekly wage multiplied by the percentage of permanent impairment as determined by particular medical guides specified in the statute, 33 U. S. C. § 908(c)(23). The claimant is entitled to such benefits for the duration of the impairment. Ibid, The differences between the first and third compensation systems can result in significantly differing benefits. An award to a claimant under the schedule, i. e., the first system, is based upon the degree of loss to the scheduled body part, whereas an award under the third system is based on the extent to which the “whole body” has been impaired. In most cases, this difference makes recovery under the schedule more generous than that under the retiree provisions. ( Respondent was exposed to loud noise during his employment as a riveter and chipper at petitioner’s iron works from 1939 until 1947, and again from 1950 until his retirement in 1972. In 1985 he received the results of an audiogram indicating an 82.4 percent loss of hearing. As authorized by a provision in the 1984 amendments-that is not at issue in this case, he then filed a timely claim for benefits. The ALJ, following Board precedent, applied a hybrid of the first and third compensation systems to calculate respondent’s benefits. The ALJ concluded that respondent’s hearing loss fell within the scope of the 1984 amendments as an occupational disease that does not immediately result in disability and that the relevant “time of injury” was the date in September 1985 when respondent received his audiogram and became aware of his hearing loss. Accordingly, the ALJ identified the national average weekly wage in September 1985 as the relevant average weekly wage. At that point, however, the ALJ departed from the third system; instead of applying the formula in § 8(c)(23) applicable to claims for latent occupational diseases, he turned to the first system, the schedule in §8(c)(13), to calculate respondent’s weekly benefit. Respondent’s benefits were thus limited to a precise number of weeks, as opposed to continuing throughout the duration of his disability as would be required under §8(c)(23). Yet, because of the differing formulas used in §§8(c)(23) and 8(c)(13), the amount of each weekly benefit was higher than it would have been had respondent’s benefit been calculated under §8(c)(23). The Benefits Review Board affirmed on the same rationale. On appeal, petitioners (the employer and its insurance carrier) agreed with the ALJ and the Board that respondent suffers from a latent occupational disease within the meaning of § 10(i), but argued that the ALJ and the Board erred in failing to apply the benefit formula in § 8(c) (23) appropriate to such claims. While petitioners challenged the method of computing the benefit, they did not contest the use of 82.4 percent as the measure of Brown’s hearing loss, even though the record contains persuasive evidence that a portion of that loss is attributable to the aging process after his retirement. The Director of the Department of Labor’s Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs challenged the ALJ’s and the Board’s reasoning on different grounds. The error they made, the Director argued, was in looking to the third compensation system at all, for hearing loss is not an occupational disease that “does not immediately result in death or disability.” 33 U. S. C. §910(i). Relying on undisputed scientific evidence, the Director argued that work-related hearing loss, unlike a disease such as asbestosis, does cause immediate disability: “[D]eafness is an injury that a worker typically suffers before retirement. After retirement a worker’s workplace-noise-induced deafness will not ordinarily grow worse; if anything it will get better. See R. T. Sataloff & J. Sataloff, Occupational Hearing Loss 357 (1987). Moreover, unlike asbestosis, the symptoms of deafness occur simultaneously with the ‘disease.’ In other words, to say that a worker is ‘84.4% deaf’ is to say that he has lost 84.4% of his hearing. If he does not notice his deafness, and does not file a claim until long after retirement, that fact does not mean he is not deaf; it does not mean he has no deafness symptom; rather, it means he may have grown accustomed to his deafness, which is quite a different matter.” 942 F. 2d 811, 816 (CA1 1991) (summarizing Director’s argument). Accepting the Director’s undisputed characterization of occupational hearing loss, the Court of Appeals held that respondent’s disability was not “due to an occupational disease which does not immediately result in . . . disability,” 33 U. S. C. § 910(i), and that therefore his claim did not fall within the third compensation system. “[U]sing ordinary English,” the court noted, “one would normally say that deafness is a disease that causes its symptoms, namely loss of hearing, simultaneously with its occurrence. One simply cannot say that a person suffering from deafness is not deaf — whether or not he notices how deaf he is.” 942 F. 2d, at 817 (emphasis added). Having ruled out application of the third compensation system, the court found that respondent’s claim fell squarely within the first system, which draws no distinction between retired and working claimants and expressly provides for compensation for work-related hearing loss. The court thus affirmed the Board’s result — application of the benefit calculation formula for scheduled injuries in §8(c)(13) — but rejected its reliance on the third compensation system for latent occupational diseases. The Courts of Appeals for the Fifth and Eleventh Circuits have reached the opposite conclusion. While both courts have agreed with the court below in rejecting the Board’s “hybrid” approach, they have both held, in contrast to the decision below, that a retiree’s claim for occupational hearing loss is “a claim for compensation for . . . disability due to an occupational disease which does not immediately result in . . . disability,” 33 U. S. C. § 910(i), and therefore should be compensated under the retiree provisions enacted in 1984. See Ingalls Shipbuilding v. Director, Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs, 898 F. 2d 1088 (CA5 1990); Alabama Dry Dock and Shipbuilding Corp. v. Sowell, 933 F. 2d 1561 (CA111991). We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict. 503 U. S. 935 (1992). We now affirm. Ill Petitioners do not dispute the Director’s or the lower court’s characterization of occupational hearing loss, and we find no basis for doing so ourselves. Once we accept that characterization, it follows that the retiree provisions enacted in 1984—the so-called “third” compensation system— do not apply to claims for occupational hearing loss. Occupational hearing loss, unlike a long-latency disease such as asbestosis, is not an occupational disease that does not “immediately result in . . . disability.” 33 U. S. C. §910(i). Whereas a worker who has been exposed to harmful levels of asbestos suffers no injury until the disease manifests itself years later, a worker who is exposed to excessive noise suffers the injury of loss of hearing, which, as a scheduled injury, is presumptively disabling, simultaneously with that exposure. Because occupational hearing loss does result in immediate disability, the plain language of § 10(i) leads to the conclusion that a retiree’s claim for occupational hearing loss does not fall within the class of claims covered by the third compensation system. The Courts of Appeals for the Fifth and Eleventh Circuits recognized the crucial distinction between occupational hearing loss and latent diseases such as asbestosis, but nonetheless concluded that Congress, in enacting the third compensation system, did not intend to distinguish between the different types of occupational diseases suffered by retirees. In particular, these courts were concerned that if a retiree’s claim for occupational hearing loss was not deemed to be a claim with respect to “an occupational disease which does not immediately result in ... disability,” then the Act would be silent as to the appropriate “time of injury” for such a claim. That is, if the “time of injury” for a retiree’s claim of occupational hearing loss is not “the date on which the employee or claimant becomes aware, or . . . should have been aware, of the relationship between the employment, the disease, and the death or disability,” then when is it? To the Director’s response that in the case of occupational hearing loss the time of injury is the date on which the disabling condition is complete, that is, the date of last exposure to the workplace noise, both courts found that the “date of last exposure” rule had been rejected by other courts and by Congress and therefore should not be resurrected absent some indication of congressional intent to do so. Ingalls, 898 F. 2d, at 1093-1094; Sowell, 933 F. 2d, at 1566-1567. We do not find the reasoning of these courts persuasive for two reasons. First, the statute provides that the retiree provisions apply not to every occupational disease, but just to an occupational disease “which does not immediately result in ;.. disability.” 33 U. S. C. § 910(i) (emphasis added). Asbestosis is such a disease; hearing loss is not. In ignoring the fact that occupational hearing loss does immediately result in disability, the Courts of Appeals for the Fifth and Eleventh Circuits have essentially read that key phrase out of the statute. Congress certainly could have enacted a compensation system that treated retirees differently from current workers in all cases, regardless of the nature of the particular occupational disease from which they suffered. As we read the statute, however, that is not the path Congress took. Second, while it is true that prior to the 1984 amendments some courts had rejected fixing the time of injury, and thus the applicable average weekly wage, as the date of last exposure to the harmful substance, those cases involved long-, latency diseases such as asbestosis. See, e. g., Todd Ship yards Corp. v. Black, 717 F. 2d 1280 (CA9 1983). In such cases, using the date of last exposure as the relevant time of injury was deemed inappropriate because, according to ordinary understanding, a worker is not injured at that time; the injury arises years later when the disease manifests itself. Id., at 1290 (“The average person . . . would not consider himself ‘injured’ merely because the [asbestos] fibers were embedded in his lung”). For the reasons explained above, the same cannot be said about occupational hearing loss. The injury, loss of hearing, occurs simultaneously with the exposure to excessive noise. Moreover, the injury is complete when the exposure ceases. Under those circumstances, we think it quite proper to say that- the date of last exposure — the date upon which the injury is complete — is the relevant time of injury for calculating a retiree’s benefits for occupational hearing loss. Nor are we persuaded by petitioners’ arguments as to why retiree claims for occupational hearing loss should be compensated pursuant to the third compensation system. Petitioners correctly point out that even though the portion of a retiree’s hearing loss that is attributable to his occupation may remain constant after retirement, the aging process may cause it to worsen during retirement. In our view, however, this is a matter that is relevant to the computation of the amount of the benefit — a matter that is not in dispute in this case — rather than to the retiree’s eligibility for a scheduled benefit. To the extent there is any unfairness in the statutory scheme in that employers may be liable for hearing loss attributable to aging, employers can protect themselves by providing their employees with an audiogram at the time of retirement and thereby freezing the amount of compensable hearing loss attributable to the claimant’s employment. Petitioners also point out, again correctly, that during debate on the 1984 amendments a Senator made a passing reference to the Redick case and suggested that the House and Senate conferees disagreed with the Board’s decision in that case. 130 Cong. Rec. 26300 (1984) (statement of Sen. Hatch). Because that was a hearing loss case, they infer that the retiree provisions of the amendment should be construed to apply to such cases. In addition to the fact that the conclusion does not necessarily follow from the premise, we reject the argument for two reasons, each of which is sufficient. First, when carefully read, we find the text of the statute unambiguous on the point at issue; accordingly, we give no weight to a single reference by a single Senator during floor debate in the Senate. Second, as part of. the 1984 amendments, Congress amended §8(c)(13) to preserve the timeliness of hearing loss claims filed more than a year after the employee’s last exposure. It accomplished that purpose not by postponing the time of injury until the date of awareness, but, on the contrary, by providing that the “time for filing a . . . claim for compensation . . . shall not begin to run in connection with any claim for loss of hearing under this section . . . until the employee has received an' audiogram . . . .” 33 U. S. C. § 908(c)(13)(D). Thus, Congress responded to its concern about latent diseases that are not scheduled and cause no loss of earnings by enacting the interrelated provisions constituting the “third” compensation system, whereas it responded to a concern about hearing loss claims by amending § 8(c)(13). r — < C For the reasons given, we hold, as did the court below, that claims for hearing loss, whether filed by current workers or retirees, are claims for a scheduled injury and must be compensated pursuant to §8(c)(13) of the LHWCA, not § 8(c)(23). The judgment of the Court of Appeals, accordingly, is affirmed. It is so ordered. The various methods for calculating benefits under the Act were so labeled by the Court of Appeals, and the parties retain that characterization in their briefs before this Court. We find that characterization useful and adhere to it in our discussion of the Act. For example, workers who lose an arm are entitled to two-thirds of their weekly pay for 312 weeks, 33 U. S. C. § 908(c)(1), whereas workers who lose a leg are entitled to such compensation for 288 weeks, § 908(c)(2). Section 8(c)(13), both before and after the LHWCA Amendments of 1984, authorized compensation of two-thirds of the average weekly wage for a period of 200 weeks for a total loss of hearing in both ears. For a partial loss of hearing, the Act requires a proportionate reduction in benefits. See n. 9, infra. Prior to 1984, §902(10) defined the term “disability” to mean “incapacity because of injury to earn the wages which the employee was receiving at the time of injury in the same or any other employment.” 33 U. S. C. §902(10) (1982 ed.). An employee with a scheduled injury, however, is presumed to be disabled, even though the injury does not actually affect his earnings. As we held in Potomac Electric Power Co. v. Director, Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs, 449 U. S. 268 (1980), such an employee is only entitled to the scheduled benefit even when the actual impairment of his earnings would have produced a higher benefit if calculated under §8(c)(21). Id., at 270-271. The Benefits Review Board was created by Congress to “hear and determine appeals . . . with respect to claims of employees under [the Act].” 33 U.S.C. § 921(b)(3). See n. 4, supra. See also Worrell v. Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., 16 BRBS 216 (1983) (Administrative Law Judge (AU) decision denying death benefits where claimant who had been exposed to asbestos developed and died from mesothelioma after retirement); Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock v. Director, Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs, 681 F. 2d 938, 942 (CA4 1982) (“Before retirement, the asbestosis was not disabling; after retirement there was no diminished capacity”). Piecing all these various provisions together, § 8(c), 33 U. S. C. § 908(c), provides: “Permanent partial disability: In case of disability partial in character but permanent in quality the compensation shall be 66/3 per centum of the average weekly wages,. . . and shall be paid to the employee, as follows: “(13) Loss of Hearing: “(B) Compensation for loss of hearing in both ears, two-hundred weeks. “(21) Other cases: In all other cases in the class of disability, the compensation shall be 66% per centum of the difference between the average weekly wages of the employee and the employee’s wage-earning capacity thereafter in the same employment or otherwise, payable during the continuance of partial disability. “(23) Notwithstanding paragraphs (1) through (22), with respect to a claim for permanent partial disability for which the average weekly wages are determined under section 910(d)(2) of this title, the compensation shall be 66% per centum of such average weekly wages multiplied by the percentage of permanent impairment, as determined under the guides referred to in section 902(10) of this title, payable during the continuance of such impairment.” Section 10(d), 33 U. S. C. § 910(d), provides: “(2) Notwithstanding paragraph (1), with respect to any claim based on a death or disability due to an occupational disease for which the time of injury (as determined under subsection (i) of this section) occurs— “(A) within the first year after the employee has retired, the average weekly wages shall be one fifty-second part of his average annual earnings during the 52-week period preceding retirement; or “(B) more than one year after the employee has retired, the average weekly wage shall be deemed to be the national average weekly wage ... applicable at the time of the injury.” Section 10(i), 33 U. S. C. § 910(i), provides: “For purposes of this section with respect to a claim for compensation for death or disability due to an occupational disease which does not immediately result in death or disability, the time of injury shall be deemed to be the date on which the employee or claimant becomes aware, or in the exercise of reasonable diligence or by reason of medical advice should have been aware, of the relationship between the employment, the disease, and the death or disability.” For example, because respondent’s hearing loss is partial (82.4 percent), see infra this page, his recovery under the schedule would be reduced from two-thirds of his average weekly wage for 200 weeks to the same amount for 165 weeks (200 weeks times .824 equals 165 weeks). See 33 U. S. C. § 908(c)(19). Under the guides referenced in § 8(c)(23), however, an 82.4 percent hearing loss translates into a 29 percent impairment of the “whole person.” Thus, under the third system respondent would only receive 29 percent of two-thirds of the appropriate average weekly wage. There are some aspects of the third system, however, that may provide for more favorable treatment to claimants. For instance, benefits calculated pursuant to the third system are paid weekly for as long as the claimant is impaired, whereas benefits for a scheduled injury continue only for a specified number of weeks. Title 33 U. S. C. § 908(c)(13)(D) provides: “The time for filing a notice of injury, under section 912 of this title, or a claim for compensation, under section 913 of this title, shall not begin to run in connection with any claim for loss of hearing under this section, until the employee has received an audiogram, with thé accompanying report thereon, which indicates that the employee has suffered a loss of hearing.” See n. 9, supra, and accompanying text. The Board did not fully apply the benefit calculation for scheduled injuries. Instead of using the average weekly wage at the time respondent was injured, it used the national average weekly wage in September 1985, the average weekly wage that would be appropriate had respondent in fact suffered from “an occupational disease which does not immediately result in death or disability.” 33 U. S. C. § 910(i). See supra, at 160. Petitioners did not raise the issue below and the Court of Appeals considered it waived. 942 F. 2d, at 819. We do as well. As explained above, the average weekly wage used to calculate benefits under the Act is the wage that the claimant was receiving at the time of injury. Thus, in order to calculate benefits under the Act, one must be able to identify the appropriate time of injury. See supra, at 161. See n. 10, supra. In so holding, we reject respondent employee’s arguments in support of the Board’s hybrid approach. There is simply no basis in the statute for combining the compensation provisions applicable for retirees suffering from latent occupational diseases with those governing claimants with scheduled injuries. We note that even the Board has now receded from that interpretation of the Act. See Harms v. Stevedoring Services of America, 25 BRBS 375, 382 (1992) (“Where claimant is a retiree and Section 10(i) applies, the plain language of the statute renders the provisions of Section[s] 8(c)(l)-(22), including Section 8(c)(13), inapplicable”). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Chief Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. In Chapman v. California, 386 U. S. 18, 24 (1967), we held that the standard for determining whether a conviction must be set aside because of federal constitutional error is whether the error “was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.” In this case we must decide whether the Chapman harmless-error standard applies in determining whether the prosecution’s use for impeachment purposes of petitioner’s post-Miranda silence, in violation of due process under Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U. S. 610 (1976), entitles petitioner to ha-beas corpus relief. We hold that it does not. Instead, the standard for determining whether habeas relief must be granted is whether the Doyle error “had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict.” Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U. S. 750, 776 (1946). The Kotteakos harmless-error standard is better tailored to the nature and purpose of collateral review than the Chapman standard, and application of a less onerous harmless-error standard on habeas promotes the considerations underlying our habeas jurisprudence. Applying this standard, we conclude that petitioner is not entitled to habeas relief. Petitioner Todd A. Brecht was serving time in a Georgia prison for felony theft when his sister and her husband, Molly and Roger Hartman, paid the restitution for petitioner’s crime and assumed temporary custody of him. The Hartmans brought petitioner home with them to Alma, Wisconsin, where he was to reside with them before entering a halfway house. This caused some tension in the Hartman household because Roger Hartman, a local district attorney, disapproved of petitioner’s heavy drinking habits and homosexual orientation, not to mention his previous criminal exploits. To make the best of the situation, though, the Hartmans told petitioner, on more than one occasion, that he was not to drink alcohol or engage in homosexual activities in their home. Just one week after his arrival, however, petitioner violated this house rule. While the Hartmans were away, petitioner broke into their liquor cabinet and began drinking. He then found a rifle in an upstairs room and began shooting cans in the backyard. When Roger Hartman returned home from work, petitioner shot him in the back and sped off in Mrs. Hartman’s car. Hartman crawled to a neighbor’s house to summon help. (The downstairs phone in the Hartmans’ house was inoperable because petitioner had taken the receiver on the upstairs phone off the hook.) Help came, but Hartman’s wound proved fatal. Meanwhile, petitioner had driven Mrs. Hartman’s car into a ditch in a nearby town. When a police officer stopped to offer assistance, petitioner told him that his sister knew about his car mishap and had called a tow truck. Petitioner then hitched a ride to Winona, Minnesota, where he was stopped by police. At first he tried to conceal his identity, but he later identified himself and was arrested. When he was told that he was being held for the shooting, petitioner replied that “it was a big mistake” and asked to talk with “somebody that would understand [him].” App. 39, 78. Petitioner was returned to Wisconsin, and thereafter was given his Miranda warnings at an arraignment. Then petitioner was charged with first-degree murder. At trial in the Circuit Court for Buffalo County, he took the stand and admitted shooting Hartman, but claimed it was an accident. According to petitioner, when he saw Hartman pulling into the driveway on the evening of the shooting, he ran to replace the gun in the upstairs room where he had found it. But as he was running toward the stairs in the downstairs hallway, he tripped, causing the rifle to discharge the fatal shot. After the shooting, Hartman disappeared, so petitioner drove off in Mrs. Hartman’s car to find him. Upon spotting Hartman at his neighbor’s door, however, petitioner panicked and drove away. The State argued that petitioner’s account was belied by the fact that he had failed to get help for Hartman, fled the Hartmans’ home immediately after the shooting, and lied to the police officer who came upon him in the ditch about having called Mrs. Hartman. In addition, the State pointed out that petitioner had failed to mention anything about the shooting being an accident to the officer who found him in the ditch, the man who gave him a ride to Winona, or the officers who eventually arrested him. Over the objections of defense counsel, the State also asked petitioner during cross-examination whether he had told anyone at any time before trial that the shooting was an accident, to which petitioner replied “no,” and made several references to petitioner’s pretrial silence during closing argument. Finally, the State offered extrinsic evidence tending to contradict petitioner’s story, including the path the bullet traveled through Mr. Hartman’s body (horizontal to slightly downward) and the location where the rifle was found after the shooting (outside), as well as evidence of motive (petitioner’s hostility toward Mr. Hartman because of his disapproval of petitioner’s sexual orientation). The jury returned a guilty verdict, and petitioner was sentenced to life imprisonment. The Wisconsin Court of Appeals set the conviction aside on the ground that the State’s references to petitioner’s post-Miranda silence, see n. 2, supra, violated due process under Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U. S. 610 (1976), and that this error was sufficiently “prejudicial” to require reversal. State v. Brecht, 138 Wis. 2d 158, 168-169, 405 N. W. 2d 718, 723 (1987). The Wisconsin Supreme Court reinstated the conviction. Although it agreed that the State’s use of petitioner’s post-Miranda silence was impermissible, the court determined that this error “‘was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.’” State v. Brecht, 143 Wis. 2d 297, 317, 421 N. W. 2d 96, 104 (1988) (quoting Chapman v. California, 386 U. S. 18, 24 (1967)). In finding the Doyle violation harmless, the court noted that the State’s “improper references to Brecht’s silence were infrequent,” in that they “comprised less than two pages of a 900 page transcript, or a few minutes in a four day trial in which twenty-five witnesses testified,” and that the State’s evidence of guilt was compelling. 143 Wis. 2d, at 317, 421 N. W. 2d, at 104. Petitioner then sought a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U. S. C. § 2254, reasserting his Doyle claim. The District Court agreed that the State’s use of petitioner’s post-Miranda silence violated Doyle, but disagreed with the Wisconsin Supreme Court that this error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, and set aside the conviction. 759 F. Supp. 500 (WD Wis. 1991). The District Court based its harmless-error determination on its view that the State’s evidence of guilt was not “overwhelming,” and that the State’s references to petitioner’s post-Miranda silence, though “not extensive,” were “crucial” because petitioner’s defense turned on his credibility. Id., at 508. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversed. It, too, concluded that the State’s references to petitioner’s post-Miranda silence violated Doyle, but it disagreed with both the standard that the District Court had applied in conducting its harmless-error inquiry and the result it reached. 944 F. 2d 1363, 1368, 1375-1376 (1991). The Court of Appeals held that the Chapman harmless-error standard does not apply in reviewing Doyle error on federal habeas. Instead, because of the “prophylactic” nature of the Doyle rule, 944 F. 2d, at 1370, as well as the costs attendant to reversing state convictions on collateral review, id., at 1373, the Court of Appeals held that the standard for determining whether petitioner was entitled to habeas relief was whether the Doyle violation “ ‘had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict,’ ” 944 F. 2d, at 1376 (quoting Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U. S., at 776). Applying this standard, the Court of Appeals concluded that petitioner was not entitled to relief because, “given the many more, and entirely proper, references to [petitioner’s] silence preceding arraignment,” he could not contend with a “straight face” that the State’s use of his post-Miranda silence had a “substantial and injurious effect” on the jury’s verdict. 944 F. 2d, at 1376. We granted certiorari to resolve a conflict between Courts of Appeals on the question whether the Chapman harmless-error standard applies on collateral review of Doyle violations, 604 U. S. 972 (1992), and now affirm. We are the sixth court to pass on the question whether the State’s use for impeachment purposes of petitioner’s post-Miranda silence requires reversal of his murder conviction. Petitioner urges us to even the count, and decide matters in his favor once and for all. He argues that the Chapman harmless-error standard applies with equal force on collateral review of Doyle error. According to petitioner, the need to prevent state courts from relaxing their standards on direct review of Doyle claims, and the confusion which would ensue were we to adopt the Kotteakos harmless-error standard on collateral review, require application of the Chapman standard here. Before considering these arguments, however, we must first characterize the nature of Doyle error itself. In Doyle v. Ohio, 426 U. S., at 619, we held that “the use for impeachment purposes of [a defendant’s] silence, at the time of arrest and after receiving Miranda warnings, violate[s] the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.” This rule “rests on ‘the fundamental unfairness of implicitly assuring a suspect that his silence will not be used against him and then using his silence to impeach an explanation subsequently offered at trial.’” Wainwright v. Greenfield, 474 U. S. 284, 291 (1986) (quoting South Dakota v. Neville, 459 U. S. 553, 565 (1983)). The “implicit assurance” upon which we have relied in our Doyle line of cases is the right-to-remain-silent component of Miranda. Thus, the Constitution does not prohibit the use for impeachment purposes of a defendant’s silence prior to arrest, Jenkins v. Anderson, 447 U. S. 231, 239 (1980), or after arrest if no Miranda warnings are given, Fletcher v. Weir, 455 U. S. 603, 606-607 (1982) (per curiam). Such silence is probative and does not rest on any implied assurance by law enforcement authorities that it will carry no penalty. See 447 U. S., at 239. This case illustrates the point well. The first time petitioner claimed that the shooting was an accident was when he took the stand at trial. It was entirely proper — and probative — for the State to impeach his testimony by pointing out that petitioner had failed to tell anyone before the time he received his Miranda warnings at his arraignment about. the shooting being an accident. Indeed, if the shooting was an accident, petitioner had every reason — including to clear his name and preserve evidence supporting his version of the events — to offer his account immediately following the shooting. On the other hand, the State’s references to petitioner’s silence after that point in time, or more generally to petitioner’s failure to come forward with his version of events at any time before trial, see n. 2, supra, crossed the Doyle line. For it is conceivable that, once petitioner had been given his Miranda warnings, he decided to stand on his right to remain silent because he believed his silence would not be used against him at trial. The Court of Appeals characterized Doyle as “a prophylactic rule.” 944 F. 2d, at 1370. It reasoned that, since the need for Doyle stems from the implicit assurance that flows from Miranda warnings, and “the warnings required by Miranda are not themselves part of the Constitution,” “Doyle is... a prophylactic rule designed to protect another prophylactic rule from erosion or misuse.” Ibid. But Doyle was not simply a further extension of the Miranda prophylactic rule. Rather, as we have discussed, it is rooted in fundamental fairness and due process concerns. However real these concerns, Doyle does not “ ‘overprotec[t]’ ” them. Duckworth v. Eagan, 492 U. S. 195, 209 (1989) (O’Connor, J., concurring). Under the rationale of Doyle, due process is violated whenever the prosecution uses for impeachment purposes a defendant’s post-Miranda silence. Doyle thus does not bear the hallmarks of a prophylactic rule. Instead, we think Doyle error fits squarely into the category of constitutional violations which we have characterized as ‘“trial error.’” See Arizona v. Fulminante, 499 U. S. 279, 307 (1991). Trial error “occur[s] during the presentation of the case to the jury,” and is amenable to harmless-error analysis because it “may... be quantitatively assessed in the context of other evidence presented in order to determine [the effect it had on the trial].” Id., at 307-308. At the other end of the spectrum of constitutional errors lie “structural defects in the constitution of the trial mechanism, which defy analysis by ‘harmless-error’ standards.” Id., at 309. The existence of such defects — deprivation of the right to counsel, for example — requires automatic reversal of the conviction because they infect the entire trial process. See id., at 309-310. Since our landmark decision in Chapman v. California, 386 U. S. 18 (1967), we have applied the harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard in reviewing claims of constitutional error of the trial type. In Chapman, we considered whether the prosecution’s reference to the defendants’ failure to testify at trial, in violation of the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, required reversal of their convictions. We rejected the argument that the Constitution requires a blanket rule of automatic reversal in the case of constitutional error, and concluded instead that “there may be some constitutional errors which in the setting of a particular case are so unimportant and insignificant that they may, consistent with the Federal Constitution, be deemed harmless.” Id., at 22. After examining existing harmless-error rules, including the federal rule (28 U. S. C. §2111), we held that “before a federal constitutional error can be held harmless, the court must be able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.” 386 U. S., at 24. The State bears the burden of proving that an error passes muster under this standard. Chapman reached this Court on direct review, as have most of the cases in which we have applied its harmless-error standard. Although we have applied the Chapman standard in a handful of federal habeas cases, see, e. g., Yates v. Evatt, 500 U. S. 391 (1991); Rose v. Clark, 478 U. S. 570 (1986); Milton v. Wainwright, 407 U. S. 371 (1972); Anderson v. Nelson, 390 U. S. 523 (1968) (per curiam), we have yet squarely to address its applicability on collateral review. Petitioner contends that we are bound by these habeas cases, by way of stare decisis, from holding that the Kotteakos harmless-error standard applies on habeas review of Doyle error. But since we have never squarely addressed the issue, and have at most assumed the applicability of the Chapman standard on habeas, we are free to address the issue on the merits. See Edelman v. Jordan, 415 U. S. 651, 670-671 (1974). The federal habeas corpus statute is silent on this point. It permits federal courts to entertain a habeas petition on behalf of a state prisoner “only on the ground that he is in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States,” 28 U. S. C. § 2254(a), and directs simply that the court “dispose of the matter as law and justice require,” § 2243. The statute says nothing about the standard for harmless-error review in habeas cases. Respondent urges us to fill this gap with the Kotteakos standard, under which an error requires reversal only if it “had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict.” Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U. S., at 776. This standard is grounded in the federal harmless-error statute. 28 U. S. C. §2111 (“On the hearing of any appeal or writ of certiorari in any case, the court shall give judgment after an examination of the record without regard to errors or defects which do not affect the substantial rights of the parties”). On its face § 2111 might seem to address the situation at hand, but to date we have limited its application to claims of nonconstitutional error in federal criminal cases. See, e. g., United States v. Lane, 474 U. S. 438 (1986). Petitioner asserts that Congress’ failure to enact various proposals since Chapman was decided that would have limited the availability of habeas relief amounts to legislative disapproval of application of a less stringent harmless-error standard on collateral review of constitutional error. Only one of these proposals merits discussion here. In 1972, a bill was proposed that would have amended 28 U. S. C. § 2264 to require habeas petitioners to show that “ ‘a different result would probably have obtained if such constitutional violation had not occurred.’” 118 Cong. Rec. 24936 (1972) (quoting S. 3833, 92d Cong., 2d Sess. (1972)). In response, the Attorney General suggested that the above provision be modified to make habeas relief available only where the petitioner “‘suffered a substantial deprivation of his constitutional rights at his trial.’” 118 Cong. Rec. 24939 (1972) (quoting letter from Richard G. Kleindienst, Attorney General, to Emanuel Celler, Chairman of the House Committee on the Judiciary (June 21,1972)). This language of course parallels the federal harmless-error rule. But neither the Attorney General’s suggestion nor the proposed bill itself was ever enacted into law. As a general matter, we are “reluctant to draw inferences from Congress’ failure to act.” Schneidewind v. ANR Pipeline Co., 485 U. S. 293, 306 (1988) (citing American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Atchison, T. & S. F. R. Co., 387 U. S. 397, 416-418 (1967)); Red Lion Broadcasting Co. v. FCC, 396 U. S. 367, 381, n. 11 (1969)). We find no reason to depart from this rule here. In the absence of any express statutory guidance from Congress, it remains for this Court to determine what harmless-error standard applies on collateral review of petitioner’s Doyle claim. We have filled the gaps of the habeas corpus statute with respect to other matters, see, e. g., McCleskey v. Zant, 499 U. S. 467, 487 (1991); Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S. 72, 81 (1977); Sanders v. United States, 373 U. S. 1, 15 (1963); Townsend v. Sain, 372 U. S. 293, 312-313 (1963), and find it necessary to do so here. As always, in defining the scope of the writ, we look first to the considerations underlying our habeas jurisprudence, and then determine whether the proposed rule would advance or inhibit these considerations by weighing the marginal costs and benefits of its application on collateral review. The principle that collateral review is different from direct review resounds throughout our habeas jurisprudence. See, e. g., Wright v. West, 505 U. S. 277, 292-293 (1992) (opinion of Thomas, J.); Teague v. Lane, 489 U. S. 288, 306 (1989) (opinion of O’Connor, J.); Pennsylvania v. Finley, 481 U. S. 551, 556-557 (1987); Mackey v. United States, 401 U. S. 667, 682 (1971) (Harlan, J., concurring in judgments in part and dissenting in part). Direct review is the principal avenue for challenging a conviction. “When the process of direct review— which, if a federal question is involved, includes the right to petition this Court for a writ of certiorari — comes to an end, a presumption of finality and legality attaches to the conviction and sentence. The role of federal habeas proceedings, while important in assuring that constitutional rights are observed, is secondary and limited. Federal courts are not forums in which to relitigate state trials.” Barefoot v. Estelle, 463 U. S. 880,. 887 (1983). In keeping with this distinction, the writ of habeas corpus has historically been regarded as an extraordinary remedy, “a bulwark against convictions that violate 'fundamental fairness.’” Engle v. Isaac, 456 U. S. 107, 126 (1982) (quoting Wainwright v. Sykes, supra, at 97 (Stevens, J., concurring)). “Those few who are ultimately successful [in obtaining habeas relief] are persons whom society has grievously wronged and for whom belated liberation is little enough compensation.” Fay v. Noia, 372 U. S. 391, 440-441 (1963). See also Kuhlmann v. Wilson, 477 U. S. 436, 447 (1986) (plurality opinion) (“The Court uniformly has been guided by the proposition that the writ should be available to afford relief to those ‘persons whom society has grievously wronged’ in light of modern concepts of justice”) (quoting Fay v. Noia, supra, at 440-441); Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U. S. 307, 332, n. 5 (1979) (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment) (Habeas corpus “is designed to guard against extreme malfunctions in the state criminal justice systems”). Accordingly, it hardly bears repeating that “ ‘an error that may justify reversal on direct appeal will not necessarily support a collateral attack on a final judgment.’ ” United States v. Frady, 456 U. S. 152, 165 (1982) (quoting United States v. Addonizio, 442 U. S. 178, 184 (1979)). Recognizing the distinction between direct and collateral review, we have applied different standards on habeas than would be applied on direct review with respect to matters other than harmless-error analysis. Our recent retroactivity jurisprudence is a prime example. Although new rules always have retroactive application to criminal cases on direct review, Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U. S. 314, 320-328 (1987), we have held that they seldom have retroactive application to criminal cases on federal habeas, Teague v. Lane, supra, at 305-310 (opinion of O’Connor, J.). Other examples abound throughout our habeas cases. See, e.g., Pennsylvania v. Finley, 481 U. S. 551, 555-556 (1987) (Although the Constitution guarantees the right to counsel on direct appeal, Douglas v. California, 372 U. S. 353, 355 (1963), there is no “right to counsel when mounting collateral attacks”); United States v. Frady, supra, at 162-169 (While the federal “plain error” rule applies in determining whether a defendant may raise a claim for the first time on direct appeal, the “cause and prejudice” standard applies in determining whether that same claim may be raised on habeas); Stone v. Powell, 428 U. S. 465, 489-496 (1976) (Claims under Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U. S. 643 (1961), are not cognizable on habeas as long as the state courts have provided a full and fair opportunity to litigate them at trial or on direct review). The reason most frequently advanced in our cases for distinguishing between direct and collateral review is the State’s interest in the finality of convictions that have survived direct review within the state court system. See, e. g., Wright v. West, supra, at 293 (opinion of Thomas, J.); McCleskey v. Zant, 499 U. S., at 491; Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S., at 90. We have also spoken of comity and federalism. “The States possess primary authority for defining and enforcing the criminal law. In criminal trials they also hold the initial responsibility for vindicating constitutional rights. Federal intrusions into state criminal trials frustrate both the States’ sovereign power to punish offenders and their good-faith attempts to honor constitutional rights.” Engle v. Isaac, supra, at 128. See also Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U. S. 722, 748 (1991); McCleskey, supra, at 491. Finally, we have recognized that “[Iliberal allowance of the writ... degrades the prominence of the trial itself,” Engle, supra, at 127, and at the same time encourages habeas petitioners to relitigate their claims on collateral review, see Rose v. Lundy, 455 U. S. 509, 547 (1982) (Stevens, J., dissenting). In light of these considerations, we must decide whether the same harmless-error standard that the state courts applied on direct review of petitioner’s Doyle claim also applies in this habeas, proceeding. We are the sixth court to pass on the question whether the State’s use for impeachment purposes of petitioner’s post-Miranda silence in this case requires reversal of his conviction. Each court that has reviewed the record has disagreed with the court before it as to whether the State’s Doyle error was “harmless.” State courts are fully qualified to identify constitutional error and evaluate its prejudicial effect on the trial process under Chapman, and state courts often occupy a superior vantage point from which to evaluate the effect of trial error. See Rushen v. Spain, 464 U. S. 114, 120 (1983) (per curiam). For these reasons, it scarcely seems logical to require federal habeas courts to engage in the identical approach to harmless-error review that Chapman requires state courts to engage in on direct review. Petitioner argues that application of the Chapman harmless-error standard on collateral review is necessary to deter state courts from relaxing their own guard in reviewing constitutional error and to discourage prosecutors from committing error in the first place. Absent affirmative evidence that state-court judges are ignoring their oath, we discount petitioner’s argument that courts will respond to our ruling by violating their Article VI duty to uphold the Constitution. See Robb v. Connolly, 111 U. S. 624, 637 (1884). Federalism, comity, and the constitutional obligation of state and federal courts all counsel against any presumption that a decision of this Court will “deter” lower federal or state courts from fully performing their sworn duty. See Engle, supra, at 128; Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U. S. 218, 263-265 (1973) (Powell, J., concurring). In any event, we think the costs of applying the Chapman standard on federal habeas outweigh the additional deterrent effect, if any, that would be derived from its application on collateral review. Overturning final and presumptively correct convictions on collateral review because the State cannot prove that an error is harmless under Chapman undermines the States’ interest in finality and infringes upon their sovereignty over criminal matters. Moreover, granting habeas relief merely because there is a “ ‘reasonable possibility’ ” that trial error contributed to the verdict, see Chapman v. California, 386 U. S., at 24 (quoting Fahy v. Connecticut, 375 U. S. 85, 86 (1963)), is at odds with the historic meaning of habeas corpus — to afford relief to those whom society has “grievously wronged.” Retrying defendants whose convictions are set aside also imposes significant “social costs,” including the expenditure of additional time and resources for all the parties involved, the “erosion of memory” and “dispersion of witnesses” that accompany the passage of time and make obtaining convictions on retrial more difficult, and the frustration of “society’s interest in the prompt administration of justice.” United States v. Mechanik, 475 U. S. 66, 72 (1986) (internal quotation marks omitted). And since there is no statute of limitations governing federal habeas, and the only laches recognized is that which affects the State’s ability to defend against the claims raised on habeas, retrials following the grant of habeas relief ordinarily take place much later than do retrials following reversal on direct review. The imbalance of the costs and benefits of applying the Chapman harmless-error standard on collateral review counsels in favor of applying a less onerous standard on habeas review of constitutional error. The Kotteakos standard, we believe, fills the bill. The test under Kotteakos is whether the error “had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict.” 328 U. S., at 776. Under this standard, habeas petitioners may obtain plenary review of their constitutional claims, but they are not entitled to habeas relief based on trial error unless they can establish that it resulted in “actual prejudice.” See United States v. Lane, 474 U. S. 438, 449 (1986). The Kotteakos standard is thus better tailored to the nature and purpose of collateral review and more likely to promote the considerations underlying our recent habeas cases. Moreover, because the Kotteakos standard is grounded in the federal harmless-error rule, 28 U. S. C. §2111, federal courts may turn to an existing body of case law in applying it. Therefore, contrary to the assertion of petitioner, application of the Kotteakos standard on collateral review is unlikely to confuse matters for habeas courts. For the foregoing reasons, then, we hold that the Kot-teakos harmless-error standard applies in determining whether habeas relief must be granted because of constitutional error of the trial type. All that remains to be decided is whether petitioner is entitled to relief under this standard based on the State’s Doyle error. Because the Court of Appeals applied the Kotteakos standard below, we proceed to this question ourselves rather than remand the case for a new harmless-error determination. Cf. Yates v. Evatt, 500 U. S. 391, 407 (1991). At trial, petitioner admitted shooting Hartman, but claimed it was an accident. The principal question before the jury, therefore, was whether the State met its burden in proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the shooting was intentional. Our inquiry here is whether, in light of the record as a whole, the State’s improper use for impeachment purposes of petitioner’s post-Miranda silence, see n. 2, supra, “had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict.” We think it clear that it did not. The State’s references to petitioner’s post-Miranda silence were infrequent, comprising less than two pages of the 900-page trial transcript in this case. And in view of the State’s extensive and permissible references to petitioner’s pre-Miranda silence — i e., his failure to mention anything about the shooting being an accident to the officer who found him in the ditch, the man who gave him a ride to Winona, or the officers who eventually arrested him — its references to petitioner’s post-Miranda silence were, in effect, cumulative. Moreover, the State’s evidence of guilt was, if not overwhelming, certainly weighty. The path of the bullet through Mr. Hartman’s body was inconsistent with petitioner’s testimony that the rifle had discharged as he was falling. The police officers who searched the Hartmans’ home found nothing in the downstairs hallway that could have caused petitioner to trip. The rifle was found outside the house (where Hartman was shot), not inside where petitioner claimed it had accidently fired, and there was a live round rammed in the gun’s chamber, suggesting that petitioner had tried to fire a second shot. Finally, other circumstantial evidence, including the motive proffered by the State, also pointed to petitioner’s guilt. In light of the foregoing, we conclude that the Doyle error that occurred at petitioner’s trial did not “substantially]... influence” the jury’s verdict. Petitioner is therefore not entitled to habeas relief, and the judgment of the Court of Appeals is Affirmed. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 (1966). The State’s cross-examination of petitioner included the following exchange: “Q. In fact the first time you have ever told this story is when you testified here today was it not? “A. You mean the story of actually what happened? “Q. Yes. “A. I knew what happened, I’m just telling it the way it happened, yes, I didn’t have a chance to talk to anyone, I didn’t want to call somebody from a phone and give up my rights, so I didn’t want to talk about it, no sir.” App. 22-23. Then on re-cross-examination, the State further inquired: “Q. Did you tell anyone about what had happened in Alma? “A. No I did not.” Id., at 23. During closing argument, the State urged the jury to “remember that Mr. Brecht never volunteered until in this courtroom what happened in the Hartman residence....” Id., at 30. It also made the following statement with regard to petitioner’s pretrial silence: “He sits back here and sees all of our evidence go in and then he comes out with this crazy story....” Id., at 31. Finally, during its closing rebuttal, the State said: “I know what I’d say [had I been in petitioner’s shoes], I’d say, ‘hold on, this was a mistake, this was an accident, let me tell you what happened,’ but he didn’t say that did he. No, he waited until he hears our story.” Id., at 36. Cf. Bass v. Nix, 909 F. 2d 297 (CA8 1990) (The Chapman harmless-error standard governs in reviewing Doyle violations on collateral review). Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963). Griffin v. California, 380 U. S. 609 (1965). In Greer v. Miller, 483 U. S. 756 (1987), we granted certiorari to consider the same question presented here but did not reach this question because we concluded that no Doyle error had occurred in that case. See 483 U. S., at 761, n. 3, 765. But see id., at 768 ( Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Blackmun delivered the opinion of the Court. The petition here, arising from two cases Below, presents the issue whether a married woman domiciled in the community property State of Louisiana is personally liable for federal income tax on half the community income realized during the existence of the community de- ' spite the exercise of her statutory right of exoneration. The-issue arises in the .context, in one case, of a divorce, and, in the other, of the husband’s death. I Mrs.. Mitchell and Mrs. Sims: The Commissioner of Internal Revenue determined deficiencies against Anne Goyne Mitchell and Jane Isabell Goyne Sims for the tax years 1955-1959, inclusive. These were for federal income tax and for additions to tax under § 6651 (a) (failure to file return), § 6653 (a) (underpayment due to negligence or intentional disregard of rules and regulations), and § 6654 (underpayment of estimated tax) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954, 26 U. S. C. §§ 6651 (a), 6653 (a), and 6654. Mrs. Sims is the sister of Mrs. Mitchell. The determinations as to her were made under § 6901 as Mrs. Mitchell’s transferee without consideration. Anne Goyne and Emmett Bell Mitchell, Jr., were married in 1946. They lived in Louisiana. In July 1960, however, they began to live separately and apart. In August 1961 Mrs. Mitchell sued her husband in state court for separation. Upon his default, she was granted this relief. A final decree of divorce was entered in October 1962. In her separation suit. Mrs. Mitchell prayed that she be allowed to accept the community of acquets and gains with benefit of inventory. However, taking advantage of the privilege granted her by Art. 2410 of the Louisiana Civil Code, she formally renounced the community on September 18, 1961. As a consequence, she received neither a distribution of community property nor a property settlement upon dissolution of her marriage. This renunciation served to exonerate her of “debts contracted during the marriage.” Mrs. Mitchell earned $4,200 as a teacher during 1955 and 1956. From these earnings tax was withheld. Mr. Mitchell enjoyed taxable income during the five years in question. All income realized by both spouses during this period was community income. Mrs. Mitchell had little knowledge of her husband’s finances. She rarely knew the balance in the family bank account.. She possessed a withdrawal privilege on that account, and occasionally exercised it. Her husband was in charge of the couple’s financial affairs and did not usually consult his wife about them. She was aware of fiscal irresponsibility on his part. She questioned him each year about tax returns. She knew returns were required, but relied on .his assurances that he was filing timely returns and paying the taxes due. She signed no return herself and assumed that he had signed her name for her. In July 1960 she learned that, in fact, no returns had ever been filed for 1955-1959. The deficiencies determined against Mrs. Mitchell were based upon half the community income. The Commissioner sought to collect the deficiencies from property Mrs. Mitchell inherited from her mother in 1964 and immediately transferred, without consideration, to Mrs. Sims. Mrs. Mitchell sought redetermination in the Tax Court. Judge Forrester held that under Louisiana community property law Mrs. Mitchell possessed an immediate vested ownership interest in half the community property income and was personally responsible for the tax on her share. He also ruled that this tax liability was not affected by her Art. 2410 renunciation. Mitchell v. Commissioner, 51 T. C. 641 (1969). On appeal, the Fifth Circuit reversed, holding that by the renunciation Mrs. Mitchell avoided any federal income tax liability on the community income. Mitchell v. Commissioner, 430 F. 2d 1 (CA5 1970). Judge Simpson dissented on the basis of Judge Forrester’s opinion in the Tax Court. 430 F. 2d, at 7. Mrs. Angello. Throughout the calendar years 1959-1961 Mrs. Angello, who. was then Frances Sparacio, lived with her husband, Jack Sparacio, in Louisiana. Community income wás realized by the Sparacios during those years, but neither the husband nor the. wife filed any returns. In 1965 the District Director made assessments against them for taxes, penalties, and interest, filed a notice of lien, and addressed a notice of levy to the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, which had a policy outstanding on Mr. Sparacio’s life. The insured died, in March 1966 and the notice of levy (for that amount of tax and interest resulting from imputing to Mrs. Sparacio half the community’s income for the tax years in question) attached to the proceeds of the policy. The widow, who was the named beneficiary, sued the Metropolitan in state court to recover the policy proceeds. The United States intervened to assert and protect its lien. The case was then removed to federal court. The Metropolitan paid the proceeds into the court registry and was dismissed from the case. • Each side then moved for summary judgment. Judge Christenberry granted the Government’s motion and denied Mrs. Angello’s. Despite the absence of any formal renunciation by Mrs. Angello under Art. 2410, the Government did not contend that she had accepted any benefits of the community. On appeal, the Court of Appeals reversed, relying on the same panel’s decision in the Mitchell case. Angello v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., 430 F. 2d 7 (CA5 1970). Judge Simpson again dissented. We granted certiorari in both cases, 400 U. S. 1008 (1971), on a single petition filed under our Rule 23 (5). II Sections 1 and 3 of the 1954 Code, 26 U. S. C. §§ 1 and 3, as have all of their predecessors since the Revenue Act of .1917, impose a tax on the taxable income “of every individual.” The statutes, however, have not specified what that phrase includes. Forty years ago this Court had occasion to consider the phrase in the face of various state community property laws and of §§ 210 and 211 of the Revenue Act of 1926. A husband and wife, residents of the State of Washington, had income in 1927 consisting of the husband's salary and of amounts realized from real and personal property of the community. The spouses filed separate returns for 1927 and each reported half the community income. Mr. Justice Roberts, in speaking for a unanimous Court (two Justices not participating) upholding this tax treatment, said: “These sections lay a tax upon the net income of every individual. The Act goes no farther, and furnishes no other standard or definition of what constitutes an individual’s income. The use of the word 'of' denotes ownership. It would be a strained construction, which, in the absence of further definition by Congress, should impute a broader significance to the phrase.” Poe v. Seaborn, 282 U. S. 101, 109 (1930). The Court thus emphasized ownership. It looked to the law of the State as to the ownership of community property and of community income. It concluded that in Washington the wife has “a vested property right in the community property, equal with that of her husband; and in the income of the community, including salaries or wages of either husband or wife, or both.” Id., at 111. It noted that, in contrast, in an earlier case, United States v. Robbins, 269 U. S. 315 (1926), the opposite result had been reached under the then California law. But; “In the Robbins case, we found that' the law of California, as construed by her own courts, gave the wife a mere expectancy and that the property rights of the husband during the life of the community were so complete that' he was in fact the owner.” 282 U. S., at 116. In companion cases the Court came to the same conclusion, as it had reached in Seaborn, with respect to the community property laws of Arizona, Texas, and Louisiana. Goodell v. Koch, 282 U. S. 118 (1930); Hopkins v. Bacon, 282 U. S. 122 (1930); Bender v. Pfaff, 282 U. S. 127 (1930). In the Louisiana case it was said: “It the test be, as we have held it is,, ownership of the community income, this case is probably the strongest of those presented to us, in favor of the wife’s ownership of one-half of that income.” 282 U. S., at 131. The Court then reviewed the relevant Louisiana statutes and the power-of disposition possessed by each spouse. It noted that, while the husband is the manager of the affairs of the marital partnership, the limitations upon the wrongful exercise of his power over community property are more stringent than in many other States. It concluded: “Inasmuch, therefore, as, in Louisiana, the wife has a present vested interest in community property equal to that of her husband, we hold that the spouses are entitled to file separate returns, each treating one-half of the community income as income of each ‘of’ them as an ‘individual’ as those words are used in §§ 210 (a) and 211 (a) of the Revenue Act of 1926.” 282 U. S., at 132. Two months later the Court arrived at the same conclusion with respect to California community property law and federal income tax under the 1928 Act, with the Government conceding the effectiveness, in this respect, of amendments made to the California statutes since the Robbins decision. United States v. Malcolm, 282 U. S. 792 (1931). Significantly, the Court there answered in the affirmative, citing Seaborn, Koch, and Bacon, the following certified question: “Has the wife under § 161 (a) of the Civil Code of California such an interest in the community income that she should separately report and pay tax on one-half of such income?” 282 U. S., at 794. This affirmative answer to a question phrased in terms of “should,” not “may,” clearly indicates that the wife had the obligation, not merely the right, to report half the community income. The federal courts since Malcolm consistently have held that the wife is required to report half the community income and that the husband is taxable only on the other half. Gilmore v. United States, 154 Ct. Cl. 365, 290 F. 2d 942 (1961), rev’d on other grounds, 372 U. S. 39 (1963); Van Antwerp v. United States, 92 F. 2d 871 (CA9 1937); Simmons v. Cullen, 197 F. Supp. 179 (ND Cal. 1961); Dillin v. Commissioner, 56 T. C. 228 (1971); Kimes v. Commissioner, 55 T. C. 774 (1971); Hill v. Commissioner, 32 T. C. 254 (1959); Hunt v. Commissioner, 22 T. C. 228 (1954); Freundlich v. Commissioner, T. C. Memo. 1955-177; Cavanagh v. Commissioner, 42 B. T. A. 1037, 1044 (1940), aff’d, 125 F. 2d 366 (CA9 1942). - There were holdings from the Fifth Circuit to this apparent effect with respect to Louisiana taxpayers. Commissioner v. Hyman, 135 F. 2d 49, 50 (1943); Saenger v. Commissioner, 69 F. 2d 633 (1934); Smith v. Donnelly, 65 F. Supp. 415 (ED La. 1946). See Henderson’s Estate v. Commissioner, 155 F. 2d 310 (CA5 1946), and Gonzalez v. National Surety Corp., 266 F. 2d 667, 669 (CA5 1959). Thus, with respect to community income, as with respect to other income, federal income tax liability follows ownership. Blair v. Commissioner, 300 U. S. 5, 11-14 (1937). See Hoeper v. Tax Comm’n, 284 U. S. 206 (1931). In the determination of ownership, state law controls. “The state law creates legal interests., but the federal statute determines when and how they shall be taxed.” Burnet v. Harmel, 287 U. S. 103, 110 (1932); Morgan v. Commissioner, 309 U. S. 78, 80-81 (1940); Helvering v. Stuart, 317 U. S. 154, 162 (1942); Commissioner v. Harmon, 323 U. S. 44, 50-51 (1944) (Douglas, J., dissenting); see Commissioner v. Estate of Bosch, 387 U. S. 456 (1967). The dates of the cited cases indicate that these principles are long established in the law of taxation. Ill This would appear to foreclose the issue for the present cases. Nevertheless, because respondents and the Court of Appeals stress the evanescent nature of the wife’s interest in community property in Louisiana, a review of the pertinent Louisiana statutes and decisions is perhaps in order. Every marriage contracted in Louisiana “superinduces of right partnership or community of acquets or gains, if there be no stipulation to the contrary,” La. Civ. Code Ann., Art. 2399 (1971). . “This partnership or community consists of the profits of all the effects of which the husband has the administration and' enjoyment, either of right or in fact, of the produce of the reciprocal industry and labor of both husband and wife, and of the estate which they may acquire during the marriage, either by donations made jointly to them both, or by purchase, or in any other similar way, even although the purchase be only in the name of one of the two and not of both, because in that case the period of time when the purchase is made is alone attended to, and not the person who made the purchase. . . .” Art. 2402. The debts contracted during the marriage “enter into the partnership or community of gains; and must be acquitted out of the common fund . . . Art. 2403. “The husband is the head and master of the partnership or community of gains; he administers its effects, disposes of the revenues which they produce, and may alienate them by an onerous title, without the consent and permission of his wife.” Also “he may dispose of the movable effects by a gratuitous and particular title, to the benefit of all persons.” Art. 2404. The same article, however, denies him the power of conveyance, “by a gratuitous title,” of community immovables, or of the whole or a quota of the movables, unless for the children; and if the husband has sold or disposed of the common property in fraud of the wife, she has an action against her husband's heirs. At the dissolution of a marriage “all effects which both husband and wife reciprocally possess, are presumed common effects or gains . . . .” Art. 2405. At dissolution, “The effects which compose the partnership or community of gains, are divided into two equal portions between the husband and thé wife, or between their heirs . . . Art. 2406. “It is understood that, in the partition of the effects of the partnership' or community of gains, both husband and wife are to be equally liable for their share of the debts contracted during the marriage, and not acquitted at the time of its dissolution.” Art. 2409. Then the wife and her heirs or assigns may “exonerate themselves from the debts contracted during the marriage, by renouncing the partnership or community of gains.” Art. 2410. And the wife “who renounces, loses every sort of right to the effects of the partnership or community of gains” except that “she takes back all her effects, whether dotal or extradotal.” Art. 2411. The Louisiana court has described and forcefully stated the -nature of the community interest. In Phillips v. Phillips, 160 La. 813, 825-826, 107 So. 584, 588 (1926), it was said: “The wife’s half interest in the community property is not a mere expectancy during the marriage; it is not transmitted to her by or in consequence of a dissolution of the community. The title for half of the community property is vested in the wife the moment it is acquired by the community or by the spouses jointly, even though it' be acquired in the name of only one of them. . . . There are loose expressions, appearing in some of the. opinions rendered by this court, to the effect that the wife’s half interest in the community property is only an expectancy, or a residuary interest, until the community is dissolved- and liquidated. But that is contrary to the provisions of the Civil Code . . . and is contrary to the rule announced in every decision of this court since the error was first committed . . . .” Later, in Succession of Wiener, 203 La. 649, 14 So. 2d 475 (1943), a state inheritance tax case, the court, after referring to Arts. 2399 and 2402 of the Civil Code, said: “That this community is a partnership in which the husband and wife own equal shares, their title thereto vesting at the very instant such property is acquired, is well settled in this state . . . .” “The conclusion we have reached in this ease is.in keeping with .the decision of the United States Supreme Court in the case of Bender v. Pfaff, supra, where that court recognized that under the law of Louisiana the wife is not only vested with the ownership of half of the community property from the moment it is acquired, but is likewise the owner of half of the community income. . . .” 203 La., at 657 and 662, 14 So. 2d, at 477 and 479. After reviewing joint tenancy and tenancy by the entirety known to the common law, the court observed: “In Louisiana, the situation is entirely different, for here the civil law prevails, and the theory of the civil law is that the acquisition of all property during the marriage is due to the joint or common efforts, labor, industry, economy, and sacrifices of the husband and wife; in her station the wife is just as much an agency in acquiring this property as is her husband. In Louisiana, therefore, the wife's rights in and to the community property do not rest upon the mere gratuity of her husband; they are just as great as his and are entitled to equal dignity. . . . She is the half-partner and owner of all acquisitions made during the existence of the community, whether they be property or income. . . . “It is true that in weaving this harmonious commercial partnership around the intimate and sacred marital relationship, the framers of our law and its codifiers saw fit, in their wisdom, to place the hus-„ band at the head of the partnership, but this did not in any way affect the status of the property or the wife’s ownership of her half thereof. . . . And the husband was made the managing partner of the community and charged with the administration of its effects, as well as with the alienation of its effects and revenues by onerous title, because he was deemed the best qualified to act.” 203 La., at 665-667, 14 So. 2d, at 480-481. The court then outlined in detail the various protections afforded by Louisiana law to the wife and concluded: “It is obvious, therefore, that the wife’s interest in the community property in Louisiana does not spring from any fiction of the law or from any gift or act of generosity on the part of her husband but, instead, from an express legal contract of partnership entered into at the time of the marriage. There is no substantial difference between her interest therein and the interest of an ordinary member of a limited or ordinary partnership, the control and management of whose affairs has, by agreement, been entrusted to a managing partner. The only real difference is that the limitations placed on the managing partner in the community partnership are fixed by law, while those placed on the managing partner in an ordinary or limited partnership are fixed by convention or contract.” 203 La., at 669, 14 So. 2d, at 481-482. The husband thus is the manager and agent of the Louisiana community, but his powers as manager do not serve to defeat the ownership rights of the wife. These principles repeatedly have found expression in Louisiana cases. United States Fidelity & Guaranty Co. v. Green, 252 La. 227, 232-233, 210 So. 2d 328, 330 (1968); Gebbia v. City of New Orleans, 249 La. 409, 415-416, 187 So. 2d 423, 425 (1966); Azar v. Azar, 239 . La. 941, 946, 120 So. 2d 485, 487 (1960); Messersmith v. Messersmith, 229 La. 495, 507, 86 So. 2d 169, 173 (1956) ; Dixon v. Dixon’s Executors, 4 La. 188 (1832). This Court recognized these Louisiana community property principles in the Wiener estate's federal estate tax litigation. Fernandez v. Wiener, 326 U. S. 340 (1945). There the inclusion in the decedent’s gross estate of the entire community property was upheld for ■ purposes of the federal estate tax which is an excise tax. Mr. Chief Justice Stone noted the respective interests of the spouses when, in the following language, he spoke of the effect of death: “As we have seen, the death of the husband of the Louisiana marital community not only operates to transfer his rights in his share of the community to his heirs or those taking under his will. It terminates his expansive and sometimes profitable control over the wife’s share, and for the first time brings her half of the property into her full and exclusive possession, control and enjoyment. The cessation of these extensive powers of the husband, even though they were powers over property which he never ‘owned,’ and the establishment in the wife of new powers of control over her share, though it was always hers, furnish appropriate occasions for the imposition of an excise tax. “Similarly, with the death of the wife, her title or ownership in her share of the • community property ends, and passes to her heirs or other appointees. More than this, her death, by ending the marital community, liberates her husband’s share from the restrictions which the existence of the community had placed upon his control of it. •. . . “This redistribution of powers and restrictions upon power is brought about by death notwithstanding that the rights in the property subject to these powers and restrictions were in every sense ‘vested’ from the moment the community began. . . 326 U. S., at 355-356. Thus the Louisiana statutes and cases also seem to foreclose the claims advanced by the respondents. IV Despite all this, despite the concession that the wife’s interest in the community property is not a mere expectancy, and despite the further concession that she has a vested title in, and is the owner of, a half share of the community income, respondents take the position that somehow the wife’s interest is insufficient to make her liable for federal income tax computed on that half of the community income. It is said that her right to renounce the community and to place herself in the same position as if it had never existed is substantive; that the wife is not personally liable for a community debt; that it is really the community as an entity, not the husband or the wife, that, owns the property; and that Seaborn and it's companion cases were concerned only with the right to split income, not with the. obligation so to do. It is also said that the wife’s dominion over the community property is nonexistent in Louisiana; that the husband administers. the community’s affairs as he sees fit; that he is not required to account to the wife, even for mismanagement, unless he enriches his estate at her expense by fraud; that she has no way to terminate the community other than by suit for separation, and then only by showing mismanagement on his part that threatens her separate estate; that her status is imposed by law, as contrasted with a commercial partnership where status is consensual; that she has no legal right to obtain the information necessary to file a tax return or to obtain the funds with which to pay the tax'; and that Robbins authorizes taxing the whole of the community income to the husband. The same arguments, however, were advanced in Seaborn, 282 U. S., at 103-105, and in its companion cases, 282 U. S., at 119, 123, and 128, and were unavailing there, 282 U. S., at 111-113. They do not persuade us here. Specifically, the power to renounce, granted by Article 2410, is of no comfort to the wife-taxpayer. As Judge Forrester aptly expressed it, 51 T. C., at 646, Mrs. Mitchell’s renunciation “came long after her liabilities for the annual income-taxes here in issue had attached.” Further, “[t]his right of the wife to renounce or repudiate must not be misconstrued as an indication that she had never owned and possessed her share, for that fact was not denied; but she did have, under the principles of community property, the right to revoke her ownership and possession. . . .” 1 W. deFuniak, Principles of Community Property § 218, p. 621 (1943). . The results urged by the respondents might follow, of course, in connection with a tax or other, obligation the collection of which is controlled by state law. But an exempt status under state law does not bind the federal collector. Federal law governs what is exempt from federal levy. Section 6321 of the 1954 Code imposes a lien for the income tax “upon all property and rights to property . . . belonging to” the person liable for the tax. Section 6331 (a) authorizes levy “upon all property and rights to property . . . belonging to such person .'. . .” What is exempt from levy is specified in § 6334 (a). Section 6334 (c) provides, “Notwithstanding any other law of the United States, no property or rights to property shall be exempt from levy other than the property specifically made exempt by subsection (a).” This language is specific and it is clear and there is no room in it for automatic exemption of property that happens to be exempt from state levy under state lawi United States v. Bess, 357 U. S. 51, 56-57 (1958); Shambaugh v. Scofield, 132 F. 2d 345 (CA5 1942); United States v. Heffron, 158 F. 2d 657 (CA9), cert. denied, 331 U. S. 831 (1947); Treas. Reg. § 301.6334-1 (c). See Birch v. Dodt, 2 Ariz. App. 228, 407 P. 2d 417 (1965). As a consequence, state law which exempts a husband’s interest in community property from his premarital debts does not defeat collection of his federal income tax liability for premarital tax years from his interest in the community. United States v. Overman, 424 F. 2d 1142, 1145 (CA9 1970); In re Ackerman, 424 F. 2d 1148 (CA9 1970). The result as to Mrs. Mitchell and Mrs. Angello is no different. It must be conceded that these cases are “hard” cases and exceedingly unfortunate for the two women taxpayers. Mrs. Mitchell loses the benefit of her inheritance from her mother, an inheritance that ripened after the dissolution of her marriage. Mrs. Angello loses her beneficiary interest in her deceased husband’s life insurance policy. This takes .place with each wife not really aware of the community tax situation, and not really in a position to ascertain the details of the community income. The law, however, is clear. The taxes were due. They were not paid. Returns were not even filed. The “fault,” if fault there be, lies with the four taxpayers and flows from the settled principles of the community property system. If the wives were to prevail here, they would have the best of both worlds. . The remedy is in legislation. An example is Pub. L. 91-679 of January 12, 1971, 84 Stat. 2063, adding to the Code subsection (e) of § 6013 and the final sen- ■ tence of § 6653 (b). These amendments afford relief to an innocent spouse, who was a party to a joint return, with respect to. omitted income and fraudulent underpayment. Relief of that kind is the answer to the respondents’. situation. The judgment in each case is reversed. It is so ordered. Art. 2410. “Both the wife and her heirs or assigns have the privilege of being able to exonerate themselves from the debts contracted during the marriage, by renouncing the partnership or community of gains.” Accord, with respect to Texas, law, Ramos v. Commissioner, 429 F. 2d 487 (CA5 1970). Internal Revenue Code of 1939, §§ 11 and 12; Revenue Act of 1938, §§ 11 and 12, 52 Stat. 452, 453; Revenue Act of 1936, §§ 11 and 12, 49 Stat. 1653; Revenue Act of 1934, §§ 11 and 12, 48 Stat. 684; Revenue Act of 1932, §§ 11 and 12, 47 Stat. 174; Revenue Act of 1928, §§ 11 and 12, 45 Stat. 795, 796; Revenue Act of 1926, §§ 210 and 211, 44 Stat. 21; Revenue Act of 1924, §§ 210 and 211, 43 Stat. 264, 265; Act of March 4, 1923, 42 Stat. 1507; Revenue Act of 1921, §§ 210 and 211, 42 Stat. 233; Revenue Act of 1918, §§ 210 and 211, 40 Stat. 1062; Revenue Act of 1917, §§ 1 and 201, 40 Stat. 300, 303. Angello Brief 2. Angello Brief 2, 9. Of course, as Baron Rolfe long ago observed, hard cases “are apt to introduce bad law.” Winterbottom v. Wright, 10 M. & W. 109, 116, 152 Eng. Rep. 402, 406 (1842). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

L

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. The City of Pawtucket, Rhode Island, has an ordinance which reads as follows: “Sec. 11. No person shall address any political or religious meeting in any public park; but this section shall not be construed to prohibit any political or religious club or society from visiting any public park in a body, provided that no public address shall be made under the auspices of such club or society in such park.” Jehovah’s Witnesses, a religious sect, assembled in Slater Park of Pawtucket for a meeting which at the trial was conceded to be religious in character. About 400 people attended, 150 being Jehovah’s Witnesses. Appellant is a minister of this sect, residing in Arlington, Mass. He was invited to Pawtucket as a visiting minister to give a talk before the Pawtucket congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Appellant accepted the invitation, attended the meeting in the park, and addressed it over two loud-speakers. It was a quiet, orderly meeting with no disturbances or breaches of the peace whatsoever. Appellant’s address was entitled “The Pathway to Peace.” He discussed the futility of efforts being made to establish peace in the world. And then, according to his uncontradicted testimony, he “launched forth into the scriptural evidence to show where we were on the string of time; that we had reached the end of this wicked system of things.” Appellant had been talking only a few minutes when he was arrested by the police and charged with violating the ordinance set forth above. He was tried and found guilty over objections that the ordinance as so construed and applied violated the Eirst and the Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution. He was fined $5. His conviction was affirmed by the Rhode Island Supreme Court. 80 R. I. -, 91 A. 2d 27. And see Fowler v. State, 79 R. I. 16, 83 A. 2d 67, an earlier opinion answering certified questions and holding the ordinance valid. The case is here on appeal. 28 U. S. C. § 1257 (2). Davis v. Massachusetts, 167 U. S. 43, decided in 1897, sustained a conviction of a man for making a speech on the Boston Commons in violation of an ordinance that forbade the making of a public address there without a permit from the mayor. Much of the oral argument and most of the briefs have been devoted on the one hand to a defense of the Davis case and on the other hand to an attack on it. Analyses of subsequent decisions have been submitted in an effort either to demonstrate that the Davis case is today good law, or to show that it has been so qualified as no longer to have any vitality. We are invited by appellant to overrule it; we are asked by respondent to reaffirm it. We put to one side the problems presented by the Davis case and its offspring. For there is one aspect of the present case that undercuts all others and makes it necessary for us to reverse the judgment. As we have said, it was conceded at the trial that this meeting was a religious one. On oral argument before the Court the Assistant Attorney General further conceded that the ordinance, as construed and applied, did not prohibit church services in the park. Catholics could hold mass in Slater Park and Protestants could conduct their church services there without violating the ordinance. Church services normally entail not only singing, prayer, and other devotionals but preaching as well. Even so, those services would not be barred by the ordinance. That broad concession, made in oral argument, is fatal to Rhode Island’s case. For it plainly shows that a religious service of Jehovah’s Witnesses is treated differently than a religious service of other sects. That amounts to the state preferring some religious groups over this one. In Niemotko v. Maryland, 340 U. S. 268, 272-273, we had a case on all fours with this one. There a public park, open to all religious groups, was denied Jehovah’s Witnesses because of the dislike which the local officials had of these people and their views. That was a discrimination which we held to be barred by the First and Fourteenth Amendments. Appellant’s sect has conventions that are different from the practices of other religious groups. Its religious service is less ritualistic, more unorthodox, less formal than some. But apart from narrow exceptions not relevant here (Reynolds v. United States, 98 U. S. 145; Davis v. Beason, 133 U. S. 333) it is no business of courts to say that what is a religious practice or activity for one group is not religion under the protection of the First Amendment. Nor is it in the competence of courts under our constitutional scheme to approve, disapprove, classify, regulate, or in any manner control sermons delivered at religious meetings. Sermons are as much a part of a religious service as prayers. They cover a wide range and have as great a diversity as the Bible or other Holy Book from which they commonly take their texts. To call the words which one minister speaks to his congregation a sermon, immune from regulation, and the words of another minister an address, subject to regulation, is merely an indirect way of preferring one religion over another. That would be precisely the effect here if we affirmed this conviction in the face of the concession made during oral argument. Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, or Episcopal ministers, Catholic priests, Moslem mullahs, Buddhist monks could all preach to their congregations in Paw-tucket’s parks with impunity. But the hand of the law would be laid on the shoulder of a minister of this unpopular group for performing the same function. The judgment is reversed and the cause is remanded to the Supreme Court of Rhode Island for proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. Reversed. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

C

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Chief Justice Warren delivered the opinion of the Court. This is a companion case to Quinn v. United States, ante, p. 155. Challenged in each proceeding is a conviction under 2 U. S. C. § 192 in the District Court for the District of Columbia. The two cases arose out of the same investigation by the Committee on Un-American Activities of the House of Representatives. Because of the similarity of the legal issues presented, the cases were consolidated for argument in this Court. Pursuant to subpoena, petitioner appeared on December 5, 1949, before a subcommittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities. The subcommittee consisted of a single member, Rep. Morgan M. Moulder. Petitioner was then the General Secretary-Treasurer of the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America as well as Editor of the UE News, the union’s official publication. The subcommittee’s hearings had previously been announced as concerning “the question of Communist affiliation or association of certain members” of the union and “the advisability of tightening present security requirements in industrial plants working on certain Government contracts.” Petitioner was asked a total of 239 questions. Most dealt with the structure of the union, the duties of its officers, the scope of its membership and bargaining commitments, the alleged similarity in policies of the UE News and the Communist Party, the non-Communist affidavit that petitioner had filed with the National Labor Relations Board, and related matters. Petitioner answered all of these questions. He declined, however, to answer 68 of the 239 questions. These 68 questions dealt exclusively with petitioner’s associations and affiliations. He based his refusal on “primarily the first amendment, supplemented by the fifth.” Of the 68 questions, 58 asked in substance that he state whether or not he was acquainted with certain named individuals and whether or not those individuals had ever held official positions in the union. Two of the questions concerned petitioner’s alleged membership in the National Federation for Constitutional Liberties and the Civil Rights Congress. Eight questions concerned petitioner’s alleged membership and activity in the Communist Party. On November 20, 1950, petitioner was indicted under § 192 for his refusal to answer the 68 questions. Sitting without a jury, the District Court held that petitioner’s references to “primarily the first amendment, supplemented by the fifth” were insufficient to invoke the Fifth Amendment’s privilege against self-incrimination. The District Court accordingly found petitioner guilty on all 68 counts and sentenced him to a term of six months and a fine of $500. The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, three judges dissenting, affirmed en banc. From that decision this Court granted certiorari. I. As pointed out in Quinn v. United States, supra, no ritualistic formula or talismanic phrase is essential in order to invoke the privilege against self-incrimination. All that is necessary is an objection stated in language that a committee may reasonably be expected to understand as an attempt to invoke the privilege. In the Quinn case we hold that Quinn’s references to “the First and Fifth Amendments” and “the First Amendment to the Constitution, supplemented by the Fifth Amendment” were sufficient to meet this standard. It would be unwarranted, we think, to reach a different conclusion here as to petitioner’s plea based on “primarily the first amendment, supplemented by the fifth.” The Government does not even attempt to distinguish between the two cases in this respect. Apparently conceding that petitioner as well as Quinn intended to invoke the privilege, the Government points out “the probability” that his references to the Fifth Amendment were likewise deliberately phrased in muffled terms “to obtain the benefit of the privilege without incurring the popular opprobrium which often attaches to its exercise.” On this basis the Government contends that petitioner’s plea was not adequate. The answer to this contention is threefold. First, an objection that is sufficiently clear to reveal a probable intention to invoke the privilege cannot be ignored merely because it is not phrased in an orthodox manner. Second, if it is true that in these times a stigma may somehow result from a witness’ reliance on the Self-Incrimination Clause, a committee should be all the more ready to recognize a veiled claim of the privilege. Otherwise, the great right which the Clause was intended to secure might be effectively frustrated by private pressures. Third, it should be noted that a committee is not obliged to either accept or reject an ambiguous constitutional claim the very moment it is first presented. The way is always open for the committee to inquire into the nature of the claim before making a ruling. If the witness intelligently and unequivocally waives any objection based on the Self-Incrimination Clause, or if the witness refuses a committee request to state whether he relies on the Self-Incrimination Clause, he cannot later invoke its protection in a prosecution for contempt for refusing to answer that question. The Government argues that petitioner did in fact waive the privilege, at least as to one count of the indictment, and that the conviction can be sustained on that count alone. In response to a question concerning his associations, petitioner expressed apprehension that the committee was “trying to perhaps frame people for possible criminal prosecution” and added that “I think I have the right to reserve whatever rights I have . . . .” The following colloquy then took place: “Mr. Moulder. Is it your feeling that to reveal your knowledge of them would subject you to criminal prosecution? “Mr. Emspak. No. I don’t think this committee has a right to pry into my associations. That is my own position.” Petitioner’s reply, it is contended, constituted an effective disclaimer of the privilege. We find this contention without merit. As this Court declared in Smith v. United States, 337 U. S. 137, 150: “Although the privilege against self-incrimination must be claimed, when claimed it is guaranteed by the Constitution. . . . Waiver of constitutional rights ... is not lightly to be inferred. A witness cannot properly be held after claim to have waived his privilege . . . upon vague and uncertain evidence.” The Smith case, we believe, is controlling here. The witness in that case, at the outset of questioning by an OPA examiner, stated “I want to claim privilege as to anything I say.” The examiner accepted this statement as a plea of possible self-incrimination and a request for the immunity afforded to involuntary witnesses by the Price Control Act of 1942.. The questioning proceeded on that basis. In response to one question, however, the witness made a statement that appeared to the examiner to be voluntary. This colloquy then ensued: “Question: This is a voluntary statement. You do not claim immunity with respect to that statement? “Answer: No.” In a subsequent prosecution of the witness for violation of the Price Control Act, it was held that his “No” answer waived his immunity at least as to the one statement. This Court unanimously reversed, stating (337 U. S., at 151): “Without any effort to clarify the 'No,’ the examiner went ahead and had the witness restate the substance of the long answer . . . without any further intimation that the subsequent answers were considered by the examiner to be voluntary. We do not think under these circumstances this equivocal ‘No’ is a waiver of the previous definite claim of general privilege against self-incrimination.” Similarly, in the instant case, we do not think that petitioner’s “No” answer can be treated as a waiver of his previous express claim under the Fifth Amendment. At most, as in the Smith case, petitioner’s “No” is equivocal. It may have merely represented a justifiable refusal to discuss the reasons underlying petitioner’s assertion of the privilege; the privilege would be of little avail if a witness invoking it were required to disclose the precise hazard which he fears. And even if petitioner’s “No” answer were taken as responsive to the question, the answer would still be consistent with a claim of the privilege. The protection of the Self-Incrimination Clause is not limited to admissions that “would subject [a witness] to criminal prosecution”; for this Court has repeatedly held that “Whether such admissions by themselves would support a conviction under a criminal statute is immaterial” and that the privilege also extends to admissions that may only tend to incriminate. In any event, we cannot say that the colloquy between the committee and petitioner was sufficiently unambiguous to warrant finding a waiver here. To conclude otherwise would be to violate this Court’s own oft-repeated admonition that the courts must “indulge every reasonable presumption against waiver of fundamental constitutional rights.” Throughout this entire proceeding — in the trial in the District Court, on appeal in the Court of Appeals, and here on certiorari — the Government has never denied that petitioner would be entitled to the protection of the privilege if he did in fact invoke it. And during argument in this Court the Government expressly conceded that all 68 questions were of an incriminatory character. In addition, neither the District Court nor the Court of Appeals saw fit to introduce the issue into the case. We are therefore reluctant to do so now. But doubts on the issue by some members of the Court make its consideration necessary. “To sustain the privilege,” this Court has recently held, “it need only be evident from the implications of the question, in the setting in which it is asked, that a responsive answer to the question or an explanation of why it cannot be answered might be dangerous because injurious disclosure could result.” And nearly 150 years ago Chief Justice Marshall enunciated a similar test: “Many links frequently compose that chain of testimony which is necessary to convict any individual of a crime. It appears to the court to be the true sense of the rule that no witness is compellable to furnish any one of them against himself.” Applying this test to the instant case, we have no doubt that the eight questions concerning petitioner’s alleged membership in the Communist Party fell within the scope of the privilege. The same is true of the two questions concerning petitioner’s alleged membership in the National Federation for Constitutional Liberties and the Civil Rights Congress; both organizations had previously been cited by the committee as Communist-front organizations. There remains for consideration the 58 questions concerning petitioner’s associations. This Court has already made abundantly clear that such questions, when asked in a setting of possible incrimination, may fall within the scope of the privilege. What was the setting — as revealed by the record — in which these questions were asked? Each of the named individuals had previously been charged with having Communist affiliations. On October 14, 1949, less than two months prior to petitioner’s appearance before the committee, eleven principal leaders of the Communist Party in this country had been convicted under the Smith Act for conspiring to teach and advocate the violent overthrow of the United States. Petitioner was identified at their trial as a Communist and an associate of the defendants. It was reported that Smith Act indictments against other Communist leaders were being prepared. On November 23, 1949, two weeks prior to petitioner’s appearance, newspapers carried the story that the Department of Justice “within thirty days” would take “an important step” toward the criminal prosecution of petitioner in connection with his non-Communist affidavit filed with the National Labor Relations Board. Under these circumstances, it seems clear that answers to the 58 questions concerning petitioner’s associations “might be dangerous because injurious disclosure could result.” To reveal knowledge about the named individuals — all of them having been previously charged with Communist affiliations — could well have furnished “a link in the chain” of evidence needed to prosecute petitioner for a federal crime, ranging from conspiracy to violate the Smith Act to the filing of a false non-Coxnmunist affidavit under the Taft-Hartley Act. That being so, it is immaterial that some of the questions sought information about associations that petitioner might have been able to explain away on some innocent basis unrelated to Communism. If an answer to a question may tend to be incriminatory, a witness is not deprived of the protection of the privilege merely because the witness if subsequently prosecuted could perhaps refute any inference of guilt arising from the answer. II. There is here, as in the Quinn case, a second ground for our decision. At no time did the committee specifically overrule petitioner’s objection based on the Fifth Amendment, nor did the committee indicate its overruling of the objection by specifically directing petitioner to answer. In the absence of such committee action, petitioner was never confronted with a clear-cut choice between compliance and noncompliance, between answering the question and risking prosecution for contempt. For the reasons set out in the Quinn opinion, we believe the committee — by failing to meet these minimal procedural standards, originally recognized by the committee and recently re-adopted — did not adequately apprise petitioner that an answer was required notwithstanding his objections. And without such apprisal, there is lacking the element of deliberateness necessary for a conviction under § 192 for a refusal to answer. III. Our disposition of the case makes it unnecessary to pass on petitioner’s other contentions as to the First Amendment and the grand jury. The judgment below is reversed and the case remanded to the District Court with directions to enter a judgment of acquittal. Reversed. [For dissenting opinion of Mb. Justice Reed, joined by Mr. Justice Minton, insofar as it applies to this case, see ante, p. 171.] Section 192 provides: “Every person who having been summoned as a witness by the authority of either House of Congress to give testimony or to produce papers upon any matter under inquiry before either House, or any joint committee established by a joint or concurrent resolution of the two Houses of Congress, or any committee of either House of Congress, willfully makes default, or who, having appeared, refuses to answer any question pertinent to the question under inquiry, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not more than $1,000 nor less than $100 and imprisonment in a common jail for not less than one month nor more than twelve months.” Hearings before House Committee on Un-American Activities Regarding Communist Infiltration of Labor Unions, 81st Cong., 1st Sess., Part I, 541-542. At the very outset of this line of questioning, the following colloquy took place: “Mr. Moulder. Are you going to answer the question? “Mr. Emspak. Because of the hysteria, I think it is my duty to endeavor to protect the rights guaranteed under the Constitution, primarily the first amendment, supplemented by the fifth. This committee will corrupt those rights.” (Italics added.) Hearings, supra, note 2, Part II, at 839. Petitioner’s motions to dismiss the indictment were denied. United States v. Emspak, 95 F. Supp. 1010, 1012. United States v. Emspak, unreported, Criminal No. 1742-50 (D. D. C.). In a companion case under § 192, United States v. Matles, unreported, Criminal No. 1745-50 (D. D. C.), the same district judge directed an acquittal of James J. Matles, a UE official who testified before the committee on the same day as Emspak and who similarly relied on “the First and Fifth Amendments.” Hearings, supra, note 2, Part II, at 856. The court held that Matles’ plea was sufficient to invoke the Self-Incrimination Clause because it appeared that Rep. Moulder so understood it. 91 U. S. App. D. C. 378, 203 F. 2d 54. 346 U. S. 809. After argument, the case was restored to the docket for reargument. 347 U. S. 1006. Brief for United States, p. 33, in Quinn v. United States, ante, p. 155. Petitioner’s general sentence on all 68 counts was less than the maximum permissible on any count. See Sinclair v. United States, 279 U. S. 263, 299. Hearings, supra, note 2, Part II, at 840. Id., at 841. United States v. Daisart Sportswear, Inc., 169 F. 2d 856, 862-863 (C. A. 2d Cir.). See also United States v. St. Pierre, 128 F. 2d 979, 980 (C. A. 2d Cir.), from which this Court’s Smith opinion approvingly quotes the following: “Nor is it material that appellant stated at several points that he had committed no federal crime; such a contradiction, especially by a nervous or excitable witness would not overcome a clear claim of privilege if he was otherwise entitled to the privilege.” Cf. United States v. Weisman, 111 F. 2d 260, 261 (C. A. 2d Cir.). See Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, 486; United States v. Burr, 25 Fed. Cas. 38, at 40, No. 14,692e. Blau v. United States, 340 U. S. 159, 161. See Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, at 486-487; United States v. Burr, 25 Fed. Cas. 38, at 40-41, No. 14,692e. And see note 18, infra. Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U. S. 458, 464. See also, e. g., Glasser v. United States, 315 U. S. 60, 70, and Smith v. United States, 337 U. S. 137, 150. Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, 486-487. Compare the test laid down in Arndstein v. McCarthy, 254 U. S. 71, 72: “It is impossible to say from mere consideration of the questions propounded, in the light of the circumstances disclosed, that they could have been answered with entire impunity.” And see United States v. Coffey, 198 F. 2d 438, 440 (C. A. 3d Cir.): “It is enough (1) that the trial court be shown by argument how conceivably a prosecutor, building on the seemingly harmless answer, might proceed step by step to link the witness with some crime against the United States, and (2) that this suggested course and scheme of linkage not seem incredible in the circumstances of the particular case. It is in this latter connection, the credibility of the suggested connecting chain, that the reputation and known history of the witness may be significant. “Finally, in determining whether the witness really apprehends danger in answering a question, the judge cannot permit himself to be skeptical; rather must he be acutely aware that in the deviousness of crime and its detection incrimination may be approached and achieved by obscure and unlikely lines of inquiry.” United States v. Burr, 25 Fed. Cas. 38, at 40, No. 14,692e. Blau v. United States, 340 U. S. 159. See also Brunner v. United States, 343 U. S. 918, reversing 190 F. 2d 167 (C. A. 9th car.). In United States v. Singleton, 193 F. 2d 464 (C. A. 3d Cir.), the defendant was convicted of contempt for refusing to answer the question “What business is he in?” with respect to three named individuals. This Court summarily reversed, 343 U. S. 944, citing Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, and Greenberg v. United States, 343 U. S. 918. The Hoffman decision, in reversing 185 F. 2d 617 (C. A. 3d Cir.), upheld an assertion of the privilege in response to questions concerning the whereabouts of an acquaintance of the defendant. The Greenberg decision, in reversing 192 F. 2d 201 (C. A. 3d Cir.), upheld an assertion of the privilege in response to a question, among others, asking the defendant to identify certain “men who are in the numbers business.” See note 24, infra. 18 U. S. C. § 2385; 18 U. S. C. § 371. 29 U. S. C. § 159 (h); 18 U. S. C. § 1001. At the present time the Courts of Appeals are apparently uniform in holding that the privilege may extend to questions of the sort involved here. See, e. g., Judge Learned Hand in United States v. Weisman, 111 F. 2d 260, 261 (C. A. 2d Cir.), upholding privilege in response to question of whether the witness knew anyone who visited, lived in, or stayed at, Shanghai in the years 1934 to 1939; Judge Augustus Hand in United States v. Zwillman, 108 F. 2d 802 (C. A. 2d Cir.), upholding privilege in response to question of who the witness’ business associates were in the years 1928 to 1932; Chief Judge Denman in Kasinowitz v. United States, 181 F. 2d 632 (C. A. 9th Cir.), upholding privilege in response to questions of whether the witness knew Dorothy Healy and whether the witness knew Dorothy Healy’s occupation; Chief Judge Magruder in Maffie v. United States, 209 F. 2d 225, 231 (C. A. 1st Cir.), upholding privilege in response to question, among others, whether witness knew “Specs” O’Keefe and Stanley Gusciora; Judge Holmes in Estes v. Potter, 183 F. 2d 865 (C. A. 5th Cir.), upholding privilege in response to question whether the witness personally knew a certain alien; Judge Rives in Marcello v. United States, 196 F. 2d 437, 442 (C. A. 5th Cir.), upholding privilege in response to question “Do you know Salvatore Vittali?”; Judge Martin in Aiuppa v. United States, 201 F. 2d 287 (C. A. 6th Cir.), upholding privilege in response to questions whether the witness knew R. L. O’Donnell and Anthony Aceardo; Judge Maris in In re Neff, 206 F. 2d 149 (C. A. 3d Cir.), upholding privilege in response to questions whether the witness knew Julius Zinman and Lou Malinow. See also Alexander v. United States, 181 F. 2d 480 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Doran v. United States, 181 F. 2d 489 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Healey v. United States, 186 F. 2d 164 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Poretto v. United States, 196 F. 2d 392, 396 (C. A. 5th Cir.); United States v. Girgenti, 197 F. 2d 218 (C. A. 3d Cir.) ; United States v. Coffey, 198 F. 2d 438 (C. A. 3d Cir.); Daly v. United States, 209 F. 2d 232, 233 (C. A. 1st Cir.). Cf. Kiewel v. United States, 204 F. 2d 1 (C. A. 8th Cir.); United States v. Doto, 205 F. 2d 416 (C. A.2d Cir.). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. Respondent Union filed a complaint in 1972 with the National Labor Relations Board alleging that South Prairie Construction Co. (South Prairie) and Peter Kiewit Sons’ Co. (Kiewit) had violated §§ 8 (a)(5) and (1) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, 61 Stat. 140, 29 U. S. C. §§ 158 (a)(5) and (1), by their continuing refusal to apply to South Prairie’s employees the collective-bargaining agreement in effect between the Union and Kiewit. The Union first asserted that since South Prairie and Kiewit are wholly owned subsidiaries of Peter Kiewit Sons’, Inc. (PKS), and engage in highway construction in Oklahoma, they constituted a single “employer” within the Act for purposes of applying the Union-Kiewit agreement. That being the case, the Union contended, South Prairie was obligated to recognize the Union as the representative of a bargaining unit drawn to include South Prairie’s employees. Disagreeing with the Administrative Law Judge on the first part of the Union’s claim, the Board concluded that South Prairie and Kiewit were in fact separate employers, and dismissed the complaint. On the Union’s petition for review, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit canvassed the facts of record. It discussed, inter alia, the manner in which Kiewit, South Prairie, and PKS functioned as entities; PKS’ decision to activate South Prairie, its nonunion subsidiary, in a State where historically Kiewit had been the only union highway contractor among the latter’s Oklahoma competitors; and the two firms’ competitive bidding patterns on Oklahoma highway jobs after South Prairie was activated in 1972 to do business there. Stating that it was applying the criteria recognized by this Court in Radio Union v. Broadcast Service, 380 U. S. 255 (1965), the Court of Appeals disagreed with the Board and decided that on the facts presented Kiewit and South Prairie were a single “employer.” It reasoned that in addition to the “presence of a very substantial qualitative degree of centralized control of labor relations,” the facts “evidence a substantial qualitative degree of interrelation of operations and common management — one that we are satisfied would not be found in the arm’s length relationship existing among uninte-grated companies.” 171 U. S. App. D. C. 102, 108, 109, 518 F. 2d 1040, 1046, 1047 (1975). The Board’s finding to the contrary was, therefore, in the view of the Court of Appeals “not warranted by the record.” Id., at 109, 518 F. 2d, at 1047. Having set aside this portion of the Board’s determination, however, the Court of Appeals went on to reach and decide the second question presented by the Union’s complaint which had not been passed upon by the Board. The court decided that the employees of Kiewit and South Prairie constituted the appropriate unit under § 9 of the Act for purposes of collective bargaining. On the basis of this conclusion, it decided that these firms had committed an unfair labor practice by refusing “to recognize Local 627 as the bargaining representative of South Prairie’s employees or to extend the terms of the Union’s agreement with Kiewit to South Prairie’s employees.” Id., at 112, 518 F. 2d, at 1050. The case was remanded to the Board for “issuance and enforcement of an appropriate order against . . . Kiewit and South Prairie.” Ibid. Petitioners South Prairie and the Board in their petitions here contest the action of the Court of Appeals in setting aside the Board’s determination on the “employer” question. But their principal contention is that the Court of Appeals invaded the statutory province of the Board when it proceeded to decide the § 9 “unit” question in the first instance, instead of remanding the case to the Board so that it could make the initial determination. While we refrain from disturbing the holding of the Court of Appeals that Kiewit and South Prairie are an “employer,” see NLRB v. Pittsburgh S. S. Co., 340 U. S. 498 (1951), we agree with petitioners’ principal contention. The Court of Appeals was evidently of the view that since the Board dismissed the complaint it had necessarily decided that the employees of Kiewit and South Prairie would not constitute an appropriate bargaining unit under § 9. But while the Board’s opinion referred to its cases in this area and included a finding that “the employees of each constitute a separate bargaining unit,” 206 N. L. R. B. 562, 563 (1973), its brief discussion was set in the context of what it obviously considered was the dispositive issue, namely, whether the two firms were separate employers. We think a fair reading of its decision discloses that it did not address the “unit” question on the basis of any assumption, arguendo, that it might have been wrong on the threshold “employer” issue. Section 9 (b) of the Act, 29 U. S. C. § 159 (b), directs the Board to “decide in each case whether, in order to assure to employees the fullest freedom in exercising the rights guaranteed by this Act, the unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining shall be the employer unit, craft unit, plant unit, or subdivision thereof . . . The Board's cases hold that especially in the construction industry a determination that two affiliated firms constitute a single employer “does not necessarily establish that an employerwide unit is appropriate, as the factors which are relevant in identifying the breadth of an employer’s operation are not conclusively determinative of the scope of an appropriate unit.” Central New Mexico Chapter, National Electrical Contractors Assn., Inc., 152 N. L. R. B. 1604, 1608 (1965). See also B & B Industries, Inc., 162 N. L. R. B. 832 (1967). Cf. Gerace Constr., Inc., 193 N. L. R. B. 645 (1971). The Court of Appeals reasoned that the Board’s principal case on the “unit” question, Central New Mexico Chapter, supra, was distinguishable because there the two affiliated construction firms were engaged in different types of contracting. It thought that this fact was critical to the Board’s conclusion in that case that the employees did not have the same “community of interest” for purposes of identifying an appropriate bargaining unit. Whether or not the Court of Appeals was correct in this reasoning, we think that for it to take upon itself the initial determination of this issue was “incompatible with the orderly function of the process of judicial review.” NLRB v. Metropolitan Ins. Co., 380 U. S. 438, 444 (1965). Since the selection of an appropriate bargaining unit lies largely within the discretion of the Board, whose decision, “if not final, is rarely to be disturbed,” Packard Motor Co. v. NLRB, 330 U. S. 485, 491 (1947), we think the function of the Court of Appeals ended when the Board’s error on the “employer” issue was “laid bare.” FPC v. Idaho Power Co., 344 U. S. 17, 20 (1952). As this Court stated in NLRB v. Food Store Employees, 417 U. S. 1, 9 (1974): “It is a guiding principle of administrative law, long recognized by this Court, that 'an administrative determination in which is imbedded a legal question open to judicial review does not impliedly foreclose the administrative agency, after its error has been corrected, from enforcing the legislative policy committed to its charge.' FCC v. Pottsville Broadcasting Co., 309 U. S. 134, 145 (1940).” In foreclosing the Board from the opportunity to determine the appropriate bargaining unit under § 9, the Court of Appeals did not give “due observance [to] the distribution of authority made by Congress as between its power to regulate commerce and the reviewing power which it has conferred upon the courts under Article III of the Constitution.” FCC v. Pottsville Broadcasting Co., 309 U. S. 134, 141 (1940). The petitions for certiorari are accordingly granted, and that part of the judgment of the Court of Appeals which set aside the determination of the Board on the question of whether Kiewit and South Prairie were a single employer is affirmed. That part of the judgment which held that the two firms’ employees constituted the appropriate bargaining unit for purposes of the Act, and which directed the Board to issue an enforcement order, is vacated, and the case is remanded to the Court of Appeals for proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. The relevant portions of the Act, §§ 8 and 9, 29 U. S. C. §§ 158 and 159, provide in part: “Sec. 8 (a) It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer— “(1) to interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in section 7; “(5) to refuse to bargain collectively with the representatives of his employees, subject to the provisions of section 9 (a). “Sec. 9 (a) Representatives designated or selected for the purposes of collective bargaining by the majority of the employees in a unit appropriate for such purposes, shall be the exclusive representatives of all the employees in such unit.... “(b) The Board shall decide in each case whether, in order to assure to employees the fullest freedom in exercising the rights guaranteed by this Act, the unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining shall be the employer unit, craft unit, plant unit, or subdivision thereof . . . .” On the facts of this ease, the Union first had to establish that Kiewit and South Prairie were a single “employer.” If it succeeded, the existence of a violation under § 8 (a) (5) would then turn on whether under § 9 the “employer unit” was the “appropriate” one for collective-bargaining purposes. We need not for present purposes set out the facts as Summarized at length in the Court of Appeals’ opinion. See 171 U. S. App. D. C. 102, 104r-107, 518 F. 2d 1040, 1042-1045 (1975). “[I]n determining the relevant employer, the Board considers several nominally separate business entities to be a single employer where they comprise an integrated enterprise, N. L. R. B. Twenty-first Arm. Rep. 14r-15 (1956). The controlling criteria, Set out and elaborated in Board decisions, are interrelation of operations, common management, centralized control of labor relations and common ownership.” 380 U. S., at 256. See n. 1, supra. “Were we called upon to pass on the Board's conclusions in the first instance or to make an independent' review of the review by the Court of Appeals, we might well support the Board’s conclusion and reject that of the court below. But Congress has charged the Courts of Appeals and not this Court with the normal and primary responsibility for granting or denying enforcement of Labor Board orders.” 340 U. S., at 502. The Administrative Law Judge’s decision in favor of the Union included a conclusion that the pertinent employees of Kiewit and South Prairie constituted an appropriate unit under § 9 (b). But that conclusion was, of course, preceded by the determination that the two firms were a single employer. In disagreeing on the “employer” issue, the Board was not compelled to reach the § 9 (b) question in order to dismiss the complaint. Compare Radio Union v. Broadcast Service, 380 U. S. 255 (1965), with Packard Motor Co. v. NLRB, 330 U. S. 485, 491-492 (1947). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. Section 14 (b) of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA), 81 Stat. 607, as set forth in 29 U. S. C. § 633 (b), provides in pertinent part: “In the case of an alleged unlawful practice occurring in a State which has a law prohibiting discrimination in employment because of age and establishing or authorizing a State authority to grant or seek relief from such discriminatory practice, no suit may be brought under section 626 of this title before the expiration of sixty days after proceedings have been commenced under the State law, unless such proceedings have been earlier terminated: Provided, ... [i]f any requirement for the commencement of such proceedings is imposed by a State authority other than a requirement of the filing of a written and signed statement of the facts upon which the proceeding is based, the proceeding shall be deemed to have been commenced for the purposes of this subsection at the time such statement is sent by registered mail to the appropriate State authority.” This case presents three questions under that section. First, whether § 14 (b) requires an aggrieved person to resort to appropriate state remedies before bringing suit under § 7 (c) of the ADEA, 29 TJ. S. C. § 626 (c). Second, if so, whether the state proceedings must be commenced within time limits specified by state law in order to preserve the federal right of action. Third, if so, whether any circumstances may excuse the failure to commence timely state proceedings. We hold that § 14 (b) mandates that a grievant not bring suit in federal court under § 7 (c) of the ADEA until he has first resorted to appropriate state administrative proceedings. We also hold, however, that the grievant is not required by § 14 (b) to commence the state proceedings within time limits specified by state law. In light of these holdings, it is not necessary to address the question of the circumstances, if any, in which failure to comply with § 14 (b) may be excused. I Respondent Joseph Evans was employed by petitioner Oscar Mayer & Co. for 23 years until his involuntary retirement in January 1976. On March 10, 1976, respondent filed with the United States Department of Labor a notice of intent to sue the company under the ADEA. Respondent charged that he had been forced to retire because of his age in violation of the Act. At approximately this time respondent inquired of the Department whether he was obliged to file a state complaint in order to preserve his federal rights. The Department informed respondent that the ADEA contained no such requirement. Relying on this official advice, respondent refrained from resorting to state proceedings. On March 7, 1977, after federal conciliation efforts had failed, respondent brought suit against petitioner company and company officials in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa. Petitioners moved to dismiss the complaint on the grounds that the Iowa State Civil Rights Commission was empowered to remedy age discrimination in employment and that § 14 (b) required resort to this state remedy prior to the commencement of the federal suit. The District Court denied the motion, and the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed. 580 F. 2d 298 (1978). We granted certiorari, 439 U. S. 925 (1978). We reverse. II Petitioners argue that § 14 (b) mandates that in States with agencies empowered to remedy age discrimination in employment (deferral States) a grievant may not bring suit under the ADEA unless he has first commenced a proceeding with the appropriate state agency. Respondent, on the other hand, argues that the grievant has the option of whether to resort to state proceedings, and that § 14 (b) requires only that grievants choosing to resort to state remedies wait 60 days before bringing suit in federal court. The question of construction is close, but we conclude that petitioners are correct. Section 14 (b) of the ADEA was patterned after and is virtually in haec verba with § 706 (c) of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (formerly § 706 (b)), 78 Stat. 259, as redesignated, 86 Stat. 104, 42 U. S. C. § 2000e-5 (c). The relevant portion of § 706 (c) reads as follows: “In the case of an alleged unlawful employment practice occurring in a State, .. . which has a .. . law prohibiting the unlawful employment practice alleged and establishing or authorizing a State . . . authority to grant or seek relief from such practice ... , no charge may be filed ... by the person aggrieved before the expiration of sixty days after proceedings have been commenced under the State . . . law, unless such proceedings have been earlier terminated . . . .” Congress intended through § 706 (c) to screen from the federal courts those problems of civil rights that could be settled to the satisfaction of the grievant in “a voluntary and localized manner.” See 110 Cong. Rec. 12725 (1964) (remarks of Sen. Humphrey). The section is intended to give state agencies a limited opportunity to resolve problems of employment discrimination and thereby to make unnecessary, resort to federal relief by victims of the discrimination. See Voutsis v. Union Carbide Corp., 452 F. 2d 889 (CA2 1971). Because state agencies cannot even attempt to resolve discrimination complaints not brought to their attention, the section has been interpreted to require individuals in deferral States to resort to appropriate state proceedings before bringing suit under Title VII. See Love v. Pullman Co., 404 U. S. 522 (1972); Olson v. Rembrandt Printing Co., 511 F. 2d 1228 (CA8 1975). Since the ADEA and Title VII share a common purpose, the elimination of discrimination in the workplace, since the language of § 14 (b) is almost in haec verba with § 706 (c), and since the legislative history of § 14 (b) indicates that its source was § 706 (c), we may properly conclude that Congress intended that the construction of § 14 (b) should follow that of § 706 (c). See Northcross v. Memphis Board of Education, 412 U. S. 427, 428 (1973). We therefore conclude that § 14 (b), like § 706 (c), is intended to screen from the federal courts those discrimination complaints that might be settled to the satisfaction of the grievant in state proceedings. We further conclude that prior resort to appropriate state proceedings is required under § 14 (b), just as under § 706 (c). The contrary arguments advanced by respondent in support of construing § 14 (b) as merely optional are not persuasive. Respondent notes first that under Title VII persons aggrieved must file with a state antidiscrimination agency before filing with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). See 42 U. S. C. §2000e-5(c). Under the ADEA, by contrast, grievants may file with state and federal agencies simultaneously. See 29 U. S. C. §§ 626 (d) and 633 (b). From this respondent concludes that the ADEA pays less deference to state agencies and that, as a consequence, ADEA claimants have the option to ignore state remedies. We disagree. The ADEA permits concurrent rather than sequential state and federal administrative jurisdiction in order to expedite the processing of age-discrimination claims. The premise for this difference is that the delay inherent in sequential jurisdiction is particularly prejudicial to the rights of “older citizens to whom, by definition, relatively few productive years are left.” 113 Cong. Rec. 7076 (1967) (remarks of Sen. Javits). The .purpose of expeditious disposition would not be frustrated were ADEA claimants required to pursue state and federal administrative remedies simultaneously. Indeed, simultaneous state and federal conciliation efforts may well facilitate rapid settlements. There is no reason to conclude, therefore, that the possibility of concurrent state and federal cognizance supports the construction of § 14 (b) that ADEA grievants may ignore state remedies altogether. Respondent notes a second difference between the ADEA and Title VII. Section 14 (a) of the ADEA, 29 IT. S. C. § 633 (a), for which Title VII has no counterpart, provides that upon commencement of an action under ADEA, all state proceedings are superseded. From this, respondent concludes that it would be an exercise in futility to require aggrieved persons to file state complaints since those persons may, after only 60 days, abort their involuntary state proceeding by filing a federal suit. We find no merit in the argument. Unless § 14 (b) is to be stripped of all meaning, state agencies must be given at least some opportunity to solve problems of discrimination. While 60 days provides a limited time for the state agency to act, that was a decision for Congress to make and Congress apparently thought it sufficient. As Senator Dirksen told the Senate during the debates on § 14 (b)’s predecessor, § 706 (c) of Title VII: “[A]t the local level . . . many cases are disposed of in a matter of days, and certainly not more than a few weeks. In the case of California, FEPC cases are disposed of in an average of about 5 days. In my own State it is approximately 14 days.” 110 Cong. Rec. 13087 (1964). Respondent argues finally that a Committee Report that accompanied 1978 ADEA amendments supports his construction of § 14 (b). This Committee Report suggested that resort to state remedies should be optional under § 14 (b). See S. Rep. No. 95-493, pp. 6-7 (1978), adopted in Joint Explanatory Statement of the Committee of Conference, H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 95-950, pp. 7, 12 (1978). We are not persuaded. Senate Report No. 95-493 was written 11 years after the ADEA was passed in 1967, and such “ [1] egislative observations ... are in no sense part of the legislative history.” United Airlines, Inc. v. McMann, 434 U. S. 192, 200 n. 7 (1977). “It is the intent of the Congress that enacted [the section] . . . that controls.” Teamsters v. United States, 431 U. S. 324, 354 n. 39 (1977). Whatever evidence is provided by the 1978 Committee Report of the intent of Congress in 1967, it is plainly insufficient to overcome the clear and convincing evidence that Congress intended § 14 (b) to have the same meaning as § 706 (c). We therefore hold that under § 14 (b) of the ADEA, as under § 706 (c) of Title VII, resort to administrative remedies in deferral States by individual claimants is mandatory, not optional. Ill We consider now the consequences of respondent’s failure to file a complaint with the Iowa State Civil Rights Commission. Petitioners argue that since Iowa’s 120-day age-discrimination statute of limitations has run, see Iowa Code §§ 601A.14 (1), (15) (1975), it is now too late for respondent to remedy his procedural omission and that respondent's federal action is therefore jurisdictionally barred. Respondent pleads that since his failure to file was due to incorrect advice by the Department of Labor, his tardiness should be excused. Both arguments miss the mark. Neither questions of jurisdiction nor questions of excuse arise unless Congress mandated that resort to state proceedings must be within time limits specified by the State. We do not construe § 14 (b) to make that requirement. Section 14 (b) requires only that the grievant commence state proceedings. Nothing whatever in the section requires the respondent here to commence those proceedings within the 120 days allotted by Iowa law in order to preserve a right of action under § 7 (c). We start with the language of the section. Section 14 (b) provides, in relevant part, that “no suit may be brought. .. before the expiration of sixty days after proceedings have been commenced under the State law, unless such proceedings have been earlier terminated.” 29 U. S. C. § 633 (b) (emphasis added). By its terms, then, the section requires only that state proceedings be commenced 60 days before federal litigation is instituted; besides commencement no other obligation is placed upon the ADEA grievant. In particular, there is no requirement that, in order to commence state proceedings and thereby preserve federal rights, the grievant must file with the State within whatever time limits are specified by state law. Rather, use of the word “commenced” strongly implies the opposite — that state limitations periods are irrelevant — since, by way of analogy, under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure even a time-barred action may be “commenced” by the filing of a complaint. See Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 3; Magalotti v. Ford Motor Co., 418 F. Supp. 430, 434 (ED Mich. 1976). This implication is made express by the last sentence of § 14 (b), which specifically provides: “If any requirement for the commencement of such proceedings is imposed by a State authority other than a requirement of the filing of a written and signed statement of the facts upon which the proceeding is based, the proceeding shall be deemed to have been commenced for the purposes of this subsection at the time such statement is sent by registered mail to the appropriate State authority.” 29TJ. S. C. § 633 (b). State limitations periods are, of course, requirements “other than a requirement of the filing of a written and signed statement of the facts upon which the proceeding is based.” Therefore, even if a State were to make timeliness a precondition for commencement, rather than follow the more typical pattern of making untimeliness an affirmative defense, a state proceeding will be deemed commenced for purposes of § 14 (b) as soon as the complaint is filed. This has been the prevailing interpretation of § 14 (b). See Nickel v. Shatterproof Glass Corp., 424 F. Supp. 884 (ED Mich. 1976); Magalotti v. Ford Motor Co., supra. It is also the prevailing interpretation of § 14 (b)’s counterpart, § 706 (c) of Title VII, which contains an identical definition of commencement. See Davis v. Valley Distributing Co., 522 F. 2d 827, 831-833 (CA9 1975), cert. denied, 429 U. S. 1090 (1977); Olson v. Rembrandt Printing Co., 511 F. 2d, at 1232; Pinckney v. County of Northampton, 433 F. Supp. 373, 376 n. 1 (ED Pa. 1976); McAdams v. Thermal Industries, Inc., 428 F. Supp. 156, 161 (WD Pa. 1977) ; De Gideo v. Sperry-Univac Co., 415 F. Supp. 227, 229 (ED Pa. 1976); see also White v. Dallas Independent School Dist., 581 F. 2d 556, 562 n. 10 (CA5 1978) (en banc) (filing with EEOC tolls state limitations period for federal purposes) ; Ferguson v. Kroger Co., 545 F. 2d 1034 (CA6 1976) (EEOC’s negligent failure to refer charge to state agency within state limitations period does not foreclose federal claim). But see Richardson v. Miller, 446 F. 2d 1247 (CA3 1971). It is also the EEOC’s interpretation of § 706 (c), see Case No. KC7-5-315, CCH EEOC Decisions (1973) ¶6024 (1969), and as such is “entitled to great deference.” Griggs v. Duke Power Co., 401 U. S. 424, 434 (1971). This construction of the statute is fully consistent with the ADEA’s remedial purposes and is particularly appropriate “in a statutory scheme in which laymen, unassisted by trained lawyers, initiate the process.” Love v. Pullman Co., 404 U. S., at 527. It is also consistent with the purposes of § 14 (b). Section 14 (b) does not stipulate an exhaustion requirement. The section is intended only to give state agencies a limited opportunity to settle the grievances of ADEA claimants in a voluntary and localized manner so that the grievants thereafter have no need or desire for independent federal relief. Individuals should not be penalized if States decline, for whatever reason, to take advantage of these opportunities. See Pacific Maritime Assn. v. Quinn, 465 F. 2d 108 (CA9 1972). Congress did not intend to foreclose federal relief simply because state relief was also foreclosed. See Voutsis v. Union Carbide Corp., 452 F. 2d, at 893. The structure of the ADEA reinforces the conclusion that state procedural defaults cannot foreclose federal relief and that state limitations periods cannot govern the efficacy of the federal remedy. The ADEA’s limitations periods are set forth in explicit terms in 29 U. S. C. §§ 626 (d) and (e), not § 14 (b), 29 U. S. C. § 633 (b). Sections 626 (d) and (e) adequately protect defendants against stale claims. We will not attribute to Congress an intent through § 14 (b) to add to these explicit requirements by implication and to incorporate by reference into the ADEA the various state age-discrimination statutes of limitations. Cf. Occidental Life Ins. Co. v. EEOC, 432 U. S. 355, 371 (1977). Congress could not have intended to consign federal lawsuits to the “vagaries of diverse state limitations statutes,” ibid., particularly since, in many States, including Iowa, the limitations periods are considerably shorter than the 180-day period allowed grievants in nondeferral States by 29 U. S. C. § 626 (d)(1). See De Gideo v. Sperry-Univac Co., supra, at 231 n. 9. That Congress regarded incorporation as inconsistent with the federal scheme is made clear by the legislative history of § 706 (c)’s definition of commencement — the same definition later used in § 14 (b). Proponents of Title VII were concerned that localities hostile to civil rights might enact sham discrimination ordinances for the purpose of frustrating the vindication of federal rights. See 2 B. Schwartz, Statutory History of the United States: Civil Rights 1330 (1970). The statutory definition of commencement as requiring the filing of a state complaint and nothing more was intended to meet this concern while at the same time avoiding burdensome case-by-case inquiry into the reasonableness of various state procedural requirements. Cf. NAACP v. Alabama ex rel. Patterson, 357 U. S. 449 (1958). As Senator Humphrey explained to the Senate: “ [T] o avoid the possible imposition of onerous State requirements for initiating a proceeding, subsection (b) provides that to comply with the requirement of prior resort to the State agency, an individual need merely send a written statement of the facts to the State agency by registered mail.” 2 Schwartz, supra, at 1352. The strongest argument against this construction of the statute is that it would permit grievants to avoid state intervention by waiting until the state statute of limitations has expired and then filing federal suit, thus frustrating the intent of Congress that federal litigation be used as a last resort. No reason suggests itself, however, why an employee would wish to forgo an available state remedy. Prior resort to the state remedy would not impair the availability of the federal remedy, for the two are supplementary, not mutually exclusive. A complainant would save no time by bypassing the state remedy since the federal court must, in any event, defer to the State for 60 days, and is required to defer no longer. See Davis v. Valley Distributing Co., 522 F. 2d 827 (CA9 1975); Nickel v. Shatterproof Glass Corp., 424 F. Supp. 884 (ED Mich. 1976). We therefore hold that respondent may yet comply with the requirements of § 14 (b) by simply filing a signed complaint with the Iowa State Civil Rights Commission. That Commission must be given an opportunity to entertain respondent’s grievance before his federal litigation can continue. Meanwhile, the federal suit should be held in abeyance. If, as respondent fears, his state complaint is subsequently dismissed as untimely, respondent may then return to federal court. But until that happens, or until 60 days have passed without a settlement, respondent must pursue his state remedy. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded to that court with instructions to enter an order directing the District Court to hold respondent’s suit in abeyance until respondent has complied with the mandate of § 14 (b). T, 7 , It is so ordered. The Court of Appeals initially reversed the District Court but on rehearing withdrew its opinion and substituted an opinion affirming the District Court. See Hearings on S. 830 et al. before the Subcommittee on Labor of the Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, 90th Cong., 1st Sess., 102 (1967) (testimony of Mr. Biemiller); id., at 228 (testimony of Mr. Conway). Even respondent concedes that under § 706 (e) resort to appropriate state proceedings is mandatory, not optional. See Brief for Respondent 18. ADEA grievants may file with the State before or after they file with the Secretary of Labor. Respondent concedes that the amendments themselves “are not relevant to the questions raised in this case.” Brief for Respondent 3 n. 1. This rule, of course, governs only claims for individual relief, such as the present case. Nothing in our decision in anywise disturbs the rule of Albemarle Paper Co. v. Moody, 422 U. S. 405, 414 n. 8 (1975), concerning the rights of unnamed parties in plaintiff class actions. A number of cases have reached a similar result upon slightly different theories. See, e. g., Skoglund v. Singer Co., 403 F. Supp. 797 (NH 1975) (timely state complaint not required unless there has been a deliberate bypass of state procedure); Bertsch v. Ford Motor Co., 415 F. Supp. 619 (ED Mich. 1976) (timely state complaint not required if state limitations period significantly shorter than 180 days). See also Vaughn v. Chrysler Corp., 382 F. Supp. 143 (ED Mich. 1974) (timely state complaint not required if claimant detrimentally relied upon mistaken official advice). Two cases have reached contrary results. See Graham v. Chrysler Corp., 15 FEP Cases 876 (ED Mich. 1976); McGhee v. Ford Motor Co., 15 FEP Cases 869 (ED Mich. 1976). This is made clear by Senator Humphrey’s remarks to the Senate concerning the limits of federal deference under § 706 (c) : “[W]e recognized the absolute necessity of providing the Federal Government with authority to act in instances where States and localities did not choose to exercise these opportunities to solve the problem of civil rights in a voluntary and localized manner. The basic rights protected by [Title VII] are rights which accrue to citizens of the United States; the Federal Government has the clear obligation to see that these rights are fully protected. In instances where States are unable or unwilling to provide this protection, the Federal Government must have the authority to act.” 110 Cong. Rec. 12725 (1964). Title 29 U. S. C. § 626 (d) provides: “No civil action may be commenced by any individual under this section until the individual has given the Secretary not less than sixty days’ notice of an intent to file such action. Such notice shall be filed— “(1) within one hundred and eighty days after the alleged unlawful practice occurred, or “(2) in a case to which section 633 (b) of this title applies, within three hundred days after the alleged unlawful practice occurred or within thirty days after receipt by the individual of notice of termination of proceedings under State law, whichever is earlier. “Upon receiving a notice of intent to sue, the Secretary shall promptly notify all persons named therein as prospective defendants in the action and shall promptly seek to eliminate any afieged unlawful practice by informal methods of conciliation, conference, and persuasion.” Title 29 U. S. C. § 626 (e) provides: “Sections 255 and 259 of this title shall apply to actions under this chapter.” Title 29 U. S. C. § 255 provides in relevant part: “Any action commenced on or after May 14, 1947 . . . “(a) if the cause of action accrues on or after May 14, 1947 — may be commenced within two years after the cause of action accrued, and every such action shall be forever barred unless commenced within two years after the cause of action accrued, except that a cause of action arising out of a willful violation may be commenced within three years after the cause of action accrued.” Moreover, even the danger that state remedies will be inadvertently bypassed by otherwise proper ADEA plaintiffs will soon become nonexistent. After July 1, 1979, the EEOC will administer the ADEA. See Reorg. Plan No. 1 of 1978, 3 CFR 321 (1979). Discrimination charges will have to be filed with the EEOC within time limits specified by federal law, and the EEOC already has a regular procedure whereby discrimination complaints are automatically referred to appropriate agencies as soon as they are received. See Love v. Pullman Co., 404 U. S. 522 (1972); 29 CFR § 1601.13 (1978). Thus, the deference to state agencies required by § 14 (b) will soon become automatic. In any event, even if the risk of bypass of state agencies were real, which it is not, States could readily avoid the possibility by extending their limitations periods to 180 days and by tolling their statutes of limitations upon the filing of a timely charge with the Department of Labor. See Davis v. Valley Distributing Co. Cf. Burnett v. New York Central R. Co., 380 U. S. 424 (1965). Whether Iowa may toll its statute of limitations from the date that respondent contacted the Department of Labor is a question of Iowa law not for our decision. See Iowa Civil Rights Comm’n v. Massey-Ferguson, Inc., 207 N. W. 2d 5, 8 (Iowa 1973). Suspension of proceedings is preferable to dismissal with leave to refile. Respondent’s timely complaint has already satisfied the requirements of 29 U. S. C. § 626 (e). “To require a second ‘filing’ by the aggrieved party after termination of state proceedings would serve no purpose other than the creation of an additional procedural technicality. Such technicalities are particularly inappropriate in a statutory scheme in which laymen, unassisted by trained lawyers, initiate the process.” Love v. Pullman Co., supra, at 526-527 (charge may be held in suspended animation during deferral period). For this reason, suspension pending deferral is the preferred practice in the federal courts. See Crosslin v. Mountain States Tel. & Tel. Co., 400 U. S. 1004 (1971) (judgment of dismissal for want of jurisdiction arising from failure to defer vacated; case remanded for consideration of stay pending deferral); Gabriele v. Chrysler Corp., 573 F. 2d 949, 956 n. 18 (CA6 1978); Oubichon v. North American Rockwell Corp., 482 F. 2d 569, 571 (CA9 1973); Parker v. General Telephone Co. of the Northwest, Inc., 476 F. 2d 595, 596 (CA9 1973); Mitchell v. Mid-Continent Spring Co. of Ky., 466 F. 2d 24, 26-27 (CA6 1972), cert. denied, 410 U. S. 928 (1973); Motorola, Inc. v. EEOC, 460 F. 2d 1245, 1246 (CA9 1972); Bertrand v. Orkin Exterminating Co., Inc., 419 F. Supp. 1123, 1130 (ND Ill. 1976); Winsey v. Pace College, 394 F. Supp. 1324, 1329 (SDNY 1975). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. This case presents important questions concerning the construction of R. S. § 1979, 42 U. S. C. § 1983, which reads as follows: “Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress.” The complaint alleges that 13 Chicago police officers broke into petitioners’ home in the early morning, routed them from bed, made them stand naked in the living room, and ransacked every room, emptying drawers and ripping mattress covers. It further alleges that Mr. Monroe was then taken to the police station and detained on “open” charges for 10 hours, while he was interrogated about a two-day-old murder, that he was not taken before a magistrate, though one was accessible, that he was not permitted to call his family or attorney, that he was subsequently released without criminal charges being preferred against him. It is alleged that the officers had no search warrant and no arrest warrant and that they acted “under color of the statutes, ordinances, regulations, customs and usages” of Illinois and of the City of Chicago. Federal jurisdiction was asserted under R. S. § 1979, which we have set out above, and 28 U. S. C. § 1343 and 28 U. S. C. § 1331. The City of Chicago moved to dismiss the complaint on the ground that it is not liable under the Civil Rights Acts nor for acts committed in performance of its governmental functions. All defendants moved to dismiss, alleging that the complaint alleged no cause of action under those Acts or under the Federal Constitution. The District Court dismissed the complaint. The Court of Appeals affirmed, 272 F. 2d 365, relying on its earlier decision, Stift v. Lynch, 267 F. 2d 237. The case is here on a writ of certiorari which we granted because of a seeming conflict of that ruling with our prior cases. 362 U. S. 926. I. Petitioners claim that the invasion of their home and the subsequent search without a warrant and the arrest and detention of Mr. Monroe without a warrant and without arraignment constituted a deprivation of their “rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution” within the meaning of R. S. § 1979. It has been said that when 18 U. S. C. § 241 made criminal a conspiracy “to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any citizen in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution,” it embraced only rights that an individual has by reason of' his relation to the central government, not to state governments. United States v. Williams, 341 U. S. 70. Cf. United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542; Ex parte Yarbrough, 110 U. S. 651; Guinn v. United States, 238 U. S. 347. But the history of the section of the Civil Rights Act presently involved does not permit such a narrow interpretation. Section 1979 came onto the books as § 1 of the Ku Klux Act of April 20, 1871. 17 Stat. 13. It was one of the means whereby Congress exercised the power vested in it by § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment to enforce the provisions of that Amendment. Senator Edmunds, Chairman of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, said concerning this section: “The first section is one that I believe nobody objects to, as defining the rights secured by the Constitution of the United States when they are assailed by any State law or under color of any State law, and it is merely carrying out the principles of the civil rights bill, which has since become a part of the Constitution,” viz., the Fourteenth Amendment. Its purpose is plain from the title of the legislation, “An Act to enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and for other Purposes.” 17 Stat. 13. Allegation of facts constituting a deprivation under color of state authority of a right guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment satisfies to that extent the requirement of R. S. § 1979. See Douglas v. Jeannette, 319 U. S. 157, 161-162. So far petitioners are on solid ground. For the guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures contained in the Fourth Amendment has been made applicable to the States by' reason of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Wolf v. Colorado, 338 U. S. 25; Elkins v. United States, 364 U. S. 206, 213. II. There can be no doubt at least since Ex parte Virginia, 100 U. S. 339, 346-347, that Congress has the power to enforce provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment against those who carry a badge of authority of a State and represent it in some capacity, whether they act in accordance with their authority or misuse it. See Home Tel. & Tel. Co. v. Los Angeles, 227 U. S. 278, 287-296. The question with which we now deal is the narrower one of whether Congress, in enacting § 1979, meant to give a remedy to parties deprived of constitutional rights, privileges and immunities by an official’s abuse of his position. Cf. Williams v. United States, 341 U. S. 97; Screws v. United States, 325 U. S. 91; United States v. Classic, 313 U. S. 299. We conclude that it did so intend. It is argued that “under color of” enumerated state authority excludes acts of an official or policeman who can show no authority under state law, state custom, or state usage to do what he did. In this case it is said that these policemen, in breaking into petitioners’ apartment, violated the Constitution and laws of Illinois. It is pointed out that under Illinois law a simple remedy is offered for that violation and that, so far as it appears, the courts of Illinois are available to give petitioners that full redress which the common law affords for violence done to a person; and it is earnestly argued that ho “statute, ordinance, regulation, custom or usage” of Illinois bars that redress. The Ku Klux Act grew out of a message sent to Congress by President Grant on March 23, 1871, reading: “A condition of affairs now exists in some States of the Union rendering life and property insecure and the carrying of the mails and the collection of the revenue dangerous. The proof that such a condition of affairs exists in some localities is now before the Senate. That the power to correct these evils is beyond the control of State authorities I do not doubt; that the power of the Executive of the United States, acting within the limits of existing laws, is sufficient for present emergencies is not clear. Therefore, I urgently recommend such legislation as in the judgment of Congress shall effectually secure life, liberty, and property, and the enforcement of law in all parts of the United States....” The legislation — in particular the section with which we are now concerned — had several purposes. There are threads of many thoughts running through the debates. One who reads them in their entirety sees that the present section had three main aims. First, it might, of course, override certain kinds of state laws. Mr. Sloss of Alabama, in opposition, spoke of that object and emphasized that it was irrelevant because there were no such laws: “The first section of this bill prohibits any invidious legislation by States against the rights or privileges of citizens of the United States. The object of this section is not very clear, as it is not pretended by its advocates on this floor that any State has passed any laws endangering the rights or privileges of the colored people.” Second, it provided a remedy where state law was inadequate. That aspect of the legislation was summed up as follows by Senator Sherman of Ohio: “... it is said the reason is that any offense may be committed upon a negro by a white man, and a negro cannot testify in any case against a white man, so that the only way by which any conviction can be had in Kentucky in those cases is in the United States courts, because the United States courts enforce the United States laws by which negroes may testify.” But the purposes were much broader. The third aim was to provide a federal remedy where the state remedy, though adequate in theory, was not available in practice. The opposition to the measure complained that “It overrides the reserved powers of the States,” just as they argued that the second section of the bill “absorb [ed] the entire jurisdiction of the States over their local and domestic affairs.” This Act of April 20, 1871, sometimes called “the third ‘force bill,’ ” was passed by a Congress that had the Klan “particularly in mind.” The debates are replete with references to the lawless conditions existing in the South in 1871. There was available to the Congress during these debates a report, nearly 600 pages in length, dealing with the activities of the Klan and the inability of the state governments to cope with it. This report was drawn on by many of the speakers. It was not the unavailability of state remedies but the failure of certain States to enforce the laws with an equal hand that furnished the powerful momentum behind this “force bill.” Mr. Lowe of Kansas said: “While murder is stalking abroad in disguise, while whippings and lynchings and banishment have been visited upon unoffending American citizens, the local administrations have been found inadequate or unwilling to apply the proper corrective. Combinations, darker than the night that hides them, conspiracies, wicked as the worst of felons could devise, have gone unwhipped of justice. Immunity is given to crime, and the records of the public tribunals are searched in vain for any evidence of effective redress.” Mr. Beatty of Ohio summarized in the House the case for the bill when he said: “... certain States have denied to persons within their jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. The proof on this point is voluminous and unquestionable.... [M]en were murdered, houses were burned, women were outraged, men were scourged, and officers of the law shot down; and the State made no successful effort to bring the guilty to punishment or afford protection or redress to the outraged and innocent. The State, from lack of power or inclination, practically denied the equal protection of the law to these persons.” While one main scourge of the evil — perhaps the leading one — was the Ku Klux Klan, the remedy created was not a remedy against it or its members but against those who representing a State in some capacity were unable or unwilling to enforce a state law. Senator Osborn of Florida put the problem in these terms: “That the State courts in the several States have been unable to enforce the criminal laws of their respective States or to suppress the disorders existing, and in fact that the preservation of life and property in many sections of the country is beyond the power o'f the State government, is a sufficient reason why Congress should, so far as they have authority under the Constitution, enact the laws necessary for the protection of citizens of the United States. The question of the constitutional authority for the requisite legislation has been sufficiently discussed.” There was, it was said, no quarrel with the state laws on the books. It was their lack of enforcement that was the nub of the difficulty. Speaking of conditions in Virginia, Mr. Porter of that State said: “The outrages committed upon loyal men there are under the forms of law.” Mr. Burchard of Illinois pointed out that the statutes of a State may show no discrimination: “If the State Legislature pass a law discriminating against any portion of its citizens, or if it fails to enact provisions equally applicable to every class for the protection of their person and property, it will be admitted that the State does not afford the equal protection. But if the statutes show no discrimination, yet in its judicial tribunals one class is unable to secure that enforcement of their rights and punishment for their infraction which is accorded to another, or if secret combinations of men are allowed by the Executive to band together to deprive one class of citizens of their legal rights without a proper effort to discover, detect, and punish the violations of law and order, the State has not afforded to all its citizens the equal protection of the laws.” Mr. Hoar of Massachusetts stated: “Now, it is an effectual denial by a State of the equal protection of the laws when any class of officers charged under the laws with their administration permanently and as a rule refuse to extend that protection. If every sheriff in South Carolina refuses to serve a writ for a colored man and those sheriffs are kept in office year after year by the people of South Carolina, and no verdict against them for their failure of duty can be obtained before a South Carolina jury, the State of South Carolina, through the class of officers who are its representatives to afford the equal protection of the laws to that class of citizens, has denied that protection. If the jurors of South Carolina constantly and as a rule refuse to do justice between man and man where the rights of a particular class of its citizens are concerned, and that State affords by its legislation no remedy, that is as much a denial to that class of citizens of the equal protection of the laws as if the State itself put on its statute-book a statute enacting that no verdict should be rendered in the courts of that State in favor of this class of citizens.” Senator Pratt of Indiana spoke of the discrimination against Union sympathizers and Negroes in the actual enforcement of the laws: “Plausibly and sophistically it is said the laws of North Carolina do not discriminate against them; that the provisions in favor of rights and liberties are general; that the courts are open to all; that juries, grand and petit, are commanded to hear and redress without distinction as to color, race, or political sentiment. “But it is a fact, asserted in the report, that of the hundreds of outrages committed upon loyal people through the agency of this Ku Klux organization not one has been punished. This defect in the administration of the laws does not extend to other cases. Vigorously enough are the laws enforced against Union people. They only fail in efficiency when a man of known Union sentiments, white or black, invokes their aid. Then Justice closes the door of her temples.” It was precisely that breadth of the remedy which the opposition emphasized. Mr. Kerr of Indiana referring to the section involved in the present litigation said: “This section gives to any person who may have been injured in any of his rights, privileges, or immunities of person or property, a civil action for damages against the wrongdoer in the Federal courts. The offenses committed against him may be the common violations of the municipal law of his State. It may give rise to numerous vexations and outrageous prosecutions, inspired by mere mercenary considerations, prosecuted in a spirit of plunder, aided by the crimes of perjury and subornation of perjury, more reckless and dangerous to society than the alleged offenses out of which the causé of action may have arisen. It is a covert attempt to transfer another large portion of jurisdiction from the State tribunals, to which it of right belongs, to those of the United States. It is neither authorized nor expedient, and is not calculated to bring peace, or order, or domestic content and prosperity to the disturbed society of the South. The contrary will certainly be its effect.” Mr. Voorhees of Indiana, also speaking in opposition, gave it the same construction: “And now for a few moments let us inspect the provisions of this bill, inspired as it is by the waning and decaying fortunes of the party in power, and called for, as I have shown, by no public necessity whatever. The first and second sections are designed to transfer all criminal jurisdiction from the courts of the States to the courts of the United States. This is to be done upon the assumption that the courts of the southern States fail and refuse to do their duty in the punishment of offenders against the law.” Senator Thurman of Ohio spoke in the same vein about the section we are now considering: “It authorizes any person who is deprived of any right, privilege, or immunity secured to him by the Constitution of the United States, to bring an action against the wrong-doer in the Federal courts, and that without any limit whatsoever as to the amount in controversy. The deprivation may be of the slightest conceivable character, the damages in the estimation of any sensible man may not be five dollars or even five cents; they may be what lawyers call merely nominal damages; and yet by this section jurisdiction of that civil action is given to the Federal courts instead of its being prosecuted as now in the courts of the States.” The debates were long and extensive. It is abundantly clear that one reason the legislation was passed was to afford a federal right in federal courts because, by reason of prejudice, passion, neglect, intolerance or otherwise, state laws might not be enforced and the claims of citizens to the enjoyment of rights,, privileges, and immunities guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment might be denied by the state agencies. Much is made of the history of § 2 of the proposed legislation. As introduced § 2 was very broad: .. if two or more persons shall, within the limits of any State, band, conspire, or combine together to do any act in violation of the rights, privileges, or immunities of any person, to which he is entitled under the Constitution and laws of the United States, which, committed within a place under the sole and exclusive jurisdiction of the United States, would, under any law of the United States then in force, constitute the crime of either murder, manslaughter, mayhem, robbery, assault and battery, perjury, subornation of perjury, criminal obstruction of legal process or resistance of officers in discharge of official duty, arson, or larceny; and if one or more of the parties to said conspiracy or combination shall do any act to effect the object thereof, all the parties to or engaged in said conspiracy or combination, whether principals or accessories, shall be deemed guilty of a felony... It was this provision that raised the greatest storm. It was § 2 that was rewritten so as to be in the main confined to conspiracies to interfere with a federal or state officer in the performance of his duties. 17 Stat. 13. Senator Trumbull said: “Those provisions were changed, and as the bill passed the House of Representatives, it was understood by the members of that body to go no further than to protect persons in the rights which were guarantied to them by the Constitution and laws of the United States, and it did not undertake to furnish redress for wrongs done by one person upon another in any of the States of the Union in violation of their laws, unless he also violated some law of the United States, nor to punish one person for an ordinary assault and battery committed on another in a State.” But § 1 — the section with which we are here concerned — was not changed as respects any feature with which we are presently concerned. The words “under color of” law were in the legislation from the beginning to the end. The changes hailed by the opposition — indeed the history of the evolution of § 2 much relied upon now— are utterly irrelevant to the problem before us, viz., the meaning of “under color of” law. The vindication of States’ rights which was hailed in the amendments to § 2 raises no implication as to the construction to be given to “color of any law” in § 1. The scope of § 1 — under any construction — is admittedly narrower than was the scope of the original version of § 2. Opponents of the Act, however, did not fail to note that by virtue of § 1 federal courts would sit in judgment on the misdeeds of state officers. Proponents of the Act, on the other hand, were aware of the extension of federal power contemplated by every section of the Act. They found justification, however, for this extension in considerations such as those advanced by Mr. Hoar: “The question is not whether a majority of the people in a majority of the States are likely to be attached to and able to secure their own liberties. The question is not whether the majority of the people in every State are not likely to desire to secure their own rights. It is, whether a majority of the people in every State are sure to be so attached to the principles of civil freedom and civil justice as to be as much desirous of preserving the liberties of others as their own, as to insure that under no temptation of party spirit, under no political excitement, under no jealousy of race or caste, will the majority either in numbers or strength in any State seek to deprive the remainder of the population of their civil ■rights.” Although the legislation was enacted because of the conditions that existed in the South at that time, it is cast in general language and is as applicable to Illinois as it is to the States whose names were mentioned over and again in the debates. It is no answer that the State has a law which if enforced would give relief. The federal remedy is supplementary to the state remedy, and the latter need not be first sought and refused before the federal one is invoked. Hence the fact that Illinois by its constitution and laws outlaws unreasonable searches and seizures is no barrier to the present suit in the federal court. We had before us in United States v. Classic, supra, § 20 of the Criminal Code, 18 U. S. C. § 242, which provides a criminal punishment for anyone who “under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom” subjects any inhabitant of a State to the deprivation of “any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States.” Section 242 first came into the law as § 2 of the Civil Rights Act, Act of April 9, 1866, 14 Stat. 27. After passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, this provision was re-enacted and amended by §§ 17, 18, Act of May 31, 1870, 16 Stat. 140, 144. The right involved in the Classic case was the right of voters in a primary to have their votes counted. The laws of Louisiana required the defendants “to count the ballots, to record the result of the count, and to certify the result of the election.” United States v. Classic, supra, 325-326. But according to the indictment they did not perform their duty. In an opinion written by Mr. Justice (later Chief Justice) Stone, in which Mr. Justice Roberts, Mr. Justice Reed, and Mr. Justice Frankfurter joined, the Court ruled, “Misuse of power, possessed by virtue of state law and made possible only because the wrongdoer is clothed with the authority of state law, is action taken ‘under color of’ state law.” Id., 326. There was a dissenting opinion; but the ruling as to the meaning of “under color of” state law was not questioned. That view of the meaning of the words “under color of” state law, 18 U. S. C. § 242, was reaffirmed in Screws v. United States, supra, 108-113. The acts there complained of were committed by state officers in performance of their duties, viz., making an arrest effective. It was urged there, as it is here, that “under color of” state law should not be construed to duplicate in federal law what was an offense under state law. Id. (dissenting opinion) 138-149, 157-161. It was said there, as it is here, that the ruling in the Classic case as to the meaning of “under color of” state law was not in focus and was ill-advised. Id. (dissenting opinion) 146-147. It was argued there, as it is here, that “under color of” state law included only action taken by officials pursuant to state law. Id. (dissenting opinion) 141-146. We rejected that view. Id., 110-113 (concurring opinion) 114-117. We stated: “The construction given § 20 [18 U. S. C. § 242] in the Classic case formulated a rule of law which has become the basis of federal enforcement in this important field. The rule adopted in that case was formulated after mature consideration. It should be good for more than one day only. We do not have here a situation comparable to Mahnich v. Southern S. S. Co., 321 U. S. 96, where we overruled a decision demonstrated to be a sport in the law and inconsistent with what preceded and what followed. The Classic case was not the product of hasty action or inadvertence. It was not out of line with the cases which preceded. It was designed to fashion the governing rule of law in this important field. We are not dealing with constitutional interpretations which throughout the history of the Court have wisely remained flexible and subj ect to frequent re-examination. The meaning which the Classic case gave to the phrase 'under color of any law’ involved only a construction of the statute. Hence if it states a rule undesirable in its consequences, Congress can change it. We add only to the instability and uncertainty of the law if we revise the meaning of § 20 [18 U. S. C. § 242] to meet the exigencies of each case coming before us.” Id., 112-113. We adhered to that view in Williams v. United States, supra, 99. Mr. Shellabarger, reporting out the bill which became the Ku Klux Act, said of the provision with which we now deal: “The model for it will be found in the second section of the act of April 9, 1866, known as the ‘civil rights act.’... This section of this bill, on the same state of facts, not only provides a civil remedy for persons whose former condition may have been that of slaves, but also to all people where, under color of State law, they or any of them may be deprived of rights....” Thus, it is beyond doubt that this phrase should be accorded the same construction in both statutes — in § 1979 and in 18 U. S. C. § 242. Since the Screws and Williams decisions, Congress has had several pieces of civil rights legislation before it. In 1956 one bill reached the floor of the House. This measure had at least one provision in it penalizing actions taken “under color of law or otherwise.” A vigorous minority-report was filed attacking, inter alia, the words “or otherwise.” But not a word of criticism of the phrase “under color of” state law as previously construed by the Court is to be found in that report. Section 131 (c) of the Act of September 9,1957, 71 Stat. 634, 637, amended 42 U. S. C. § 1971 by adding a new subsection which provides that no person “whether acting under color of law or otherwise” shall intimidate any other person in voting as he chooses for federal officials. A vigorous minority report was filed attacking the wide scope of the new subsection by reason of the words “or otherwise.” It was said in that minority report that those words went far beyond what this Court had construed “under color of law” to mean. But there was not a word of criticism directed to the prior construction given by this Court to the words “under color of” law. The Act of May 6, 1960, 74 Stat. 86, uses “under color of” law in two contexts, once when § 306 defines “officer of election” and next when § 601 (a) gives a judicial remedy on behalf of a qualified voter denied the opportunity to register. Once again there was a Committee report containing minority views. Once again no one challenged the scope given by our prior decisions to the phrase “under color of” law. If the results of our construction of “under color of” law were as horrendous as now claimed, if they were as disruptive of our federal scheme as now urged, if they were such an unwarranted invasion of States’ rights as pretended, surely the voice of the opposition would have been heard in those Committee reports. Their silence and the new uses to which “under color of” law have recently been given reinforce our conclusion that our prior decisions were correct on this matter of construction. We conclude that the meaning given “under color of” law in the Classic case and in the Screws and Williams cases was the correct one; and we adhere to it. In the Screws case we dealt with a statute that imposed criminal penalties for acts “wilfully” done. We construed that word in its setting to mean the doing of an act with “a specific intent to deprive a person of a federal right.” 325 U. S., at 103. We do not think that gloss should be placed on § 1979 which we have here. The word “wil-fully” does not appear in § 1979. Moreover, § 1979 provides a civil remedy, while in the Screws case we dealt with a criminal law challenged on the ground of vagueness. Section 1979 should be read against the background of tort liability that makes a man responsible for the natural consequences of his actions. So far, then, the complaint states a cause of action. There remains to consider only a defense peculiar to the City of Chicago. III. The City of Chicago asserts that it is not liable under § 1979. We do not stop to explore the whole range of questions tendered us on this issue at oral argument and in the briefs. For we are of the opinion that Congress did not undertake to bring municipal corporations within the ambit of § 1979. When the bill that became the Act of April 20, 1871, was being debated in the Senate, Senator Sherman of Ohio proposed an amendment which would have made “the inhabitants of the county, city, or parish” in which certain acts of violence occurred liable “to pay full compensation” to the person damaged or his widow or legal representative. The amendment was adopted by the Senate. The House, however, rejected it. The Conference Committee reported another version. The House rejected the Conference report. In a second conference the Sherman amendment was dropped and in its place § 6 of the Act of April 20, 1871, was substituted. This new section, which is now R. S. § 1981, 42 U. S. C. § 1986, dropped out all provision for municipal liability and extended liability in damages to “any person or persons, having knowledge that any” of the specified wrongs are being committed. Mr. Poland, speaking for the House Conferees about the Sherman proposal to make municipalities liable, said: “We informed the conferees on the part of the Senate that the House had taken a stand on that subject and would not recede from it; that that section imposing liability upon towns and counties must go out or we should fail to agree.” The objection to the Sherman amendment stated by Mr. Poland was that “the House had solemnly decided that in their judgment Congress had no constitutional power to impose any obligation upon county and town organizations, the mere instrumentality for the administration of state law.” The question of constitutional power of Congress to impose civil liability on municipalities was vigorously debated with powerful arguments advanced in the affirmative. Much reliance is placed on the Act of February 25,1871, 16 Stat. 431, entitled “An Act prescribing the Form of the enacting and resolving Clauses of Acts and Resolutions of Congress, and Rules for the Construction thereof.” Section 2 of this Act provides that “the word ‘person’ may extend and be applied to bodies politic and corporate.” It should be noted, however, that this definition is merely an allowable, not a mandatory, one. It is said that doubts should be resolved in favor of municipal liability because private remedies against officers for illegal searches and seizures are conspicuously ineffective, and because municipal liability will not only afford plaintiffs responsible defendants but cause those defendants to eradicate abuses that exist at the police level. We do not reach those policy considerations. Nor do we reach the constitutional question whether Congress has the power to make municipalities liable for acts of its officers that violate the civil rights of individuals. The response of the Congress to the proposal to make municipalities liable for certain actions being brought within federal purview by the Act of April 20, 1871, was so antagonistic that we cannot believe that the word "person” was used in this particular Act to include them. Accordingly we hold that the motion to dismiss the complaint against the City of Chicago was properly granted. But since the complaint should not have been dismissed against the officials the judgment must be and is Reversed. This section provides in material part: “The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of any civil action authorized by law to be commenced by any person: “(3) To redress the deprivation, under color of any State law, statute, ordinance, regulation, custom or usage, of any right, privilege or immunity secured by the Constitution of the United States or by any Act of Congress providing for equal rights of citizens or of all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States.” Subsection (a) provides: “The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of all civil actions wherein the matter in controversy exceeds the sum or value of $10,000, exclusive of interest and costs, and arises under the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States.” In their complaint, petitioners also invoked R. S. §§ 1980, 1981, 42 U. S. C. §§ 1985, 1986. Before this Court, however, petitioners have limited their claim to recovery to the liability imposed by § 1979. Accordingly, only that section is before us. See Cong. Globe, 42d Cong., 1st Sess., App. 68, 80, 83-86. Act of April 9, 1866, 14 Stat. 27. Supra, note 3, 568. Illinois Const., Art. II, § 6, provides: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated; and no warrant shall issue without probable cause, supported by affidavit, particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” Respondents also point to Ill. Rev. Stat., <?. 38, §§ 252, 449.1; Chicago, Illinois, Municipal Code, § 11-40. Cong. Globe, 42d Cong., 1st Sess., p. 244. Id., App. 268. Id., p. 345. Id., p. 365. The speaker, Mr. Arthur of Kentucky, had no doubts as to the scope of § 1: “[I]f the sheriff levy an execution, execute a writ, serve a summons, or make an arrest, all acting under a solemn, official oath, though as pure in duty as a saint and as immaculate as a seraph, for a mere error of judgment, [he is liable]....” Ibid. (Italics added.) Id., p. 366. Randall, The Civil War and Reconstruction (1937), p. 857. S. Rep. No. 1, 42d Cong., 1st Sess. See, e. g., Cong. Globe, 42d Cong., 1st Sess., App. 166-167. Id., p. 374. Id., p. 428. As Randall, op. cit~ supra, note 12, p. 855, says in discussing the Ku Klux Klan: “A friendly view of the order might represent it as an Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr.. Justice Whittaker delivered the opinion of the Court; Respondents were indicted'for murder in the- District Court for the District of Columbia, and- upon a trial were found guilty by a jury of the lesser included offense of manslaughter. After their motions for a new trial were considered and denied, the court entered judgment of conviction on May 7, 1958. Twenty-one days thereafter, on May 28, respondents separately filed in the District Court their notices of appeal. On the same day they each asked, and were granted by the District Court, leave to prosecute their appeals in forma pauperis. On June 30, the Government moved the Court of Appeals to dismiss respondents’ appeals for want of jurisdiction, because their notices of appeal were not filed within 10 days after entry of the judgment. In opposition to the motion, affidavits of respondent Travit Robinson, and of counsel for both respondents, were filed in the Court of Appeals. They tended to show that the late filing of the notices of appeal was due to a misunderstanding as to whether the notices were to be filed by respondents themselves or by their counsel. The Court of Appeals, one judge dissenting, held that the notices of appeal, although filed 11 days after expiration of the time prescribed in Rule 37 (a) (2) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, were sufficient to confer jurisdiction of the appeals if the District Court actually had found, under Rule 45 (b), that the failure to file the notices of appeal within 10 days after entry of the judgment “was the result of excusable neglect.” Being unable to determine from the record whether the District Court had so found, the Court of Appeals, on October 2, remanded to the District Court “for supplementation of the record” on that score, meanwhile holding in abeyance the Government’s motion to dismiss. On October 8, the District Court “ordered that the record reflect that the appeals were allowed and failure to act was due to excusable neglect under Rule 45 (b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure;” On November 5,- the Court of Appeals en banc, two judges dissenting, denied the Government’s petition for rehearing, 104 U. S. App. D. C. 200, 260 F. 2d 718. Because of the importance of the question to the proper and uniform administration of the Federal Rules; of Criminal Procedure, we granted certiorari. 358 U. S. 940. ' The single question presented is whether the filing of a notice of appeal in a criminal cáse after expiration of the time prescribed in Rule 37 (a) (2) confers jurisdiction of the appeal upon the Court of Appeals if the District Court,'proceeding under Rule 45' (b), has found that the late filing of the notice of appeal was the result of excusable neglect. There being no dispute about the fact that the notices of appeal were not filéd within the 10-day period prescribed by Rule 37 (a)(2), the answer to the question presented depends upon the proper interpretation of Rule 45 (b). It provides: “Enlargement. When an act is required or allowed to be done at or within a specified time, the court for cause shown may at any time in its discretion (1) with or without motion or notice, order the period enlarged if application therefor is made before the expiration of the period originally prescribed or as . extended by a previous order or (2) upon motion permit the act to be done after the expiration of the specified period if the failure to act was the result of excusable neglect; but the court may not enlarge the period for taking any action under Rules 33, 34 and 35, except as otherwise provided in those rules, or the period for taking an appeal.” In interpreting that Rule, the Court of Appeals took the. view that, although “the District Court has no authority to grant a greater period than ten days for taking an [appeal, it] may, however, if satisfied that the failure to note an appeal within ten days is excusable, permit late filing.” It thought that , there was “ample justification in reason for different treatment of pre-expiration and post-expiration applications”; that if a defendant “can make a timely application for an extension of time, he can readily and with less effort file the notice of appeal itself.” But if, “for some cause amounting legally to ‘excusable neglect’ the party fails to take any action during the prescribed time, the rule seems plainly to allow the . District Court discretion to permit him to file a late notice of appeal.” It thought that so doing would not.be to “enlarge” the period for taking an appeal, but rather would be only to “permit the act to be done” after expiration of the specified period. This conclusion has, at least, enough surface plausibility to require a detailed examination of the language, judicial interpretations, and history of Rule'45 (b) and the related Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. On its face, Rule 45 (b) appears to be quite plain and clear. It specifically says that “the court may not enlarge . . . the period for taking an appeal.” We think that to recognize a late notice of appeal is actually to “enlarge” the period for taking an appeal. Giving the words of 45 (b) their plain meaning, it would seem that the conclusion of the.Court of Appeals is in direct conflict with that Rule. No authority was cited by the Court of Appeals in support of its conclusion, nor is any supporting authority cited by respondents here. The Government insists, it appears correctly, that there is no case that supports the Court of Appeals’ conclusion. Every other decision, to which we have been cited, and that we have found, holds that the filing of a notice of appeal within the 10-day period prescribed by Rule 37 (a) (2) is mandatory and jurisdictional. It is quite significant that Rule 45 (b) not only prohibits the court from enlarging the period for taking an appeal, but, by the same language in the same sentence, also prohibits enlargement of the period for taking any action under Rules 33, 34 and 35, except as provided in those Rules. That language is: “. . . but the court may not enlarge the period for taking any action under Rules 33, 34 and 35, except as otherwise provided in those Rules, or the period for taking an appeal.” If, as the Court of Appeals has held, the delayed filing of a notice of appeal— found to have resulted from “excusable neglect” — is sufficient to confer jurisdiction of the appeal, it would consistently follow that á District Court may, upon a like finding, permit delayed filing of a motion for new trial under Rule 33, of a motion - in arrest of judgment under Rule 34, and the reduction of sentence under Rule 35, at any time — months or even years — after expiration of the periods specifically prescribed in those Rules. < This is not only contrary to the language of those Rules, but also contrary to the decisions of this Court. In United States v. Smith, 331 U. S. 469, it was held that the power of the District Court sua sponte to grant a new .trial under Rule 33 is limited to the timq. fixed in that Rule.- There, quite like here, it was argued “that because the literal language of the Rule places the five-day limit only on the making of the motion [for a new trial], it does not limit the power of the court'later to grant [a new trial] . . . .” 331 U. S., at 473. This Court rejected the contention that such power “lingers on indefinitely,” and pointed out that • the Rules, in abolishing the limitation based on the Court Term, did not substitute indefiniteness, but prescribed precise times within which the'power of the courts must • be confined. 331 U. S., at 474. See also Marion v. United States, 171 F. 2d 185 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Drown v. United States, 198 F. 2d 999 (C. A. 9th Cir.). The same rule must apply with respect to the time within which a' motion in arrest of judgment may be filed under-Rule 34. Similarly, it has been held that a District Court may not reduce a sentence under Rule 35 after expiration of the 60-day period prescribed by that- Rule regardless of excuse. United States v. Hunter, 162 F. 2d 644 (C. A. 7th Cir.). Cf. Affronti v. United States, 350 U. S. 79. The right of appeal in criminal cases in federal courts is oí relatively recent origin. Carroll v. United States, 354 U. S. 394, 400. By the Act of February 24, 1933, 47 Stat. 904 (now 18 U. S. C. § 3772) Congress first gave this Court authority to promulgate rules regulating the time and manner for taking appeals in criminal cases’.' One of the principal purposes was to eliminate delays in such appeals. H. R. Rep. No. 2047, 72d Cong., 2d Sess., to accompany S. 4020. The first Criminal Appeals Rules promulgated under that Act were the 13 Rules effective September 1, 1934. 292 U. S. 661-670. Rule III provided a 5-day time limit for the taking of an appeal from a judgment of conviction. It was uniformly held that Rule III was mandatory and jurisdictional, and appeals not taken within that time appear always to have been dismissed regardless of excuse. From this review, it would seem that there is nothing in the language of Rule 45 (b), or in the judicial interpretations of that Rule or its predecessor, which supports the conclusion of the Court of Appeals. We turn, then, to the history of Rule 45 (b)'to see whether any support for the court’s conclusion can be found in that source. Under the Act of June 29, 1940, 54 Stat. 688, as amended (now 18 U. S: C. § 3771), this Court was authorized to prescribe Rules of Criminal Procedure to and including verdict, which would become effective upon passive acceptance by Congress. Under that Act and the previous authority (the Act of February 24, 1933, 47 Stat. 904— now 18 U. S. C. § 3772), and with' the aid of an . advisory committee, this Court promulgated the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Rules 32 through 39 were made effective by order of the Court, 327 U. S. 825, and the remaining Rules became effective by. acceptance of Congress. What' are now Rules 37 (a) (2) and 45 (b) underwent a number of draft changes before adoption. The first preliminary draft of Rule. 37 (a) (2) changed from 5 days to 10 days the time limit for the taking of an appeal, but of more significance is the fact that the preliminary draft of that Rule stated, ill effect, that when a court imposes sentence upon, a- defendant, represented by appointed counsel or not represented by any counsel, the court shall ask the. defendant whether he wishes to appeal and, if he answers in, the affirmative, “the court shall direct the clerk forthwith to prepare, file, and serve on behalf of the defendant a notice of appeal or shall extend the time specified by rule for the filing of a notice of appeal.” (Emphasis'-added.) In conformity with that draft proposal, the preliminary draft of what is now Rule 45 (b) stated: “. . . but it may not enlarge . . . the period for taking an appeal except as provided in Rule 35 (a) (2).” The limited provision for an extension of the.time within which to appeal that was contained in the first preliminary draft of those Rules was eliminated by the second preliminary draft and never reappeared. This seems almost conclusively to show a deliberate inténtion to eliminate any power of the courts to extend the time for the taking of an appeal.. But there is more. The prototype for Rule 45 (b) was Rule 6 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. When the original Criminal Rules were being prepared, the limiting clause of Rule 6 (b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure stated: “. . . but it may not enlarge the period for taking any action under Rule 59, except as stated in subdivision (c) thereof, or the period for taking an appeal as provided by law.” It had consistently been held that Civil Rule 6 (b) was mandatory and jurisdictional and could not be extended regardless of excuse. It must be presumed that the Advisory Committee and the Justices of this Court were aware of the limiting language of Civil Rule 6 (b) and of the judicial construction it had received when they prepared and adopted the. Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. No support for the conclusion of the Court of Appeals can be found in this history of Rule’45 (b). • Rule 45 (b) says in plain words that . . the court may not enlarge . . . the period for taking an appeal.” The courts have uniformly held that the taking of an appeal within the prescribed time is mandatory and jurisdictional. The history of Rule 45 (b) shows that consideration was given to the matter of vesting a limited discretion in the courts to grant an extension of time for the taking of an appeal, but, upon further consideration, the idea was deliberately abandoned. It follows that the plain words, the judicial interpretations, and the history, of Rule 45 (b) not only fail to support, but actually oppose, the conclusion of the Court of Appeals, and therefore its. judgment cannot stand. That powerful policy arguments may be made both for and against greater flexibility with respect to the time for the taking of an appeal is indeed evident. But that policy question, involving, as it does, many weighty and conflicting considerations, must be resolved through the rule-making process and not by judicial decision.’ United States v. Isthmian S. S. Co., 359 U. S. 314. If, by that process, the courts are ever giyen power to extend the time for the filing of a notice of appeal upon a finding of excusable neglect, it seems reasonable to think that some definite limitation upon the time within which they might do so would be prescribed; for otherwise, as under the decision of the court below, many appeals might— almost surely would — be indefinitely delayed. Certainly that possibility would unnecessarily produce intolerable uncertainty and confusion. Whatever may be the proper resolution of the policy question involved, it was beyond the power of the Court of Appeals to resolve it. Reversed. Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Douglas dissent, as they share the view of Judge Bazelon, 104 U. S. App. D. C. 200, 201, 260 F. 2d 718, 719, that an extension of time, granted after the 10-day period for an appeal has passed; is not an “enlargement” of the time in the narrow sense in which Rule 45 (b) uses the word. Travit Robinson’s affidavit was, in essence, as follows: On “the day of sentencing, I advised my attorney that I was going to appeal the case .... I had told him that from [what] other inmates at the District Jail [had told me] I knew I could appeal the judgment but [I] did not file the necessary appeal paper, thinking that my attorney would do it, while I now [understand] he thought I would do it ... . We misunderstood each other and I now find that I gave him the wrong impression as to what I wanted done and that he misunderstood what I was going to do or wanted to do.” The affidavit of respondents’ counsel substantially conformed to Travit Robinson’s affidavit and further recited: “I was under the impression that he was going to [file the notice of appeal] without me, [and also] I neglected to differentiate the rules as to appealing this type of a. case [from the Rules applying to the appeal] of a civil case.” All references to Rules are to the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure unless otherwise stated. Rule 37 (a) (2) of Fed. Rules Crim. Proc. provides: “Time for Taking Appeal. An appeal by a defendant may be taken within 10 days after entry of the judgment or order appealed from, but if a motion for a new trial or in arrest' of'judgment has been made within the 10-day period an appeal from a judgment of conviction may be taken within 10 days after entry of the order denying the motion. When a court after trial imposes senteneé upon a defendant not represented by counsel, the defendant shall be advised of his right to appeal and if he so requests, the clerk shall prepare and file forthwith a notice of appeal on behalf of the defendant. . . See, e. g., Martin v. United States, 263 F. 2d 516 (C. A. 10th Cir.); Bryant v. United States, 261 F. 2d 229 (C. A. 6th Cir.); United States v. Isabella, 251 F. 2d 223 (C. A. 2d Cir.); Banks v. United States, 240 F. 2d 302 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Wagner v. United States, 220 F. 2d 513 (C. A. 4th Cir.); Kirksey v. United States, 94 U. S. App. D. C. 393, 219 F. 2d 499; Brant v. United States, 210 F. 2d 470 (C. A. 5th Cir.); McIntosh v. United States, 204 F. 2d 545 (C. A. 5th Cir.); Marion v. United States, 171 F. 2d 185 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Swihart v. United States, 169 F. 2d 808 (C. A. 10th Cir.); United States v. Froehlich, 166 F. 2d 84 (C. A. 2d Cir.). It is thus made to appear that the court below has itself recognized and enforced this Eule in Kirksey v. United States, supra, as it did also in Richards v. United States, 89 U. S. App. D. C. 354, n. 2, at 356, 192 F. 2d 602, n. 2. at 604. Rule 33 of Fed. Rules Crim. Proc., in pertinent part, provides: “. . .A motion for a new trial based on the ground of newly discovered evidence may be made only before or within two years after final judgment, but if an appeal is pending the court may grant the motion only on remand of'the case. A motion for a new trial based on- any other grounds shall be made within 5 days after verdict or finding of guilty or within such further time as the court may fix during the 5-day period.” (Emphasis added.) Rule 34 of Fed. Rules Crim. Proc. provides: “The court shall arrest judgment if the indictment or information does not charge an offense or if the court was without jurisdiction of the offense charged. The motion in arrest of judgment shall be made within 5 days after determination of guilt or within such further time as the court may fix during the 5-day period.” (Emphasis added.) Rule 35 of Fed. Rules Crim. Proc. provides: “The court may correct an illegal sentence at any time. The court may reduce a sentence within 60 days after the sentence is imposed, or within 60 days after receipt by the court of a mandate issued upon affirmance of the judgment or dismissal of the appeal, or within 60 days after receipt of an order of the Supreme Court denying an application for a writ of certiorari.” See, e. g., Nix v. United States, 131 F. 2d 857 (C. A. 5th Cir.) ; United States v. Infusino, 131 F. 2d 617 (C. A. 7th Cir.); Miller v. United States, 104 F. 2d 343 (C. A. 5th Cir.); United States v. Tousey, 101 F. 2d 892 (C. A. 7th Cir.); O’Gwin v. United States, 90 F. 2d 494 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Burr v. United States, 86 F. 2d 502 (C. A. 7th Cir.); Fewox v. United States, 77 F. 2d 699 (C. A. 5th Cir.). And compare United States ex rel. Coy v. United States, 316 U. S. 342, and United States v. Hark, 320 U. S. 531, 533. Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, Preliminary Draft, with Notes and Forms, Prepared by the Advisory Committee on Rules of Criminal Procedure, United States Government Printing Office, 1943, Appeal Rule then No. 35 (a)(2), p. 152. What became Rule 45 (b) was then treated as Rule. 41 (b). Id., at p. 179. The note to this proposed Rule-stated that it -. . is an adaptation for all criminal proceedings of Fed. Rules Civ. Proc., Rule 6 (Time).” Id., at p. 180. Federal. Rules of Criminal Procedure, Second Preliminary Draft, with Notes and Forms, Prepared by the Advisory Committee on Rules of Criminal Procedure, United States Government Printing Office, February 1944, Appeal Rule then No. 39 (a)(2), p. 135. The Notes of Advisory Committee on Rules of Criminal Procedure (Rule 45), state, “The rule is in substance the same as Rule 6 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure . . . .” United Drug Co. v. Helvering, 108 F. 2d 637 (C. A. 2d Cir.); Alexander v. Special School District of Booneville, 132 F. 2d 355 (C. A. 8th Cir.); Tinkoff v. West Publishing Co., 138 F. 2d 607 (C. A. 7th Cir.); Lamb v. Shasta Oil Co., 149 F. 2d 729 (C. A. 5th Cir.); Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation v. Congregation Poiley Tzedeck, 159 F. 2d 163 (C. A. 2d Cir.). The allowance of an appeal months or years after expiration of the prescribed time seems unnecessary for the accomplishment of substantial justice, for there are a number of collateral remedies available to redress denial of basic rights. Examples are: The power of a District Court under Rule 35 to correct an illegal sentence at any time, and to reduce a sentence .within 60 days after the judgment of conviction becomes final; the power of a District Court to entertain a collateral attack upon a judgment of conviction and to vacate, set aside or correct the sentence under 28 U. S. C. §2255; and proceedings by way of writ of error coram nobis. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Judgment of the Court, and opinion of Mr. Justice Stewart, Mr. Justice Powell, and Mr. Justice Stevens, announced by Mr. Justice Powell. The issue presented by this case is whether the imposition of the sentence of death for the crime of murder under the law of Florida violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. I The petitioner, Charles William Proffitt, was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to death for the first-degree murder of Joel Medgebow. The circumstances surrounding the murder were testified to by the decedent’s wife, who was present at the time it was committed. On July 10, 1973, Mrs. Medgebow awakened around 5 a. m. in the bedroom of her apartment to find her husband sitting up in bed, moaning. He was holding what she took to be a ruler. Just then a third person jumped up, hit her several times with his fist, knocked her to the. floor, and ran out of the house. It soon appeared that Medgebow had been fatally stabbed with a butcher knife. Mrs. Medgebow was not able to identify the attacker, although she was able to give a description of him. The petitioner’s wife testified that on the night before the murder the petitioner had gone to work dressed in a white shirt and gray pants, and that he had returned at about 5:15 a. m. dressed in the same clothing but without shoes. She said that after a short conversation the petitioner had packed his clothes and departed. A young woman boarder, who overheard parts of the petitioner’s conversation with his wife, testified that the petitioner had told his wife that he had stabbed and killed a man with a butcher knife while he was burglarizing a place, and that he had beaten a woman. One of the petitioner’s coworkers testified that they had been drinking together until 3:30 or 3:45 on the morning of the murder and that the petitioner had then driven him home. He said that the petitioner at this time was wearing gray pants and a white shirt. The jury found the defendant guilty as charged. Subsequently, as provided by Florida law, a separate hearing was held to determine whether the petitioner should be sentenced to death or to life imprisonment. Under the state law that decision turned on whether certain statutory aggravating circumstances surrounding the crime outweighed any statutory mitigating circumstances found to exist. At that hearing it was shown that the petitioner had one prior conviction, a 1967 charge of breaking and entering. The State also introduced the testimony of the physician (Dr, Crumbley) at the jail where the petitioner had been held pending trial. He testified that the petitioner had come to him as a physician, and told him that he was concerned that he would harm other people in the future, that he had had an uncontrollable desire to kill that had already resulted in his killing one man, that this desire was building up again, and that he wanted psychiatric help so he would not kill again. Dr. Crumbley also testified that, in his opinion, the petitioner was dangerous and would be a danger to his fellow inmates if imprisoned, but that his condition could be treated successfully. The jury returned an advisory verdict recommending the sentence of death. The trial judge ordered an independent psychiatric evaluation of the petitioner, the results of which indicated that the petitioner was not, then or at the time of the murder, mentally impaired. The judge then sentenced the petitioner to death. In his written findings supporting the sentence, the judge found as aggravating circumstances that (1) the murder was premeditated and occurred in the course of a felony (burglary); (2) the petitioner has the propensity to commit murder; (3) the murder was especially heinous, atrocious, and cruel; and (4) the petitioner knowingly, through his intentional act, created a great risk of serious bodily harm and death to many persons. The judge also found specifically that none of the statutory mitigating circumstances existed. The Supreme Court of Florida affirmed. 315 So. 2d 461 (1975). We granted certiorari, 423 U. S. 1082 (1976), to consider whether the imposition of the death sentence in this case constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. II The petitioner argues that the imposition of the death penalty under any circumstances is cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. We reject this argument for the reasons stated today in Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 168-187. III A In response to Furman v. Georgia, 408 U. S. 238 (1972), the Florida Legislature adopted new statutes that authorize the imposition of the death penalty on those convicted of first-degree murder. Fla. Stat. Ann. § 782.04 (1) (Supp. 1976-1977). At the same time Florida adopted a new capital-sentencing procedure, patterned in large part on the Model Penal Code. See § 921.141 (Supp. 1976-1977). Under the new statute, if a defendant is found guilty of a capital offense, a separate evi-dentiary hearing is held before the trial judge and jury to determine his sentence. Evidence may be presented on any matter the judge deems relevant to sentencing and must include matters relating to certain legislatively specified aggravating and mitigating circumstances. Both the prosecution and the defense may present argument on whether the death penalty shall be imposed. At the conclusion of the hearing the jury is directed to consider “[wjhether sufficient mitigating circumstances exist . . . which outweigh the aggravating circumstances found to exist; and . . . [b]ased on these considerations, whether the defendant should be sentenced to life [imprisonment] or death.” §§ 921.141 (2) (b) and (c) (Supp. 1976-1977). The jury’s verdict is determined by majority vote. It is only advisory; the actual sentence is determined by the trial judge. The Florida Supreme Court has stated, however, that “[i]n order to sustain a sentence of death following a jury recommendation of life, the facts suggesting a sentence of death should be so clear and convincing that virtually no reasonable person could differ.” Tedder v. State, 322 So. 2d 908, 910 (1975). Accord, Thompson v. State, 328 So. 2d 1, 5 (1976). Cf. Spinkellink v. State, 313 So. 2d 666, 671 (1976). The trial judge is also directed to weigh the statutory aggravating and mitigating circumstances when he determines the sentence to be imposed on a defendant. The statute requires that if the trial court imposes a sentence of death, “it shall set forth in writing its findings upon which the sentence of death is based as to the facts: (a) [t]hat sufficient [statutory] aggravating circumstances exist . . . and (b) [t]hat there are insufficient [statutory] mitigating circumstances ... to outweigh the aggravating circumstances.” § 921.141 (3) (Supp. 1976-1977). The statute provides for automatic review by the Supreme Court of Florida of all cases in which a death sentence has been imposed. § 921.141 (4) (Supp. 1976-1977). The law differs from that of Georgia in that it does not require the court to conduct any specific form of review. Since, however, the trial judge must justify the imposition of a death sentence with written findings, meaningful appellate review of each such sentence is made possible, and the Supreme Court of Florida, like its Georgia counterpart, considers its function to be to “[guarantee] that the [aggravating and mitigating] reasons present in one case will reach a similar result to that reached under similar circumstances in another case. . . . If a defendant is sentenced to die, this Court can review that case in light of the other decisions and determine whether or not the punishment is too great.” State v. Dixon, 283 So. 2d 1, 10 (1973). On their face these procedures, like those used in Georgia, appear to meet the constitutional deficiencies identified in Furman. The sentencing authority in Florida, the trial judge, is directed to weigh eight aggravating factors against seven mitigating factors to determine whether the death penalty shall be imposed. This determination requires the trial judge to focus on the circumstances of the crime and the character of the individual defendant. He must, inter alia, consider whether the defendant has a prior criminal record, whether the defendant acted under duress or under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance, whether the defendant’s role in the crime was that of a minor accomplice, and whether the defendant’s youth argues in favor of a more lenient sentence than might otherwise be imposed. The trial judge must also determine whether the crime was committed in the course of one of several enumerated felonies, whether it was committed for pecuniary gain, whether it was committed to assist in an escape from custody or to prevent a lawful arrest, and whether the crime was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel. To answer these questions, which are not unlike those considered by a Georgia sentencing jury, see Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 197, the sentencing judge must focus on the individual circumstances of each homicide and each defendant. The basic difference between the Florida system and the Georgia system is that in Florida the sentence is determined by the trial judge rather than by the jury. This Court has pointed out that jury sentencing in a capital case can perform an important societal function, Witherspoon v. Illinois, 391 U. S. 510, 519 n. 15 (1968), but it has never suggested that jury sentencing is constitutionally required. And it would appear that judicial sentencing should lead, if anything, to even greater consistency in the imposition at the trial court level of capital punishment, since a trial judge is more experienced in sentencing than a jury, and therefore is better able to impose sentences similar to those imposed in analogous cases. The Florida capital-sentencing procedures thus seek to assure that the death penalty will not be imposed in an arbitrary or capricious manner. Moreover, to the extent that any risk to the contrary exists, it is minimized by Florida's appellate review system, under which the evidence of the aggravating and mitigating circumstances is reviewed and reweighed by the Supreme Court of Florida “to determine independently whether the imposition of the ultimate penalty is warranted.” Songer v. State, 322 So. 2d 481, 484 (1975). See also Sullivan v. State, 303 So. 2d 632, 637 (1974). The Supreme Court of Florida, like that of Georgia, has not hesitated to vacate a death sentence when it has determined that the sentence should not have been imposed. Indeed, it has vacated 8 of the 21 death sentences that it has reviewed to date. See Taylor v. State, 294 So. 2d 648 (1974); Lamadline v. State, 303 So. 2d 17 (1974); Slater v. State, 316 So. 2d 539 (1975); Swan v. State, 322 So. 2d 485 (1975); Tedder v. State, 322 So. 2d 908 (1975); Halliwell v. State, 323 So. 2d 557 (1975); Thompson v. State, 328 So. 2d 1 (1976); Messer v. State, 330 So. 2d 137 (1976). Under Florida's capital-sentencing procedures, in sum, trial judges are given specific and detailed guidance to assist them in deciding whether to impose a death penalty or imprisonment for life. Moreover, their decisions are reviewed to ensure that they are consistent with other sentences imposed in similar circumstances. Thus, in Florida, as in Georgia, it is no longer true that there is “ 'no meaningful basis for distinguishing the few cases in which [the death penalty] is imposed from the many cases in which it is not.’ ” Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 188, quoting Furman v. Georgia, 408 U. S., at 313 (White, J., concurring). On its face the Florida system thus satisfies the constitutional deficiencies identified in Furman. B As in Gregg, the petitioner contends, however, that, while perhaps facially acceptable, the new sentencing procedures in actual effect are merely cosmetic, and that arbitrariness and caprice still pervade the system under which Florida imposes the death penalty. (1) The petitioner first argues that arbitrariness is inherent in the Florida criminal justice system because it allows discretion to be exercised at each stage of a criminal proceeding — the prosecutor’s decision whether to charge a capital offense in the first place, his decision whether to accept a plea to a lesser offense, the jury’s consideration of lesser included offenses, and, after conviction and unsuccessful appeal, the Executive’s decision whether to commute a death sentence. As we noted in Gregg, this argument is based on a fundamental misinterpretation of Furman, and we reject it for the reasons expressed in Gregg. See ante, at 199. (2) The petitioner next argues that the new Florida sentencing procedures in reality do not eliminate the arbitrary infliction of death that was condemned in Furman. Basically he contends that the statutory aggravating and mitigating circumstances are vague and overbroad, and that the statute gives no guidance as to how the mitigating and aggravating circumstances should be weighed in any specific case. (a) Initially the petitioner asserts that the enumerated aggravating and mitigating circumstances are so vague and so broad that virtually “any capital defendant becomes a candidate for the death penalty . . . In particular, the petitioner attacks the eighth and third statutory aggravating circumstances, which authorize the death penalty to be imposed if the crime is “especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel,” or if “[t]he defendant knowingly created a great risk of death to many persons.” §§ 921.141 (5)(h), (c) (Supp. 1976-1977). These provisions must be considered as they have been construed by the Supreme Court of Florida. That court has recognized that while it is arguable “that all killings are atrocious, . . . [s] till, we believe that the Legislature intended something 'especially’ heinous, atrocious or cruel when it authorized the death penalty for first degree murder.” Tedder v. State, 322 So. 2d, at 910. As a consequence, the court has indicated that the eighth statutory provision is directed only at “the conscienceless or pitiless crime which is unnecessarily torturous to the victim.” State v. Dixon, 283 So. 2d, at 9. See also Alford v. State, 307 So. 2d 433, 445 (1975); Halliwell v. State, supra, at 561. We cannot say that the provision, as so construed, provides inadequate guidance to those charged with the duty of recommending or imposing sentences in capital cases. See Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 200-203. In the only case, except for the instant case, in which the third aggravating factor — “[t]he defendant knowingly created a great risk of death to many persons”— was found, Alvord v. State, 322 So. 2d 533 (1975), the State Supreme Court held that the defendant created a great risk of death because he “obviously murdered two of the victims in order .to avoid a surviving witness to the [first] murder.” Id., at 540. As construed by the Supreme Court of Florida these provisions are not impermissibly vague. (b) The petitioner next attacks the imprecision of the mitigating circumstances. He argues that whether a defendant acted “under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance,” whether a defendant’s capacity “to conform his conduct to the requirements of law was substantially impaired,” or whether a defendant’s participation as an accomplice in a capital felony was “relatively minor,” are questions beyond the capacity of a jury or judge to determine. See §§ 921.141 (6)(b), (f), (d) (Supp. 1976-1977). He also argues that neither a jury nor a judge is capable of deciding how to weigh a defendant’s age or determining whether he had a “significant history of prior criminal activity.” See §§ 921.141 (6) (g)-, (a) (Supp. 1976-1977). In a similar vein the petitioner argues that it is not possible to make a rational determination whether there are “sufficient” aggravating circumstances that are not outweighed by the mitigating circumstances, since the state law assigns no specific weight to any of the various circumstances to be considered. See § 921.141 (Supp. 1976-1977). While these questions and decisions may be hard, they require no more line drawing than is commonly required of a factfinder in a lawsuit. For example, juries have traditionally evaluated the validity of defenses such as insanity or reduced capacity, both of which involve the same considerations as some of the above-mentioned mitigating circumstances. While the various factors to be considered by the sentencing authorities do not have numerical weights assigned to them, the requirements of Furman are satisfied when the sentencing authority’s discretion is guided and channeled by requiring examination of specific factors that argue in favor of or against imposition of the death penalty, thus eliminating total arbitrariness and capriciousness in its imposition. The directions given to judge and jury by the Florida statute are sufficiently clear and precise to enable the various aggravating circumstances to be weighed against the mitigating ones. As a result, the trial court’s sentencing discretion is guided and channeled by a system that focuses on the circumstances of each individual homicide and individual defendant in deciding whether the death penalty is to be imposed. (c) Finally, the Florida statute has a provision designed to assure that the death penalty will not be imposed on a capriciously selected group of convicted defendants. The Supreme Court of Florida reviews each death sentence to ensure that similar results are reached in similar cases. Nonetheless the petitioner attacks the Florida appellate review process because the role of the Supreme Court of Florida in reviewing death sentences is necessarily subjective and unpredictable. While it may be true that that court has not chosen to formulate a rigid objective test as its standard of review for all cases, it does not follow that the appellate review process is ineffective or arbitrary. In fact, it is apparent that the Florida court has undertaken responsibly to perform its function of death sentence review with a maximum of rationality and consistency. For example, it has several times compared the circumstances of a case under review with those of previous cases in which it has assessed the imposition of death sentences. See, e. g., Alford v. State, 307 So. 2d, at 445; Alvord v. State, 322 So. 2d, at 540-541. By following this procedure the Florida court has in effect adopted the type of proportionality review mandated by the Georgia statute. Cf. Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 204-206. And any suggestion that the Florida court engages in only cursory or rubber-stamp review of death penalty cases is totally controverted by the fact that it has vacated over one-third of the death sentences that have come before it. See supra, at 253. IV Florida, like Georgia, has responded to Furman by enacting legislation that passes constitutional muster. That legislation provides that after a person is convicted of first-degree murder, there shall be an informed, focused, guided, and objective inquiry into the question whether he should be sentenced to death. If a death sentence is imposed, the sentencing authority articulates in writing the statutory reasons that led to its decision. Those reasons, and the evidence supporting them, are conscientiously reviewed by a court which, because of its statewide jurisdiction, can assure consistency, fairness, and rationality in the evenhanded operation of the state law. As in Georgia, this system serves to assure that sentences of death will not be “wantonly” or “freakishly” imposed. See Furman v. Georgia, 408 U. S., at 310 (Stewart, J., concurring). Accordingly, the judgment before us is affirmed. It is so ordered. [For dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Brennan, see ante, p. 227.] [For dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Marshall, see ante, p. 231.] It appears that the “ruler” was actually the murder weapon which Medgebow had pulled from his own chest. She described the attacker as wearing light pants and a pinstriped shirt with long sleeves rolled up to the elbow. She also stated that the attacker was a medium-sized white male. See infra, at 248-250. The murder statute under which petitioner was convicted reads as follows: “(1) (a) The unlawful killing of a human being, when perpetrated from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person killed or any human being, or when committed by a person engaged in the perpetration of, or in the attempt to perpetrate, any arson, involuntary sexual battery, robbery, burglary, kidnapping, aircraft piracy, or unlawful throwing, placing, or discharging of a destructive device or bomb, or which resulted from the unlawful distribution of heroin by a person 18 years of age or older when such drug is proven to bo the proximate cause of the death of the user, shall be murder in the first degree and shall constitute a capital felony, punishable as provided in s. 775.082. “(b) In all cases under this section, the procedure set forth in s. 921.141 shall be followed in order to determine sentence of death or life imprisonment.” Fla. Stat. Ann. §782.04 (Supp. 1976-1977). Another Florida statute authorizes imposition of the death penalty upon conviction of sexual battery of a child under 12 years of age. §794.011 (2) (Supp. 1976-1977). We do not in this opinion consider the constitutionality of the death penalty for any offense other than first-degree murder. See Model Penal Code §210.6 (Proposed Official Draft, 1962) (set out in Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 193-194, n. 44). The aggravating circumstances are: “(a) The capital felony was committed by a person under sentence of imprisonment. “(b) The defendant was previously convicted of another capital felony or of a felony involving the use or threat of violence to the person. “(c) The defendant knowingly created a great risk of death to many persons. “(d) The capital felony was committed while the defendant was engaged, or was an accomplice, in the commission of, or an attempt to commit, or flight after committing or attempting to commit, any robbery, rape, arson, burglary, kidnapping, or aircraft piracy or the unlawful throwing, placing, or discharging of a destructive device or bomb. “(e) The capital felony was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest or effecting an escape from custody. “(f) The capital felony was committed for pecuniary gain. “(g) The capital felony was committed to disrupt or hinder the lawful exercise of any governmental function or the enforcement of laws. “(h) The capital felony was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel.” §921.141 (5) (Supp. 1976-1977). The mitigating circumstances are: “(a) The defendant has no significant history of prior criminal activity. “(b) The capital felony was committed while the defendant was under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance. “(c) The victim was a participant in the defendant’s conduct or consented to the act. “(d) The defendant was an accomplice in the capital felony committed by another person and his participation was relatively minor. “(e) The defendant acted under extreme duress or under the substantial domination of another person. “(f) The capacity of the defendant to appreciate the criminality of his conduct or to conform his conduct, to- the requirements of law was substantially impaired. “(g) The age of the defendant at the time of the crime.” § 921.141 (6) (Supp. 1976-1977). Tedder has not always been cited when the Florida court has considered a judge-imposed death sentence following a jury recommendation of life imprisonment. See, e. g., Thompson v. State, 328 So. 2d 1 (1976); Douglas v. State, 328 So, 2d 18 (1976); Dobbert v. State, 328 So. 2d 433 (1976). But in the latter case two judges relied on Tedder in separate opinions, one in support of reversing the death sentence and one in support of affirming it. In one case the Florida court upheld a death sentence where the trial judge had simply listed six aggravating factors as justification for the sentence he imposed. Sawyer v. State, 313 So. 2d 680 (1975). Since there were no mitigating factors, and since some of these aggravating factors arguably fell within the statutory categories, it is unclear whether the Florida court would uphold a death sentence that rested entirely on nonstatutory aggravating circumstances. It seems unlikely that it would do so, since the capital-sentencing statute explicitly provides that “[aggravating circumstances shall be limited to the following [eight specified factors].” §921.141(5) (Supp. 1976-1977). (Emphasis added.) There is no such limiting language introducing the list of statutory mitigating factors. See § 921.141 (6) (Supp. 1976-1977). See also n. 14, infra. Because the trial judge imposes sentence, the Florida court has ruled that he may order preparation of a presentence investigation report to assist him in determining the appropriate sentence. See Swan v. State, 322 So. 2d 485, 488-489 (1975); Songer v. State, 322 So. 2d 481, 484 (1975). These reports frequently contain much information relevant to sentencing. See Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 189 n. 37. See American Bar Association Project on Standards for Criminal Justice, Sentencing Alternatives and Procedures § 1.1, Commentary, pp. 43-48 (Approved Draft 1968); President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice: The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society, Task Force Report: The Courts 26 (1967). See also Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 189-192. In the words of the Florida court, “a trial judge with experience in the facts of criminality possesses the requisite knowledge to balance the facts of the case against the standard criminal activity which can only be developed by involvement with the trials of numerous defendants.” State v. Dixon, 283 So. 2d 1, 8 (1973). As in Gregg, we examine the claims of vagueness and over-breadth in the statutory criteria only insofar as it is necessary to determine whether there is a substantial risk that the Florida capital-sentencing system, when viewed in its entirety, will result in the capricious or arbitrary imposition of the death penalty. See Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 201 n. 51. The Supreme Court of Florida has affirmed death sentences in several cases, including the instant case, where this eighth statutory aggravating factor was found, without specifically stating that the homicide was “pitiless” or “torturous to the victim.” See, e. g., Hallman v. State, 305 So. 2d 180 (1974) (victim's throat slit with broken bottle); Spinkellink v. State, 313 So. 2d 666 (1975) (“career criminal” shot sleeping traveling companion); Gardner v. State, 313 So. 2d 675 (1975) (brutal beating and murder); Alvord v. State, 322 So. 2d 533 (1975) (three women killed by strangulation, one raped); Douglas v. State, 328 So. 2d 18 (1976) (depraved murder); Henry v. State, 328 So. 2d 430 (1976) (torture murder); Dobbert v. State, 328 So. 2d 433 (1976) (torture and killing of two children). But the circumstances of all of these cases could accurately be characterized as “pitiless” and ‘'unnecessarily torturous,” and it thus does not appear that the Florida Court has abandoned the definition that it announced in Dixon and applied in Alford, Tedder, and Halliwell. While it might be argued that this case broadens that construction, since only one person other than the victim was attacked at all and then only by being hit with a fist, this would be to read more into the State Supreme Court’s opinion than is actually there. That court considered 11 claims of error advanced by the petitioner, including the trial judge’s finding that none of the statutory mitigating circumstances existed. It did not, however, consider whether the findings as to each of the statutory aggravating circumstances were supported by the evidence. If only one aggravating circumstance had been found, or if some mitigating circumstance had been found to exist but not to outweigh the aggravating circumstances, we would be justified in concluding that the State Supreme Court had necessarily decided this point even though it had not expressly done so. However, in the circumstances of this case, when four separate aggravating circumstances were found and where each mitigating circumstance was expressly found not to exist, no such holding on the part of the State Supreme Court can be implied. The petitioner notes further that Florida’s sentencing system fails to channel the discretion of the jury or judge because it allows for consideration of nonstatutory aggravating factors. In the only ease to approve such a practice, Sawyer v. State, 313 So. 2d 680 (1975), the Florida court recast the trial court’s six non-statutory aggravating factors into four aggravating circumstances— two of them statutory. As noted earlier, it is unclear that the Florida court would ever approve a death sentence based entirely on nonstatutory aggravating circumstances. See n. 8, supra. State v. Dixon, 283 So. 2d, at 10. The petitioner also argues that since the Florida Court does not review sentences of life imprisonment imposed in capital cases or sentences imposed in cases where a capital crime was charged but where the jury convicted of a lesser offense, it will have an unbalanced view of the way that the typical jury treats a murder case and it will affirm death sentences under circumstances where the vast majority of judges would have imposed a sentence of life imprisonment. As we noted in Gregg v. Georgia, ante, at 204 n. 56, this problem is not sufficient to raise a serious risk that the state capital-sentencing system will result in arbitrary and capricious imposition of the death penalty. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Marshall delivered the opinion of the Court. In Wilson v. Garcia, 471 U. S. 261 (1985), we held that courts entertaining claims brought under 42 U. S. C. § 1983 should borrow the state statute of limitations for personal injury actions. This case raises the question of what limitations period should apply to a § 1983 action where a State has one or more statutes of limitations for certain enumerated intentional torts, and a residual statute for all other personal injury actions. We hold that the residual or general personal injury statute of limitations applies. I On November 13, 1985, respondent Tom U. U. Okure brought suit in the District Court for the Northern District of New York, seeking damages under §1983 from petitioners Javan Owens and Daniel G. Lessard, two State University of New York (SUNY) police officers. Okure alleged that, on January 27, 1984, the officers unlawfully arrested him on the SUNY campus in Albany and charged him with disorderly conduct. The complaint stated that Okure was “forcibly transported” to a police detention center, “battered and beaten by [the police officers] and forced to endure great emotional distress, physical harm, and embarrassment.” App. 5-6. As a result of the arrest and beating, Okure claimed, he “sustained personal injuries, including broken teeth and a sprained finger, mental anguish, shame, humiliation, legal expenses and the deprivation of his constitutional rights.” Id., at 6. The officers moved to dismiss the complaint, which had been filed 22 months after the alleged incident, as time barred. They contended that § 1983 actions were governed by New York’s 1-year statute of limitations covering eight intentional torts: “assault, battery, false imprisonment, malicious prosecution, libel, slander, false words causing special damages, [and] a violation of the right of privacy.” N. Y. Civ. Prac. Law § 215(3) (McKinney 1972). The District Court denied the motion to dismiss. 625 F. Supp. 1568 (1986). Borrowing “a narrowly drawn statute which is applicable only to certain intentional torts,” id., at 1570, the court stated, was inconsistent with this Court’s endorsement of “a simple, broad characterization of all §1983 claims.” Ibid, (citing Wilson, supra, at 272). Moreover, a 1-year statute of limitations on § 1983 claims “would improperly restrict the scope of § 1983 and controvert federal policy.” 625 F. Supp., at 1571. The court concluded that New York’s 3-year residual statute of limitations for claims of personal injury not embraced by specific statutes of limitations, N. Y. Civ. Prac. Law §214(5) (McKinney Supp. 1988), was applicable to § 1983 actions, and that Okure’s complaint was therefore timely. The court then certified an interlocutory appeal on this question pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1292(b) (1982 ed., Supp. IV) and Rule 5(a) of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit granted permission for the appeal and affirmed. 816 F. 2d 45 (1987). It stated that Wilson’s description of § 1983 claims as general personal injury actions required a statute of limitations “expansive enough to accommodate the diverse personal injury torts that section 1983 has come to embrace.” Id., at 48. As between the two New York statutes of limitations, the court observed: “By nature, section 214(5) is general; section 215(3) is more specific and exceptional. This dichotomy survives no matter how many similar intentional torts are judicially added to those enumerated in section 215(3).” Ibid. The Court of Appeals favored § 214(5) for another reason: its 3-year period of limitations “more faithfully represents the federal interest in providing an effective remedy for violations of civil rights than does the restrictive one year limit.” Id., at 49. Injuries to personal rights are not “necessarily apparent to the victim at the' time they are inflicted,” the court explained, and “[e]ven where the injury itself is obvious, the constitutional dimensions of the tort may not be.” Id., at 48. The dissent argued that § 1983 actions are best analogized to intentional torts, id., at 51, and that, because §215(3) governs “almost every intentional injury to the person,” id., at 50, it is more appropriate for §1983 claims than §214(5), which it contended had been confined primarily to negligence claims. Ibid. The dissent added that using § 215(3)’s 1-year limitations period is not “inherently inconsistent with the policies underlying the Civil Rights Act.” Id., at 54. We granted certiorari, 485 U. S. 958 (1988), and now affirm. II A In this case, we again confront the consequences of Congress’ failure to provide a specific statute of limitations to govern § 1983 actions. Title 42 U. S. C. § 1988 endorses the borrowing of state-law limitations provisions where doing so is consistent with federal law; § 1988 does not, however, offer any guidance as to which state provision to borrow. To fill this void, for years we urged courts to select the state statute of limitations “most analogous,” Board of Regents, Univ. of New York v. Tomanio, 446 U. S. 478, 488 (1980), and “most appropriate,” Johnson v. Railway Express Agency, Inc., 421 U. S. 454, 462 (1975), to the particular § 1983 action, so long as the chosen limitations period was consistent with federal law and policy. Occidental Life Ins. Co. of California v. EEOC, 432 U. S. 355, 367 (1977); Johnson, supra, at 465. The practice of seeking state-law analogies for particular § 1983 claims bred confusion and inconsistency in the lower courts and generated time-consuming litigation. Some courts found analogies in common-law tort, others in contract law, and still others in statutory law. Often the result had less to do with the general nature of § 1983 relief than with counsel’s artful pleading and ability to persuade the court that the facts and legal theories of a particular § 1983 claim resembled a particular common-law or statutory cause of action. Consequently, plaintiffs and defendants often had no idea whether a federal civil rights claim was barred until a court ruled on their case. Predictability, a primary goal of statutes of limitations, was thereby frustrated. In Wilson, we sought to end this “conflict, confusion and uncertainty.” 471 U. S., at 266. Recognizing the problems inherent in the case-by-case approach, we determined that 42 U. S. C. §1988 requires courts to borrow and apply to all § 1983 claims the one most analogous state statute of limitations. Ibid. See id., at 275 (“[F]ederal interests in uniformity, certainty, and the minimization of unnecessary litigation all support the conclusion that Congress favored this simple approach”); see also id., at 272 (“[A] simple, broad characterization of all § 1983 claims best fits the statute’s remedial purpose”). We Concluded, based upon the legislative history of § 1983 and the wide array of claims now embraced by that provision, that § 1983 “conferfs] a general remedy for injuries to personal rights.” Id., at 278. Because “§ 1983 claims are best characterized as personal injury actions,” we held that a State’s personal injury statute of limitations should be applied to all § 1983 claims. Id., at 280. As the instant case indicates, Wilson has not completely eliminated the confusion over the appropriate limitations period for § 1983 claims. In States where one statute of limitations applies to all personal injury claims, Wilson supplies a clear answer. Courts considering § 1983 claims in States with multiple statutes of limitations for personal injury actions, however, have differed over how to determine which statute applies. Several Courts of Appeals have held that the appropriate period is that which the State assigns to certain enumerated intentional torts. These courts have reasoned that intentional torts are most closely analogous to the claims Congress envisioned being brought under the Civil Rights Act, and to the paradigmatic claims brought today under § 1983. Other Courts of Appeals, by contrast, have endorsed the use of the state residuary statute of limitations for § 1983 actions. These courts have observed that § 1983 embraces a broad array of actions for injury to personal rights, and that the intentional tort is therefore too narrow an analogy to a § 1983 claim. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit followed this second approach when it concluded that New York’s statute of limitations for certain enumerated intentional torts did not reflect the diversity of § 1983 claims. B In choosing between the two alternatives endorsed by the Courts of Appeals — the intentional torts approach and the general or residual personal injury approach — we are mindful that ours is essentially a practical inquiry. Wilson, 471 U. S., at 272. Our decision in Wilson that one “simple broad characterization” of all § 1983 actions was appropriate under § 1988 was, after all, grounded in the realization that the potential applicability of different state statutes of limitations had bred chaos and uncertainty. Id., at 275; see also Burnett v. Grattan, 468 U. S. 42, 50 (1984) (courts selecting a state statute of limitations for § 1983 actions must “tak[e] into account practicalities that are involved in litigating federal civil rights claims”); accord, Felder v. Casey, 487 U. S. 131 (1988). Thus, our task today is to provide courts with a rule for determining the appropriate personal injury limitations statute that can be applied with ease and predictability in all 50 States. A rule endorsing the choice of the state statute of limitations for intentional torts would be manifestly inappropriate. Every State has multiple intentional tort limitations provisions, carving up the universe of intentional torts into different configurations. In New York, for example, §215(3), the intentional tort statute endorsed by petitioners, covers eight enumerated torts. See supra, at 237. But different provisions cover other specified intentional torts. Malpractice actions are governed by one provision; certain veterans’ claims, by another. In Michigan, separate statutes of limitations govern “assault, battery, or false imprisonment,” Mich. Comp. Laws §600.5805(2) (1979), “malicious prosecution,” §600.5805(3), “libel or slander,” §600.5805(7), and “all other actions to recover damages for the death of a person or for injury to a person §600.5805(8). In Ohio, separate provisions govern “bodily injury,” Ohio Rev. Code Ann. §2305.10 (Supp. 1987), “libel, slander, malicious prosecution, or false imprisonment,” §2305.11, and “assault or battery,” §2305.111. Similarly, in Pennsylvania, separate provisions govern “libel, slander or invasion of privacy,” 42 Pa. Cons. Stat. § 5523(1) (1988), “assault, battery, false imprisonment, false arrest, malicious prosecution or malicious abuse of process,” §5524(1), “injuries to the person or for the death of an individual caused by the wrongful act or neglect or unlawful violence or negligence of another,” § 5524(2), and “[a]ny other action or proceeding to recover damages for injury to person or property which is founded on negligent, intentional, or otherwise tortious conduct.” §5524(7). Were we to call upon courts to apply the state statute of limitations governing intentional torts, we would succeed only in transferring the present confusion over the choice among multiple personal injury provisions to a choice among multiple intentional tort provisions. In marked contrast to the multiplicity of state intentional tort statutes of limitations, every State has one general or residual statute of limitations governing personal injury actions. Some States have a general provision which applies to all personal injury actions with certain specific exceptions. Others have a residual provision which applies to all actions not specifically provided for, including personal injury actions. Whichever form they take, these provisions are easily identifiable by language or application. Indeed, the very idea of a general or residual statute suggests that each State would have no more than one. Potential § 1983 plaintiffs and defendants therefore can readily ascertain, with little risk of confusion or unpredictability, the applicable limitations period in advance of filing a § 1983 action. Petitioners’ argument that courts should borrow the intentional tort limitations periods because intentional torts are most analogous to § 1983 claims fails to recognize the enormous practical disadvantages of such a selection. Moreover, this analogy is too imprecise to justify such a result. In Wilson, we expressly rejected the practice of drawing narrow analogies between § 1983 claims and state causes of action. 471 U. S., at 272. We explained that the Civil Rights Acts provided “[a] unique remedy mak[ing] it appropriate to accord the statute ‘a sweep as broad as its language.’ Because the § 1983 remedy is one that can ‘override certain kinds of state laws,’ Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S. 167, 173 (1961), and is, in all events, ‘supplementary to any remedy any State might have,’ McNeese v. Board of Education, 373 U. S. 668, 672 (1963), it can have no precise counterpart in state law. Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S., at 196, n. 5 (Harlan, J., concurring). Therefore, it is ‘the purest coincidence,’ ibid., when state statutes or the common law provide for equivalent remedies; any analogies to those causes of action are bound to be imperfect.” Ibid, (footnotes omitted). The intentional tort analogy is particularly inapposite in light of the wide spectrum of claims which § 1983 has come to span. In Wilson, we noted that claims brought under § 1983 include “discrimination in public employment on the basis of race or the exercise of First Amendment rights, discharge or demotion without procedural due process, mistreatment of schoolchildren, deliberate indifference to the medical needs of prison inmates, the seizure of chattels without advance notice or sufficient opportunity to be heard.” Id., at 273 (footnotes omitted). See also id., at 273, n. 31; Blackmun, Section 1983 and Federal Protection of Individual Rights — Will the Statute Remain Alive or Fade Away?, 60 N. Y. U. L. Rev. 1, 19-20 (1985). Many of these claims bear little if any resemblance to the common-law intentional tort. See Felder v. Casey, 487 U. S., at 146, n. 3. Even where intent is an element of a constitutional claim or defense, the necessary intent is often different from the intent requirement of a related common-law tort. E. g., Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, 485 U. S. 46, 53 (1988) (distinguishing constitutional “malice” in the First Amendment context from common-law “malice”). Given that so many claims brought under § 1983 have no precise state-law analog, applying the statute of limitations for the limited category of intentional torts would be inconsistent with § 1983’s broad scope. We accordingly hold that where state law provides multiple statutes of limitations for personal injury actions, courts considering § 1983 claims should borrow the general or residual statute for personal injury actions. III The Court of Appeals therefore correctly applied New York’s 3-year statute of limitations governing general personal injury actions to respondent Okure’s claim. Our decision in Wilson promised an end to the confusion over what statute of limitations to apply to § 1983 actions; with today’s decision, we hope to fulfill Wilson’s promise. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is Affirmed. New York Civ. Prac. Law §214 provides in relevant part: “The following actions must be commenced within three years: “5. an action to recover damages for a personal injury except as provided in sections 214-b, 214-c and 215....” In relevant part, § 1988 provides: “The jurisdiction in civil and criminal matters conferred on the district courts by the provisions of this Title, and of Title ‘CIVIL RIGHTS,’ and of Title ‘CRIMES,’ for the protection of all persons in the United States in their civil rights, and for their vindication, shall be exercised and enforced in conformity with the laws of the United States, so far as such laws are suitable to carry the same into effect; but in all cases where they are not adapted to the object, or are deficient in the provisions necessary to furnish suitable remedies and punish offenses against law, the common law, as modified and changed by the constitution and statutes of the State wherein the court having jurisdiction of such civil or criminal cause is held, so far as the same is not inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States, shall be extended to and govern the said courts in the trial and disposition of the cause....” 42 U. S. C. § 1988. See Shapiro, Choosing the Appropriate State Statute of Limitations for Section 1983 Claims After Wilson v. Garcia: A Theory Applied to Maryland Law, 16 Balt. L. Rev. 242, 251-256 (1987) (describing different approaches to determining the appropriate statute of limitations for § 1983 actions); Note, Retroactive Application of Wilson v. Garcia: Continued Confusion to a Troubled Topic, 44 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 135, 135, n. 4 (1987) (same); Comment, Statutes of Limitations in Federal Civil Rights Litigation, 1976 Ariz. S. L. J. 97, 116-126 (same). See Preuit & Mauldin v. Jones, 474 U. S. 1105, 1108 (1986) (White, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari) (“[CJonflicting principles... have determined the statutes of limitations chosen for § 1983 actions in the Tenth Circuit on the one hand and the Fifth and Eleventh Circuits on the other”); Wilson, 471 U. S., at 286-287 (O’Connor, J., dissenting) (anticipating dilemma facing courts in States with more than one statute of limitations for personal injury claims). See, e. g., Mulligan v. Hazard, 777 F. 2d 340 (CA6 1985) (selecting Ohio statute of limitations for libel, slander, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, false imprisonment, and malpractice, and rejecting statute of limitations for bodily injury or for injury to the rights of the plaintiff not enumerated elsewhere), cert. denied, 476 U. S. 1174 (1986); Gates v. Spinks, 771 F. 2d 916 (CA5 1985) (selecting Mississippi statute of limitations for most intentional torts, and rejecting statute for causes of action not otherwise provided for), cert. denied, 475 U. S. 1065 (1986); Jones v. Preuit & Mauldin, 763 F. 2d 1250, 1254 (CA11 1985) (selecting Alabama statute of limitations for actions for “ ‘any trespass to person or liberty, such as false imprisonment or assault and battery,’ ” and rejecting statute for “ ‘any injury to the person or rights of another not arising from contract and not specifically enumerated in this section’ ”), cert. denied, 474 U. S. 1105 (1986). The Fifth and Sixth Circuits, however, on several occasions have departed from this approach. See, e. g., Kline v. North Texas State Univ., 782 F. 2d 1229 (CA5 1986) (selecting Texas statute of limitations for injury done to the person of another); Carroll v. Wilkerson, 782 F. 2d 44, 45 (CA6) (per curiam) (selecting Michigan general personal injury statute of limitations), cert, denied sub nom. County of Wayne v. Wilkerson, 479 U. S. 923 (1986). See, e.g., Meade v. Grubbs, 841 F. 2d 1512, 1523-1524, and 1524, n. 11 (CA10 1988) (selecting Oklahoma statute of limitations for “‘injury to the rights of another, not arising on contract and not hereinafter enumerated,’ ” and rejecting statute for assault or battery); Banks v. Chesapeake & Potomac Tel. Co., 256 U. S. App. D. C. 22, 33, 802 F. 2d 1416, 1427 (1986) (stating in dicta that it “might well” apply District of Columbia statute of limitations for claims not otherwise provided for and rejecting statute for libel, slander, assault, battery, mayhem, wounding, malicious prosecution, false arrest, or false imprisonment); Small v. Inhabitants of Belfast, 796 F. 2d 544, 546-547 (CA1 1986) (selecting Maine’s statute of limitations for “ ‘[a]ll civil actions... except as otherwise specifically provided,”’ and rejecting statute for assault and battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel, and medical malpractice); McKay v. Hammock, 730 F. 2d 1367, 1370 (CA10 1984) (en banc) (selecting Colorado statute of limitations for “ ‘[a]ll other actions of every kind for which no other period of limitation is provided by law,’ ” and rejecting statutes for trespass and trespass on the case). See N. Y. Civ. Prac. Law § 214(6) (McKinney Supp. 1988) (3-year statute of limitations covers all malpractice claims not provided for in § 214-a); § 214-a (272-year statute of limitations for all medical, dental, and podiatric malpractice torts); § 214-b (2-year statute of limitations for Vietnam veterans’ claims of exposure to phenoxy herbicides, commonly known as Agent Orange). Thus, it is irrelevant that courts have construed § 215(3) to provide the appropriate limitations period for a few intentional torts that are not enumerated in that statute, see, e. g., Koster v. Chase Manhattan Bank, 609 F. Supp. 1191, 1198 (SDNY 1985) (construing § 215(3) to cover intentional infliction of emotional distress); Rio v. Presbyterian Hospital in City of New York, 561 F. Supp. 325, 328 (SDNY 1983) (construing §215(3) to cover intentional interference with contractual relations); Hansen v. Petrone, 124 App. Div. 2d 782, 508 N. Y. S. 2d 500 (1986) (mem.) (construing § 215(3) to cover abuse of process and intentional infliction of emotional distress); accord, 2 Carmody-Wait 2d § 13.74 (1965); 35 N. Y. Jur., Limitations and Laches § 35, pp. 527-528 (1964). The following nonexhaustive list illustrates the frequency with which States have enacted multiple statutes of limitations governing intentional torts. See, e. g., Ala. Code §§ 6-2-34 (1) (1977) (six years “for any trespass to person or liberty, such as false imprisonment or assault and battery”); Ala. Code §§ 6-2-38 (h), (i), (k), (1) (Supp. 1987) (two years for malicious prosecution, libel or slander, seduction, or any injury to the person, or rights of another not arising from contract and not specifically enumerated); Alaska Stat. Ann. § 09.10.070 (1983) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, seduction, false imprisonment); § 09.10.055 (six years for injuries resulting from construction-related torts); Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 12-541 (1982) (one year for malicious prosecution, false imprisonment, or injuries done to character or reputation of another by libel or slander, seduction); Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 12-542(2) (Supp. 1988) (two years for “injuries done to the person of another”); Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 12-551 (1982) (two years for injuries resulting from product liability); Ark. Code Ann. § 16-56-104 (1987) (one year for special actions on the case, criminal conversation, alienation of affection, assault and battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel with special damages); § 16-56-105 (three years for libel); § 16-56-106 (18 months for medical malpractice); § 16-56-112(b)(2) (five years for injuries resulting from construction-related torts); Cal. Civ. Proc. Code Ann. § 340 (West Supp. 1988) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, seduction, injury, or death from wrongful act or neglect); § 340.1 (three years for actions based on incestuous relationship with a minor); Cal. Civ. Proc. Code Ann. § 340.2 (West 1982) (one year for asbestos-related torts); §340.5 (three years for medical malpractice); §340.6 (one year for attorney malpractice); Cal. Civ. Code Ann. §29 (West 1982) (six years for injuries to “[a] child conceived, but not yet bom”); Colo. Rev. Stat. § 13-80-102(a) (1987) (two years for “[t]ort actions, including but not limited to actions for negligence, trespass, malicious abuse of process, malicious prosecution, outrageous conduct, interference with relationships”); Colo. Rev. Stat. § 13-80-102.5 (Supp. 1988) (two years for medical malpractice); Colo. Rev. Stat. § 13-80-103(a) (1987) (one year for assault, battery, false imprisonment, false arrest, libel, slander); D. C. Code § 12-301(4) (1981) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, mayhem, wounding, malicious prosecution, false arrest); § 12-301(8) (three years for actions not otherwise prescribed); Fla. Stat. § 95.11(3)(o) (1987) (four years for assault, battery, false arrest, malicious prosecution, malicious interference, false imprisonment, or any other intentional tort, except as provided elsewhere); § 95.11(3)(p) (four years for actions not specifically provided for); §95.U(4)(b) (two years for medical and professional malpractice and wrongful death); Ga. Code Ann. § 9-3-33 (1982) (one year for injury to reputation; two years for injury to the person; four years for injury to the person involving a loss of consortium); Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-4 (1985) (two years for libel or slander); Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-7.3 (Supp. 1987) (two to six years for medical torts depending on time of discovery of the injury); 111. Rev. Stat., eh. 110,113-201 (1984) (one year for libel, slander, or publication of matter violating right of privacy); *113-202 (two years for false imprisonment, malicious prosecution, abduction, or seduction, criminal conversation); Kan. Stat. Ann. § 60-513(a)(4) (Supp. 1987) (two years for “injury to the rights of another, not arising on contract, and not herein enumerated”); Kan. Stat. Ann. § 60-514 (1983) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, or false imprisonment); Ky. Rev. Stat. Ann. §413.120(6) (Baldwin 1988) (five years for “injury to the rights of the plaintiff, not arising on contract and not otherwise enumerated”); §413.135 (five years for injury resulting from construction of improvements to real estate); §§ 413.140(l)(d)-(e) (one year for libel, slander, and malpractice); Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit. 14, §752 (1980) (six years for civil actions except as otherwise specifically provided); § 752(A) (four years for malpractice by design professionals); § 752(B) (two years for injuries suffered during “participation in skiing or hang-gliding or the use of a tramway associated with skiing or hang-gliding”); Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit. 14, §752-C (Supp. 1988) (six years for actions based on sexual act with a minor); § 753 (two years for assault and battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel); Md. Cts. & Jud. Proc. Code Ann. § 5-101 (1984) (three years for all civil actions); § 5-105 (one year for assault, battery, libel, slander); § 5-108 (20 years for injury to person occurring after improvement to realty); Md. Cts. & Jud. Proc. Code Ann. § 5-109 (Supp. 1988) (five years for medical torts); Mass. Gen. Laws § 260:2A (1986) (three years for tort actions except as otherwise provided for); §260:4 (three years for assault, battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel, and malpractice); Mo. Rev. Stat. § 516.120(1) (1986) (five years for all liabilities “except where a different time is herein limited”); §516.140 (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, criminal conversation, and malicious prosecution); Neb. Rev. Stat. § 25-207(3) (1985) (four years for “injury to the rights of the plaintiff, not arising on contract, and not hereinafter enumerated”); § 25-208 (one year for libel, slander, assault and battery, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution); Nev. Rev. Stat. § 11.190(4)(c) (1987) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, and seduction); § ll.,190(4)(e) (two years for injuries to or death of a person caused by the wrongful act or neglect of another); N. J. Stat. Ann. §2A:14-1 (West 1987) (six years for any tortious injury to the rights of another not stated elsewhere); § 2A:14-2 (two years for injury to the person caused by the wrongful act, neglect, or default of any person); § 2A:14-3 (one year for libel or slander); N. C. Gen. Stat. § 1-52(5) (1988) (three years for “any other injury to the person or rights of another, not arising on contract and not hereafter enumerated”); § 1-54 (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); N. D. Cent. Code § 28-01-16(5) (Supp. 1987) (six years for injury to the person or rights of another not arising under contract, when not otherwise expressly provided); N. D. Cent. Code § 28-01-18(1) (1974) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); N. D. Cent. Code § 28-01-18(4) (Supp. 1987) (two years for injuries done to the person of another, when death ensues); Okla. Stat., Tit. 12, §95 (Third) (1981) (two years “for injury to the rights of another, not arising on contract, and not hereinafter enumerated”); § 95 (Fourth) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, or false imprisonment); R. I. Gen. Laws § 9-l-14(a) (1985) (one year for slander); § 9-l-14(b) (three years for injuries to the person); R. I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-14.1 (Supp. 1988) (three years for malpractice); R. I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-14.2 (1985) (three years for Agent Orange-related torts); S. C. Code § 15-3-530(5) (Supp. 1987) (six years for criminal conversation or “for any other injury to the person or rights of another, not arising on contract, not hereinafter enumerated”); S. C. Code § 15-3-550(1) (1977) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); S. D. Codified Laws § 15-2-13(5) (1984) (six years for “criminal conversation or for any other injury to the rights of another not arising on contract and not otherwise specifically enumerated”); § 15-2-14.1 (two years for medical malpractice); § 15-2-15(1) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. § 16.002 (1980) (one year for malicious prosecution, libel, slander, or breach of promise of marriage); § 16.003 (two years for “personal injury”); Utah Code Ann. § 78-12-25(3) (Supp. 1988) (four years for “action for relief not otherwise provided for by law”); Utah Code Ann. § 78-12-28(2) (1987) (two years for death caused by wrongful act or neglect); Utah Code Ann. § 78-12-29(4) (Supp. 1988) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, or seduction); Va. Code § 8.01-243A (Supp. 1988) (two years for personal injuries unless otherwise provided for); Va. Code §8.01-244 (198 Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice O’Connor delivered the opinion of the Court. The Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment provides: “[N]or shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.” Most of our cases interpreting the Clause fall within two distinct classes. Where the government authorizes a physical occupation of property (or actually takes title), the Takings Clause generally requires compensation. See, e. g., Loretto v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp., 458 U. S. 419, 426 (1982). But where the government merely regulates the use of property, compensation is required only if considerations such as the purpose of the regulation or the extent to which it deprives the owner of the economic use of the property suggest that the regulation has unfairly singled out the property owner to bear a burden that should be borne by the public as a whole. See, e. g., Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City, 438 U. S. 104, 123-125 (1978). The first category of cases requires courts to apply a clear rule; the second necessarily entails complex factual assessments of the purposes and economic effects of government actions. Petitioners own mobile home parks in Escondido, California. They contend that a local rent control ordinance, when viewed against the backdrop of California’s Mobilehome Residency Law, amounts to a physical occupation of their property, entitling them to compensation under the first category of cases discussed above. I The term “mobile home” is somewhat misleading. Mobile homes are largely immobile as a practical matter, because the cost of moving one is often a significant fraction of the value of the mobile home itself. They are generally placed permanently in parks; once in place, only about 1 in every 100 mobile homes is ever moved. Hirsch & Hirsch, Legal-Economic Analysis of Rent Controls in a Mobile Home Context: Placement Values and Vacancy Decontrol, 35 UCLA L. Rev. 399, 405 (1988). A mobile home owner typically rents a plot of land, called a “pad,” from the owner of a mobile home park. The park owner provides private roads within the park, common facilities such as washing machines or a swimming pool, and often utilities. The mobile home owner often invests in site-specific improvements such as a driveway, steps, walkways, porches, or landscaping. When the mobile home owner wishes to move, the mobile home is usually sold in place, and the purchaser continues to rent the pad on which the mobile home is located. In 1978, California enacted its Mobilehome Residency Law, Cal. Civ. Code Ann. § 798 (West 1982 and Supp. 1991). The legislature found “that, because of the high cost of moving mobilehomes, the potential for damage resulting therefrom, the requirements relating to the installation of mobilehomes, and the cost of landscaping or lot preparation, it is necessary that the owners of mobilehomes occupied within mobilehome parks be provided with the unique protection from actual or constructive eviction afforded by the provisions of this chapter.” § 798.55(a). The Mobilehome Residency Law limits the bases upon which a park owner may terminate a mobile home owner’s tenancy. These include the nonpayment of rent, the mobile home owner’s violation of law or park rules, and the park owner’s desire to change the use of his land. §798.56. While a rental agreement is in effect, however, the park owner generally may not require the removal of a mobile home when it is sold. § 798.73. The park owner may neither charge a transfer fee for the sale, § 798.72, nor disapprove of the purchaser, provided that the purchaser has the ability to pay the rent, § 798.74. The Mobilehome Residency Law contains a number of other detailed provisions, but none limit the rent the park owner may charge. In the wake of the Mobilehome Residency Law, various communities in California adopted mobile home rent control ordinances. See Hirsch & Hirsch, supra, at 408-411. The voters of Escondido did the same in 1988 by approving Proposition K, the rent control ordinance challenged here. The ordinance sets rents back to their 1986 levels and prohibits rent increases without the approval of the city council. Park owners may apply to the council for rent increases at any time. The council must approve any increases it determines to be “just, fair and reasonable,” after considering the following nonexclusive list of factors: (1) changes in the Consumer Price Index; (2) the rent charged for comparable mobile home pads in Escondido; (3) the length of time since the last rent increase; (4) the cost of any capital improvements related to the pad or pads at issue; (5) changes in property taxes; (6) changes in any rent paid by the park owner for the land; (7) changes in utility charges; (8) changes in operating and maintenance expenses; (9) the need for repairs other than for ordinary wear and tear; (10) the amount and quality of services provided to the affected tenant; and (11) any lawful existing lease. Ordinance § 4(g), App. 11-12. Petitioners John and Irene Yee own the Friendly Hills and Sunset Terrace Mobile Home Parks, both of which are located in the city of Escondido. A few months after the adoption of Escondido’s rent control ordinance, they filed suit in San Diego County Superior Court. According to the complaint, “[t]he rent control law has had the effect of depriving the plaintiffs of all use and occupancy of [their] real property and granting to the tenants of mobilehomes presently in The Park, as well as the successors in interest of such tenants, the right to physically permanently occupy and use the real property of Plaintiff.” Id., at 3, ¶ 6. The Yees requested damages of $6 million, a declaration that the rent control ordinance is unconstitutional, and an injunction barring the ordinance’s enforcement. Id., at 5-6. In their opposition to the city’s demurrer, the Yees relied almost entirely on Hall v. Santa Barbara, 833 F. 2d 1270 (CA9 1987), cert. denied, 485 U. S. 940 (1988), which had held that a similar mobile home rent control ordinance effected a physical taking under Loretto v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp., 458 U. S. 419 (1982). The Yees candidly admitted that “in fact, the Hall decision was used [as] a guide in drafting the present Complaint.” 2 Tr. 318, Points & Authorities in Opposition to Demurrer 4. The Superior Court nevertheless sustained the city’s demurrer and dismissed the Yees’ complaint. App. to Pet. for Cert. C-42. The Yees were not alone. Eleven other park owners filed similar suits against the city shortly afterwards, and all were dismissed. By stipulation, all 12 cases were consolidated for appeal; the parties agreed that all would be submitted for decision by the California Court of Appeal on the briefs and oral argument in the Yee case. The Court of Appeal affirmed, in an opinion primarily devoted to expressing the court’s disagreement with the reasoning of Hall. The court concluded: “Loretto in no way suggests that the Escondido ordinance authorizes a permanent physical occupation of the landlord’s property and therefore constitutes a per se taking.” 224 Cal. App. 3d 1349, 1358, 274 Cal. Rptr. 551, 557 (1990). The California Supreme Court denied review. App. to Pet. for Cert. B-41. Eight of the twelve park owners, including the Yees, joined in a petition for certiorari. We granted certiorari, 502 U. S. 905 (1991), to resolve the conflict between the decision below and those of two of the Federal Courts of Appeals, in Hall, supra, and Pinewood Estates of Michigan v. Barnegat Township Leveling Board, 898 F. 2d 347 (CA3 1990). II Petitioners do not claim that the ordinary rent control statutes regulating housing throughout the country violate the Takings Clause. Brief for Petitioners 7, 10. Cf. Pennell v. San Jose, 485 U. S. 1, 12, n. 6 (1988); Loretto, supra, at 440. Instead, their argument is predicated on the unusual economic relationship between park owners and mobile home owners. Park owners may no longer set rents or decide who their tenants will be. As a result, according to petitioners, any reduction in the rent for a mobile home pad causes a corresponding increase in the value of a mobile home, because the mobile home owner now owns, in addition to a mobile home, the right to occupy a pad at a rent below the value that would be set by the free market. Cf. Hirsch & Hirsch, 35 UCLA L. Rev., at 425. Because under the California Mo-bilehome Residency Law the park owner cannot evict a mobile home owner or easily convert the property to other uses, the argument goes, the mobile home owner is effectively a perpetual tenant of the park, and the increase in the mobile home’s value thus represents the right to occupy a pad at below-market rent indefinitely. And because the Mobile-home Residency Law permits the mobile home owner to sell the mobile home in place, the mobile home owner can receive a premium from the purchaser corresponding to this increase in value. The amount of this premium is not limited by the Mobilehome Residency Law or the Escondido ordinance. As a result, petitioners conclude, the rent control ordinance has transferred a discrete interest in land — the right to occupy the land indefinitely at a submarket rent — from the park owner to the mobile home owner. Petitioners contend that what has been transferred from park owner to mobile home owner is no less than a right of physical occupation of the park owner’s land. This argument, while perhaps within the scope of our regulatory taking cases, cannot be squared easily with our cases on physical takings. The government effects a physical taking only where it requires the landowner to submit to the physical occupation of his land. “This element of required acquiescence is at the heart of the concept of occupation.” FCC v. Florida Power Corp., 480 U. S. 245, 252 (1987). Thus whether the government floods a landowner’s property, Pumpelly v. Green Bay Co., 13 Wall. 166 (1872), or does no more than require the landowner to suffer the installation of a cable, Loretto, supra, the Takings Clause requires compensation if the government authorizes a compelled physical invasion of property. But the Escondido rent control ordinance, even when considered in conjunction with the California Mobilehome Residency Law, authorizes no such thing. Petitioners voluntarily rented their land to mobile home owners. At least on the face of the regulatory scheme, neither the city nor the State compels petitioners, once they have rented their property to tenants, to continue doing so. To the contrary, the Mobilehome Residency Law provides that a park owner who wishes to change the use of his land may evict his tenants, albeit with 6 or 12 months notice. Cal. Civ. Code Ann. § 798.56(g). Put bluntly, no government has required any physical invasion of petitioners’ property. Petitioners’ tenants were invited by petitioners, not forced upon them by the government. See Florida Power, supra, at 252-253. While the “right to exclude” is doubtless, as petitioners assert, “one of the most essential sticks in the bundle of rights that are commonly characterized as property,” Kaiser Aetna v. United States, 444 U. S. 164, 176 (1979), we do not find that right to have been taken from petitioners on the mere face of the Escondido ordinance. Petitioners suggest that the statutory procedure for changing the use of a mobile home park is in practice “a kind of gauntlet,” in that they are not in fact free to change the use of their land. Reply Brief for Petitioners 10, n. 16. Because petitioners do not claim to have run that gauntlet, however, this case provides no occasion to consider how the procedure has been applied to petitioners’ property, and we accordingly confine ourselves to the face of the statute. See Keystone Bituminous Coal Assn. v. DeBenedictis, 480 U. S. 470, 493-495 (1987). A different case would be presented were the statute, on its face or as applied, to compel a landowner over objection to rent his property or to refrain in perpetuity from terminating a tenancy. See Florida Power, supra, at 251-252, n. 6; see also Nollan v. California Coastal Comm’n, 483 U. S. 825, 831-832 (1987); Fresh Pond Shopping Center, Inc. v. Callahan, 464 U. S. 875, 877 (1983) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting). On their face, the state and local laws at issue here merely regulate petitioners’ use of their land by regulating the relationship between landlord and tenant. “This Court has consistently affirmed that States have broad power to regulate housing conditions in general and the landlord-tenant relationship in particular without paying compensation for all economic injuries that such regulation entails.” Loretto, 458 U. S., at 440. See also Florida Power, supra, at 252 (“statutes regulating the economic relations of landlords and tenants are not per se takings”). When a landowner decides to rent his land to tenants, the government may place ceilings on the rents the landowner can charge, see, e. g., Pennell, supra, at 12, n. 6, or require the landowner to accept tenants he does not like, see, e. g., Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States, 379 U. S. 241, 261 (1964), without automatically having to pay compensation. See also PruneYard Shopping Center v. Robins, 447 U. S. 74, 82-84 (1980). Such forms of regulation are analyzed by engaging in the “essentially ad hoc, factual inquiries” necessary to determine whether a regulatory taking has occurred. Kaiser Aetna, supra, at 175. In the words of Justice Holmes, “while property may be regulated to a certain extent, if regulation goes too far it will be recognized as a taking.” Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U. S. 393, 415 (1922). Petitioners emphasize that the ordinance transfers wealth from park owners to incumbent mobile home owners. Other forms of land use regulation, however, can also be said to transfer wealth from the one who is regulated to another. Ordinary rent control often transfers wealth from landlords to tenants by reducing the landlords’ income and the tenants’ monthly payments, although it does not cause a one-time transfer of value as occurs with mobile homes. Traditional zoning regulations can transfer wealth from those whose activities are prohibited to their neighbors; when a property owner is barred from mining coal on his land, for example, the value of his property may decline but the value of his neighbor’s property may rise. The mobile home owner’s ability to sell the mobile home at a premium may make this wealth transfer more visible than in the ordinary case, see Epstein, Rent Control and the Theory of Efficient Regulation, 54 Brooklyn L. Rev. 741, 758-759 (1988), but the existence of the transfer in itself does not convert regulation into physical invasion. Petitioners also rely heavily on their allegation that the ordinance benefits incumbent mobile home owners without benefiting future mobile home owners, who will be forced to purchase mobile homes at premiums. Mobile homes, like motor vehicles, ordinarily decline in value with age. But the effect of the rent control ordinance, coupled with the restrictions on the park owner’s freedom to reject new tenants, is to increase significantly the value of the mobile home. This increased value normally benefits only the tenant in possession at the time the rent control is imposed. See Hirsch & Hirsch, 35 UCLA L. Rev., at 430-431. Petitioners are correct in citing the existence of this premium as a difference between the alleged effect of the Escondido ordinance and that of an ordinary apartment rent control statute. Most apartment tenants do not sell anything to their successors (and are often prohibited from charging “key money”), so a typical rent control statute will transfer wealth from the landlord to the incumbent tenant and all future tenants. By contrast, petitioners contend that the Escondido ordinance transfers wealth only to the incumbent mobile home owner. This effect might have some bearing on whether the ordinance causes a regulatory taking, as it may shed some light on whether there is a sufficient nexus between the effect of the ordinance and the objectives it is supposed to advance. See Nollan v. California Coastal Comm’n, supra, at 834-835. But it has nothing to do with whether the ordinance causes a physical taking. Whether the ordinance benefits only current mobile home owners or all mobile home owners, it does not require petitioners to submit to the physical occupation of their land. The same may be said of petitioners’ contention that the ordinance amounts to compelled physical occupation because it deprives petitioners of the ability to choose their incoming tenants. Again, this effect may be relevant to a regulatory taking argument, as it may be one factor a reviewing court would wish to consider in determining whether the ordinance unjustly imposes a burden on petitioners that should “be compensated by the government, rather than remain[ing] disproportionately concentrated on a few persons.” Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City, 438 U. S., at 124. But it does not convert regulation into the unwanted physical occupation of land. Because they voluntarily open their property to occupation by others, petitioners cannot assert a per se right to compensation based on their inability to exclude particular individuals. See Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States, 379 U. S., at 261; see also id., at 269 (“[AJppellant has no ‘right’ to select its guests as it sees fit, free from governmental regulation”); PruneYard Shopping Center v. Robins, 447 U. S., at 82-84. Petitioners’ final line of argument rests on a footnote in Loretto, in which we rejected the contention that “the landlord could avoid the requirements of [the statute forcing her to permit cable to be permanently placed on her property] by ceasing to rent the building to tenants.” We found this possibility insufficient to defeat a physical taking claim, because “a landlord’s ability to rent his property may not be conditioned on his forfeiting the right to compensation for a physical occupation.” Loretto, 458 U. S., at 439, n. 17. Petitioners argue that if they have to leave the mobile home park business in order to avoid the strictures of the Escondido ordinance, their ability to rent their property has in fact been conditioned on such a forfeiture. This argument fails at its base, however, because there has simply been no compelled physical occupation giving rise to a right to compensation that petitioners could have forfeited. Had the city required such an occupation, of course, petitioners would have a right to compensation, and the city might then lack the power to condition petitioners’ ability to run mobile home parks on their waiver of this right. Cf. Nollan v. California Coastal Comm’n, 483 U. S., at 837. But because the ordinance does not effect a physical taking in the first place, this footnote in Loretto does not help petitioners. With respect to physical takings, then, this case is not far removed from FCC v. Florida Power Corp., 480 U. S. 245 (1987), in which the respondent had voluntarily leased space on its utility poles to a cable television company for the installation of cables. The Federal Government, exercising its statutory authority to regulate pole attachment agreements, substantially reduced the annual rent. We rejected the respondent’s claim that “it is a taking under Loretto for a tenant invited to lease at a rent of $7.15 to remain at the regulated rent of $1.79.” Id., at 252. We explained that “it is the invitation, not the rent, that makes the difference. The line which separates [this case] from Loretto is the unambiguous distinction between a . .. lessee and an interloper with a government license.” Id., at 252-253. The distinction is equally unambiguous here. The Escondido rent control ordinance, even considered against the backdrop of California’s Mobilehome Residency Law, does not authorize an unwanted physical occupation of petitioners’ property. It is a regulation of petitioners’ use of their property, and thus does not amount to a per se taking. Ill In this Court, petitioners attempt to challenge the ordinance on two additional grounds: They argue that it constitutes a denial of substantive due process and a regulatory taking. Neither of these claims is properly before us. The first was not raised or addressed below, and the second is not fairly included in the question on which we granted certiorari. A The Yees did not include a due process claim in their complaint. Nor did petitioners raise a due process claim in the Court of Appeal. It was not until their petition for review in the California Supreme Court that petitioners finally raised a substantive due process claim. But the California Supreme Court denied discretionary review. Such a denial, as in this Court, expresses no view as to the merits. See People v. Triggs, 8 Cal. 3d 884, 890-891, 506 P. 2d 232, 236 (1973). In short, petitioners did not raise a substantive due process claim in the state courts, and no state court has addressed such a claim. In reviewing the judgments of state courts under the jurisdictional grant of 28 U. S. C. § 1257, the Court has, with very rare exceptions, refused to consider petitioners’ claims that were not raised or addressed below. Illinois v. Gates, 462 U. S. 213, 218-220 (1983). While we have expressed inconsistent views as to whether this rule is jurisdictional or prudential in cases arising from state courts, see ibid., we need not resolve the question here. (In cases arising from federal courts, the rule is prudential only. See, e. g., Carlson v. Green, 446 U. S. 14, 17, n. 2 (1980).) Even if the rule were prudential, we would adhere to it in this case. Because petitioners did not raise their substantive due process claim below, and because the state courts did not address it, we will not consider it here. B As a preliminary matter, we must address respondent’s assertion that a regulatory taking claim is unripe because petitioners have not sought rent increases. While respondent is correct that a claim that the ordinance effects a regulatory taking as applied to petitioners’ property would be unripe for this reason, see Williamson County Regional Planning Comm’n v. Hamilton Bank of Johnson City, 473 U. S. 172, 186-197 (1985), petitioners mount a facial challenge to the ordinance. They allege in this Court that the ordinance does not “‘substantially advance’” a “‘legitimate state interest’” no matter how it is applied. See Nollan v. California Coastal Comm’n, supra, at 834; Agins v. Tiburon, 447 U. S. 255, 260 (1980). As this allegation does not depend on the extent to which petitioners are deprived of the economic use of their particular pieces of property or the extent to which these particular petitioners are compensated, petitioners’ facial challenge is ripe. See Keystone Bituminous Coal Assn. v. DeBenedictis, 480 U. S., at 495; Agins, supra, at 260. We must also reject respondent’s contention that the regulatory taking argument is not properly before us because it was not made below. It is unclear whether petitioners made this argument below: Portions of their complaint and briefing can be read either to argue a regulatory taking or to support their physical taking argument. For the same reason it is equally ambiguous whether the Court of Appeal addressed the issue. Yet petitioners’ regulatory taking argument stands in a posture different from their substantive due process claim. Petitioners .unquestionably raised a taking claim in the state courts. The question whether the rent control ordinance took their property without compensation, in violation of the Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause, is thus properly before us. Once a federal claim is properly presented, a party can make any argument in support of that claim; parties are not limited to the precise arguments they made below. Bankers Life & Casualty Co. v. Crenshaw, 486 U. S. 71, 78, n. 2 (1988); Gates, supra, at 219-220; Dewey v. Des Moines, 173 U. S. 193, 197-198 (1899). Petitioners’ arguments that the ordinance constitutes a taking in two different ways, by physical occupation and by regulation, are not separate claims. They are, rather, separate arguments in support of a single claim — that the ordinance effects an unconstitutional taking. Having raised a taking claim in the state courts, therefore, petitioners could have formulated any argument they liked in support of that claim here. A litigant seeking review in this Court of a claim properly raised in the lower courts thus generally possesses the ability to frame the question to be decided in any way he chooses, without being limited to the manner in which the question was framed below. While we have on occasion rephrased the question presented by a petitioner, see, e. g., Ankenbrandt v. Richards, 502 U. S. 1023 (1992), or requested the parties to address an important question of law not raised in the petition for certiorari, see, e. g., Payne v. Tennessee, 498 U. S. 1080 (1991), by and large it is the petitioner himself who controls the scope of the question presented. The petitioner can generally frame the question as broadly or as narrowly as he sees fit. The framing of the question presented has significant consequences, however, because under this Court’s Rule 14.1(a), “[o]nly the questions set forth in the petition, or fairly included therein, will be considered by the Court.” While “[t]he statement of any question presented will be deemed to comprise every subsidiary question fairly included therein,” ibid., we ordinarily do not consider questions outside those presented in the petition for certiorari. See, e. g., Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U. S. 420, 443, n. 38 (1984). This rule is prudential in nature, but we disregard it “only in the most exceptional cases,” Stone v. Powell, 428 U. S. 465, 481, n. 15 (1976), where reasons of urgency or of economy suggest the need to address the unpresented question in the case under consideration. Rule 14.1(a) serves two important and related purposes. First, it provides the respondent with notice of the grounds upon which the petitioner is seeking certiorari, and enables the respondent to sharpen the arguments as to why certio-rari should not be granted. Were we routinely to consider questions beyond those raised in the petition, the respondent would lack any opportunity in advance of litigation on the merits to argue that such questions are not worthy of review. Where, as is not unusual, the decision below involves issues on which the petitioner does not seek certiorari, the respondent would face the formidable task of opposing certiorari on every issue the Court might conceivably find present in the case. By forcing the petitioner to choose his questions at the outset, Rule 14.1(a) relieves the respondent of the expense of unnecessary litigation on the merits and the burden of opposing certiorari on unpresented questions. Second, Rule 14.1(a) assists the Court in selecting the cases in which certiorari will be granted. Last Term alone we received over 5,000 petitions for certiorari, but we have the capacity to decide only a small fraction of these cases on the merits. To use our resources most efficiently, we must grant certiorari only in those cases that will enable us to resolve particularly important questions. Were we routinely to entertain questions not presented in the petition for certiorari, much of this efficiency would vanish, as parties who feared an inability to prevail on the question presented would be encouraged to fill their limited briefing space and argument time with discussion of issues other than the one on which certiorari was granted. Rule 14.1(a) forces the parties to focus on the questions the Court has viewed as particularly important, thus enabling us to make efficient use of our resources. We granted certiorari on a single question pertaining to the Takings Clause: “Two federal courts of appeal have held that the transfer of a premium value to a departing mobile-home tenant, representing the value of the right to occupy at a reduced rate under local mobilehome rent control ordinances, constitute^] an impermissible taking. Was it error for the state appellate court to disregard the rulings and hold that there was no taking under the fifth and fourteenth amendments?” This was the question presented by petitioners. Pet. for Cert. i. It asks whether the court below erred in disagreeing with the holdings of the Courts of Appeals for the Third and Ninth Circuits in Pinewood Estates of Michigan v. Barnegat Township Leveling Board, 898 F. 2d 347 (CA3 1990), and Hall v. Santa Barbara, 833 F. 2d 1270 (CA9 1987), cert. denied, 485 U. S. 940 (1988). These cases, in turn, held that mobile home ordinances effected physical takings, not regulatory takings. Fairly construed, then, petitioners’ question presented is the equivalent of the question “Did the court below err in finding no physical taking?” Whether or not the ordinance effects a regulatory taking is a question related to the one petitioners presented, and perhaps complementary to the one petitioners presented, but it is not “fairly included therein.” Consideration of whether a regulatory taking occurred would not assist in resolving whether a physical taking occurred as well; neither of the two questions is subsidiary to the other. Both might be subsidiary to a question embracing both — Was there a taking? — but they exist side by side, neither encompassing the other. Cf. American Nat. Bank & Trust Co. of Chicago v. Haroco, Inc., 473 U. S. 606, 608 (1985) (question whether complaint adequately alleges conduct of racketeering enterprise is not fairly included in question whether statute requires that plaintiff suffer damages through defendant’s conduct of such an enterprise). Rule 14.1(a) accordingly creates a heavy presumption against our consideration of petitioners’ claim that the ordinance causes a regulatory taking. Petitioners have not overcome that presumption. While the regulatory taking question is no doubt important, from an institutional perspective it is not as important as the physical taking question. The lower courts have not reached conflicting results, so far as we know, on whether similar mobile home rent control ordinances effect regulatory takings. They have reached conflicting results over whether such ordinances cause physical takings; such a conflict is, of course, a substantial reason for granting certiorari under this Court’s Rule 10. Moreover, the conflict is between two courts whose jurisdiction includes California, the State with the largest population and one with a relatively high percentage of the Nation’s mobile homes. Forum shopping is thus of particular concern. See Azul Pacifico, Inc. v. Los Angeles, 948 F. 2d 575, 579 (CA9 1991) (mobile home park owners may file physical taking suits in either state or federal court). Prudence also dictates awaiting a case in which the issue was fully litigated below, so that we will have the benefit of developed arguments on both sides and lower court opinions squarely addressing the question. See Lytle v. Household Mfg., Inc., 494 U. S. 545, 552, n. 3 (1990) (“Applying our analysis ... to the facts of a particular case without the benefit of a full record or lower court determinations is not a sensible exercise of this Court’s discretion”). In fact, were we to address the issue here, we would apparently be the first court in the Nation to determine whether an ordinance like this one effects a regulatory taking. We will accordingly follow Rule 14.1(a), and consider only the question petitioners raised in seeking certiorari. We leave the regulatory taking issue for the California courts to address in the first instance. I — I C We made this observation in Loretto: “Our holding today is very narrow. We affirm the traditional rule that a permanent physical occupation of property is a taking. In such a case, the property owner- entertains a historically rooted expectation of compensation, and the character of the invasion is qualitatively more intrusive than perhaps any other category of property regulation. We do not, however, question the equally substantial authority upholding a State’s broad power to impose appropriate restrictions upon an owner’s use of his property.” 458 U. S., at 441. We respected this distinction again in Florida Power, where we held that no taking occurs under Loretto when a tenant invited to lease at one rent remains at a lower regulated rent. Florida Power, 480 U. S., at 252-253. We continue to observe the distinction today. Because the Escondido rent control ordinance does not compel a landowner to suffer the physical occupation of his property, it does not effect a per se taking under Loretto. The judgment of the Court of Appeal is accordingly Affirmed. Strictly speaking, the Escondido rent control ordinance only limits rents. Petitioners’ inability to select their incoming tenants is a product of the State’s Mobilehome Residency Law, the constitutionality of which has never been at issue in this case. (The State, moreover, has never been a party.) But we understand petitioners to be making a more subtle argument — that before the adoption of the ordinance they were able to influence a mobile home owner’s selection of a purchaser by threatening to increase the rent for prospective purchasers they disfavored. To the extent the rent control ordinance deprives petitioners of this type of influence, petitioners’ argument is one we must consider. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

D

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. Respondent attempted to enter the United States by car ferry at Port Angeles, Washington. Hidden in the trunk of his rental car were explosives that he intended to detonate at the Los Angeles International Airport. After the ferry docked, respondent was questioned by a customs official, who instructed him to complete a customs declaration form; respondent did so, identifying himself on the form as a Canadian citizen (he is Algerian) named Benni Noris (his name is Ahmed Ressam). Respondent was then directed to a secondary inspection station, where another official performed a search of his car. The official discovered explosives and related items in the car’s spare tire well. Respondent was subsequently convicted of a number of crimes, including the felony of making a false statement to a United States customs official in violation of 18 U. S. C. § 1001 (1994 ed., Supp. V) (Count 5) and carrying an explosive “during the commission of” that felony in violation of § 844(h)(2) (1994 ed.) (Count 9). The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit set aside his conviction on Count 9 because it read the word “during,” as used in § 844(h)(2), to include a requirement that the explosive be carried “in relation to” the underlying felony. 474 F. 3d 597, 601 (2007). Because that construction of the statute conflicted with decisions of other Courts of Appeals, we granted certiorari. 552 U. S. 1074 (2007). I The most natural reading of the relevant statutory text provides a sufficient basis for reversal. That text reads: “Whoever— “(1) uses fire or an explosive to commit any felony which may be prosecuted in a court of the United States, or “(2) carries an explosive during the commission of any felony which may be prosecuted in a court of the United States, “including a felony which provides for an enhanced punishment if committed by the use of a deadly or dangerous weapon or device shall, in addition to the punishment provided for such felony, be sentenced to imprisonment for 10 years.” 18 U. S. C. §844(h). It is undisputed that the items hidden in respondent’s car were “explosives.” It is also undisputed that respondent was “carr[ying]” those explosives when he knowingly made false statements to a customs official, and that those statements violated § 1001 (1994 ed., Supp. V). There is no need to consult dictionary definitions of the word “during” in order to arrive at the conclusion that respondent engaged in the precise conduct described in § 844(h)(2) (1994 ed.). The term “during” denotes a temporal link; that is surely the most natural reading of the word as used in the statute. Because respondent’s carrying of the explosives was contemporaneous with his violation of § 1001, he carried them “during” that violation. II The history of the statute we construe today further supports our conclusion that Congress did not intend to require the Government to establish a relationship between the explosive carried and the underlying felony. Congress originally enacted § 844(h)(2) as part of its “Regulation of Explosives” in Title XI of the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970, 84 Stat. 957. The provision was modeled after a portion of the Gun Control Act of 1968, § 102,82 Stat. 1224, codified, as amended, at 18 U. S. C. § 924(c) (2000 ed. and Supp. V). The earlier statute mandated at least 1 and no more than 10 years’ imprisonment for any person who “carries a firearm unlawfully during the commission of any felony which may be prosecuted in a court of the United States.” 18 U. S. C. § 924(c)(2) (1964 ed., Supp. IV). Except for the word “explosive” in § 844(h)(2), instead of the word “firearm” in § 924(c)(2), the two provisions as originally enacted were identical. In 1984, Congress redrafted the firearm statute; it increased the penalties attached to the provision and, most significantly for our purposes, deleted the word “unlawfully” and inserted the words “and in relation to” immediately after the word “during.” § 1005(a), 98 Stat. 2138. Reviewing a conviction for an offense that was committed before the amendment but not decided on appeal until after its enactment, the Ninth Circuit held that the original version of the firearm statute had implicitly included the “in relation to” requirement that was expressly added while the case was pending on appeal. As then-judge Kennedy explained: “The statute as written when Stewart committed the offense provided in pertinent part that it was a crime to (carr[y] a firearm unlawfully during the commission of any felony____’ 18 U. S. C. § 924(c)(2) (1982). In 1984, Congress revised section 924(c).... The 1984 amendment substituted for the word ‘during’ the phrase ‘during and in relation to.’ 18 U. S. C. A. § 924(c) (West Supp. 1985) (emphasis added). Our study of the legislative history of the amendment... indicates the ‘in relation to’ language was not intended to create an element of the crime that did not previously exist, but rather was intended to make clear a condition already implicit in the statute. The legislative history reveals that because the amendment eliminated the requirement that the firearm be carried unlawfully, 18 U. S. C. A. § 924(c) (West Supp. 1985), the ‘in relation to’ language was added to allay explicitly the concern that a person could be prosecuted under section 924(e) for committing an entirely unrelated crime while in possession of a firearm. Though the legislative history does not say so expressly, it strongly implies that the ‘in relation to’ language did not alter the scope of the statute . . . .” United States v. Stewart, 779 F. 2d 538, 539-540 (1985) (citations omitted). Relying on that Circuit precedent, the Court of Appeals in this case concluded that the explosives statute, like the firearm statute, implicitly included a requirement of a relationship between possession of the item in question and the underlying felony. Whatever the merits of the argument that § 924(c) as originally enacted contained a relational requirement, the subsequent changes to both statutes convince us that the Government’s reading of § 844(h) as presently written is correct. Ill In 1988, Congress enacted the “Explosives Offenses Amendments,” § 6474(b), 102 Stat. 4379, which modified the text of § 844(h). Those amendments increased the penalties for violating the provision, § 6474(b)(2), id., at 4380; they also deleted the word “unlawfully,” § 6474(b)(1), ibid. Unlike its earlier amendment to the firearm statute, however, Congress did not also insert the words “and in relation to” after the word “during.” While it is possible that this omission was inadvertent, that possibility seems remote given the stark difference that was thereby introduced into the otherwise similar texts of 18 U. S. C. §§ 844(h) and 924(c). Even if the similarity of the original texts of the two statutes might have supported an inference that both included an implicit relationship requirement, their current difference virtually commands the opposite inference. While the two provisions were initially identical, Congress’ replacement of the word “unlawfully” in the firearm statute with the phrase “and in relation to,” coupled with the deletion of the word “unlawfully” without any similar replacement in the explosives statute, convinces us that Congress did not intend to introduce a relational requirement into the explosives provision, but rather intended us to accept the more straightforward reading of § 844(h). Since respondent was carrying explosives when he violated §1001, he was carrying them “during” the commission of that felony. The statute as presently written requires nothing further. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed. It is so ordered. Justice Thomas, with whom Justice Scalia joins, concurring in part and concurring in the judgment. Because the plain language of the statute squarely answers the question presented in this case, I join only Part I of the Court’s opinion. Both the Third and Fifth Circuits have declined to interpret § 844(h)(2) as requiring that the explosive be carried in relation to the underlying felony. See United States v. Rosenberg, 806 F. 2d 1169, 1178-1179 (CA3 1986) (“The plain everyday meaning of ‘during’ is ‘at the same time’ or ‘at a point in the course of’ ... . It does not normally mean ‘at the same time and in connection with----’ It is not fitting for this court to declare that the crime defined by § 844(h)(2) has more elements than those enumerated on the face of the statute”); United States v. Ivy, 929 F. 2d 147, 151 (CA5 1991) (“Section 844(h)(2)... does not include the relation element Ivy urges .... We . .. refuse to judicially append the relation element to § 844(h)(2)”). Because respondent concedes that the items in his car were “explosives,” we have no occasion to determine the boundaries of that term as used in the statute. Specifically, we do not comment on when, if ever, “such commonplace materials as kerosene, gasoline, or certain fertilizers,” post, at 278 (Breyer, J., dissenting), might fall within the definition of “explosive.” Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Me. Justice Marshall delivered the opinion of the Court. In August 1965, petitioner was tried in a Maryland state court on charges of burglary and larceny. The jury found petitioner not guilty of larceny but convicted him on the burglary count. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Shortly after his notice of appeal was filed in the Maryland Court of Appeals, that court handed down its decision in the case of Schowgurow v. State, 240 Md. 121, 213 A. 2d 475 (1965). In Schowgurow the Maryland Court of Appeals struck down a section of the state constitution which required jurors to swear their belief in the existence of God. As a result of this decision, petitioner’s case was remanded to the trial court. Because both the grand and petit juries in petitioner’s case had been selected under the invalid constitutional provision, petitioner was given the option of demanding re-indictment and retrial. He chose to have his conviction set aside, and a new indictment and new trial followed. At this second trial, petitioner was again charged with both larceny and burglary. Petitioner objected to retrial on the larceny count, arguing that because the first jury had found him not guilty of larceny, retrial would violate the constitutional prohibition against subjecting persons to double jeopardy for the same offense. The trial judge denied petitioner’s motion to dismiss the larceny charge, and petitioner was tried for both larceny and burglary. This time the jury found petitioner guilty of both offenses, and the judge sentenced him to 15 years on the burglary count and 5 years for larceny, the sentences to run concurrently. On appeal to the newly created Maryland Court of Special Appeals, petitioner’s double jeopardy claim was rejected on the merits. 1 Md. App. 647, 232 A. 2d. 541 (1967). The Court of Appeals denied discretionary review. On the last day of last Term, we granted certiorari, 392 U. S. 925 (1968), but limited the writ to the consideration of two issues: After oral argument, it became clear that the existence of a concurrent sentence on the burglary count might prevent the Court from reaching the double jeopardy issue, at least if we found that any error affected only petitioner’s larceny conviction. Therefore, we scheduled the case for reargument, 393 U. S. 994 (1968), limited to the following additional question not included in the original writ: “(1) Is the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment? “(2) If so, was the petitioner ‘twice put in jeopardy’ in this case?” “Does the ‘concurrent sentence doctrine,’ enunciated in Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U. S. 81, 105, and subsequent cases, have continuing validity in light of such decisions as Ginsberg v. New York, 390 U. S. 629, 633, n. 2, Peyton v. Rowe, 391 U. S. 54, Carafas v. LaVallee, 391 U. S. 234, 237-238, and Sibron v. New York, 392 U. S. 40, 50-58?” The Solicitor General was invited to file a brief expressing the views of the United States and to participate in oral argument. After consideration of all the questions before us, we find no bar to our decision of the double jeopardy issue. On the merits, we hold that the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment is applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, and we reverse petitioner’s conviction for larceny. I. At the outset of this case we are confronted with a jurisdictional problem. If the error specified in the original writ of certiorari were found to affect only petitioner’s larceny conviction, reversal of that conviction would not require the State to change the terms of petitioner’s confinement. Whatever the status of his sentence on the larceny conviction, petitioner would probably stay in prison until he had served out his sentence for burglary. Is there, in these circumstances, a live “case” or “controversy” suitable for resolution by this Court, or is the issue moot? Is petitioner asking for an advisory opinion on an abstract or hypothetical question? The answer to these questions is crucial, for it is well settled that federal courts may act only in the context of a justiciable case or controversy. Muskrat v. United States, 219 U. S. 346 (1911); see Flast v. Cohen, 392 U. S. 83, 94-97 (1968). The language used in a number of this Court’s opinions might be read to indicate that the existence of a valid concurrent sentence removes the necessary elements of a justiciable controversy. The “concurrent sentence doctrine” took root in this country quite early, although its earliest manifestations occurred in slightly different contexts. In Locke v. United States, 7 Cranch 339 (1813), a cargo belonging to the plaintiff in error had been condemned under a libel containing 11 counts. Chief Justice John Marshall, speaking for the Court, found it unnecessary to consider Locke’s challenges to all 11 counts. He declared, simply enough, “The Court however, is of opinion, that the 4th count is good, and this renders it unnecessary to decide on the others.” Id., at 344. Similar reasoning was later applied in a case where a single general sentence rested on convictions under several counts of an indictment. Drawing upon some English cases and some dicta from Lord Mansfield, the Court in Claassen v. United States, 142 U. S. 140, 146 (1891), held that if the defendant had validly been convicted on any one count “the other counts need not be considered.” The most widely cited application of this approach to cases where concurrent sentences, rather than a single general sentence, have been imposed is Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U. S. 81 (1943). In that case the defendant had been found guilty of two different offenses and had received concurrent three-month sentences. He challenged the constitutionality of both convictions, but this Court affirmed the lower court’s judgment after considering and rejecting only one of his challenges. Since the conviction on the second count was valid, the Court found it “unnecessary” to consider the challenge to the first count. Id., at 85, 105. The concurrent sentence doctrine has been widely, if somewhat haphazardly, applied in this Court’s decisions. At times the Court has seemed to say that the doctrine raises a jurisdictional bar to the consideration of counts under concurrent sentences. Some opinions have baldly declared that judgments of conviction “must be upheld” if any one count was good. Barenblatt v. United States, 360 U. S. 109, 115 (1959); see United States v. Gainey, 380 U. S. 63, 65 (1965). In other cases the Court has chosen somewhat weaker language, indicating only that a judgment “may be affirmed if the conviction on either count is valid.” Roviaro v. United States, 353 U. S. 53, 59, n. 6 (1957). And on at least one occasion, the Court has ignored the rule entirely and decided an issue that affected only one count, even though there were concurrent sentences. Putnam v. United States, 162 U. S. 687 (1896). One can search through these cases, and related ones, without finding any satisfactory explanation for the concurrent sentence doctrine. See United States v. Hines, 256 F. 2d 561, 562-563 (C. A. 2d Cir. 1958). But whatever the underlying justifications for the doctrine, it seems clear to us that it cannot be taken to state a jurisdictional rule. See Yates v. United States, 355 U. S. 66, 75-76 (1957); Putnam v. United States, supra. Moreover, whatever may have been the approach in the past, our recent decisions on the question of mootness in criminal cases make it perfectly clear that the existence of concurrent sentences does not remove the elements necessary to create a justiciable case or controversy. In Sibron v. New York, 392 U. S. 40 (1968), we held that a criminal case did not become moot upon the expiration of the sentence imposed. We noted “the obvious fact of life that most criminal convictions do in fact entail adverse collateral legal consequences.” Id., at 55. We concluded that the mere possibility of such collateral consequences was enough to give the case the “impact of actuality” which was necessary to make it a justiciable case or controversy. Sibron and a number of other recent cases have canvassed the possible adverse collateral effects of criminal convictions, and we need not repeat that analysis here. It is enough to say that there are such possibilities in this case. For example, there are a few States which consider all prior felony convictions for the purpose of enhancing sentence under habitual criminal statutes, even if the convictions actually constituted only separate counts in a single indictment tried on the same day. Petitioner might some day in one of these States have both his larceny and burglary convictions counted against him. Although this possibility may well be a remote one, it is enough to give this case an adversary cast and make it justiciable. Moreover, as in Sibron, both of petitioner’s convictions might some day be used to impeach his character if put in issue at a future trial. Although petitioner could explain that both convictions arose out of the same transaction, a jury might not be able to appreciate this subtlety. We cannot, therefore, say that this Court lacks jurisdiction to decide petitioner’s challenge to his larceny conviction. It may be that in certain circumstances a federal appellate court, as a matter of discretion, might decide (as in Hirabayashi) that it is “unnecessary” to consider all the allegations made by a particular party. The concurrent sentence rule may have some continuing validity as a rule of judicial convenience. That is not a subject we must canvass today, however. It is sufficient for present purposes to hold that there is no jurisdictional bar to consideration of challenges to multiple convictions, even though concurrent sentences were imposed. II. While Maryland apparently agrees that there is no jurisdictional bar to consideration of petitioner’s larceny conviction, it argues that the possibility of collateral consequences is so remote in this case that any double jeopardy violation should be treated as a species of “harmless error.” The Solicitor General, while not commenting at length on the facts of this particular case, suggests that we treat the concurrent sentence doctrine as a principle of judicial efficiency which permits judges to avoid decision of issues which have no appreciable impact on the rights of any party. Both Maryland and the Solicitor General argue that the defendant should bear the burden of convincing the appellate court of the need to review all his concurrent sentences. Petitioner, on the other hand, sees in Sibron a command that federal appellate courts treat all errors which may possibly affect a defendant’s rights, and he argues that the concurrent sentence rule therefore has no continuing validity, even as a rule of convenience. Because of the special circumstances in this case, we find it unnecessary to resolve this dispute. For even if the concurrent sentence doctrine survives as a rule of judicial convenience, we find good reason not to apply it here. On direct appeal from petitioner’s conviction, the Maryland Court of Special Appeals did in fact rule on his double jeopardy challenge to the larceny count. 1 Md. App., at 650-651, 232 A. 2d, at 542-543. It is unclear whether Maryland courts always consider all challenges raised on direct appeal, notwithstanding the existence of concurrent sentences, but at least in this case the State decided not to apply the concurrent sentence rule. This may well indicate that the State has some interest in keeping the larceny conviction alive; if, as Maryland argues here, the larceny conviction is of no importance to either party, one wonders why the state courts found it necessary to pass on it. Since the future importance of the conviction may well turn on issues of state law about which we are not well informed, we propose, on direct appeal from the Maryland courts, to accept their judgment on this question. Since they decided this federal constitutional question, we see no reason why we should not do so as well. Moreover, the status of petitioner’s burglary conviction and the eventual length of his sentence are both still in some doubt. Should any attack on the burglary conviction be successful, or should the length of the burglary sentence be reduced to less than five years, petitioner would then clearly have a right to have his larceny conviction reviewed. As we said in Sibron v. New York, supra, at 56-57, it is certainly preferable to have that review now on direct appeal, rather than later. For these reasons, and because there is no jurisdictional bar, we find it appropriate to reach the questions specified in our original writ of certiorari. III. In 1937, this Court decided the landmark case of Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U. S. 319. Palko, although indicted for first-degree murder, had been convicted of murder in the second degree after a jury trial in a Connecticut state court. The State appealed and won a new trial. Palko argued that the Fourteenth Amendment incorporated, as against the States, the Fifth Amendment requirement that no person “be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” The Court disagreed. Federal double jeopardy standards were not applicable against the States. Only when a kind of jeopardy subjected a defendant to “a hardship so acute and shocking that our polity will not endure it,” id., at 328, did the Fourteenth Amendment apply. The order for a new trial was affirmed. In subsequent appeals from state courts, the Court continued to apply this lesser Palko standard. See, e. g., Brock v. North Carolina, 344 U. S. 424 (1953). Recently, however, this Court has “increasingly looked to the specific guarantees of the [Bill of Rights] to determine whether a state criminal trial was conducted with due process of law.” Washington v. Texas, 388 U. S. 14, 18 (1967). In an increasing number of cases, the Court “has rejected the notion that the Fourteenth Amendment applies to the States only a ‘watered-down, subjective version of the individual guarantees of the Bill of Rights ....’” Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U. S. 1, 10-11 (1964) , Only last Term we found that the right to trial by jury in criminal cases was “fundamental to the American scheme of justice,” Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 145, 149 (1968), and held that the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial was applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. For the same reasons, we today find that the double jeopardy prohibition of the Fifth Amendment represents a fundamental ideal in our constitutional heritage, and that it should apply to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. Insofar as it is inconsistent with this holding, Palko v. Connecticut is overruled. Palko represented an approach to basic constitutional rights which this Court’s recent decisions have rejected. It was cut of the same cloth as Betts v. Brady, 316 IT. S. 455 (1942), the case which held that a criminal defendant’s right to counsel was to be determined by deciding in each case whether the denial of that right was “shocking to the universal sense of justice.” Id., at 462. It relied upon Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U. S. 78 (1908), which held that the right against compulsory self-incrimination was not an element of Fourteenth Amendment due process. Betts was overruled by Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963); Twining, by Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U. S. 1 (1964). Our recent cases have thoroughly rejected the Palko notion that basic constitutional rights can be denied by the States as long as the totality of the circumstances does not disclose a denial of “fundamental fairness.” Once it is decided that a particular Bill of Rights guarantee is “fundamental to the American scheme of justice,” Duncan v. Louisiana, supra, at 149, the same constitutional standards apply against both the State and Federal Governments. Palko’s roots had thus been cut away years ago. We today only recognize the inevitable. The fundamental nature of the guarantee against double jeopardy can hardly be doubted. Its origins can be traced to Greek and Roman times, and it became established in the common law of England long before this Nation’s independence. See Bartkus v. Illinois, 359 U. S. 121, 151-155 (1959) (Black, J., dissenting). As with many other elements of the common law, it was carried into the jurisprudence of this Country through the medium of Blackstone, who codified the doctrine in his Commentaries. “[T]he plea of autrefoits acquit, or a former acquittal,” he wrote, “is grounded on this universal maxim of the common law of England, that no man is to be brought into jeopardy of his life more than once for the same offence.” Today, every State incorporates some form of the prohibition in its constitution or common law. As this Court put it in Green v. United States, 355 U. S. 184, 187-188 (1957), “[t]he underlying idea, one that is deeply ingrained in at least the Anglo-American system of jurisprudence, is that the State with all its resources and power should not be allowed to make repeated attempts to convict an individual for an alleged offense, thereby subjecting him to embarrassment, expense and ordeal and compelling him to live in a continuing state of anxiety and insecurity, as well as enhancing the possibility that even though innocent he may be found guilty.” This underlying notion has from the very beginning been part of our constitutional tradition. Like the right to trial by jury, it is clearly “fundamental to the American scheme of justice.” The validity of petitioner’s larceny conviction must be judged, not by the watered-down standard enunciated in Palko, but under this Court’s interpretations of the Fifth Amendment double jeopardy provision. IV. It is clear that petitioner’s larceny conviction cannot stand once federal double jeopardy standards are applied. Petitioner was acquitted of larceny in his first trial. Because he decided to appeal his burglary conviction, he is forced to suffer retrial on the larceny count as well. As this Court held in Green v. United States, supra, at 193— 194, “[conditioning an appeal of one offense on a coerced surrender of a valid plea of former jeopardy on another offense exacts a forfeiture in plain conflict with the constitutional bar against double jeopardy.” Maryland argues that Green does not apply to this case because petitioner’s original indictment was absolutely void. One cannot be placed in “jeopardy” by a void indictment, the State argues. This argument sounds a bit strange, however, since petitioner could quietly have served out his sentence under this “void” indictment had he not appealed his burglary conviction. Only by accepting the option of a new trial could the indictment be set aside; at worst the indictment would seem only voidable at the defendant’s option, not absolutely void. In any case, this argument was answered here over 70 years ago in United States v. Ball, 163 U. S. 662 (1896). In that case Millard Fillmore Ball was indicted, together with two other men, for the murder of one William T. Box in the Indian Territory. He was acquitted and his codefendants were convicted. They appealed and won a reversal on the ground that the indictment erroneously failed to aver the time or place of Box’s death. All three defendants were retried, and this time Ball was convicted. This Court sustained his double jeopardy claim, notwithstanding the technical invalidity of the indictment upon which he was first tried. The Court refused to allow the Government to allege its own error to deprive the defendant of the benefit of an acquittal by a jury. Id., at 667-668. “ [A] lthough the indictment was fatally defective, yet, if the court had jurisdiction of the cause and of the party, its judgment is not void, but only voidable by writ of error . . . ,” and the Government could not have the acquittal set aside over the defendant’s objections. Id., at 669-670. This case is totally indistinguishable. Petitioner was acquitted of larceny. He has, under Green, a valid double jeopardy plea which he cannot be forced to waive. Yet Maryland wants the earlier acquittal set aside, over petitioner’s objections, because of a defect in the indictment. This it cannot do. Petitioner’s larceny conviction cannot stand. Y. Petitioner argues that his burglary conviction should be set aside as well. He contends that some evidence, inadmissible under state law in a trial for burglary alone, was introduced in the joint trial for both burglary and larceny, and that the jury was prejudiced by this evidence. This question was not decided by the Maryland Court of Special Appeals because it found no double jeopardy violation at all. It is not obvious on the face of the record that the burglary conviction was affected by the double jeopardy violation. To determine whether there is in fact any such evidentiary error, we would have to explore the Maryland law of evidence and the Maryland definitions of larceny and burglary, and then examine the record in detail. We do not think that this is the kind of determination we should make unaided by prior consideration by the state courts. Accordingly, we think it “just under the circumstances,” 28 U. S. C. § 2106, to vacate the judgment below and remand for consideration of this question. The judgment is vacated and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. The increase in petitioner’s sentence on the burglary count from 10 to 15 years is presently the subject of litigation on federal habeas corpus in the lower federal courts. A federal district court ordered the State to resentence petitioner, Benton v. Copinger, 291 F. Supp. 141 (D. C. Md. 1968), and an appeal brought by the State is presently pending in the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. See Part V, infra. Of course, if the error infected both counts upon which petitioner was convicted, there would be no concurrent sentence problem at all. We do not, however, resolve the question of whether the burglary conviction was “tainted.” The length of that sentence is presently a matter in dispute, see n. 1, supra. Grant v. Astle, 2 Doug. 722, 99 Eng. Rep. 459 (1781); Peake v. Oldham, 1 Cowp. 275, 98 Eng. Rep. 1083 (1775); Rex v. Benfield, 2 Burr. 980, 97 Eng. Rep. 664 (1760). Street v. New York, 394 U. S. 576, 579-580, n. 3 (1969); Carafas v. LaVallee, 391 U. S. 234, 237-238 (1968); Ginsberg v. New York, 390 U. S. 629, 633-634, n. 2 (1968). The majority rule is, apparently, that all convictions handed down at the same time count as a single conviction for the purpose of habitual offender statutes, but a few States follow the stricter rule described in the text. The relevant cases are collected at 24 A. L. R. 2d 1262-1267 (1952), and in the accompanying supplements. In Sibron we noted the inadequacies of a procedure which postpones appellate review until it is proposed to subject the convicted person to collateral consequences. 392 U. S., at 56-57. For the reasons there stated, an attempt to impose collateral consequences after an initial refusal to review a conviction on direct appeal because of the concurrent sentence doctrine may well raise some constitutional problems. That issue is not, however, presented by this case, and accordingly we express no opinion on it. Compare Meade v. State, 198 Md. 489, 84 A. 2d 892 (1951), with Marks v. State, 230 Md. 108, 185 A. 2d 909 (1962). See n. 7, supra. See n. 1, supra, and Part V, infra. A stronger ease for total abolition of the concurrent sentence doctrine may well be made in cases on direct appeal, as compared to convictions attacked collaterally by suits for post-conviction relief. Because of our disposition of this case, we need not reach this question. Quoting from Ohio ex rel. Eaton v. Price, 364 U. S. 263, 275 (1960) (opinion of BrennaN, J.). A list of those Bill of Rights guarantees which have been held “incorporated” in the Fourteenth Amendment can be found in Duncan, supra, at 148. J. Sigler, Double Jeopardy 1-37 (1969). 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries *335. Sigler, supra, n. 14, at 78-79; Brock v. North Carolina, 344 U. S. 424, 435, n. 6 (1953) (Vinson, C. J., dissenting). There is no danger here that the jury might have been tempted to compromise on a lesser charge because of an erroneous retrial on a greater charge. See United States ex rel. Hetenyi v. Wilkins, 348 F. 2d 844, 866 (C. A. 2d Cir. 1965), cert. denied, sub nom. Mancusi v. Hetenyi, 383 U. S. 913 (1966). Larceny is a lesser offense than burglary. See Note, Individualized Criminal Justice in the Supreme Court: A Study of Dispositional Decision Making, 81 Harv. L. Rev. 1260, 1272-1273 (1968). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court. In 2001, Enron Corporation, then the seventh highest-revenue-grossing company in America, crashed into bankruptcy. We consider in this opinion two questions arising from the prosecution of Jeffrey Skilling, a longtime Enron executive, for crimes committed before the corporation’s collapse. First, did pretrial publicity and community prejudice prevent Skilling from obtaining a fair trial? Second, did the jury improperly convict Skilling of conspiracy to commit “honest-services” wire fraud, 18 U. S. C. §§371, 1343, 1346? Answering no to both questions, the Fifth Circuit affirmed Skilling’s convictions. We conclude, in common with the Court of Appeals, that Skilling’s fair-trial argument fails; Skilling, we hold, did not establish that a presumption of juror prejudice arose or that actual bias infected the jury that tried him. But we disagree with the Fifth Circuit’s honest-services ruling. In proscribing fraudulent deprivations of “the intangible right of honest services,” § 1346, Congress intended at least to reach schemes to defraud involving bribes and kickbacks. Construing the honest-services statute to extend beyond that core meaning, we conclude, would encounter a vagueness shoal. We therefore hold that § 1346 covers only bribery and kickback schemes. Because Skilling’s alleged misconduct entailed no bribe or kickback, it does not fall within § 1346’s proscription. We therefore affirm in part and vacate in part. I Founded in 1985, Enron Corporation grew from its headquarters in Houston, Texas, into one of the world’s leading energy companies. Skilling launched his career there in 1990 when Kenneth Lay, the company’s founder, hired him to head an Enron subsidiary. Skilling steadily rose through the corporation’s ranks, serving as president and chief operating officer, and then, beginning in February 2001, as chief executive officer. Six months later, on August 14, 2001, Skilling resigned from Enron. Less than four months after Skilling’s departure, Enron spiraled into bankruptcy. The company’s stock, which had traded at $90 per share in August 2000, plummeted to pennies per share in late 2001. Attempting to comprehend what caused the corporation’s collapse, the U. S. Department of Justice formed an Enron Task Force, comprising prosecutors and Federal Bureau of Investigation agents from around the Nation. The Government’s investigation uncovered an elaborate conspiracy to prop up Enron’s short-run stock prices by overstating the company’s financial well-being. In the years following Enron’s bankruptcy, the Government prosecuted dozens of Enron employees who participated in the scheme. In time, the Government worked its way up the corporation’s chain of command: On July 7, 2004, a grand jury indicted Skilling, Lay, and Richard Causey, Enron’s former chief accounting officer. These three defendants, the indictment alleged, “engaged in a wide-ranging scheme to deceive the investing public, including Enron’s shareholders,... about the true performance of Enron’s businesses by: (a) manipulating Enron’s publicly reported financial results; and (b) making public statements and representations about Enron’s financial performance and results that were false and misleading.” App. ¶ 5, p. 277a. Skilling and his co-conspirators, the indictment continued, “enriched themselves as a result of the scheme through salary, bonuses, grants of stock and stock options, other profits, and prestige.” Id., ¶ 14, at 280a. Count 1 of the indictment charged Skilling with conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud; in particular, it alleged that Skilling had sought to “depriv[e] Enron and its shareholders of the intangible right of [his] honest services.” Id., ¶ 87, at 318a. The indictment further charged Skilling with more than 25 substantive counts of securities fraud, wire fraud, making false representations to Enron’s auditors, and insider trading. In November 2004, Skilling moved to transfer the trial to another venue; he contended that hostility toward him in Houston, coupled with extensive pretrial publicity, had poisoned potential jurors. To support this assertion, Skilling, aided by media experts, submitted hundreds of news reports detailing Enron’s downfall; he also presented affidavits from the experts he engaged portraying community attitudes in Houston in comparison to other potential venues. The U. S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, in accord with rulings in two earlier instituted Enron-related prosecutions, denied the venue-transfer motion. Despite “isolated incidents of intemperate commentary,” the court observed, media coverage “ha[d] [mostly] been objective and unemotional,” and the facts of the case were “neither heinous nor sensational.” App. to Brief for United States 10a-lla. Moreover, “courts ha[d] commonly” favored “effective voir dire... to ferret out any [juror] bias.” Id, at 18a. Pretrial publicity about the case, the court concluded, did not warrant a presumption that Skilling would be unable to obtain a fair trial in Houston. Id., at 22a. In the months leading up to the trial, the District Court solicited from the parties questions the court might use to screen prospective jurors. Unable to agree on a questionnaire’s format and content, Skilling and the Government submitted dueling documents. On venire members’ sources of Enron-related news, for example, the Government proposed that they tick boxes from a checklist of generic labels such as “[television,” “[n]ewspaper,” and “[r]adio,” Record 8415; Skilling proposed more probing questions asking venire members to list the specific names of their media sources and to report on “what st[ood] out in [their] mind[s]” of “all the things [they] ha[d] seen, heard or read about Enron,” id., at 8404-8405. The District Court rejected the Government’s sparer inquiries in favor of Skilling’s submission. Skilling’s questions “[we]re more helpful,” the court said, “because [they] [we]re generally... open-ended and w[ould] allow the potential jurors to give us more meaningful information.” Id., at 9539. The court converted Skilling’s submission, with slight modifications, into a 77-question, 14-page document that asked prospective jurors about, inter alia, their sources of news and exposure to Enron-related publicity, beliefs concerning Enron and what caused its collapse, opinions regarding the defendants and their possible guilt or innocence, and relationships to the company and to anyone affected by its demise. In November 2005, the District Court mailed the questionnaire to 400 prospective jurors and received responses from nearly all the addressees. The court granted hardship exemptions to approximately 90 individuals, id., at 11773-11774, and the parties, with the court’s approval, further winnowed the pool by excusing another 119 for cause, hardship, or physical disability, id., at 11891, 13594. The parties agreed to exclude, in particular, “each and every” prospective juror who said that a pre-existing opinion about Enron or the defendants would prevent her from impartially considering the evidence at trial. Id., at 13668. On December 28, 2005, three weeks before the date scheduled for the commencement of trial, Causey pleaded guilty. Skilling’s attorneys immediately requested a continuance, and the District Court agreed to delay the proceedings until the end of January 2006. Id., at 14277. In the interim, Skilling renewed his change-of-venue motion, arguing that the juror questionnaires revealed pervasive bias and that news accounts of Causey’s guilty plea further tainted the jury pool. If Houston remained the trial venue, Skilling urged that “jurors need to be questioned individually by both the Court and counsel” concerning their opinions of Enron and “publicity issues.” Id., at 12074. The District Court again declined to move the trial. Skilling, the court concluded, still had not “establish[ed] that pretrial publicity and/or community prejudice raise[d] a presumption of inherent jury prejudice.” Id., at 14115. The questionnaires and voir dire, the court observed, provided safeguards adequate to ensure an impartial jury. Id., at 14115-14116. Denying Skilling’s request for attorney-led voir dire, the court said that in 17 years on the bench: “I’ve found... I get more forthcoming responses from potential jurors than the lawyers on either side. I don’t know whether people are suspicious of lawyers — but I think if I ask a person a question, I will get a candid response much easier than if a lawyer asks the question.” Id., at 11805. But the court promised to give counsel an opportunity to ask followup questions, ibid., and it agreed that venire members should be examined individually about pretrial publicity, id., at 11051-11053. The court also allotted the defendants jointly 14 peremptory challenges, 2 more than the standard number prescribed by Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 24(b)(2) and (c)(4)(B). Id., at 13673-13675. Voir dire began on January 30, 2006. The District Court first emphasized to the venire the importance of impartiality and explained the presumption 'of innocence and the Government’s burden of proof. The trial, the court next instructed, was not a forum “to seek vengeance against Enron’s former officers,” or to “provide remedies for” its victims. App. 823a. “The bottom line,” the court stressed, “is that we want... jurors who... will faithfully, conscientiously and impartially serve if selected.” Id., at 823a-824a. In response to the court’s query whether any prospective juror questioned her ability to adhere to these instructions, two individuals indicated that they could not be fair; they were therefore excused for cause, id., at 816a, 819a-820a. After questioning the venire as a group, the District Court brought prospective jurors one by one to the bench for individual examination. Although the questions varied, the process generally tracked the following format: The court asked about exposure to Enron-related news and the content of any stories that stood out in the prospective juror’s mind. Next, the court homed in on questionnaire answers that raised a red flag signaling possible bias. The court then permitted each side to pose followup questions. Finally, after the venire member stepped away, the court entertained and ruled on challenges for cause. In all, the court granted one of the Government’s for-cause challenges and denied four; it granted three of the defendants’ challenges and denied six. The parties agreed to excuse three additional jurors for cause and one for hardship. By the end of the day, the court had qualified 38 prospective jurors, a number sufficient, allowing for peremptory challenges, to empanel 12 jurors and 4 alternates. Before the jury was sworn in, Skilling objected to the seating of six jurors. He did not contend that they were in fact biased; instead, he urged that he would have used peremptories to exclude them had he not exhausted his supply by striking several venire members after the court refused to excuse them for cause. Supp. App. 3sa-4sa (Sealed). The court overruled this objection. After the jurors took their oath, the District Court told them they could not discuss the case with anyone or follow media accounts of the proceedings. “[E]ach of you,” the court explained, “needs to be absolutely sure that your decisions concerning the facts will be based only on the evidence that you hear and read in this courtroom.” App. 1026a. Following a four-month trial and nearly five days of deliberation, the jury found Skilling guilty of 19 counts, including the honest-services-fraud conspiracy charge, and not guilty of 9 insider-trading counts. The District Court sentenced Skilling to 292 months’ imprisonment, 3 years’ supervised release, and $45 million in restitution. On appeal, Skilling raised a host of challenges to his convictions, including the fair-trial and honest-services arguments he presses here. Regarding the former, the Fifth Circuit initially determined that the volume and negative tone of media coverage generated by Enron’s collapse created a presumption of juror prejudice. 554 F. 3d 529, 559 (2009). The court also noted potential prejudice stemming from Causey’s guilty plea and from the large number of victims in Houston — from the “[thousands of Enron employees... [who] lost their jobs, and... saw their 401(k) accounts wiped out,” to Houstonians who suffered spillover economic effects. Id., at 559-560. The Court of Appeals stated, however, that “the presumption [of prejudice] is rebuttable,” and it therefore examined the voir dire to determine whether “the District Court em-' paneled an impartial jury.” Id., at 561 (internal quotation marks, italics, and some capitalization omitted). The voir dire was, in the Fifth Circuit’s view, “proper and thorough.” Id., at 562. Moreover, the court noted, Skilling had challenged only one seated juror — Juror 11 — for cause. Although Juror 11 made some troubling comments about corporate greed, the District Court “observed [his] demeanor, listened to his answers, and believed he would make the government prove its ease.” Id., at 564. In sum, the Fifth Circuit found that the Government had overcome the presumption of prejudice and that Skilling had not “show[n] that any juror who actually sat was prejudiced against him.” Ibid. The Court of Appeals also rejected Skilling’s claim that his conduct did not indicate any conspiracy to commit honest-services fraud. “[T]he jury was entitled to convict Skilling,” the court stated, “on these elements”: “(1) a material breach of a fiduciary duty... (2) that results in a detriment to the employer,” including one occasioned by an employee’s decision to “withhold material information, i. e., information that he had reason to believe would lead a reasonable employer to change its conduct.” Id., at 547. The Fifth Circuit did not address Skilling’s argument that the honest-services statute, if not interpreted to exclude his actions, should be invalidated as unconstitutionally vague. Brief for Defendant-Appellant Skilling in No. 06-20885 (CA5), p. 65, n. 21. Arguing that the Fifth Circuit erred in its consideration of these claims, Skilling sought relief from this Court. We granted certiorari, 558 U. S. 945 (2009), and now affirm in part, vacate in part, and remand for further proceedings. We consider first Skilling’s allegation of juror prejudice, and next, his honest-services argument. II Pointing to “the community passion aroused by Enron’s collapse and the vitriolic media treatment” aimed at him, Skilling argues that his trial “never should have proceeded in Houston.” Brief for Petitioner 20. And even if it had been possible to select impartial jurors in Houston, “[t]he truncated voir dire... did almost nothing to weed out prejudices,” he contends, so “[f]ar from rebutting the presumption of prejudice, the record below affirmatively confirmed it.” Id., at 21. Skilling’s fair-trial claim thus raises two distinct questions. First, did the District Court err by failing to move the trial to a different venue based on a presumption of prejudice? Second, did actual prejudice contaminate Skilling’s jury? A 1 The Sixth Amendment secures to criminal defendants the right to trial by an impartial jury. By constitutional design, that trial occurs “in the State where the... Crimes... have been committed.” Art. III, §2, cl. 3. See also Arndt. 6 (right to trial by “jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been, committed”). The Constitution’s place-of-trial prescriptions, however, do not impede transfer of the proceeding to a different district at the defendant’s request if extraordinary local prejudice will prevent a fair trial — a “basic requirement of due process,” In re Murchison, 349 U. S. 133, 136 (1955). 2 “The theory of our [trial] system is that the conclusions to be reached in a case will be induced only by evidence and argument in open court, and not by any outside influence, whether of private talk or public print.” Patterson v. Colorado ex rel. Attorney General of Colo., 205 U. S. 454, 462 (1907) (opinion for the Court by Holmes, J.). When does the publicity attending conduct charged as criminal dim prospects that the trier can judge a case, as due process requires, impartially, unswayed by outside influence? Because most cases of consequence garner at least some pretrial publicity, courts have considered this question in diverse settings. We begin our discussion by addressing the presumption of prejudice from which the Fifth Circuit’s analysis in Skilling’s case proceeded. The foundation precedent is Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U. S. 723 (1963). Wilbert Rideau robbed a bank in a small Louisiana town, kidnaped three bank employees, and killed one of them. Police interrogated Rideau in jail without counsel present and obtained his confession. Without informing Rideau, no less seeking his consent, the police filmed the interrogation. On three separate occasions shortly before the trial, a local television station broadcast the film to audiences ranging from 24,000 to 53,000 individuals. Rideau moved for a change of venue, arguing that he could not receive a fair trial in the parish where the crime occurred, which had a population of approximately 150,000 people. The trial court denied the motion, and a jury eventually convicted Rideau. The Supreme Court of Louisiana upheld the conviction. We reversed. “What the people [in the community] saw on their television sets,” we observed, “was Rideau, in jail, flanked by the sheriff and two state troopers, admitting in detail the commission of the robbery, kidnapping, and murder.” Id., at 725. “[T]o the tens of thousands of people who saw and heard it,” we explained, the interrogation “in a very real sense was Rideau’s trial — at which he pleaded guilty.” Id., at 726. We therefore “d[id] not hesitate to hold, without pausing to examine a particularized transcript of the voir dire,” that “[t]he kangaroo court proceedings” trailing the televised confession violated due process. Id., at 726-727. We followed Rideau’s lead in two later cases in which media coverage manifestly tainted a criminal prosecution. In Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S. 532, 538 (1965), extensive publicity before trial swelled into excessive exposure during preliminary court proceedings as reporters and television crews overran the courtroom and “bombardjed]... the community with the sights and sounds of” the pretrial hearing. The media’s overzealous reporting efforts, we observed, “led to considerable disruption” and denied the “judicial serenity and calm to which [Billie Sol Estes] was entitled.” Id., at 536. Similarly, in Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S. 333 (1966), news reporters extensively covered the story of Sam Sheppard, who was accused of bludgeoning his pregnant wife to death. “[B]edlam reigned at the courthouse during the trial and newsmen took over practically the entire courtroom,” thrusting jurors “into the role of celebrities.” Id., at 353, 355. Pretrial media coverage, which we characterized as “months [of] virulent publicity about Sheppard and the murder,” did not alone deny due process, we noted. Id., at 354. But Sheppard’s case involved more than heated reporting pretrial: We upset the murder conviction because a “carnival atmosphere” pervaded the trial, id., at 358. In each of these cases, we overturned a “conviction obtained in a trial atmosphere that [was] utterly corrupted by press coverage”; our decisions, however, “cannot be made to stand for the proposition that juror exposure to... news accounts of the crime... alone presumptively deprives the defendant of due process.” Murphy v. Florida, 421 U. S. 794, 798-799 (1975). See also, e. g., Patton v. Yount, 467 U. S. 1025 (1984). Prominence does not necessarily produce prejudice, and juror impartiality, we have reiterated, does not require ignorance. Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U. S. 717, 722 (1961) (Jurors are not required to be “totally ignorant of the facts and issues involved”; “scarcely any of those best qualified to serve as jurors will not have formed some impression or opinion as to the merits of the case.”); Reynolds v. United States, 98 U. S. 145, 155-156 (1879) (“[E]very case of public interest is almost, as a matter of necessity, brought to the attention of all the intelligent people in the vicinity, and scarcely any one can be found among those best fitted for jurors who has not read or heard of it, and who has not some impression or some opinion in respect to its merits.”). A presumption of prejudice, our decisions indicate, attends only the extreme case. 3 Relying on Rideau, Estes, and Sheppard, Skilling asserts that we need not pause to examine the screening questionnaires or the voir dire before declaring his jury’s verdict void. We are not persuaded. Important differences separate Skilling’s prosecution from those in which we have presumed juror prejudice. First, we have emphasized in prior decisions the size and characteristics of the community in which the crime occurred. In Rideau, for example, we noted that the murder was committed in a parish of only 150,000 residents. Houston, in contrast, is the fourth most populous city in the Nation: At the time of Skilling’s trial, more than 4.5 million individuals eligible for jury duty resided in the Houston area. App. 627a. Given this large, diverse pool of potential jurors, the suggestion that 12 impartial individuals could not be empaneled is hard to sustain. See Mu’Min v. Virginia, 500 U. S. 415, 429 (1991) (potential for prejudice mitigated by the size of the “metropolitan Washington [D. C.] statistical area, which has a population of over 3 million, and in which, unfortunately, hundreds of murders are committed each year”); Gentile v. State Bar of Nev., 501 U. S. 1030, 1044 (1991) (plurality opinion) (reduced likelihood of prejudice where venire was drawn from a pool of over 600,000 individuals). Second, although news stories about Skilling were not kind, they contained no confession or other blatantly prejudicial information of the type readers or viewers could not reasonably be expected to shut from sight. Rideau’s dramatieally staged admission of guilt, for instance, was likely imprinted indelibly in the mind of anyone who watched it. Cf. Parker v. Randolph, 442 U. S. 62, 72 (1979) (plurality opinion) (“[T]he defendant’s own confession [is] probably the most probative and damaging evidence that can be admitted against him.” (internal quotation marks omitted)). Pretrial publicity about Skilling was less memorable and prejudicial. No evidence of the smoking-gun variety invited prejudgment of his culpability. See United States v. Chagra, 669 F. 2d 241, 251-252, n. 11 (CA5 1982) (“A jury may have difficulty in disbelieving or forgetting a defendant’s opinion of his own guilt but have no difficulty in rejecting the opinions of others because they may not be well-founded.”). Third, unlike cases in which trial swiftly followed a widely reported crime, e. g., Rideau, 373 U. S., at 724, over four years elapsed between Enron’s bankruptcy and Skilling’s trial. Although reporters covered Enron-related news throughout this period, the decibel level of media attention diminished somewhat in the years following Enron’s collapse. See App. 700a; id., at 785a; Yount, 467 U. S., at 1032, 1034. Finally, and of prime significance, Skilling’s jury acquitted him of nine insider-trading counts. Similarly, earlier instituted Enron-related prosecutions yielded no overwhelming victory for the Government. In Rideau, Estes, and Sheppard, in marked contrast, the jury’s verdict did not undermine in any way the supposition of juror bias. It would be odd for an appellate court to presume prejudice in a case in which jurors’ actions run counter to that presumption. See, e. g., United States v. Arzola-Amaya, 867 F. 2d 1504, 1514 (CA5 1989) (“The jury’s ability to discern a failure of proof of guilt of some of the alleged crimes indicates a fair minded consideration of the issues and reinforces our belief and conclusion that the media coverage did not lead to the deprivation of [the] right to an impartial trial.”). 4 Skilling’s trial, in short, shares little in common with those in which we approved a presumption of juror prejudice. The Fifth Circuit reached the opposite conclusion based primarily on the magnitude and negative tone of media attention directed at Enron. But “pretrial publicity — even pervasive, adverse publicity — does not inevitably lead to an unfair trial.” Nebraska Press Assn. v. Stuart, 427 U. S. 539, 554 (1976). In this case, as just noted, news stories about Enron did not present, the kind of vivid, unforgettable information we have recognized as particularly likely to produce prejudice, and Houston’s size and diversity diluted the media’s impact. Nor did Enron’s “sheer number of victims,” 554 F. 3d, at 560, trigger a presumption of prejudice. Although the widespread community impact necessitated careful identification and inspection of prospective jurors’ connections to Enron, the extensive screening questionnaire and followup voir dire were well suited to that task. And hindsight shows the efficacy of these devices; as we discuss infra, at 389-390, jurors’ links to Enron were either nonexistent or attenuated. Finally, although Causey’s “well-publicized decision to plead guilty” shortly before trial created a danger of juror prejudice, 554 F. 3d, at 559, the District Court took appropriate steps to reduce that risk. The court delayed the proceedings by two weeks, lessening the immediacy of that development. And during voir dire, the court asked about prospective jurors’ exposure to recent publicity, including news regarding Causey. Only two venire members recalled the plea; neither mentioned Causey by name, and neither ultimately served on Skilling’s jury. App. 888a, 993a. Although publicity about a codefendant’s guilty plea calls for inquiry to guard against actual prejudice, it does not ordinarily — and, we are satisfied, it did not here — warrant an automatic presumption of prejudice. Persuaded that no presumption arose, we conclude that the District Court, in declining to order a venue change, did not exceed constitutional limitations. B We next consider whether actual prejudice infected Skilling’s jury. Voir dire, Skilling asserts, did not adequately detect and defuse juror bias. “[T]he record... affirmatively confirmjs]” prejudice, he maintains, because several seated jurors “prejudged his guilt.” Brief for Petitioner 21. We disagree with Skilling’s characterization of the voir dire and the jurors selected through it. 1 No hard-and-fast formula dictates the necessary depth or breadth of voir dire. See United States v. Wood, 299 U. S. 123, 145-146 (1936) (“Impartiality is not a technical conception. It is a state of mind. For the ascertainment of this mental attitude of appropriate indifference, the Constitution lays down no particular tests and procedure is not chained to any ancient and artificial formula.”). Jury selection, we have repeatedly emphasized, is “particularly within the province of the trial judge.” Ristaino v. Ross, 424 U. S. 589, 594-595 (1976) (internal quotation marks omitted); see, e. g., Mu’Min, 500 U. S., at 424; Yount, 467 U. S., at 1038; Rosales-Lopez v. United States, 451 U. S. 182, 188-189 (1981) (plurality opinion); Connors v. United States, 158 U. S. 408, 408-413 (1895). When pretrial publicity is at issue, “primary reliance on the judgment of the trial court makes [especially] good sense” because the judge “sits in the locale where the publicity is said to have had its effect” and may base her evaluation on her “own perception of the depth and extent of news stories that might influence a juror.” Mu’Min, 500 U. S., at 427. Appellate courts making after-the-fact assessments of the media’s impact on jurors should be mindful that their judgments lack the on-the-spot comprehension of the situation possessed by trial judges. Reviewing courts are properly resistant to second-guessing the trial judge’s estimation of a juror’s impartiality, for that judge’s appraisal is ordinarily influenced by a host of factors impossible to capture fully in the record — among them, the prospective juror’s inflection, sincerity, demeanor, candor, body language, and apprehension of duty. See Reynolds, 98 U. S., at 156-157. In contrast to the cold transcript received by the appellate court, the in-the-moment voir dire affords the trial court a more intimate and immediate basis for assessing a venire member’s fitness for jury service. We consider the adequacy of jury selection in Skilling’s case, therefore, attentive to the respect due to district-court determinations of juror impartiality and of the measures necessary to ensure that impartiality. 2 Skilling deems the voir dire insufficient because, he argues, jury selection lasted “just five hours,” “[m]ost of the court’s questions were conclusory[,] high-level, and failed adequately to probe jurors’ true feelings,” and the court “consistently took prospective jurors at their word once they claimed they could be fair, no matter what other indications of bias were present.” Brief for Petitioner 10-11 (emphasis deleted). Our review of the record, however, yields a different appraisal. As noted, supra, at 370-372, and n. 4, the District Court initially screened venire members by eliciting their responses to a comprehensive questionnaire drafted in large part by Skilling. That survey helped to identify prospective jurors excusable for 'cause and served as a springboard for further questions put to remaining members of the array. Voir dire thus was, in the court’s words, the “culmination of a lengthy process.” App. 841a; see 554 F. 3d, at 562, n. 51 (“We consider the... questionnaire in assessing the quality of voir dire as a whole.”). In other Enron-related prosecutions, we note, District Courts, after inspecting venire members’ responses to questionnaires, completed the jury-selection process within one day. See supra, at 374, n. 6. The District Court conducted voir dire, moreover, aware of the greater-than-normal need, due to pretrial publicity, to ensure against jury bias. At Skilling’s urging, the court examined each prospective juror individually, thus preventing the spread of any prejudicial information to other venire members. See Mu’Min, 500 U. S., at 425. To encourage candor, the court repeatedly admonished that there were “no right and wrong answers to th[e] questions.” E. g., App. 843a. The court denied Skilling’s request for attorney-led voir dire because, in its experience, potential jurors were “more forthcoming” when the court, rather than counsel, asked the question. Record 11805. The parties, however, were accorded an opportunity to ask followup questions of every prospective juror brought to the bench for colloquy. Skilling’s counsel declined to ask anything of more than half of the venire members questioned individually, including eight eventually selected for the jury, because, he explained, “the Court and other counsel have covered” everything he wanted to know. App. 967a. Inspection of the questionnaires and voir dire of the individuals who actually served as jurors satisfies us that, notwithstanding the flaws Skilling lists, the selection process successfully secured jurors who were largely untouched by Enron’s collapse. Eleven of the seated jurors and alternates reported no connection at all to Enron, while all other jurors reported at most an insubstantial link. See, e. g., Supp. App. lOlsa (Juror 63) (“I once met a guy who worked for Enron. I cannot remember his name.”). As for pretrial publicity, 14 jurors and alternates specifically stated that they had paid scant attention to Enron-related news. See, e. g., App. 859a-860a (Juror 13) (would “[b]asically” start out knowing nothing about the case because “I just... didn’t follow [it] a whole lot”); id., at 969a (Juror 78) (“[Enron] wasn’t anything that I was interested in reading [about] in detail.... I don’t really know much about it.”). The remaining two jurors indicated that nothing in the news influenced their opinions about Skilling. The questionnaires confirmed that, whatever community prejudice existed in Houston generally, Skilling’s jurors were not under its sway. Although many expressed sympathy for victims of Enron’s bankruptcy and speculated that greed contributed to the corporation’s collapse, these sentiments did not translate into animus toward Skilling. When asked whether they “ha[d] an opinion about... Jeffrey Skilling,” none of the seated jurors and alternates checked the “yes” box. And in response to the question whether “any opinion [they] may have formed regarding Enron or [Skilling] [would] prevent” their impartial consideration of the evidence at trial, every juror — despite options to mark “yes” or “unsure” — instead checked “no.” The District Court, Skilling asserts, should not have “accepted] at face value jurors’ promises of fairness.” Brief for Petitioner 37. In Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U. S., at 727-728, Skilling points out, we found actual prejudice despite jurors’ assurances that they could be impartial. Brief for Petitioner 26. Justice Sotomayor, in turn, repeatedly relies on Irvin, which she regards as closely analogous to this case. See post, at 448 (dissent). See also, e. g., post, at 441-442, 458, 460, 464. We disagree with that characterization of Irvin. The facts of Irvin are worlds apart from those presented here. Leslie Irvin stood accused of a brutal murder and robbery spree in a small rural community. 366 U. S., at 719. In the months before Irvin’s trial, “a barrage” of publicity was “unleashed against him,” including reports of his confessions to the slayings Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Stewart delivered the opinion of the Court. These companion cases involve a double-barreled assault upon the efforts of a national bank to go into the business of operating a mutual investment fund. The petitioners in No. 61 are an association of open-end investment companies and several individual such companies. They brought an action in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, attacking portions of Regulation 9 issued by the Comptroller of the Currency, on the ground that this Regulation, in purporting to authorize banks to establish and operate collective investment funds, sought to permit activities prohibited to national banks or their affiliates by various provisions of the Glass-Steagall Banking Act of 1933, 48 Stat. 162. The petitioners also specifically attacked the Comptroller’s approval of the application of First National City Bank of New York for permission to establish and operate a collective investment fund. In No. 59 the National Association of Securities Dealers filed a petition in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit seeking review of an order of the Securities and Exchange Commission that partially exempted the collective investment fund of First National City Bank of New York from various provisions of the Investment Company Act of 1940. In No. 61 the District Court concluded that the challenged provisions of Regulation 9 were invalid under the Glass-Steagall Act. The Comptroller and First National City Bank appealed from this decision, and the appeal was consolidated with the petition for review in No. 59. The Court of Appeals held that the actions taken by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Comptroller were fully consonant with the statutes committed to their regulatory supervision. Accordingly, it affirmed the order of the Commission and reversed the judgment of the District Court. We granted certiorari to consider important questions presented under federal regulatory statutes. For the reasons that follow, we hold Regulation 9 invalid insofar as it authorizes the sale of interests in an investment fund of the type established by First National City Bank pursuant to the Comptroller’s approval. This disposition makes it unnecessary to consider the propriety of the action of the Securities and Exchange Commission in affording this fund exemption from certain of the provisions of the Investment Company Act of 1940. I In No. 61 it is urged at the outset that petitioners lack standing to question whether national banks may legally enter a field in competition with them. This contention is foreclosed by Data Processing Service v. Camp, 397 U. S. 150. There we held that companies that offered data processing services to the general business community had standing to seek judicial review of a ruling by the Comptroller that national banks could make data processing services available to other banks and to bank customers. We held that data processing companies were sufficiently injured by the competition that the Comptroller had authorized to create a case or controversy. The injury to the petitioners in the instant case is indistinguishable. We also concluded that Congress did not intend “to preclude judicial review of administrative rulings by the Comptroller as to the legitimate scope of activities available to national banks under [the National Bank Act].” 397 U. S., at 157. This is precisely the review that the petitioners have sought in this case. Finally, we concluded that Congress had arguably legislated against the competition that the petitioners sought to challenge, and from which flowed their injury. We noted that whether Congress had indeed prohibited such competition was a question for the merits. In the discussion that follows in the balance of this opinion we deal with the merits of the petitioners’ contentions and conclude that Congress did legislate against the competition that the petitioners challenge. There can be no real question, therefore, of the petitioners’ standing in the light of the Data Processing case. See also Arnold Tours v. Camp, 400 U. S. 45. II The issue before us is whether the Comptroller of the Currency may, consistently with the banking laws, authorize a national bank to offer its customers the opportunity to invest in a stock fund created and maintained by the bank. Before 1963 national banks were prohibited by administrative regulation from offering this service. The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, which until 1962 had regulatory jurisdiction over all the trust activities of national banks, allowed the collective investment of trust assets only for “the investment of funds held for true fiduciary purposes.” The applicable regulation, Regulation F, specified that “the operation of such Common Trust Funds as investment trusts for other than strictly fiduciary purposes is hereby prohibited.” The Board consistently ruled that it was improper for a bank to use “a Common Trust Fund as an investment trust attracting money seeking investment alone and to embark upon what would be in effect the sale of participations in a Common Trust Fund to the public as investments.” 26 Fed. Reserve Bull. 393 (1940); see also 42 Fed. Reserve Bull. 228 (1956); 41 Fed. Reserve Bull. 142 (1955). In 1962 Congress transferred jurisdiction over most of the trust activities of national banks from the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System to the Comptroller of the Currency, without modifying any provision of substantive law. Pub. L. 87-722, 76 Stat. 668, 12 U. S. C. § 92a. The Comptroller thereupon solicited suggestions for improving the regulations applicable to trust activities. Subsequently, new regulations were proposed which expressly authorized the collective investment of monies delivered to the bank for investment management, so-called managing agency accounts. These proposed regulations were officially promulgated in 1963 with changes not material here. In 1965 the First National City Bank of New York submitted for the Comptroller’s approval a plan for the collective investment of managing agency accounts. The Comptroller promptly approved the plan, and it is now in operation. This plan, which departs in some respects from the plan envisaged by the Comptroller’s Regulation, is expected, the briefs tell us, to be a model for other banks which decide to offer their customers a collective investment service. Under the plan the bank customer tenders between $10,000 and $500,000 to the bank, together with an authorization making the bank the customer’s managing agent. The customer’s investment is added to the fund, and a written evidence of participation is issued which expresses in “units of participation” the customer’s proportionate interest in fund assets. Units of participation are freely redeemable, and transferable to anyone who has executed a managing agency agreement with the bank. The fund is registered as an investment company under the Investment Company Act of 1940. The bank is the underwriter of the fund’s units of participation within the meaning of that Act. The fund has filed a registration statement pursuant to the Securities Act of 1933. The fund is supervised by a five-member committee elected annually by the participants pursuant to the Investment Company Act of 1940. The Securities and Exchange Commission has exempted the fund from the Investment Company Act to the extent that a majority of this committee may be affiliated with the bank, and it is expected that a majority always will be officers in the bank’s trust and investment division. The actual custody and investment of fund assets is carried out by the bank as investment advisor pursuant to a management agreement. Although the Investment Company Act requires that this management agreement be approved annually by the committee, including a majority of the unaffiliated members, or by the participants, it is expected that the bank will continue to be investment advisor. Ill Section 16 of the Glass-Steagall Act as amended, 12 U. S. C. § 24, Seventh, provides that the “business of dealing in securities and stock [by a national bank] shall be limited to purchasing and selling such securities and stock without recourse, solely upon the order, and for the account of, customers, and in no case for its own account.... Except as hereinafter provided or otherwise permitted by law, nothing herein contained shall authorize the purchase by [a national bank] for its own account of any shares of stock of any corporation.” The petitioners contend that a purchase of stock by a bank’s investment fund is a purchase of stock by a bank for its own account in violation of this section. Section 16 also provides that a national bank “shall not underwrite any issue of securities or stock.” And § 21 of the same Act, 12 U. S. C. § 378 (a), provides that “it shall be unlawful — (1) For any person, firm, corporation, association, business trust, or other similar organization, engaged in the business of issuing, underwriting, selling, or distributing, at wholesale or retail, or through syndicate participation, stocks, bonds, debentures, notes, or other securities, to engage at the same time to any extent whatever in the business of [deposit banking].” The petitioners contend that the creation and operation of an investment fund by a bank which offers to its customers the opportunity to purchase an interest in the fund’s assets constitutes the issuing, underwriting, selling, or distributing of securities or stocks in violation of these sections. The questions raised by the petitioners are novel and substantial. National banks were granted trust powers in 1913. Federal Reserve Act, § 11, 38 Stat. 261. The first common trust fund was organized in 1927, and such funds were expressly authorized by the Federal Reserve Board by Regulation F promulgated in 1937. Report on Commingled or Common Trust Funds Administered by Banks and Trust Companies, H. R. Doc. No. 476, 76th Cong., 2d Sess., 4-5 (1939). For at least a generation, therefore, there has been no reason to doubt that a national bank can, consistently with the banking laws, commingle trust funds on the one hand, and act as a managing agent on the other. No provision of the banking law suggests that it is improper for a national bank to pool trust assets, or to act as a managing agent for individual customers, or to purchase stock for the account of its customers. But the union of these powers gives birth to an investment fund whose activities are of a different character. The differences between the investment fund that the Comptroller has authorized and a conventional open-end mutual fund are subtle at best, and it is undisputed that this bank investment fund finds itself in direct competition with the mutual fund industry. One would suppose that the business of a mutual fund consists of buying stock “for its own account” and of “issuing” and “selling” “stock” or “other securities” evidencing an undivided and redeemable interest in the assets of the fund. On their face, §§16 and 21 of the Glass-Steagall Act appear clearly to prohibit this activity by national banks. But we cannot come lightly to the conclusion that the Comptroller has authorized activity that violates the banking laws. It is settled that courts should give great weight to any reasonable construction of a regulatory statute adopted by the agency charged with the enforcement of that statute. The Comptroller of the Currency is charged with the enforcement of the banking laws to an extent that warrants the invocation of this principle with respect to his deliberative conclusions as to the meaning of these laws. See First National Bank v. Missouri, 263 U. S. 640, 658. The difficulty here is that the Comptroller adopted no expressly articulated position at the administrative level as to the meaning and impact of the provisions of §§16 and 21 as they affect bank investment funds. The Comptroller promulgated Regulation 9 without opinion or accompanying statement. His subsequent report to Congress did not advert to the prohibitions of the Glass-Steagall Act. Comptroller of the Currency, 101st Annual Report 14-15 (1963). To be sure, counsel for the Comptroller in the course of this litigation, and specifically in his briefs and oral argument in this Court, has rationalized the basis of Regulation 9 with great professional competence. But this is hardly tantamount to an administrative interpretation of §§16 and 21. In Burlington Truck Lines v. United States, 371 U. S. 156, we said, “The courts may not accept appellate counsel’s post hoc rationalizations for agency action.... For the courts to substitute their or counsel’s discretion for that of the [agency] is incompatible with the orderly functioning of the process of judicial review.” Id., at 168-169. Congress has delegated to the administrative official and not to appellate counsel the responsibility for elaborating and enforcing statutory commands. It is the administrative official and not appellate counsel who possesses the expertise that can enlighten and rationalize the search for the meaning and intent of Congress. Quite obviously the Comptroller should not grant new authority to national banks until he is satisfied that the exercise of this authority will not violate the intent of the banking laws. If he faces such questions only after he has acted, there is substantial danger that the momentum generated by initial approval may seriously impair the enforcement of the banking laws that Congress enacted. IV There is no dispute that one of the objectives of the Glass-Steagall Act was to prohibit commercial banks, banks that receive deposits subject to repayment, lend money, discount and negotiate promissory notes and the like, from going into the investment banking business. Many commercial banks were indirectly engaged in the investment banking business when the Act was passed in 1933. Even before the passage of the Act it was generally believed that it was improper for a commercial bank to engage in investment banking directly. But in 1908 banks began the practice of establishing security affiliates that engaged in, inter alia, the business of floating bond issues and, less frequently, underwriting stock issues. The Glass-Steagall Act confirmed that national banks could not engage in investment banking directly, and in addition made affiliation with an organization so engaged illegal. One effect of the Act was to abolish the security affiliates of commercial banks. It is apparent from the legislative history of the Act why Congress felt that this drastic step was necessary. The failure of the Bank of United States in 1930 was widely attributed to that bank’s activities with respect to its numerous securities affiliates. Moreover, Congress was concerned that commercial banks in general and member banks of the Federal Reserve System in particular had both aggravated and been damaged by stock market decline partly because of their direct and indirect involvement in the trading and ownership of speculative securities. The Glass-Steagall Act reflected a determination that policies of competition, convenience, or expertise which might otherwise support the entry of commercial banks into the investment banking business were outweighed by the “hazards” and “financial dangers” that arise when commercial banks engage in the activities proscribed by the Act. The hazards that Congress had in mind were not limited to the obvious danger that a bank might invest its own assets in frozen or otherwise imprudent stock or security investments. For often securities affiliates had operated without direct access to the assets of the bank. This was because securities affiliates had frequently been established with capital paid in by the bank’s stockholders, or by the public, or through the allocation of a legal dividend on bank stock for this purpose. The legislative history of the Glass-Steagall Act shows that Congress also had in mind and repeatedly focused on the more subtle hazards that arise when a commercial bank goes beyond the business of acting as fiduciary or managing agent and enters the investment banking business either directly or by establishing an affiliate to hold and sell particular investments. This course places new promotional and other pressures on the bank which in turn create new temptations. For example, pressures are created because the bank and the affiliate are closely associated in the public mind, and should the affiliate fare badly, public confidence in the bank might be impaired. And since public confidence is essential to the solvency of a bank, there might exist a natural temptation to shore up the affiliate through unsound loans or other aid. Moreover, the pressure to sell a particular investment and to make the affiliate successful might create a risk that the bank would make its credit facilities more freely available to those companies in whose stock or securities the affiliate has invested or become otherwise involved. Congress feared that banks might even go so far as to make unsound loans to such companies. In any event, it was thought that the bank’s salesman’s interest might impair its ability to function as an impartial source of credit. Congress was also concerned that bank depositors might suffer losses on investments that they purchased in reliance on the relationship between the bank and its affiliate. This loss of customer good will might “become an important handicap to a bank during a major period of security market deflation.” More broadly, Congress feared that the promotional needs of investment banking might lead commercial banks to lend their reputation for prudence and restraint to the enterprise of selling particular stocks and securities, and that this could not be done without that reputation being undercut by the risks necessarily incident to the investment banking business. There was also perceived the danger that when commercial banks were subject to the promotional demands of investment banking, they might be tempted to make loans to customers with the expectation that the loan would facilitate the purchase of stocks and securities. There was evidence before Congress that loans for investment written by commercial banks had done much to feed the speculative fever of the late 1920’s. Senator Glass made it plain that it was “the fixed purpose of Congress” not to see the facilities of commercial banking diverted into speculative operations by the aggressive and promotional character of the investment banking business. Another potential hazard that very much concerned Congress arose from the plain conflict between the promotional interest of the investment banker and the obligation of the commercial banker to render disinterested investment advice. Senator Bulkley stated: “Obviously, the banker who has nothing to sell to his depositors is much better qualified to advise disinterestedly and to regard diligently the safety of depositors than the banker who uses the list of depositors in his savings department to distribute circulars concerning the advantages of this, that, or the other investment on which the bank is to receive an originating profit or an underwriting profit or a distribution profit or a trading profit or any combination of such profits.” Congress had before it evidence that security affiliates might be driven to unload excessive holdings through the trust department of the sponsor bank. Some witnesses at the hearings expressed the view that this practice constituted self-dealing in violation of the trustee’s obligation of loyalty, and indeed that it would be improper for a bank’s trust department to purchase anything from the bank’s securities affiliate. In sum, Congress acted to keep commercial banks out of the investment banking business largely because it believed that the promotional incentives of investment banking and the investment banker’s pecuniary stake in the success of particular investment opportunities was destructive of prudent and disinterested commercial banking and of public confidence in the commercial banking system. As Senator Bulkley put it: “If we want banking service to be strictly banking service, without the expectation of additional profits in selling something to customers, we must keep the banks out of the investment security business.” y The language that Congress chose to achieve this purpose includes the prohibitions of § 16 that a national bank “shall not underwrite any issue of securities or stock” and shall not purchase “for its own account... any shares of stock of any corporation,” and the prohibition of § 21 against engaging in “the business of issuing, underwriting, selling, or distributing... stocks, bonds, debentures, notes, or other securities.” In this litigation the Comptroller takes the position that the operation of a bank investment fund is consistent with these provisions, because participating interests in such a fund are not “securities” within the meaning of the Act. It is argued that a bank investment fund simply makes available to the small investor the benefit of investment management by a bank trust department which would otherwise be available only to large investors, and that the operation of an investment fund creates no problems that are not present whenever a bank invests in securities for the account of customers. But there is nothing in the phrasing of either § 16 or § 21 that suggests a narrow reading of the word “securities.” To the contrary, the breadth of the term is implicit in the fact that the antecedent statutory language encompasses not only equity securities but also securities representing debt. And certainly there is nothing in the language of these provisions to suggest that the sale of an interest in the business of buying, holding, and selling stocks for investment is to be distinguished from the sale of an interest in a commercial or industrial enterprise. Indeed, there is direct evidence that Congress specifically contemplated that the word “security” includes an interest in an investment fund. The Glass-Steagall Act was the product of hearings conducted pursuant to Senate Resolution 71 which included among the topics to be investigated the impact on the banking system of the formation of investment and security trusts. The subcommittee found that one of the activities in which bank security affiliates engaged was that of an investment trust: “buying and selling securities acquired purely for investment or speculative purposes.” Since Congress generally intended to divorce commercial banking from the kinds of activities in which bank security affiliates engaged, there is reason to believe that Congress explicitly intended to prohibit a national bank from operating an investment trust. But, in any event, we are persuaded that the purposes for which Congress enacted the Glass-Steagall Act leave no room for the conclusion that a participation in a bank investment fund is not a “security” within the meaning of the Act. From the perspective of competition, convenience, and expertise, there are arguments to be made in support of allowing commercial banks to enter the investment banking business. But Congress determined that the hazards outlined above made it necessary to prohibit this activity to commercial banks. Those same hazards are clearly present when a bank undertakes to operate an investment fund. A bank that operates an investment fund has a particular investment to sell. It is not a matter of indifference to the bank whether the customer buys an interest in the fund or makes some other investment. If its customers cannot be persuaded to invest in the bank’s investment fund, the bank will lose their investment business and the fee which that business would have brought in. Even as to accounts large enough to qualify for individual investment management, there might be a potential for a greater profit if the investment were placed in the fund rather than in individually selected securities, because of fixed costs and economies of scale. The mechanics of operating an investment fund might also create promotional pressure. When interests in the fund were redeemed, the bank would be effectively faced with the choice of selling stocks from the fund’s portfolio or of selling new participations to cover redemptions. The bank might have a pecuniary incentive to choose the latter course in order to avoid the cost of stock transactions undertaken solely for redemption purposes. Promotional incentives might also be created by the circumstance that the bank’s fund would be in direct competition with mutual funds that, from the point of view of the investor, offered an investment opportunity comparable to that offered by the bank. The bank would want to be in a position to show to the prospective customer that its fund was more attractive than the mutual funds offered by others. The bank would have a salesman’s stake in the performance of the fund, for if the fund were less successful than the competition the bank would lose business and the resulting fees. A bank that operated an investment fund would necessarily put its reputation and facilities squarely behind that fund and the investment opportunity that the fund offered. The investments of the fund might be conservative or speculative, but in any event the success or failure of the fund would be a matter of public record. Imprudent or unsuccessful management of the bank’s investment fund could bring about a perhaps unjustified loss of public confidence in the bank itself. If imprudent management should place the fund in distress, a bank might find itself under pressure to rescue the fund through measures inconsistent with sound banking. The promotional and other pressures incidental to the operation of an investment fund, in other words, involve the same kinds of potential abuses that Congress intended to guard against when it legislated against bank security affiliates. It is not the slightest reflection on the integrity of the mutual fund industry to say that the traditions of that industry are not necessarily the conservative traditions of commercial banking. The needs and interests of a mutual fund enterprise more nearly approximate those of securities underwriting, the activity in which bank security affiliates were primarily engaged. When a bank puts itself in competition with mutual funds, the bank must make an accommodation to the kind of ground rules that Congress firmly concluded could not be prudently mixed with the business of commercial banking. And there are other potential hazards of the kind Congress sought to eliminate with the passage of the Glass-Steagall Act. The bank’s stake in the investment fund might distort its credit decisions or lead to unsound loans to the companies in which the fund had invested. The bank might exploit its confidential relationship with its commercial and industrial creditors for the benefit of the fund. The bank might undertake, directly or indirectly, to make its credit facilities available to the fund or to render other aid to the fund inconsistent with the best interests of the bank’s depositors. The bank might make loans to facilitate the purchase of interests in the fund. The bank might divert talent and resources from its commercial banking operation to the promotion of the fund. Moreover, because the bank would have a stake in a customer’s making a particular investment decision — the decision to invest in the bank’s investment fund — the customer might doubt the motivation behind the bank’s recommendation that he make such an investment. If the fund investment should turn out badly there would be a danger that the bank would lose the good will of those customers who had invested in the fund. It might be unlikely that disenchantment would go so far as to threaten the solvency of the bank. But because banks are dependent on the confidence of their customers, the risk would not be unreal. These are all hazards that are not present when a bank undertakes to purchase stock for the account of its individual customers or to commingle assets which it has received for a true fiduciary purpose rather than for investment. These activities, unlike the operation of an investment fund, do not give rise to a promotional or salesman’s stake in a particular investment; they do not involve an enterprise in direct competition with aggressively promoted funds offered by other investment companies; they do not entail a threat to public confidence in the bank itself; and they do not impair the bank’s ability to give disinterested service as a fiduciary or managing agent. In short, there is a plain difference between the sale of fiduciary services and the sale of investments. VI The Glass-Steagall Act was a prophylactic measure directed against conditions that the experience of the 1920’s showed to be great potentials for abuse. The literal terms of that Act clearly prevent what the Comptroller has sought to authorize here. Because the potential hazards and abuses that flow from a bank’s entry into the mutual investment business are the same basic hazards and abuses that Congress intended to eliminate almost 40 years ago, we cannot but apply the terms of the federal statute as they were written. We conclude that the operation of an investment fund of the kind approved by the Comptroller involves a bank in the underwriting, issuing, selling, and distributing of securities in violation of §§ 16 and 21 of the Glass-Steagall Act. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment in No. 61 and vacate the judgment in No. 59. It is so ordered. The Chief Justice took no part in the consideration or decision of these cases. 12 CFR Pt. 9 (1970). The provisions of the Glass-Steagall Act are codified in various sections scattered through Title 12 of the United States Code. The exemption was granted in response to an application filed pursuant to § 6 (c) of the Act, 54 Stat. 802, 15 U. S. C. § 80a-6 (c). 274 F. Supp. 624. 136 U. S. App. D. C. 241, 420 F. 2d 83. 397 U. S. 986. 12 CFR §9.18 (a) provides that: “Where not in contravention of local law, funds held by a national bank as fiduciary may be invested collectively:... (3) In a common trust fund, maintained by the bank exclusively for the collective investment and reinvestment of monies contributed thereto by the bank in its capacity as managing agent under a managing agency agreement expressly providing that such monies are received by the bank in trust....” For example, the investment fund plan as established does not provide that the bank receives the investor’s money in trust. The opinion of the Commission and the dissent of Commissioner Budge are unofficially reported at CCH Fed. Sec. L. Rep., 1964-1966 Decisions, ¶ 77,332. Section 16, as enacted in 1933, granted no authority to purchase stock for the account of customers and prohibited any purchase of stock by a national bank. The 1935 Amendments to the National Bank Act included a provision intended to make it clear that a national bank may buy stock for the account of customers but not for its own account. S. Rep. No. 1007, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 17; H. R. Rep. No. 742, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 18. A mutual fund is an open-end investment company. The Investment Company Act of 1940 defines an investment company as an “issuer” of “any security” which “is or holds itself out as being engaged primarily... in the business of investing... in securities....” 15 U. S. C. §§ 80a-2 (a) (21), 80a-3 (a)(1). An open-end company is one “which is offering for sale or has outstanding any redeemable security of which it is the issuer.” 15 U. S. C. § 80a-5 (a) (1). An investment company also includes a “unit investment trust”: an investment company which, among other things, “is organized under a... contract of... agency... and... issues only redeemable securities, each of which represents an undivided interest in a unit of specified securities....” 15 U. S. C. § 80a-4 (2). Section 20 of the Act, 12 U. S. C. § 377, prohibits affiliations between banks that are members of the Federal Reserve System and organizations “engaged principally in the issue, flotation, underwriting, public sale, or distribution at wholesale or retail or through syndicate participation of stocks, bonds, debentures, notes, or other securities....” And § 32, 12 U. S. C. § 78, provides that no officer, director, or employee of a bank in the Federal Reserve System may serve at the same time as officer, director, or employee of an association primarily engaged in the activity described in § 20. The petitioners contend that if a bank’s investment fund be conceived as an entity distinct from the bank, then its affiliation with the investment fund is in violation of these sections. The Board of Governors has had occasion to consider whether an investment fund of the type operated by First National City Bank involves a violation of § 32 of the Glass-Steagall Act. 12 CFR § 218.111 (1970). The Board concluded, based on “general principles that have been developed in respect to the application of section 32,” that it would not violate that section for officers of the bank’s trust department to serve at the same time as officers of the investment fund because the fund and the bank “constitute a single entity,” and the fund “would be regarded as nothing more than an arm or department of the bank.” The Board called attention to § 21 whose provisions it summarized as forbidding “a securities firm or organization to engage in the business of receiving deposits, subject to certain exceptions.” The Board, however, declined to express a position concerning the applicability of this section because of its policy not to express views as to the meaning of statutes that carry criminal penalties. Nor has the Board expressed its views on the application of any other provision of the banking law to the creation and operation of a bank investment fund. We have no doubt but that the Board’s construction and application of § 32 is both reasonable and rational. The investment fund service authorized by the Comptroller’s regulation and as provided by the First National City Bank is a service available only to customers of the bank. It is held out as a service provided by the bank, and the investment fund bears the bank’s name. The bank has effective control over the activities of the investment fund. Moreover, there is no danger that to characterize the bank and its fund as a single entity will disserve the purpose of Congress. The limitations that the banking laws place on the activities of national banks are at least as great as the limitations placed on the activities of their affiliates. For example, § 32 refers to the “public sale” of stocks or securities while § 21 proscribes the “selling” of stocks or securities. A law review article written by Comptroller Saxon and Deputy Comptroller Miller in 1965 did take the position that the Glass-Steagall Act is inapplicable to bank common trust funds. Saxon & Miller, Common Trust Funds, 53 Geo. L. J. 994 (1965). But this view was predicated on the argument that when Congress in 1936 provided a tax exemption for common trust funds maintained by a bank, now 26 U. S. C. § 584, it contemplated the exemption of common trust funds created for strictly investment purposes, and that consequently Congress must have assumed that the banking laws, which otherwise appear to proscribe such funds, were not applicable. Id., at 1008-1010. Whatever the merits of this argument, it has no bearing on the instant litigation. It is clear that the collective investment funds authorized by Regulation 9 need not qualify for tax exemption under § 584; the First National City Bank Fund does not so qualify. Moreover, the position advanced in the brief filed on behalf of the Comptroller in this litigation is not that the banking laws are inapplicable to bank investment funds, but rather that the creation and operation of such funds are consistent with the banking laws. It is noteworthy that the § 584 exemption is available to common trust funds “maintained by a bank... exclusively for the collective investment and reinvestment of moneys contributed thereto by the bank in its capacity as a trustee, executor, administrator, or guardian... (Emphasis added.) This language, which makes no reference to contributions by the bank in its capacity as managing agent, is identical to that exempting such common trust funds from the Investment Company Act of 1940, 15 U. S. C. § 80a-3 (c)(3). The Securities and Exchange Commission has taken the position that commingled managing agency accounts do not come within § 80a-3 (c) (3). See Statement of Commissioner Cary, Hearings on Common Trust Funds — Overlapping Responsibility and Conflict in Regulation, before a Subcommittee of the House Committee on Government Operations, 88th Cong., 1st Sess., 3 (1963). Hearings Pursuant to S. Res. 71 before a Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Banking and Currency (hereafter 1931 Hearings), 71st Cong., 3d Sess., 40 (1931); 1920 Report of the Comptroller of the Currency, quoted id., at 1067, 1068. Senator Glass, commenting on earlier banking legislation, said, “We tried to, and thought at the time we had, removed the system as far as possible from the influence of the stock market.” Id., at 262. Id., at 1052. Report on Investment Trusts and Investment Companies, pt. 2, H. R. Doc. No. 70, 76th Cong., 1st Sess., 59 (1939). 1931 Hearings 116-117, 1017, 1068. See S. Rep. No. 77, 73d Cong., 1st Sess., 6, 8, 10. Id., at 18; see 1931 Hearings 366; 75 Cong. Rec. 9911 (remarks of Sen. Bulkley). 1931 Hearings 41, 192, 1056; 1920 Report of the Comptroller of the Currency, quoted Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. The judgment of the Supreme Court of Ohio is reversed. Redrup v. New York, 386 U. S. 767 (1967). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

C

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Powell delivered the opinion of the Court. These cases raise a challenge under the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the constitutionality of a recently enacted New York law which provides financial assistance, in several ways, to nonpublic elementary and secondary schools in that State. The cases involve an intertwining of societal and constitutional issues of the greatest importance. James Madison, in his Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments, admonished that a “prudent jealousy” for religious freedoms required that they never become “entangled... in precedents.” His strongly held convictions, coupled with those of Thomas Jefferson and others among the Founders, are reflected in the first Clauses of the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights, which state that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Yet, despite Madison’s admonition and the “sweep of the absolute prohibitions” of the Clauses, this Nation’s history has not been one of entirely sanitized separation between Church and State. It has never been thought either possible or desirable to enforce a regime of total separation, and as a consequence cases arising under these Clauses have presented some of the most perplexing questions to come before this Court. Those cases have occasioned thorough and thoughtful scholarship by several of this Court's most respected former Justices, including Justices Black, Frankfurter, Harlan, Jackson, Rutledge, and Chief Justice Warren. As a result of these decisions and opinions, it may no longer be said that the Religion Clauses are free of “entangling” precedents. Neither, however, may it be said that Jefferson's metaphoric “wall of separation” between Church and State has become “as winding as the famous serpentine wall” he designed for the University of Virginia. McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U. S. 203, 238 (1948) (Jackson, J., concurring). Indeed, the controlling constitutional standards have become firmly rooted and the broad contours of our inquiry are now well defined. Our task, therefore, is to assess New York’s several forms of aid in the light of principles already delineated. I In May 1972, the Governor of New York signed into law several amendments to the State's Education and Tax Laws. The first five sections of these amendments established three distinct financial aid programs for nonpublic elementary and secondary schools. Almost im-. mediately after the signing of these measures a complaint was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York challenging each of the three forms of aid as violative of the Establishment Clause. The plaintiffs were an unincorporated association, known as the Committee for Public Education and Religious Liberty (PEARL), and several individuals who were residents and taxpayers in New York, some of whom had children attending public schools. Named as defendants were the State Commissioner of Education, the Comptroller, and the Commissioner of Taxation and Finance. Motions to intervene on behalf of defendants were granted to a group of parents with children enrolled in nonpublic schools, and to the Majority Leader and President pro tern of the New York State Senate. By consent of the parties, a three-judge court was convened pursuant to 28 U. S. C. §§ 2281 and 2283, and the case was decided without an evidentiary hearing. Because the questions before the District Court were resolved on the basis of the pleadings, that court's decision turned on the constitutionality of each provision on its face. The first section of the challenged enactment, entitled “Health and Safety Grants for Nonpublic School Children,” provides for direct money grants from the State to “qualifying” nonpublic schools to be used for the “maintenance and repair of... school facilities and equipment to ensure the health, welfare and safety of enrolled pupils.” A “qualifying” school is any nonpublic, nonprofit elementary or secondary school which “has been designated during the [immediately preceding] year as serving a high concentration of pupils from low-income families for purposes of Title IV of the Federal Higher Education Act of nineteen hundred sixty-five (20 U. S. C. A. §425).” Such schools are entitled to receive a grant of $30 per pupil per year, or $40 per pupil per year if the facilities are more than 25 years old. Each school is required to submit to the Commissioner of Education an audited statement of its expenditures for maintenance and repair during the preceding year, and its grant may not exceed the total of such expenses. The Commissioner is also required to ascertain the average per-pupil cost for equivalent maintenance and repair services in the public schools, and in no event may the grant to nonpublic qualifying schools exceed 50% of that figure. “Maintenance and repair” is defined by the statute to include “the provision of heat, light, water, ventilation and sanitary facilities; cleaning, janitorial and custodial services; snow removal; necessary upkeep and renovation of buildings, grounds and equipment; fire and accident protection; and such other items as the commissioner may deem necessary to ensure the health, welfare and safety of enrolled pupils.” This section is prefaced by a series of legislative findings which shed light on the State’s purpose in enacting the law. These findings conclude that the State “has a primary responsibility to ensure the health, welfare and safety of children attending... nonpublic schools”; that the “fiscal crisis in nonpublic education... has caused a diminution of proper maintenance and repair programs, threatening the health, welfare and safety of nonpublic school children” in low-income urban areas; and that “a healthy and safe school environment” contributes “to the stability of urban neighborhoods.” For these reasons, the statute declares that “the state has the right to make grants for maintenance and repair expenditures which are clearly secular, neutral and non-ideological in nature.” The remainder of the challenged legislation — §§ 2 through 5 — is a single package captioned the “Elementary and Secondary Education Opportunity Program.” It is composed, essentially, of two parts, a tuition grant program and a tax benefit program. Section 2 establishes a limited plan providing tuition reimbursements to parents of children attending elementary or secondary nonpublic schools. To qualify under this section a parent must have an annual taxable income of less than $5,000. The amount of reimbursement is limited to $50 for each grade school child and $100 for each high school child. Each parent is required, however, to submit to the Commissioner of Education a verified statement containing a receipted tuition bill, and the amount of state reimbursement may not exceed 50% of that figure. No restrictions are imposed on the use of the funds by the reimbursed parents. This section, like § 1, is prefaced by a series of legislative findings designed to explain the impetus for the State’s action. Expressing a dedication to the “vitality of our pluralistic society,” the findings state that a “healthy competitive and diverse alternative to public education is not only desirable but indeed vital to a state and nation that have continually reaffirmed the value of individual differences.” The findings further emphasize that the right to select among alternative educational systems “is diminished or even denied to children of lower-income families, whose parents, of all groups, have the least options in determining where their children are to be educated.” Turning to the public schools, the findings state that any “precipitous decline in the number of nonpublic school pupils would cause a massive increase in public school enrollment and costs,” an increase that would “aggravate an already serious fiscal crisis in public education” and would “seriously jeopardize quality education for all children.” Based on these premises, the statute asserts the State’s right to relieve the financial burden of parents who send their children to nonpublic schools through this tuition reimbursement program. Repeating the declaration contained in § 1, the findings conclude that “[s]uch assistance is clearly secular, neutral and nonideological.” The remainder of the “Elementary and Secondary Education Opportunity Program,” contained in §§ 3, 4, and 5 of the challenged law, is designed to provide a form of tax relief to those who fail to qualify for tuition reimbursement. Under these sections parents may subtract from their adjusted gross income for state income tax purposes a designated amount for each dependent for whom they have paid at least $50 in nonpublic school tuition. If the taxpayer’s adjusted gross income is less than $9,000 he may subtract $1,000 for each of as many as three dependents. As the taxpayer’s income rises, the amount he may subtract diminishes. Thus, if a taxpayer has adjusted gross income of $15,000, he may subtract only $400 per dependent, and if his adjusted gross income is $25,000 or more, no deduction is allowed. The amount of the deduction is not dependent upon how much the taxpayer actually paid for nonpublic school tuition, and is given in addition to any deductions to which the taxpayer may be entitled for other religious or charitable contributions. As indicated in the memorandum from the Majority Leader and President pro tern of the Senate, submitted to each New York legislator during consideration of the bill, the actual tax benefits under these provisions were carefully calculated in advance. Thus, comparable tax benefits pick up at approximately the point at which tuition reimbursement benefits leave off. While the scheme of the enactment indicates that the purposes underlying the promulgation of the tuition reimbursement program should be regarded as pertinent as well to these tax law sections, § 3 does contain an additional series of legislative findings. Those findings may be summarized as follows: (i) contributions to religious, charitable and educational institutions are already deductible from gross income; (ii) nonpublic educational institutions are accorded tax exempt status; (iii) such institutions provide education for children attending them and also serve to relieve the public school systems of the burden of providing for their education; and, therefore, (iv) the “legislature... finds and determines that similar modifications... should also be provided to parents for tuition paid to nonpublic elementary and secondary schools on behalf of their dependents.” Although no record was developed in these cases, a number of pertinent generalizations may be made about the nonpublic schools which would benefit from these enactments. The District Court, relying on findings in a similar case recently decided by the same court, adopted a profile of these sectarian, nonpublic schools similar to the one suggested in the plaintiffs’ complaint. Qualifying institutions, under all three segments of the enactment, could be ones that “(a) impose religious restrictions on admissions; (b) require attendance of pupils at religious activities; (c) require obedience by students to the doctrines and dogmas of a particular faith; (d) require pupils to attend instruction in the theology or doctrine of a particular faith; (e) are an integral part of the religious mission of the church sponsoring it; (f) have as a substantial purpose the inculcation of religious values; (g) impose religious restrictions on faculty appointments; and (h) impose religious restrictions on what or how the faculty may teach.” 350 F. Supp. 655, 663. Of course, the characteristics of individual schools may vary widely from that profile. Some 700,000 to 800,000 students, constituting almost 20% of the State’s entire elementary and secondary school population, attend over 2,000 nonpublic schools, approximately 85% of which are church affiliated. And while “all or practically all” of the 280 schools entitled to receive “maintenance and repair” grants “are related to the Roman Catholic Church and teach Catholic religious doctrine to some degree,” id,, at 661, institutions qualifying under the remainder of the statute include a substantial number of Jewish, Lutheran, Episcopal, Seventh Day Adventist, and other church-affiliated schools. Plaintiffs argued below that because of the substantially religious character of the intended beneficiaries, each of the State’s three enactments offended, the Establishment Clause. The District Court, in an opinion carefully canvassing this Court’s recent precedents, held unanimously that § 1 (maintenance and repair grants) and § 2 (tuition reimbursement grants) were invalid. As to the income tax provisions of §§ 3, 4, and 5, however, a majority of the District Court, over the dissent of Circuit Judge Hays, held that the Establishment Clause had not been violated. Finding the provisions of the law severable, it enjoined permanently any further implementation of §§ 1 and 2 but declared the remainder of the law independently enforceable. The plaintiffs (hereinafter appellants) appealed directly to this Court, challenging the District Court’s adverse decision as to the third segment of the statute. The defendant state officials (hereinafter appellees) have appealed so much of the court’s decision as invalidates the first and second portions of the 1972 law, the inter-venor Majority Leader and President pro tern of the Senate (hereinafter appellee or intervenor) has also appealed from those aspects of the lower court’s opinion, and the intervening parents of nonpublic schoolchildren (hereinafter appellee or intervenor) have appealed only from the decision as to § 2. This Court noted probable jurisdiction over each appeal and ordered the cases consolidated for oral argument. 410 U. S. 907 (1973). Thus, the constitutionality of each of New York’s recently promulgated aid provisions is squarely before us. We affirm the District Court insofar as it struck down §§ 1 and 2 and reverse its determination regarding §§ 3, 4, and 5. II The history of the Establishment Clause has been recounted frequently and need not be repeated here. See Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U. S. 1 (1947); id., at 28 (Rutledge, J., dissenting); McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U. S., at 212 (separate opinion of Frankfurter, J.); McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420 (1961); Engel v. Vitale, 370 U. S. 421 (1962). It is enough to note that it is now firmly established that a law may be one “respecting an establishment of religion” even though its consequence is not to promote a “state religion,” Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U. S. 602, 612 (1971), and even though it does not aid one religion more than another but merely benefits all religions alike. Everson v. Board of Education, supra, at 15. It is equally well established, however, that not every law that confers an “indirect,” “remote,” or “incidental” benefit upon religious institutions is, for that reason alone, constitutionally invalid. Everson, supra; McGowan v. Maryland, supra, at 450; Walz v. Tax Comm’n, 397 U. S. 664, 671-672, 674-675 (1970). What our cases require is careful examination of any law challenged on establishment grounds with a view to ascertaining whether it furthers any of the evils against which that Clause protects. Primary among those evils have been “sponsorship, financial support, and active involvement of the sovereign in religious activity.” Walz v. Tax Comm’n, supra, at 668; Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra, at 612. Most of the cases coming to this Court raising Establishment Clause questions have involved the relationship between religion and education. Among these religion-education precedents, two general categories of cases may be identified: those dealing with religious activities within the public schools, and those involving public aid in varying forms to sectarian educational institutions. While the New York legislation places this case in the latter category, its resolution requires consideration not only of the several aid-to-sectarian-education cases, but also of our other education precedents and of several important noneducation cases. For the now well-defined three-part test that has emerged from our decisions is a product of considerations derived from the full sweep of the Establishment Clause cases. Taken together, these decisions dictate that to pass muster under the Establishment Clause the law in question, first, must reflect a clearly secular legislative purpose, e. g., Epperson v. Arkansas, 393 U. S. 97 (1968), second, must have a primary effect that neither advances nor inhibits religion, e. g., McGowan v. Maryland, supra; School District of Abington Township v. Schempp, 374 U. S. 203 (1963), and, third, must avoid excessive government entanglement with religion, e. g., Walz v. Tax Comm’n, supra. See Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra, at 612-613; Tilton v. Richardson, 403 U. S. 672, 678 (1971). In applying these criteria to the three distinct forms of aid involved in this case, we need touch only briefly on the requirement of a “secular legislative purpose.” As the recitation of legislative purposes appended to New York’s law indicates, each measure is adequately supported by legitimate, nonsectarian state interests. We do not question the propriety, and fully secular content, of New York’s interest in preserving a healthy and safe educational environment for all of its schoolchildren. And we do not doubt — indeed, we fully recognize — the validity of the State’s interests in promoting pluralism and diversity among its public and nonpublic schools. Nor do we hesitate to acknowledge the reality of its concern for an already overburdened public school system that might, suffer in the event that a significant percentage of children presently attending nonpublic schools should abandon those schools in favor of the public schools. But the propriety of a legislature’s purposes may not immunize from further scrutiny a law which either has a primary effect that advances religion, or which fosters excessive entanglements between Church and State. Accordingly, we must weigh each of the three aid provisions challenged here against these criteria of effect and entanglement. A The “maintenance and repair” provisions of § 1 authorize direct payments to nonpublic schools, virtually all of which are Roman Catholic schools in low-income areas. The grants, totaling $30 or $40 per pupil depending on the age of the institution, are given largely without restriction on usage. So long as expenditures do not exceed 50% of comparable expenses in the public school system, it is possible for a sectarian elementary or secondary school to finance its entire “maintenance and repair” budget from state tax-raised funds. No attempt is made to restrict payments to those expenditures related to the upkeep of facilities used exclusively for secular purposes, nor do we think it possible within the context of these religion-oriented institutions to impose such restrictions. Nothing in the statute, for instance, bars a qualifying school from paying out of state funds the salaries of employees who maintain the school chapel, or the cost of renovating classrooms in which religion is taught, or the cost of heating and lighting those same facilities. Absent appropriate restrictions on expenditures for these and similar purposes, it simply cannot be denied that this section has a primary effect that advances religion in that it subsidizes directly the religious activities of sectarian elementary and secondary schools. The state officials nevertheless argue that these expenditures for “maintenance and repair” are similar to other financial expenditures approved by this Court. Primarily they rely on Everson v. Board of Education, supra; Board of Education v. Allen, 392 U. S. 236 (1968); and Tilton v. Richardson, supra. In each of those cases it is true that the Court approved a form of financial assistance which conferred undeniable benefits upon private, sectarian schools. But a close examination of those cases illuminates their distinguishing characteristics. In Ever-son, the Court, in a five-to-four decision, approved a program of reimbursements to parents of public as well as parochial schoolchildren for bus fares paid in connection with transportation to and from school, a program which the Court characterized as approaching the “verge” of impermissible state aid. 330 U. S., at 16. In Allen, decided some 20 years later, the Court upheld a New York law authorizing the provision of secular textbooks for all children in grades seven through 12 attending public and nonpublic schools. Finally, in Tilton, the Court upheld federal grants of funds for the construction of facilities to be used for clearly secular purposes by public and nonpublic institutions of higher learning. These cases simply recognize that sectarian schools perform secular, educational functions as well as religious functions, and that some forms of aid may be channeled to the secular without providing direct aid to the sectarian. But the channel is a narrow one, as the above cases illustrate. Of course, it is true in each case that the provision of such neutral, nonideological aid, assisting only the secular functions of sectarian schools, served indirectly and incidentally to promote the religious function by rendering it more likely that children would attend sectarian schools and by freeing the budgets of those schools for use in other nonsecular areas. But an indirect and incidental effect beneficial to religious institutions has never been thought a sufficient defect to warrant the invalidation of a state law. In McGowan v. Maryland, swpra, Sunday Closing Laws were sustained even though one of their undeniable effects was to render it somewhat more likely that citizens would respect religious institutions and even attend religious services. Also, in Walz v. Tax Comm’n, supra, property tax exemptions for church property were held not violative of the Establishment Clause despite the fact that such exemptions relieved churches of a financial burden. Tilton draws the line most clearly. While a bare majority was there persuaded, for the reasons stated in the plurality opinion and in Mr. Justice White’s concurrence, that carefully limited construction grants to colleges and universities could be sustained, the Court was unanimous in its rejection of one clause of the federal statute in question. Under that clause, the Government was entitled to recover a portion of its grant to a sectarian institution in the event that the constructed facility was used to advance religion by, for instance, converting the building to a chapel or otherwise allowing it to be “used to promote religious interests.” 403 U. S., at 683. But because the statute provided that the condition would expire at the end of 20 years, the facilities would thereafter be available for use by the institution for any sectarian purpose. In striking down this provision, the plurality opinion emphasized that “[1] uniting the prohibition for religious use of the structure to 20 years obviously opens the facility to use for any purpose at the end of that period.” Ibid. And in that event, “the original federal grant will in part have the effect of advancing religion.” Ibid. See also id., at 692 (Douglas, J., dissenting in part), 659-661 (separate opinion of Brennan, J.), 665 n. 1 (White, J., concurring in judgment). If tax-raised funds may not be granted to institutions of higher learning where the possibility exists that those funds will be used to construct a facility utilized for sectarian activities 20 years hence, a fortiori they may not be distributed to elementary and secondary sectarian schools for the maintenance and repair of- facilities without any limitations on their use. If the State may not erect buildings in which religious activities are to take place, it may not maintain such buildings or renovate them when they fall into disrepair. It might be argued, however, that while the New York “maintenance and repair” grants lack specifically articulated secular restrictions, the statute does provide a sort of statistical guarantee of separation by limiting grants to 50% of the amount expended for comparable services in the public schools. The legislature’s supposition might have been that at least 50% of the ordinary public school maintenance and repair budget would be devoted to purely secular facility upkeep in sectarian schools. The shortest answer to this argument is that the statute itself allows, as a ceiling, grants satisfying the entire “amount of expenditures for maintenance and repair of such school” providing only that it is neither more than $30 or $40 per pupil nor more than 50% of the comparable public school expenditures. Quite apart from the language of the statute, our cases make clear that a mere statistical judgment will not suffice as a guarantee that state funds will not be used to finance religious education. In Earley v. DiCenso, a companion case to Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra, the Court struck down a Rhode Island law authorizing salary supplements to teachers of secular subjects. The grants were not to exceed 15% of any teacher’s annual salary. Although the law was invalidated on entanglement grounds, the Court made clear that the State could not have avoided violating the Establishment Clause by merely assuming that its teachers would succeed in segregating “their religious beliefs from their secular educational responsibilities.” 403 U. S., at 619. “The Rhode Island Legislature has not, and could not, provide state aid on the basis of a mere assumption that secular teachers under religious discipline can avoid conflicts. The State must be certain, given the Religion Clauses,, that subsidized teachers do not inculcate religion... Ibid. (Emphasis supplied.) Nor could the State of Rhode Island have prevailed by simply relying on the assumption that, whatever a secular teacher’s inabilities to refrain from mixing the religious with the secular, he would surely devote at least 15% of his efforts to purely secular education, thus exhausting the state grant. It takes little imagination to perceive the extent to which States might openly subsidize parochial schools under such a loose standard of scrutiny. See also Tilton v. Richardson, supra. What we have said demonstrates that New York’s maintenance and repair provisions violate the Establishment Clause because their effect, inevitably, is to subsidize and advance the religious mission of sectarian schools. We have no occasion, therefore, to consider the further question whether those provisions as presently written would also fail to survive scrutiny under the administrative entanglement aspect of the three-part test because assuring the secular use of all funds requires too intrusive and continuing a relationship between Church and State, Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra. B New York’s tuition reimbursement program also fails the “effect” test, for much the same reasons that govern its maintenance and repair grants. The state program is designed to allow direct, unrestricted grants of $50 to $100 per child (but no more than 50% of tuition actually paid) as reimbursement to parents in low-income brackets who send their children to nonpublic schools, the bulk of which is concededly sectarian in orientation. To qualify, a parent must have earned less than $5,000 in taxable income and must present a receipted tuition bill from a nonpublic school. There can be no question that these grants could not, consistently with the Establishment Clause, be given directly to sectarian schools, since they would suffer from the same deficiency that renders invalid the grants for maintenance and repair. In the absence of an effective means of guaranteeing that the state aid derived from public funds will be used exclusively for secular, neutral, and nonideological purposes, it is clear from our cases that direct aid in whatever form is invalid. As Mr. Justice Black put it quite simply in Everson: “No tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever form they may adopt to teach or practice religion.” 330 U. S., at 16. The controlling question here, then, is whether the fact that the grants are delivered to parents rather than schools is of such significance as to compel a contrary-result. The State and intervenor-appellees rely on Ever-son and Allen for their claim that grants to parents, unlike grants to institutions, respect the “wall of separation” required by the Constitution. It is true that in those cases the Court upheld laws that provided benefits to children attending religious schools and to their parents : As noted above, in Everson parents were reimbursed for bus fares paid to send children to parochial schools, and in Allen textbooks were loaned directly to the children. But those decisions make clear that, far from providing a per se immunity from examination of the substance of the State's program, the fact that aid is disbursed to parents rather than to the schools is only one among many factors to be considered. In Everson, the Court found the bus fare program analogous to the provision of services such as police and fire protection, sewage disposal, highways, and sidewalks for parochial schools. 330 U. S., at 17-18. Such services, provided in common to all citizens, are “so separate and so indisputably marked off from the religious function,” id., at 18, that they may fairly be viewed as reflections of a neutral posture toward religious institutions. Allen is founded upon a similar principle. The Court there repeatedly emphasized that upon the record in that case there was no indication that textbooks would be provided for anything other than purely secular courses. “Of course books are different from buses. Most bus rides have no inherent religious significance, while religious books are common. However, the language of [the law under consideration] does not authorize the loan of religious books, and the State claims no right to distribute religious literature.... Absent evidence, we cannot assume that school authorities... are unable to distinguish between secular and religious books or that they will not honestly discharge their duties under the law.” 392 U. S., at 244-245. The tuition grants here are subject to no such restrictions. There has been no endeavor “to guarantee the separation between secular and religious educational functions and to ensure that State financial aid supports only the former.” Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra, at 613. Indeed, it is precisely the function of New York’s law to provide assistance to private schools, the great majority of which are sectarian. By reimbursing parents for a portion of their tuition bill, the State seeks to relieve their financial burdens sufficiently to assure that they continue to have the option to send their children to religion-oriented schools. And while the other purposes for that aid — to perpetuate a pluralistic educational environment and to protect the fiscal integrity of overburdened public schools — are certainly unexceptionable, the effect of the aid is unmistakably to provide desired financial support for nonpublic, sectarian institutions. Mr. Justice Black, dissenting in Allen, warned that “[i]t requires no prophet to foresee that on the argument used to support this law others could be upheld providing for state or federal government funds to buy property on which to erect religious school buildings or to erect the buildings themselves, to pay the salaries of the religious school teachers, and finally to have the sectarian religious groups cease to rely on voluntary contributions of members of. their sects while waiting for the Government to pick up all the bills for the religious schools.” 392 U. S., at 253. His fears regarding religious buildings and religious teachers have not come to pass, Tilton v. Richardson, supra; Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra, and insofar as tuition grants constitute a means of “pick[ing] up... the bills for the religious schools,” neither has his greatest fear materialized. But the ingenious plans for channeling state aid to sectarian schools that periodically reach this Court abundantly support the wisdom of Mr. Justice Black’s prophecy. Although we think it clear, for the reasons above stated, that New York’s tuition grant program fares no better under the “effect” test than its maintenance and repair program, in view of the novelty of the question we will address briefly the subsidiary arguments made by the state officials and intervenors in its defense. First, it has been suggested that it is of controlling significance that New York’s program calls for reimbursement for tuition already paid rather than for direct contributions which are merely routed through the parents to the schools, in advance of or in lieu of payment by the parents. The parent is not a mere conduit, we are told, but is absolutely free to spend the money he receives in any manner he wishes. There is no element of coercion attached to the reimbursement, and no assurance that the money will eventually end up in the hands of religious schools. The absence of any element of coercion, however, is irrelevant to questions arising under the Establishment Clause. In School District of Abington Township v. Schempp, supra, it was contended that Bible recitations in public schools did not violate the Establishment Clause because participation in such exercises was not coerced. The Court rejected that argument, noting that while proof of coercion might provide a basis for a claim under the Free Exercise Clause, it was not a necessary element of any claim under the Establishment Clause. 374 U. S., at 222-223. Mr. Justice Brennan’s concurring views reiterated the Court’s conclusion: “Thus the short, and to me sufficient, answer is that the availability of excusal or exemption simply has no relevance to the establishment question, if it is once found that these practices are essentially religious exercises designed at least in part to achieve religious aims....” Id., at 288. A similar inquiry governs here: if the grants are offered as an incentive to parents to send their children to sectarian schools by making unrestricted cash payments to them, the Establishment Clause is violated whether or not the actual dollars given eventually find their way into the sectarian institutions. Whether the grant is labeled a reimbursement, a reward, or a subsidy, its substantive impact is still the same. In sum, we agree with the conclusion of the District Court that “[wjhether he gets it during the current year, or as reimbursement for the past year, is of no constitutional importance.” 350 F. Supp., at 668. Second, the Majority Leader and President pro tern of the State Senate argues that it is significant here that the tuition reimbursement grants pay only a portion of the tuition bill, and an even smaller portion of the religious school’s total expenses. The New York statute limits reimbursement to 50% of any parent’s actual outlay. Additionally, intervenor estimates that only 30% of the total cost of nonpublic education is covered by tuition payments, with the remaining coming from “voluntary contribution, endowments and the like.” On the basis of these two statistics, appellees reason that the “maximum tuition reimbursement by the State is thus only 15% of educational costs in the nonpublic schools.” And, “since the compulsory education laws of the State, by necessity require significantly more than 15% of school time to be devoted to teaching secular courses,” the New York statute provides “a statistical guarantee of neutrality.” It should readily be seen that this is simply another variant of the argument we have rejected as to maintenance and repair costs, supra, at 777-779, and it can fare no better here. Obviously, if accepted, this argument would provide the foundation for massive, direct subsidization of sectarian elementary and secondary schools. Our cases, however, have long since foreclosed the notion that mere statistical assurances will suffice to sail between the Scylla and Charybdis of “effect” and “entanglement.” Finally, the State argues that its program of tuition grants should survive scrutiny because it is designed to promote the free exercise of religion. The State notes that only “low-income parents” are aided by this law, and without state assistance their right to have their children educated in a religious environment “is diminished or even denied.” It is true, of course, that this Court has long recognized and maintained the right to choose nonpublic over public education. Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510 (1925). It is also true that a state law interfering with a parent’s right to have his child educated in a sectarian school would run afoul of the Free Exercise Clause. But this Court repeatedly has recognized that tension inevitably exists between the Free Exercise and the Establishment Clauses, e. g., Everson v. Board of Education, supra; Walz v. Tax Comm’n, supra, and that it may often not be possible to promote the former without offending the latter. As a result of this tension, our cases require the State to maintain an attitude of “neutrality,” neither “advancing” nor “inhibiting” religion. In its attempt to enhance the opportunities of the poor to choose between public and nonpublic education, the State has taken a step which can only be regarded as one “advancing” religion. However great our sympathy, Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U. S., at 18 (Jackson, J., dissenting), for the burdens experienced by those who must pay public school taxes at the same time that they support other schools because of the constraints of “conscience and discipline/’ ibid., and notwithstanding the “high social importance” of the State’s purposes, Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U. S Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

C

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Clark delivered the opinion of the Court. This is a civil action brought by respondent, a stockholder of petitioner J. I. Case Company, charging deprivation of the pre-emptive rights of respondent and other shareholders by reason of a merger between Case and the American Tractor Corporation. It is alleged that the merger was effected through the circulation of a false and misleading proxy statement by those proposing the merger. The complaint was in two counts, the first based on diversity and claiming a breach of the directors' fiduciary duty to the stockholders. The second count alleged a violation of § 14 (a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 with reference to the proxy solicitation material. The trial court held that as to this count it had no power to redress the alleged violations of the Act but was limited solely to the granting of declaratory relief thereon under § 27 of the Act. The court held Wis. Stat., 1961, § 180.405 (4), which requires posting security for expenses in derivative actions, applicable to both counts, except that portion of Count 2 requesting declaratory relief. It ordered the respondent to furnish a bond in the amount of $75,000 thereunder and, upon his failure to do so, dismissed the complaint, save that part of Count 2 seeking a declaratory judgment. On interlocutory appeal the Court of Appeals reversed on both counts, holding that the District Court had the power to grant remedial relief and that the Wisconsin statute was not applicable. 317 F. 2d 838. We granted certiorari. 375 U. S. 901. We consider only the question of whether § 27 of the Act authorizes a federal cause of action for rescission or damages to a corporate stockholder with respect to a consummated merger which was authorized pursuant to the use of a proxy statement alleged to contain false and misleading statements viola-tive of § 14 (a) of the Act. This being the sole question raised by petitioners in their petition for certiorari, we will not consider other questions subsequently presented. See Supreme Court Rule 40 (1) (d)(2); Local 1976, United Brotherhood of Carpenters v. Labor Board, 357 U. S. 93, 96 (1958); Irvine v. California, 347 U. S. 128, 129-130 (1954). I. Respondent, the owner of 2,000 shares of common stock of Case acquired prior to the merger, brought this suit based on diversity jurisdiction seeking to enjoin a proposed merger between Case and the American Tractor Corporation (ATC) on various grounds, including breach of the fiduciary duties of the Case directors, self-dealing among the management of Case and ATC and misrepresentations contained in the material circulated to obtain proxies. The injunction was denied and the merger was thereafter consummated. Subsequently successive amended complaints were filed and the case was heard on the aforesaid two-count complaint. The claims pertinent to the asserted violation of the Securities Exchange Act were predicated on diversity jurisdiction as well as on § 27 of the Act. They alleged: that petitioners, or their predecessors, solicited or permitted their names to be used in the solicitation of proxies of Case stockholders for use at a special stockholders’ meeting at which the proposed merger with ATC was to be voted upon; that the proxy solicitation material so circulated was false and misleading in violation of § 14 (a) of the Act and Rule 14a-9 which the Commission had promulgated thereunder; that the merger was approved at the meeting by a small margin of votes and was thereafter consummated; that the merger would not have been approved but for the false and misleading statements in the proxy solicitation material; and that Case stockholders were damaged thereby. The respondent sought judgment holding the merger void and damages for himself and all other stockholders similarly situated, as well as such further relief “as equity shall require.” The District Court ruled that the Wisconsin security for expenses statute did not apply to Count 2 since it arose under federal law. However, the court found that its jurisdiction was limited to declaratory relief in a private, as opposed to a government, suit alleging violation of § 14 (a) of the Act. Since the additional equitable relief and damages prayed for by the respondent would, therefore, be available only under state law, it ruled those claims subject to the security for expenses statute. After setting the amount of security at $75,000 and upon the representation of counsel that the security would not be posted, the court dismissed the complaint, save that portion of Count 2 seeking a declaration that the proxy solicitation material was false and misleading and that the proxies and, hence, the merger were void. II. It appears clear that private parties have a right under § 27 to bring suit for violation of § 14 (a) of the Act. Indeed, this section specifically grants the appropriate District Courts jurisdiction over "all suits in equity and actions at law brought to enforce any liability or duty created” under the Act. The petitioners make no concessions, however, emphasizing that Congress made no specific reference to a private right of action in § 14 (a) that, in any event, the right would not extend to derivative suits and should be limited to prospective relief only. In addition, some of the petitioners argue that the merger can be dissolved only if it was fraudulent or non-beneficial, issues upon which the proxy material would not bear. But the causal relationship of the proxy material and the merger are questions of fact to be resolved at trial, not here. We therefore do not discuss this point further. III. While the respondent contends that his Count 2 claim is not a derivative one, we need not embrace that view, for we believe that a right of action exists as to both derivative and direct causes. The purpose of § 14 (a) is to prevent management or others from obtaining authorization for corporate action by means of deceptive or inadequate disclosure in proxy solicitation. The section stemmed from the congressional belief that “[f]air corporate suffrage is an important right that should attach to every equity security bought on a public exchange.” H. R. Rep. No. 1383, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 13. It was intended to “control the conditions under which proxies may be solicited with a view to preventing the recurrence of abuses which . . . [had] frustrated the free exercise of the voting rights of stockholders.” Id., at 14. “Too often proxies are solicited without explanation to the stockholder of the real nature of the questions for which authority to cast his vote is sought.” S. Rep. No. 792, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 12. These broad remedial purposes are evidenced in the language of the section which makes it “unlawful for any person . . . to solicit or to permit the use of his name to solicit any proxy or consent or authorization in respect of any security . . . registered on any national securities exchange in contravention of such rules and regulations as the Commission may prescribe as necessary or appropriate in the public interest or for the protection of investors.” (Italics supplied.) While this language makes no specific reference to a private right of action, among its chief purposes is “the protection of investors,” which certainly Implies the availability of judicial relief where necessary to achieve that result. The injury which a stockholder suffers from corporate action pursuant to a deceptive proxy solicitation ordinarily flows from the damage done the corporation, rather than from the damage inflicted directly upon the stockholder. The damage suffered results not from the deceit practiced on him alone but rather from the deceit practiced on the stockholders as a group. To hold that derivative actions are not within the sweep of the section would therefore be tantamount to a denial of private i relief. Private enforcement of the proxy rules provides a 1 necessary supplement to Commission action. As in antitrust treble damage litigation, the possibility of civil dam|ages or injunctive relief serves as a most effective weapon fin the enforcement of the proxy requirements. The Commission advises that it examines over 2,000 proxy statements annually and each of them must necessarily be expedited. Time does not permit an independent examination of the facts set out in the proxy material and this results in the Commission’s acceptance of the representations contained therein at their face value, unless contrary to other material on file with it. Indeed, on the allegations of respondent’s complaint, the proxy material failed to disclose alleged unlawful market manipulation of the stock of ATC, and this unlawful manipulation would not have been apparent to the Commission until after the merger. We, therefore, believe that under the circumstances")'^ here it is the duty of the courts to be alert to provide | such remedies as are necessary to make effective the con-f gressional purpose. As was said in Sola Electric Co. v. Jefferson Electric Co., 317 U. S. 173, 176 (1942): “When a federal statute condemns an act as unlawful, the extent and nature of the legal consequences of the condemnation, though left by the statute to judicial determination, are nevertheless federal questions, the answers to which are to be derived from the statute and the federal policy which it has adopted.” See also Tunstall v. Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen & Enginemen, 323 U. S. 210, 213 (1944); Deitrick v. Greaney, 309 U. S. 190, 201 (1940). It is for the federal courts “to adjust their remedies so as to grant the necessary relief” where federally secured rights are invaded. “And it is also well settled that where legal rights have been invaded, and a federal statute provides for a general right to sue for such invasion, federal courts may use any available remedy to make good the wrong done.” Bell v. Hood, 327 U. S. 678, 684 (1946). Section 27 grants the District Courts jurisdiction “of all suits in equity and actions at law brought to enforce any liability or duty created by this title . . . .” In passing on almost identical language found in the Securities Act of 1933, the Court found the words entirely sufficient to fashion a remedy to rescind a fraudulent sale, secure restitution and even to enforce the right to restitution against a third party holding assets of the vendor. Deckert v. Independence Shares Corp., 311 U. S. 282 (1940). This significant language was used: “The power to enforce implies the power to make effective the right of recovery afforded by the Act. And the power to make the right of recovery effective implies the power to utilize any of the procedures or actions normally available to the litigant according to the exigencies of the particular case.” At 288. See also Porter v. Warner Holding Co., 328 U. S. 395 (1946); Mitchell v. Robert DeMario Jewelry, Inc., 361 U. S. 288 (1960); Schine Chain Theatres, Inc., v. United States, 334 U. S. 110 (1948). Nor do we find merit in the contention that such remedies are limited to prospective relief. This was the position taken in Dann v. Studebaker-Packard Corp., 288 F. 2d 201, where it was held that the “preponderance of questions of state law which would have to be interpreted and applied in order to grant the relief sought ... is so great that the federal question involved ... is really negligible in comparison.” At 214. But we believe that the overriding federal law applicable here would, where the facts required, control the appropriateness of redress despite the provisions of state corporation law, for it “is not uncommon for federal courts to fashion federal law where federal rights are concerned.” Textile Workers v. Lincoln Mills, 353 U. S. 448, 457 (1957). In addition, the fact that questions of state law must be decided does not change the character of the right; it remains federal. As Chief Justice Marshall .said in Osborn v. Bank of the United States, 9 Wheat. 738 (1824): “If this were sufficient to withdraw a case from the jurisdiction of the federal Courts, almost every case, although involving the construction of a law, would be withdrawn . . . .” At 819-820. Moreover, if federal jurisdiction were limited to the granting of declaratory relief, victims of deceptive proxy statements would be obliged to go into state courts for remedial relief. And if the law of the State happened to attach no responsibility to the use of misleading proxy I statements, the whole purpose of the section might be j frustrated. Furthermore, the hurdles that the victim might face (such as separate suits, as contemplated by Dann v. Studebaker-Packard Corp., supra, security for expenses statutes, bringing in all parties necessary for complete relief, etc.) might well prove insuperable toj effective relief. IV. Our finding that federal courts have the power to grant all necessary remedial relief is not to be construed as any indication of what we believe to be the necessary and appropriate relief in this case. We are concerned here only with a determination that federal jurisdiction for this purpose does exist. Whatever remedy is necessary must await the trial on the merits. The other contentions of the petitioners are denied. Affirmed. Section 14 (a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, 48 Stat. 896, 15 U. S. C. § 78n (a), provides: “It shall be unlawful for any person, by the use of the mails or by any means or instrumentality of interstate commerce or of any facility of any national securities exchange or otherwise to solicit or to permit the use of his name to solicit any proxy or consent or authorization in respect of any security (other than an exempted security) registered on any national securities exchange in contravention of such rules and regulations as the [Securities and Exchange] Commission may prescribe as necessary or appropriate in the public interest or for the protection of investors.” Section 27 of the Act, 48 Stat. 902-903, 15 U. S. C. § 78aa, provides in part: “The district courts of the United States, the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, and the United States courts of any Territory or other place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States shall have exclusive jurisdiction of violations of tins title or the rules and regulations thereunder, and of all suits in equity and actions at law brought to enforce any liability or duty created by this title or the rules and regulations thereunder. Any criminal proceeding may be brought in the district wherein any act or transaction constituting the violation occurred. Any suit or action to ¡'enforce any liability or duty created by this title or rules and regulations thereunder, or to enjoin any violation of such title or rules and regulations, may be brought in any such district or in the district wherein the defendant is found or is an inhabitant or transacts business, and process in such cases may be served in any other district of which the defendant is an inhabitant or wherever the defendant jnay be found.” “The phrasing of the questions presented need not be identical with that set forth in the jurisdictional statement or the petition for certiorari, but the brief may not raise additional questions or change the substance of the questions already presented in those documents. Questions not presented according to this paragraph will be disregarded, save as the court, at its option, may notice a plain error not presented.” 17 CFR §240.14a-9 provides: “False or misleading statements. No solicitation subject to §§ 240.14a-l to 240.14a-10 shall be made by means of any proxy statement, form of proxy, notice of meeting, or other communication written or oral containing any statement which at the time and in the light of the circumstances under which it is made, is false or misleading with respect to any material fact, or which omits to state any material fact necessary in order to make the statements therein not false or misleading or necessary to correct any statement in any earlier communication with respect to the solicitation of a proxy for the same meeting or subject matter which has become false or misleading.” Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Me. Justice Brennan announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion in which The Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Fortas join. This is an obscenity case in which Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (commonly known as Fanny Hill), written by John Cleland in about 1750, was adjudged obscene in a proceeding that put on trial the book itself, and not its publisher or distributor. The proceeding was a civil equity suit brought by the Attorney General of Massachusetts, pursuant to General Laws of Massachusetts, Chapter 272, §§ 28C-28H, to have the book declared obscene. Section 28C requires that the petition commencing the suit be “directed against [the] book by name” and that an order to show cause “why said book should not be judicially determined to be obscene” be published in a daily newspaper and sent by registered mail “to all persons interested in the publication.” Publication of the order in this case occurred in a Boston daily newspaper, and a copy of the order was sent by registered mail to G. P. Putnam’s Sons, alleged to be the publisher and copyright holder of the book. As authorized by § 28D, G. P. Putnam’s Sons intervened in the proceedings in behalf of the book, but it did not claim the right provided by that section to have the issue of obscenity tried by a jury. At the hearing before a justice of the Superior Court, which was conducted, under § 28F, “in accordance with the usual course of proceedings in equity,” the court received the book in evidence and also, as allowed by the section, heard the testimony of experts and accepted other evidence, such as book reviews, in order to assess the literary, cultural, or educational character of the book. This constituted the entire evidence, as neither side availed itself of the opportunity provided by the section to introduce evidence “as to the manner and form of its publication, advertisement, and distribution.” The trial justice entered a final decree, which adjudged Memoirs obscene and declared that the book “is not entitled to the protection of the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States against action by the Attorney General or other law enforcement officer pursuant to the provisions of ... § 28B, or otherwise.” The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the decree. 349 Mass. 69, 206 N. E. 2d 403 (1965). We noted probable jurisdiction. 382 U. S. 900. We reverse. I. The term “obscene” appearing in the Massachusetts statute has been interpreted by the Supreme Judicial Court to be as expansive as the Constitution permits: the “statute covers all material that is obscene in the constitutional sense.” Attorney General v. The Book Named “Tropic of Cancer," 345 Mass. 11, 13, 184 N. E. 2d 328, 330 (1962). Indeed, the final decree before us equates the finding that Memoirs is obscene within the meaning of the statute with the declaration that the book is not entitled to the protection of the First Amendment. Thus the sole question before the state courts was whether Memoirs satisfies the test of obscenity established in Both v. United States, 354 U. S. 476. We defined obscenity in Roth in the following terms: “[W]hether to the average person, applying contemporary community standards, the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to prurient interest.” 354 U. S., at 489. Under this definition, as elaborated in subsequent cases, three elements must coalesce: it must be established that (a) the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to a prurient interest in sex; (b) the material is patently offensive because it affronts contemporary community standards relating to the description or representation of sexual matters; and (c) the material is utterly without redeeming social value. The Supreme Judicial Court purported to apply the Roth definition of obscenity and held all three criteria satisfied. We need not consider the claim that the court erred in concluding that Memoirs satisfied the prurient appeal and patent offensiveness criteria; for reversal is required because the court misinterpreted the social value criterion. The court applied the criterion in this passage: “It remains to consider whether the book can be said to be ‘utterly without social importance.’ We are mindful that there was expert testimony, much of which was strained, to the effect that Memoirs is a structural novel with literary merit; that the book displays a skill in characterization and a gift for comedy; that it plays a part in the history of the development of the English novel; and that it contains a moral, namely, that sex with love is superior to sex in a brothel. But the fact that the testimony may indicate this book has some minimal literary value does not mean it is of any social importance. We do not interpret the ‘social importance’ test as requiring that a book which appeals to prurient interest and is patently offensive must be unqualifiedly worthless before it can be deemed obscene.” 349 Mass., at 73, 206 N. E. 2d, at 406. The Supreme Judicial Court erred in holding that a book need not be “unqualifiedly worthless before it can be deemed obscene.” A book cannot be proscribed unless it is found to be utterly without redeeming social value. This is so even though the book is found to possess the requisite prurient appeal and to be patently offensive. Each of the three federal constitutional criteria is to be applied independently; the social value of the book can neither be weighed against nor canceled by its prurient appeal or patent offensiveness. Hence, even on the view of the court below that Memoirs possessed only a modicum of social value, its judgment must be reversed as being founded on an erroneous interpretation of a federal constitutional standard. II. It does not necessarily follow from this reversal that a determination that Memoirs is obscene in the constitutional sense would be improper under all circumstances. On the premise, which we have no occasion to assess, that Memoirs has the requisite prurient appeal and is patently offensive, but has only a minimum of social value, the circumstances of production, sale, and publicity are relevant in determining whether or not the publication or distribution of the book is constitutionally protected. Evidence that the book was commercially exploited for the sake of prurient appeal, to the exclusion of all other values, might justify the conclusion that the book was utterly without redeeming social importance. It is not that in such a setting the social value test is relaxed so as to dispense with the requirement that a book be utterly devoid of social value, but rather that, as we elaborate in Ginzburg v. United States, post, pp. 470-473, where the purveyor’s sole emphasis is on the sexually provocative aspects of his publications, a court could accept his evaluation at its face value. In this proceeding, however, the courts were asked to judge the obscenity of Memoirs in the abstract, and the declaration of obscenity was neither aided nor limited by a specific set of circumstances of production, sale, and publicity. All possible uses of the book must therefore be considered, and the mere risk that the book might be exploited by panderers because it so pervasively treats sexual matters cannot alter the fact — given the view of the Massachusetts court attributing to Memoirs a modicum of literary and historical value — that the book will have redeeming social importance in the hands of those who publish or distribute it on the basis of that value. Reversed. Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Stewart concur in the reversal for the reasons stated in their respective dissenting opinions in Ginzburg v. United States, post, p. 476 and p. 497, and Mishkin v. New York, post, p. 515 and p. 518. APPENDIX TO OPINION OF MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN. State Statute. Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 272. Section 28B. Whoever imports, prints, publishes, sells, loans or distributes, or buys, procures, receives, or has in his possession for the purpose of sale, loan or distribution, a book, knowing it to be obscene, indecent or impure, or whoever, being a wholesale distributor, a jobber, or publisher sends or delivers to a retail storekeeper a book, pamphlet, magazine or other form of printed or written material, knowing it to be obscene, indecent or impure, which said storekeeper had not previously ordered in writing, specifying the title and quantity of such publication he desired, shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than five years or in a jail or house of correction for not more than two and one half years, or by a fine of not less than one hundred dollars nor more than five thousand dollars, or by both such fine and imprisonment in jail or the house of correction. Section 28C. Whenever there is reasonable cause to believe that a book which is being imported, sold, loaned or distributed, or is in the possession of any person who intends to import, sell, loan or distribute the same, is obscene, indecent or impure, the attorney general, or any district attorney within his district, shall bring an information or petition in equity in the superior court directed against said book by name. Upon the filing of such information or petition in equity, a justice of the superior court shall, if, upon a summary examination of the book, he is of opinion that there is reasonable cause to believe that such book is obscene, indecent or impure, issue an order of notice, returnable in or within thirty days, directed against such book by name and addressed to all persons interested in the publication, sale, loan or distribution thereof, to show cause why said book should not be judicially determined to be obscene, indecent or impure. Notice of such order shall be given by publication once each week for two successive weeks in a daily newspaper published in the city of Boston and, if such information or petition be filed in any county other than Suffolk county, then by publication also in a daily newspaper published in such other county. A copy of such order of notice shall be sent by registered mail to the publisher of said book, to the person holding the copyrights, and to the author, in case the names of any such persons appear upon said book, fourteen days at least before the return day of such order of notice. After the issuance of an order of notice under the provisions of this section, the court shall, on motion of the attorney general or district attorney, make an interlocutory finding and adjudication that said book is obscene, indecent or impure, which finding and adjudication shall be of the same force and effect as the final finding and adjudication provided in section twenty-eight E or section twenty-eight F, but only until such final finding and adjudication is made or until further order of the court. Section 28D. Any person interested in the sale, loan or distribution of said book may appear and file an answer on or before the return day named in said notice or within such further time as the court may allow, and may claim a right to trial by jury on the issue whether said book is obscene, indecent or impure. Section 28E. If no person appears and answers within the time allowed, the court may at once upon motion of the petitioner, or of its own motion, no reason to the contrary appearing, order a general default and if the court finds that the book is obscene, indecent or impure, may make an adjudication against the book that the same is obscene, indecent and impure. Section 28F. If an appearance is entered and answer filed, the case shall be set down for speedy hearing, but a default and order shall first be entered against all persons who have not appeared and answered, in the manner provided in section twenty-eight E. Such hearing shall be conducted in accordance with the usual course of proceedings in equity including all rights of exception and appeal. At such hearing the court may receive the testimony of experts and may receive evidence as to the literary, cultural or educational character of said book and as to the manner and form of its publication, advertisement, and distribution. Upon such hearing, the court may make an adjudication in the manner provided in said section twenty-eight E. Section 28G. An information or petition in equity under the provisions of section twenty-eight C shall not be open to objection on the ground that a mere judgment, order or decree is sought thereby and that no relief is or could be claimed thereunder on the issue of the defendant’s knowledge as to the obscenity, indecency or impurity of the book. Section 28H. In any trial under section twenty-eight B on an indictment found or a complaint made for any offence committed after the filing of a proceeding-under section twenty-eight C, the fact of such filing and the action of the court or jury thereon, if any, shall be admissible in evidence. If prior to the said offence a final decree had been entered against the book, the defendant, if the book be obscene, indecent or impure, shall be conclusively presumed to have known said book to be obscene, indecent or impure, or if said decree had been in favor of the book he shall be conclusively presumed not to have known said book to be obscene, indecent or impure, or if no final decree had been entered but a proceeding had been filed prior to said offence, the defendant shall be conclusively presumed to have had knowledge of the contents of said book. The text of the statute appears in the Appendix. In dissenting from the Supreme Judicial Court’s disposition in this case, 349 Mass. 69, 74-75, 206 N. E. 2d 403, 406-407 (1965), Justice Whittemore summarized this testimony: “In the view of one or another or all of the following viz., the chairman of the English department at Williams College, a professor of English at Harvard College, an associate professor of English literature at Boston University, an associate professor of English at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and an assistant professor of English and American literature at Brandéis University, the book is a minor 'work of art’ having ‘literary merit’ and ‘historical value’ and containing a good deal of ‘deliberate, calculated comedy.’ It is a piece of ‘social history of interest to anyone who is interested in fiction as a way of understanding society in the past.’ A saving grace is that although many scenes, if translated into the present day language of ‘the realistic, naturalistic novel, could be quite offensive’ these scenes are not described in such language. The book contains no dirty words and its language ‘functions ... to create a distance, even when the sexual experiences are portrayed.’ The response, therefore, is a literary response. The descriptions of depravity are not obscene because ‘they are subordinate to an interest which is primarily literary’; Fanny’s reaction to the scenes of depravity was ‘anger,’ ‘disgust, horror, [and] indignation.’ The book ‘belongs to the history of English literature rather than the history of smut.’ ” " One of the witnesses testified in part as follows: ‘Cleland is part of what I should call this cultural battle that is going on in the 18th century, a battle between a restricted Puritan, moralistic ethic that attempts to suppress freedom of the spirit, freedom of the flesh, and this element is competing with a freer attitude towards life, a more generous attitude towards life, a more wholesome attitude towards life, and this very attitude that is manifested in Fielding’s great novel “Tom Jones” is also evident in Cleland’s novel. . . . [Richardson’s] “Pamela” is the story of a young country girl; [his] “Clarissa” is the story of a woman trapped in a house of prostitution. Obviously, then Cleland takes both these themes, the country girl, her initiation into life and into experience, and the story of a woman in a house of prostitution, and what he simply does is to take the situation and reverse the moral standards. Richardson believed that chastity was the most important thing in the world; Cleland and Fielding obviously did not and thought there were more important significant moral values.’ ” “ In the opinion of the other academic witness, the headmaster of a private school, whose field is English literature, the book is without literary merit and is obscene, impure, hard core pornography, and is patently offensive.” The record in this case is thus significantly different from the records in Ginzburg v. United States, post, p. 463, and Mishkin v. New York, post, p. 502. See pp. 420-421, infra. Section 28B makes it a criminal offense, inter alia, to import, print, publish, sell, loan, distribute, buy, procure, receive, or possess for the purpose of sale, loan, or distribution, “a book, knowing it to be obscene.” Section 28H provides that in any prosecution under § 28B the decree obtained in a proceeding against the book “shall be admissible in evidence” and further that “[i]f prior to the said offence a final decree had been entered against the book, the defendant, if the book be obscene . . . shall be conclusively presumed to have known said book to be obscene . . . .” Thus a declaration of obscenity such as that obtained in this proceeding is likely to result in the total suppression of the book in the Commonwealth. The constitutionality of §28H has not been challenged in this appeal. Although the final decree provides no coercive relief but only a declaration of the book’s obscenity, our adjudication of the merits of the issue tendered, viz., whether the state courts erred in declaring the book obscene, is not premature. There is no uncertainty as to the content of the material challenged, and the Attorney General’s petition commencing this suit states that the book “is being imported, sold, loaned, or distributed in the Commonwealth.” The declaration of obscenity is likely to have a serious inhibitory effect on the distribution of the book, and this probable impact is to no small measure derived from possible collateral uses of the declaration in subsequent prosecutions under the Massachusetts criminal obscenity statute. See n. 4, supra. We infer from the opinions below that the other adjectives describing the proscribed books in §§28C-28H, “indecent” and “impure,” have either been read out of the statute or deemed synonymous with “obscene.” “[M]aterial dealing with sex in a manner that advocates ideas ... or that has literary or scientific or artistic value or any other form of social importance, may not be branded as obscenity and denied the constitutional protection. Nor may the constitutional status of the material be made to turn on a ‘weighing’ of its social importance against its prurient appeal, for a work cannot be proscribed unless it is ‘utterly’ without social importance. See Zeitlin v. Arnebergh, 59 Cal. 2d 901, 920, 383 P. 2d 152, 165, 31 Cal. Rptr. 800, 813 (1963).” Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U. S. 184, 191 (opinion of Brennan, J.). Followed in, e. g., People v. Bruce, 31 Ill. 2d 459, 461, 202 N. E. 2d 497, 498 (1964); Trans-Lux Distributing Corp. v. Maryland Bd. of Censors, 240 Md. 98, 104-105, 213 A. 2d 235, 238-239 (1965). In his dissenting opinion, 349 Mass., at 76-78, 206 N. E. 2d, at 408-409, Justice Cutter stated that, although in his view the book was not “obscene” within the meaning of Roth, “it could reasonably be found that distribution of the book to persons under the age of eighteen would be a violation of G. L. c. 272, § 28, as tending to .corrupt the morals of youth.” (Section 28 makes it a crime to sell to “a person under the age of eighteen years a book . . . which is obscene ... or manifestly tends to corrupt the morals of youth.”) He concluded that the court should “limit the relief granted to a declaration that distribution of this book to persons under the age of eighteen may be found to constitute a violation of [G. L.] c. 272, § 28, if that section is reasonably applied . . . .” However, the decree was not so limited and we intimate no view concerning the constitutionality of such a limited declaration regarding Memoirs. Cf. Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U. S., at 195. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

C

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. Under § 12(2) of the Securities Act of 1933 buyers have an express cause of action for rescission against sellers who make material misstatements or omissions “by means of a prospectus.” The question presented is whether this right of rescission extends to a private, secondary transaction, on the theory that recitations in the purchase agreement are part of a “prospectus.” I Petitioners Gustafson, McLean, and Butler (collectively Gustafson) were in 1989 the sole shareholders of Alloyd, Inc., a manufacturer of plastic packaging and automatic heat sealing equipment. Alloyd was formed, and its stock was issued, in 1961. In 1989, Gustafson decided to sell Alloyd and engaged KPMG Peat Marwick to find a buyer. In response to information distributed by KPMG, Wind Point Partners II, L. P., agreed to buy substantially all of the issued and outstanding stock through Alloyd Holdings, Inc., a new corporation formed to effect the sale of Alloyd’s stock. The shareholders of Alloyd Holdings were Wind Point and a number of individual investors. In preparation for negotiating the contract with Gustafson, Wind Point undertook an extensive analysis of the company, relying in part on a formal business review prepared by KPMG. Alloyd’s practice was to take inventory at year’s end, so Wind Point and KPMG considered taking an earlier inventory to use in determining the purchase price. In the end they did not do so, relying instead on certain estimates and including provisions for adjustments after the transaction closed. On December 20,1989, Gustafson and Alloyd Holdings executed a contract of sale. Alloyd Holdings agreed to pay Gus-tafson and his coshareholders $18,709,000 for the sale of the stock plus a payment of $2,122,219, which reflected the estimated increase in Alloyd’s net worth from the end of the previous year, the last period for which hard financial data were available. Article IV of the purchase agreement, entitled “Representations and Warranties of the Sellers,” included assurances that the company’s financial statements “present fairly... the Company’s financial condition” and that between the date of the latest balance sheet and the date the agreement was executed “there ha[d] been no material adverse change in... [Alloyd’s] financial condition.” App. 115, 117. The contract also provided that if the year-end audit and financial statements revealed a variance between estimated and actual increased value, the disappointed party would receive an adjustment. The year-end audit of Alloyd revealed that Alloyd’s actual earnings for 1989 were lower than the estimates relied upon by the parties in negotiating the adjustment amount of $2,122,219. Under the contract, the buyers had a right to recover an adjustment amount of $815,000 from the sellers. Nevertheless, on February 11,1991, the newly formed company (now called Alloyd Co., the same as the original company) and Wind Point brought suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, seeking outright rescission of the contract under § 12(2) of the Securities Act of 1933 (1933 Act or Act). Alloyd (the new company) claimed that statements made by Gustafson and his coshareholders regarding the financial data of their company were inaccurate, rendering untrue the representations and warranties contained in the contract. The buyers further alleged that the contract of sale was a “prospectus,” so that any misstatements contained in the agreement gave rise to liability under § 12(2) of the 1933 Act. Pursuant to the adjustment clause, the defendants remitted to the purchasers $815,000 plus interest, but the adjustment did not cause the purchasers to drop the lawsuit. Relying on the decision of the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Ballay v. Legg Mason Wood Walker, Inc., 925 F. 2d 682 (1991), the District Court granted Gustafson’s motion for summary judgment, holding “that section 12(2) claims can only arise out of the initial stock offerings.” App. 20. Although the sellers were the controlling shareholders of the original company, the District Court concluded that the private sale agreement “cannot be compared to an initial offering” because “the purchasers in this case had direct access to financial and other company documents, and had the opportunity to inspect the seller’s property.” Id., at 21. On review, the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit vacated the District Court’s judgment and remanded for further consideration in light of that court’s intervening decision in Pacific Dunlop Holdings Inc. v. Allen & Co. Inc., 993 F. 2d 578 (1993). In Pacific Dunlop the court reasoned that the inclusion of the term “communication” in the Act’s definition of prospectus meant that the term “prospectus” was defined “very broadly” to include all written communications that offered the sale of a security. Id., at 582. Rejecting the view of the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Ballay, the Court of Appeals decided that § 12(2)’s right of action for rescission “applies to any communication which offers any security for sale... including the stock purchase agreement in the present case.” 993 F. 2d, at 595. We granted certio-rari to resolve this Circuit conflict, 510 U. S. 1176 (1994), and we now reverse. II The rescission claim against Gustafson is based upon § 12(2) of the 1933 Act, 48 Stat. 84, as amended, 15 U. S. C. §77i(2). In relevant part, the section provides that any person who “offers or sells a security (whether or not exempted by the provisions of section 77c of this title, other than paragraph (2) of subsection (a) of said section), by the use of any means or instruments of transportation or communication in interstate commerce or of the mails, by means of a prospectus or oral communication, which includes an untrue statement of a material fact or omits to state a material fact necessary in order to make the statements, in the light of the circumstances under which they were made, not misleading (the purchaser not knowing of such untruth or omission), and who shall not sustain the burden of proof that he did not know, and in the exercise of reasonable care could not have known, of such untruth or omission, “shall be liable to the person purchasing such security from him, who may sue either at law or in equity in any court of competent jurisdiction, to recover the consideration paid for such security with interest thereon, less the amount of any income received thereon, upon the tender of such security, or for damages if he no longer owns the security.” As this case reaches us, we must assume that the stock purchase agreement contained material misstatements of fact made by the sellers and that Gustafson would not sustain its burden of proving due care. On these assumptions, Alloyd would have a right to obtain rescission if those misstatements were made “by means of a prospectus or oral communication.” The Courts of Appeals agree that the phrase “oral communication” is restricted to oral communications that relate to a prospectus. See Pacific Dunlop, supra, at 588; Ballay, supra, at 688. The determinative question, then, is whether the contract between Alloyd and Gustafson is a “prospectus” as the term is used in the 1933 Act. Alloyd argues that “prospectus” is defined in a broad manner, broad enough to encompass the contract between the parties. This argument is echoed by the dissents. See post, at 585-586 (opinion of Thomas, J.); post, at 596 (opinion of Ginsburg, J.). Gustafson, by contrast, maintains that prospectus in the 1933 Act means a communication soliciting the public to purchase securities from the issuer. Brief for Petitioners 17-18. Three sections of the 1933 Act are critical in resolving the definitional question on which the case turns: § 2(10), which defines a prospectus; § 10, which sets forth the information that must be contained in a prospectus; and § 12, which imposes liability based on misstatements in a prospectus. In seeking to interpret the term “prospectus,” we adopt the premise that the term should be construed, if possible, to give it a consistent meaning throughout the Act. That principle follows from our duty to construe statutes, not isolated provisions. See Philbrook v. Glodgett, 421 U. S. 707, 713 (1975); Kokoszka v. Belford, 417 U. S. 642, 650 (1974). A We begin with § 10. It provides, in relevant part: “Except to the extent otherwise permitted or required pursuant to this subsection or subsections (c), (d), or (e) of this section— “(1) a prospectus relating to a security other than a security issued by a foreign government or political subdivision thereof, shall contain the information contained in the registration statement...; “(2) a prospectus relating to a security issued by a foreign government or political subdivision thereof shall contain the information contained in the registration statement... 15 U. S. C. §77j(a). Section 10 does not provide that some prospectuses must contain the information contained in the registration statement. Save for the explicit and well-defined exemptions for securities listed under §3, see 15 U. S. C. §77c (exempting certain classes of securities from the coverage of the Act), its mandate is unqualified: “[A] prospectus... shall contain the information contained in the registration statement.” Although § 10 does not define what a prospectus is, it does instruct us what a prospectus cannot be if the Act is to be interpreted as a symmetrical and coherent regulatory scheme, one in which the operative words have a consistent meaning throughout. There is no dispute that the contract in this ease was not required to contain the information contained in a registration statement and that no statutory exemption was required to take the document out of § 10’s coverage. Cf. 15 U. S. C. §77c. It follows that the contract is not a prospectus under § 10. That does not mean that a document ceases to be a prospectus whenever it omits a required piece of information. It does mean that a document is not a prospectus within the meaning of that section if, absent an exemption, it need not comply with § 10’s requirements in the first place. An examination of § 10 reveals that, whatever else “prospectus” may mean, the term is confined to a document that, absent an overriding exemption, must include the “information contained in the registration statement.” By and large, only public offerings by an issuer of a security, or by controlling shareholders of an issuer, require the preparation and filing of registration statements. See 15 U. S. C. §§ 77d, 77e, 77b(ll). It follows, we conclude, that a prospectus under § 10 is confined to documents related to public offerings by an issuer or its controlling shareholders. This much (the meaning of prospectus in § 10) seems not to be in dispute. Where the courts are in disagreement is with the implications of this proposition for the entirety of the Act, and for § 12 in particular. Compare Ballay v. Legg Mason Wood Walker, Inc., 925 F. 2d, at 688-689 (suggesting that the term “prospectus” is used in a consistent manner in both §§10 and 12), with Pacific Dunlop Holdings Inc. v. Allen & Co., 998 F. 2d, at 584 (rejecting that view). We conclude that the term “prospectus” must have the same meaning under §§10 and 12. In so holding, we do not, as the dissent by Justice Ginsburg suggests, make the mistake of treating § 10 as a definitional section. See post, at 597. Instead, we find in § 10 guidance and instruction for giving the term a consistent meaning throughout the Act. The 1938 Act, like every Act of Congress, should not be read as a series of unrelated and isolated provisions. Only last Term we adhered to the “normal rule of statutory construction” that “identical words used in different parts of the same act are intended to have the same meaning.” Department of Revenue of Ore. v. ACF Industries, Inc., 510 U. S. 332, 342 (1994) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted); see also Brooke Group Ltd. v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 509 U. S. 209, 230 (1993); Atlantic Cleaners & Dyers, Inc. v. United States, 286 U. S. 427, 433 (1932). That principle applies here. If the contract before us is not a prospectus for purposes of § 10 — as all must and do concede — it is not a prospectus for purposes of § 12 either. The conclusion that prospectus has the same meaning, and refers to the same types of communications (public offers by an issuer or its controlling shareholders), in both §§ 10 and 12 is reinforced by an examination of the structure of the 1933 Act. Sections 4 and 5 of the Act together require a seller to file a registration statement and to issue a prospectus for certain defined types of sales (public offerings by an issuer, through an underwriter). See 15 U. S. C. §§ 77d, 77e. Sections 7 and 10 of the Act set forth the information required in the registration statement and the prospectus. See §§77g, 77j. Section 11 provides for liability on account of false registration statements; § 12(2) for liability based on misstatements in prospectuses. See 15 U. S. C. §§ 77k, 111. Following the most natural and symmetrical reading, just as the liability imposed by § 11 flows from the requirements imposed by §§ 5 and 7 providing for the filing and content of registration statements, the liability imposed by § 12(2) cannot attach unless there is an obligation to distribute the prospectus in the first place (or unless there is an exemption). Our interpretation is further confirmed by a reexamination of § 12 itself. The section contains an important guide to the correct resolution of the case. By its terms, § 12(2) exempts from its coverage prospectuses relating to the sales of government-issued securities. See 15 U. S. C. § 111 (excepting securities exempted by § 77c(a)(2)). If Congress intended § 12(2) to create liability for misstatements contained in any written communication relating to the sale of a security — including secondary market transactions — there is no ready explanation for exempting government-issued securities from the reach of the right to rescind granted by § 12(2). Why would Congress grant immunity to a private seller from liability in a rescission suit for no reason other than that the seller’s misstatements happen to relate to securities issued by a governmental entity? No reason is apparent. The anomaly disappears, however, when the term “prospectus” relates only to documents that offer securities sold to the public by an issuer. The exemption for government-issued securities makes perfect sense on that view, for it then becomes a precise and appropriate means of giving immunity to governmental authorities. The primary innovation of the 1933 Act was the creation of federal duties — for the most part, registration and disclosure obligations — in connection with public offerings. See, e. g., Ernst & Ernst v. Hochfelder, 425 U. S. 185, 195 (1976) (the 1933 Act “was designed to provide investors with full disclosure of material information concerning public offerings”); Blue Chip Stamps v. Manor Drug Stores, 421 U. S. 723, 752 (1975) (“The 1933 Act is a far narrower statute [than the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (1934 Act)] chiefly concerned with disclosure and fraud in connection with offerings of securities — primarily, as here, initial distributions of newly issued stock from corporate issuers”); United States v. Naftalin, 441 U. S. 768, 777-778 (1979) (“[T]he 1933 Act was primarily concerned with the regulation of new offerings”); SEC v. Ralston Purina Co., 346 U. S. 119, 122, n. 5 (1953) (“ ‘[T]he bill does not affect transactions beyond the need of public protection in order to prevent recurrences of demonstrated abuses’ ”), quoting H. R. Rep. No. 85, 73d Cong., 1st Sess., 7 (1933). We are reluctant to conclude that § 12(2) creates vast additional liabilities that are quite independent of the new substantive obligations the Act imposes. It is more reasonable to interpret the liability provisions of the 1933 Act as designed for the primary purpose of providing remedies for violations of the obligations it had created. Indeed, §§ 11 and 12(1) — the statutory neighbors of § 12(2)— afford remedies for violations of those obligations. See § 11,15 U. S. C. § 77k (remedy for untrue statements in registration statements); § 12(1), 15 U. S. C. § 77((1) (remedy for sales in violation of § 5, which prohibits the sale of unregistered securities). Under our interpretation of “prospectus,” § 12(2) in similar manner is linked to the new duties created by the Act. On the other hand, accepting Alloyd’s argument that any written offer is a prospectus under § 12 would require us to hold that the word “prospectus” in § 12 refers to a broader set of communications than the same term in §10. The Court of Appeals was candid in embracing that conclusion: “[T]he 1933 Act contemplates many definitions of a prospectus. Section 2(10) gives a single, broad definition; section 10(a) involves an isolated, distinct document — a prospectus within a prospectus; section 10(d) gives the Commission authority to classify many.” Pacific Dunlop Holdings Inc. v. Allen & Co., 993 F. 2d, at 584. The dissents take a similar tack. In the name of a plain meaning approach to statutory interpretation, the dissents discover in the Act two different species of prospectuses: formal (also called §10) prospectuses, subject to both §§10 and 12, and informal prospectuses, subject only to § 12 but not to § 10. See post, at 598-599 (opinion of Ginsburg, J.); see also post, at 588-589 (opinion of THOMAS, J.). Nowhere in the statute, however, do the terms “formal prospectus” or “informal prospectus” appear. Instead, the Act uses one term — “prospectus”— throughout. In disagreement with the Court of Appeals and the dissenting opinions, we cannot accept the conclusion that this single operative word means one thing in one section of the Act and something quite different in another. The dissenting opinions’ resort to terms not found in the Act belies the claim of fidelity to the text of the statute. Alloyd, as well as Justice Thomas in his dissent, respond that if Congress had intended § 12(2) to govern only initial public offerings, it would have been simple for Congress to have referred to the § 4 exemptions in § 12(2). See Brief for Respondents 25-26; post, at 590 (Thomas, J., dissenting). The argument gets the presumption backwards. Had Congress meant the term “prospectus” in § 12(2) to have a different meaning than the same term in § 10, that is when one would have expected Congress to have been explicit. Congressional silence cuts against, not in favor of, Alloyd’s argument. The burden should be on the proponents of the view that the term “prospectus” means one thing in §12 and another in §10 to adduce strong textual support for that conclusion. And Alloyd adduces none. B Alloyd’s contrary argument rests to a significant extent on §2(10), or, to be more precise, on one word of that section. Section 2(10) provides that “[t]he term ‘prospectus’ means any prospectus, notice, circular, advertisement, letter, or communication, written or by radio or television, which offers any security for sale or confirms the sale of any security.” 15 U. S. C. §77b(10). Concentrating on the word “communication,” Alloyd argues that any written communication that offers a security for sale is a “prospectus.” Inserting its definition into § 12(2), Alloyd insists that a material misstatement in any communication offering a security for sale gives rise to an action for rescission, without proof of fraud by the seller or reliance by the purchaser. In Al-loyd’s view, §2(10) gives the term “prospectus” a capacious definition that, although incompatible with § 10, nevertheless governs in § 12. The flaw in Alloyd’s argument, echoed in the dissenting opinions, post, at 587 (opinion of Thomas, J.); post, at 597 (opinion of Ginsburg, J.), is its reliance on one word of the definitional section in isolation. To be sure, §2(10) defines a prospectus as, inter alia, a “communication, written or by radio or television, which offers any security for sale or confirms the sale of any security.” 15 U. S. C. §77b(10). The word “communication,” however, on which Alloyd’s entire argument rests, is but one word in a list, a word Alloyd reads altogether out of context. The relevant phrase in the definitional part of the statute must be read in its entirety, a reading which yields the interpretation that the term “prospectus” refers to a document soliciting the public to acquire securities. We find that definition controlling. Alloyd’s argument that the phrase “communication, written or by radio or television,” transforms any written communication offering a security for sale into a prospectus cannot consist with at least two rather sensible rules of statutory construction. First, the Court will avoid a reading which renders some words altogether redundant. See United States v. Menasche, 348 U. S. 528, 538-539 (1955). If “communication” included every written communication, it would render “notice, circular, advertisement, [and] letter” redundant, since each of these are forms of written communication as well. Congress with ease could have drafted §2(10) to read: “The term ‘prospectus’ means any communication, written or by radio or television, that offers a security for sale or confirms the sale of a security.” Congress did not write the statute that way, however, and we decline to say it included the words “notice, circular, advertisement, [and] letter” for no purpose. The constructional problem is resolved by the second principle Alloyd overlooks, which is that a word is known by the company it keeps (the doctrine of noscitur a sociis). This rule we rely upon to avoid ascribing to one word a meaning so broad that it is inconsistent with its accompanying words, thus giving “unintended breadth to the Acts of Congress.” Jarecki v. G. D. Searle & Co., 367 U. S. 303, 307 (1961). The rule guided our earlier interpretation of the word “security” under the 1934 Act. The 1934 Act defines the term “security” to mean, inter alia, “any note.” We concluded, nevertheless, that in context “the phrase ‘any note’ should not be interpreted to mean literally ‘any note,’ but must be understood against the background of what Congress was attempting to accomplish in enacting the Securities Acts.” Reves v. Ernst & Young, 494 U. S. 56, 63 (1990). These considerations convince us that Alloyd’s suggested interpretation is not the correct one. There is a better reading. From the terms “prospectus, notice, circular, advertisement, [or] letter,” it is apparent that the list refers to documents of wide dissemination. In a similar manner, the list includes communications “by radio or television,” but not face-to-face or telephonic conversations. Inclusion of the term “communication” in that list suggests that it too refers to a public communication. When the 1933 Act was drawn and adopted, the term “prospectus” was well understood to refer to a document soliciting the public to acquire securities from the issuer. See Black’s Law Dictionary 959 (2d ed. 1910) (defining “prospectus” as a “document published by a company... or by persons acting as its agents or assignees, setting forth the nature and objects of an issue of shares... and inviting the public to subscribe to the issue”). In this respect, the word “prospectus” is a term of art, which accounts for congressional confidence in employing what might otherwise be regarded as a partial circularity in the formal, statutory definition. See 15 U. S. C. § 77b(10) (“The term ‘prospectus’ means any prospectus...”). The use of the term “prospectus” to refer to public solicitations explains as well Congress’ decision in § 12(2) to grant buyers a right to rescind without proof of reliance. See H. R. Rep. No. 85, 73d Cong., 1st Sess., 10 (1933) (“The statements for which [liable persons] are responsible, although they may never actually have been seen by the prospective purchaser, because of their wide dissemination, determine the market price of the security...”). The list of terms in § 2(10) prevents a seller of stock from avoiding liability by calling a soliciting document something other than a prospectus, but it does not compel the conclusion that Alloyd urges us to reach and that the dissenting opinions adopt. Instead, the term “written communication” must be read in context to refer to writings that, from a functional standpoint, are similar to the terms “notice, circular, [and] advertisement.” The term includes communications held out to the public at large but that might have been thought to be outside the other words in the definitional section. C Our holding that the term “prospectus” relates to public offerings by issuers and their controlling shareholders draws support from our earlier decision interpreting the one provision of the Act that extends coverage beyond the regulation of public offerings, § 17(a) of the 1933 Act. See United States v. Naftalin, 441 U. S. 768 (1979). In Naftalin, though noting that “the 1933 Act was primarily concerned with the regulation of new offerings,” the Court held that § 17(a) was “intended to cover any fraudulent scheme in an offer or sale of securities, whether in the course of an initial distribution or in the course of ordinary market trading.” The Court justified this holding — which it termed “a major departure from th[e] limitation [of the 1933 Act to new offerings]” — by reference to both the statutory language and the unambiguous legislative history. Id., at 777-778. The same considerations counsel in favor of our interpretation of § 12(2). The Court noted in Naftalin that § 17(a) contained no language suggesting a limitation on the scope of liability under § 17(a). See id., at 778 (“[T]he statutory language... makes no distinctions between the two kinds of transactions”). Most important for present purposes, § 17(a) does not contain the word “prospectus.” In contrast, as we have noted, § 12(2) contains language, i. e., “by means of a prospectus or oral communication,” that limits § 12(2) to public offerings. Just as the absence of limiting language in § 17(a) resulted in broad coverage, the presence of limiting language in § 12(2) requires a narrow construction. Of equal importance, the legislative history relied upon in Naftalin showed that Congress decided upon a deliberate departure from the general scheme of the Act in this one instance, and “made abundantly clear” its intent that § 17(a) have broad coverage. See ibid, (quoting legislative history stating that “ ‘fraud or deception in the sale of securities maybe prosecuted regardless of whether... or not it is of the class of securities exempted under sections 11 or 12,’” S. Rep. No. 47, 73d Cong., 1st Sess., 4 (1933)). No comparable legislative history even hints that §12(2) was intended to be a freestanding provision effecting expansion of the coverage of the entire statute. The intent of Congress and the design of the statute require that § 12(2) liability be limited to public offerings. D It is understandable that Congress would provide buyers with a right to rescind, without proof of fraud or reliance, as to misstatements contained in a document prepared with care, following well-established procedures relating to investigations with due diligence and in the context of a public offering by an issuer or its controlling shareholders. It is not plausible to infer that Congress created this extensive liability for every casual communication between buyer and seller in the secondary market. It is often difficult, if not altogether impractical, for those engaged in casual communications not to omit some fact that would, if included, qualify the accuracy of a statement. Under Alloyd’s view any casual communication between buyer and seller in the aftermarket could give rise to an action for rescission, with no evidence of fraud on the part of the seller or reliance on the part of the buyer. In many instances buyers in practical effect would have an option to rescind, impairing the stability of past transactions where neither fraud nor detrimental reliance on misstatements or omissions occurred. We find no basis for interpreting the statute to reach so far. Ill The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), as ami-cus, and Justice Ginsburg in dissent, rely on what they call the legislative background of the Act to support Alloyd’s construction. With a few minor exceptions, however, their reliance is upon statements by commentators and judges written after the Act was passed, not while it was under consideration. See Brief for SEC as Amicus Curiae 19-23; post, at 599-601 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting). Material not available to the lawmakers is not considered, in the normal course, to be legislative history. After-the-fact statements by proponents of a broad interpretation are not a reliable indicator of what Congress intended when it passed the law, assuming extratextual sources are to any extent reliable for this purpose. The SEC does quote one contemporaneous memorandum prepared by Dean Landis. See Brief for SEC as Amicus Curiae 13-14 (citing James M. Landis, Reply to Investment Bankers Association Objections of May 5, 1933, p. 5). The statement is quite consistent with our construction. Landis observed that, in contrast to the liabilities imposed by the Act “ ‘that flow from the fact of non-registration or registration,’ ” dealings may violate § 12(2) “ ‘even though they are not related to the fact of registration.’” See Brief for SEC as Amicus Curiae 13 (emphasis added). This, of course, is true. The liability imposed by § 12(2) has nothing to do with the fact of registration, that is, with the failure to file a registration statement that complies with §§7 and 11 of the Act. Instead, the liability imposed by § 12(2) turns on misstatements contained in the prospectus. And, one might point out, securities exempted by §3 of the Act do not require registration, although they are covered by § 12. Landis’ observation has nothing to do with the question presented here: whether a prospectus is a document soliciting the public to purchase securities from the issuer. The SEC also relies on a number of writings, the most prominent a release by the Federal Trade Commission, stating that § 12(2) applied to securities outstanding on the effective date of the 1933 Act. See id., at 19-20. Again, this is an issue not in dispute. Although the Act as passed exempted securities from registration if sold by the issuer within 60 days of the passage of the Act, see 1933 Securities Act, § 3(a)(1), the limitation did not apply to §12(2). See 15 U. S. C. § 111. Instead, actions brought under § 12(2) are subject to the limitation of actions provision in § 13. See 15 U. S. C. § 77m (one year from the date of discovery). A buyer who discovered a material omission in a prospectus after the passage of the Act could sue for rescission under §12(2) even though the prospectus had been issued before enactment of the statute. This tells us nothing one way or the other, however, about whether the term “prospectus” is limited to a document soliciting the public to purchase securities from the issuer. In large measure the writings on which both the SEC and Justice Ginsburg rely address a question on which there is no disagreement, that is, “to what securities does § 12(2) apply?” We agree with the SEC that § 12(2) applies to every class of security (except one issued or backed by a governmental entity), whether exempted from registration or not, and whether outstanding at the time of the passage of the Act or not. The question before us is the coverage of § 12(2), and the writings offered by the SEC are of little value on this point. If legislative history is to be considered, it is preferable to consult the documents prepared by Congress when deliberating. The legislative history of the Act concerning the precise question presented supports our interpretation with much clarity and force. Congress contemplated that § 12(2) would apply only to public offerings by an issuer (or a controlling shareholder). The House Report stated: “The bill affects only new offerings of securities.... It does not affect the ordinary redistribution of securities unless such redistribution takes on the characteristics of a new offering.” H. R. Rep. No. 85, 73d Cong., 1st Sess., 5 (1933). The observation extended to §12(2) as well. Part II, §6 of the House Report is entitled “Civil Liabilities.” See id., at 9. It begins: “Sections 11 and 12 create and define the civil liabilities imposed by the act.... Fundamentally, these sections entitle the buyer of securities sold upon a registration statement... to sue for recovery of his purchase price.” Ibid. It will be recalled that as to private transactions, such as the Alloyd purchase, there will never have been a registration statement. If § 12(2) liability were imposed here, it would cover transactions not within the contemplated reach of the statute. Even more important is the Report’s discussion, and justification, of the liabilities arising from omissions and misstatements in “the prospectus”: “The Committee emphasizes that these liabilities attach only when there has been an untrue statement of material fact or an omission to state a material fact in the registration statement or the prospectus — the basic Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. Section 301 (a) of the Labor Management Relations Act, provides that “Suits for violation of contracts between an employer and a labor organization representing employees in an industry affecting commerce as defined in this chapter, or between any such labor organizations, may be brought in any district court of the United States having jurisdiction of the parties, without respect to the amount in controversy or without regard to the citizenship of the parties.” The questions presented in this case are: (1) Does the scope of “contracts” within § 301 (a) include the agreement at bar, claimed to be not a “collective bargaining contract” but a “strike settlement agreement”? (2) If otherwise includible, is the “strike settlement agreement” cognizable under § 301 (a), although the petitioners, the labor-organization parties to the agreement, acknowledged that they were not entitled to recognition as exclusive representatives of the employees of the respondents? The opinions below appear to rest upon alternative holdings, answering in the negative each of these questions. The District Court’s conclusion that it lacked jurisdiction over the subject matter, 179 F. Supp. 564, was affirmed in a brief per curiam by the Court of Appeals, saying: “The contract here involved is not a collective bargaining agreement between an employer and a labor organization representing its employees. We think that the trial court was correct in reaching the conclusion that collective bargaining contracts between a union and an employer are the only contracts intended to be actionable in a United States District Court under the provisions of section 301 (a).” 286 F. 2d 235. We granted certiorari because of the importance of the questions to the enforcement of the national labor policy as expressed in § 301 (a). 366 U. S. 917. We hold that the lower courts erred and remand the cause for trial and further proceedings consistent with this opinion. The petitioners, local unions of the Retail Clerks International Association, brought this action on the sole jurisdictional basis of § 301 (a) and (b), seeking to compel respondents’ compliance with two allegedly binding arbitration awards. Respondents are two department stores in Toledo, Ohio, covered by the Labor Management Relations Act. For some years prior to 1967, petitioners had been the collective bargaining representatives of respondents’ employees and had been parties to collective bargaining agreements with respondents. In November 1957, negotiations for renewal contracts ended in impasse. A strike ensued against one of the respondents, Lasalle’s, and continued until December 24, 1958; the dispute with the other respondent, Lion Dry Goods, continued during the whole of those 13 months although no strike occurred. On December 24, 1958, the parties ended their dispute with the aid of the Toledo Labor-Management-Citizens’ Committee (hereinafter, L-M-C), a local mediation and arbitration body. Negotiations by means of L-M-C mediation had produced a “Statement of Understanding” satisfactory to all parties. The Statement contained such key points of settlement as the unions’ acknowledgment that they were not then entitled to recognition as exclusive representatives, and would not seek such recognition unless and until certified as so entitled in single store unit elections conducted by the National Labor Relations Board, and Lasalle’s agreement to reinstate striking employees without discrimination. Both stores also agreed to continue in effect detailed wage and hour schedules and provisions as to working conditions and other benefits, incorporated as exhibits to the Statement. All terms of employment had been in force prior to December 24,1958, except an agreement by the stores to provide and pay fully for specified insurance coverage. The stores wrote the L-M-C delivering the Statement, calling it “the basis on which the heretofore existing dispute between [the Locals] and our compan [ies] is to be fully and finally resolved,” and specifying that “The conditions to be performed and met by us are, of course, subject to and conditioned upon the receipt by your organization of guarantees from the respective labor organizations to make the principles enumerated [in the Statement] completely effective.” A few days later the Locals wrote the L-M-C that “we herewith agree to the conditions and guarantees of the Statement of Understanding.” The conditions to be performed by each side were performed and the dispute was terminated. In a few months, however, new grievances arose, including the two that generated this case. First. The unions claimed under the Statement the right of access to the employees’ cafeteria in order to communicate with employees during their non-working time. The stores claimed that Statement ¶ 6 gave no right of access to the employees’ cafeterias, for those are not “areas of the store which are open to customers.” Second. Two Lasalle’s employees, salesladies in the men’s furnishings department, had been fully reinstated except that the saleslady formerly assigned to sell men’s shirts was assigned to sell men’s sweaters, and the other saleslady, who had been selling sweaters, now was assigned to sell shirts. The Locals submitted these matters to the L-M-C under the procedure of Statement ¶ 7; the stores and the Locals participated fully in the ensuing arbitration proceedings; and the award went to the Locals on both grievances. The stores’ refusal to accede to those awards prompted this suit. The District Court viewed as crucial the question whether the Statement given by the stores to the L-M-C and then concurred in by the Locals, constituted “such a contract as is contemplated by Section 301 (a).” 179 F. Supp., at 567. Although the opinion is somewhat ambiguous, we read it as holding that there was a contract between the Locals and the stores but that only certain kinds of contracts are within the purview of § 301 (a) and this was not one of them. We interpret the District Court as holding that to be within § 301 (a), contracts must be “collective bargaining contracts, or agreements arrived at through collective bargaining,” ibid.; and further, must be with a union that is the recognized majority representative of the employees. The court found that the Statement of Understanding met neither test. The Court of Appeals’ brief affirmance, supra, fails to make clear whether it agreed with both of those limitations on §301 (a), or with only one and if so which one. It is argued that Congress limited § 301 (a) jurisdiction to contracts that are “collective bargaining contracts,” meaning, so runs the argument, only agreements concerning wages, hours, and conditions of employment concluded in direct negotiations between employers and unions entitled to recognition as exclusive representatives of employees. The words of § 301 (a) require no such narrow construction as is suggested; rather, they negate it. First. The Section says “contracts” though Congress knew well the phrase “collective bargaining contracts,” see, e. g., § 8 (d), § 9 (a), § 201 (c), § 203 (d), § 204 (a)(2), § 211 (a). Had Congress contemplated a restrictive differentiation, we may assume that it would not have eschewed “collective bargaining contracts” unwittingly. Moreover, Congress provided in § 211 (a) : “For the guidance and information of interested representatives of employers, employees, and the general public, the Bureau of Labor Statistics . . . shall maintain a file of copies of all available collective bargaining agreements and other available agreements and actions thereunder settling or adjusting labor disputes.” Whatever the proper construction of that Section, insofar as it reflects upon § 301 (a) at all, it supports the inference that “contracts” does include more than “collective bargaining agreements,” at least as respondents would define them. Second. If “contracts” means only collective bargaining contracts, the subsequent words “or between any such labor organizations” are superfluous, for if there is a collective bargaining agreement between unions it follows that as to that agreement, one union is the employer and the other represents employees. See Office Employes Union v. Labor Board, 353 U. S. 313. Congress was not indulging in surplusage: A federal forum was provided for actions on other labor contracts besides collective bargaining contracts. See, e. g., United Textile Workers v. Textile Workers Union, 258 F. 2d 743 (no-raiding agreement). But, it is urged, though Congress meant that labor organizations could sue one another in federal courts on other contracts between themselves, suits between employers and unions were still limited to actions on collective bargaining contracts: The provision for suits between labor organizations was inserted in Conference. Differing House and Senate bills were reconciled in Conference. The House bill spoke of suits involving a violation of “an agreement between an employer and a labor organization or other representative of employees . . . .” The Senate bill read “contracts concluded as the result of collective bargaining between an employer and a labor organization . . . .” It is urged that the Conference compromise upon the word “contracts” reflects a desire to use one word to cover both suits between employers and unions, and suits between unions. But it seems obvious that had Congress intended any limiting differentiation, this would have been accomplished by retaining the Senate bill’s phrasing for agreements between employers and unions and then providing specifically for the application of the statute to “contracts between any such labor organizations.” Third. A 1959 enactment, § 8 (f), explicitly contemplates contracts that would not fit respondents’ concept of “collective bargaining agreements.” It authorizes contracting with unions that represent persons not yet even hired by the employer. Such a contract might cover only hiring procedures and not wages, hours, and conditions of employment. Nothing supports the improbable congressional intent that the federal courts be closed to such contracts. We find, then, from a reading of the words of § 301 (a), both in isolation and in connection with the statute as a whole, no basis for denying jurisdiction of the action based upon the alleged violation of the “strike settlement agreement.” Furthermore, the statute’s purpose would be defeated by excluding such contracts from “contracts” cognizable under § 301 (a). See Charles Dowd Box Co. v. Courtney, 368 U. S. 502. If this kind of strike settlement were not enforceable under § 301 (a), responsible and stable labor relations would suffer, and the attainment of the labor policy objective of minimizing disruption of interstate commerce would be made more difficult. It is no answer that in a particular case the agreement might be enforceable in state courts: a main goal of § 301 was precisely to end “checkerboard jurisdiction,” Seymour v. Schneckloth, 368 U. S. 351, at 358. See Charles Dowd Box Co. v. Courtney, supra. Lastly, legislative history refutes the argument that Congress intended to omit agreements of the kind in suit from “contracts” falling within the purview of § 301 (a). We need not decide whether or not this strike settlement agreement is a “collective bargaining agreement” to hold, as we do, that it is a “contract” for purposes of § 301 (a). “Contract in labor law is a term the implications of which must be determined from the connection in which it appears.” J. I. Case Co. v. Labor Board, 321 U. S. 332, 334, It is enough that this is clearly an agreement between employers and labor organizations significant to the maintenance of labor peace between them. It came into being as a means satisfactory to both sides for terminating a protracted strike and labor dispute. Its terms affect the working conditions of the employees of both respondents. It effected the end of picketing and resort by the labor organizations to other economic weapons, and restored strikers to their jobs. It resolved a controversy arising out of, and importantly and directly affecting, the employment relationship. Plainly it falls within § 301 (a). “[Fjederal courts should enforce these agreements on behalf of or against labor organizations and . . . industrial peace can be best obtained only in that way.” Textile Workers Union v. Lincoln Mills, 353 U. S. 448, 455. Only a few words are necessary to dispose of respondents’ second contention, that even if this agreement were otherwise within § 301 (a), petitioners’ disclaimer of entitlement to recognition as exclusive representatives puts them out of court. This issue does not touch upon whether minority unions may demand that employers enter into particular kinds of contracts or the circumstances under which employers may accord recognition to unions as exclusive bargaining agents. The question is only whether “labor organization representing employees” in § 301 (a) has a meaning different from “labor organization which represents employees” in § 301 (b). In United States v. Ryan, 350 U. S. 299, we rejected the argument that § 301 (b) was limited to majority representatives. Neither the words, purpose, nor history of the statute suggests any reason for a different construction of the virtually identical words of subsection (a). Nor can “labor organization representing employees” in § 301 (a) be read as differing from “any such labor organizations” in that subsection’s very next phrase, and plainly, in suits between labor organizations, their right to recognition as exclusive representatives vis-a-vis employers has no relevance whatever. “Members only” contracts have long been recognized. See, e. g., Consolidated Edison Co. v. Labor Board, 305 U. S. 197. Had Congress thought that there was any merit in limiting federal jurisdiction to suits on contracts with exclusive bargaining agents, we might have expected Congress explicitly so to provide, for example, by enacting that § 301 (a) should be read with § 9 (a). Compare §8 (a)(3), §8 (a)(5), §8 (b)(3), §8 (b)(4), §8(d). Moreover, § 8 (f), the 1959 amendment considered supra, p. 27, contemplates contracting with unions that would not represent a majority. Lastly, if the federal courts’ jurisdiction under § 301 (a) required a preliminary determination of the representative status of the labor organization involved, potential conflict with the National Labor Relations Board would be increased, cf. La Crosse Telephone Corp. v. Wisconsin Employment Relations Board, 336 U. S. 18; Amazon Cotton Mill Co. v. Textile Workers Union, 167 F. 2d 183, and litigation would be much hindered. We conclude that the petitioners’ action for alleged violation of the strike settlement agreement was cognizable by the District Court under §301 (a). The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed and the cause is remanded to the District Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. 61 Stat. 156, 29 U. S. C. § 185 (a). Respondents claim that the cause is moot since, after the commencement of this action, the petitioners merged with Local 954 of the same International Union to form a new Local 954. Petitioners deny mootness and move to add or substitute Local 954 as a party. The facts of the merger make this case indistinguishable from De Veau v. Braisted, 363 U. S. 144; see also Labor Board v. Insurance Agents’ International Union, 361 U. S. 477. We therefore hold that the case is not moot, and the petitioners’ motion to add Local 954 as a party is granted. Before 1957, the respondents and two other downtown Toledo department stores, through an organization, Retail Associates, Inc., recognized the petitioners as representatives of their employees and executed collective bargaining agreements with the petitioners on a multi-employer basis. When the 1957 impasse developed, the petitioners struck one of those two other stores and it promptly contracted separately with the petitioners. Respondents and the second of the two other stores petitioned the National Labor Relations Board to conduct an election among the employees of the three stores as a single bargaining unit. The petitioners reacted with a demand that each store negotiate separately. Simultaneously, the petitioners called the strike at respondent Lasalle’s. The dispute produced considerable litigation. See Local 128, Retail Clerks v. Leedom, 42 LRR Man. 2031; Retail Associates, Inc., 120 N. L. R. B. 388; Retail Clerks Assn. v. Leedom, 43 LRR Man. 2004, 2029. A few days before December 24, 1958, the L-M-C proposed a plan for settling the dispute. Discussions ensued between the Committee and the respondents, and between the Committee and the petitioners. At no time were direct negotiations carried on between petitioners and the respondents. Each side made known to the L-M-C the conditions under which it was willing to resolve the dispute and the L-M-C discussed these conditions with the other side. In this manner a basis for settlement was fashioned which was embodied in the Statement referred to in the text. The Lasalle’s Statement of Understanding (exhibits omitted) reads as follows: "1. Employees of Lasalle’s, who have been absent due to the strike, will be re-instated without discrimination because of any strike activities and without loss of seniority provided they make application for reinstatement in the form and manner provided for by the employer within fifteen days of receipt of notice from the employer. “2. All such employees who have complied with the provisions of Paragraph 1 above, will be returned to work not later than February 2, 1959, as scheduled by the Company, in their former position classifications if vacant or in positions comparable in duties and earning opportunities. “3. It is understood that returning strikers will devote their best efforts to their work'and to serving the customers of Lasalle’s, recognizing that stability of employment depends upon the success of the business. “4. Lasalle’s will warrant to the L-M-C that the Company will not reduce rates of pay presently in effect or withdraw or reduce employee benefit programs currently provided. This assurance includes all improvements offered by the Company through the L-M-C on November 15th, 1957, which are already in effect. No employee will be discriminated against, by reason of Union activities, membership or non-membership. All employees will continue to have job security and no employee will be discharged except for just cause. Wage schedules currently in effect are appended as Exhibit A. Copies of hours and working conditions and other existing benefits, as requested by L-M-C are attached as Exhibit B. “5. Neither the Company nor the Union will interfere with the employee’s right to join or not to join a union, as provided and guaranteed by the Labor-Management-Relations Act. Nothing contained herein is to be construed as giving recognition to the union unless at some future time within the discretion of the union, the union is certified as having been chosen by a majority of employees in a single store unit election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board. “6. The Union agrees that it will not request bargaining rights unless it proves its right to represent the employees as provided in Paragraph 5 above; nor will the employer recognize any union except upon certification by the N. L. R. B.; nor will the Company file a petition for election unless a claim for representation is made upon the employer. Nothing herein shall preclude an employee representative from entering areas of the store which are open to customers; or from communicating with employees, provided such communication is on the employee’s non-working time and in no way interferes with the operating of the business. “7. Any individual employee who may have a grievance involving an interpretation or application of or arising under the terms of this understanding with the L-M-C, and who has presented such grievance to his supervisor and the Personnel Department without reaching a satisfactory solution, may take his case to the chairman of the L-M-C who in turn shall refer the case to a panel of the L-M-C, whose majority decision and order shall be final and binding. The panel shall render its decision and order within fifteen days after the grievance has been submitted to it. The procedure regulating the hearing of the grievance by the L-M-C panel shall be determined by the panel. “8. The Union will agree that immediately upon receipt of this statement of understanding by the Toledo Labor-Management-Citizens Committee it will cease all picketing, boycotting or other interference with the business of Lasalle’s, or R. H. Macy & Co., Inc. wherever located. The Union, the strikers, and the Company shall withdraw forthwith all petitions, unfair labor practice charges and litigation before the National Labor Relations Board and the Courts and further agree not to institute in the future any litigation involving or arising out of the instant dispute. The Union and the Employer shall execute mutually satisfactory releases, releasing and discharging each other, the International Union, the local unions involved, and representatives of the union in their representative or individual capacity, labor papers, and all other labor organizations or their representatives who acted in concert or cooperation in connection with the dispute, from any and all claims, demands, causes of action, of whatever nature or description arising out of the labor dispute, including but not limited to the strikes, picketing, boycotting, and all other activities which may have taken place up to the present date. “9. This understanding shall become effective in accordance with the letter of transmittal dated December 24, 1958.” The Lion Store’s Statement is identical except for the omission of paragraphs 1, 2 and 3. The parties’ trial stipulation says, inter alia: “[T]he employee cafeterias in the downtown stores of the defendants . . . are located in areas in each of the stores not open to customers; . . .” The District Court relied for its view of the limited meaning of “contracts” under §301 (a) upon Schatte v. International Alliance, 84 F. Supp. 669. However, that case decided as to § 301 only that the section did not apply to a cause of action which arose before its enactment. 182 F. 2d 158, 164-165. Apart from the question of its cognizability under §301 (a), it is clear that the Statement constitutes a contract between the parties. This is so, although they did not negotiate directly but through a mediator, and did not conjoin their signatures on one document. The record makes obvious that neither the parties nor L-M-C contemplated two independent agreements, one by each side with L-M-C only, unenforceable by either side against the other. The parties stipulated as to the arbitration proceedings that it was “assumed by all parties in attendance to be a meeting of a panel chosen ... to perform proper functions delegated to such a panel under the provisions of . . . [the] Statements of Understanding . . . .” They further stipulated that “nothing . . . [herein] is to preclude the Court from finding that the settlement of December 24, 1958, was a collective bargaining agreement.” In their answer in the District Court, respondents denied “that there is in existence any contract between the plaintiffs, or either of them, and the defendants, or either of them, or that there is in existence any agreement between the parties, collectively or singly, whereby the [L-M-C] is given any right or authority to arbitrate any grievance which the plaintiffs might claim to have.” Petitioners claim and the respondents do not deny that at no time prior to their answer had respondents suggested there was no contract: they complied with the conditions for ending the dispute, they continued following the old wage and hour schedules and other provisions, they participated in the arbitration proceedings and they asked the L-M-C to reconsider their awards on the merits. Respondents’ contention throughout, whether because of the stipulation or otherwise, has been not to negate the existence of any contract at all, but rather to deny that there is a contract of the kind contemplated by § 301 (a). The District Court so construed the defense, 179 F. Supp., at 565. The Court of Appeals appears to have agreed; see supra. And at no point in their brief in this Court do respondents argue that no contract exists; they agree that the only issue is jurisdictional. The court emphasized that the Statement disclaimed the Locals’ right to be recognized as exclusive bargaining agent until so certified by the National Labor Relations Board. 61 Stat. 156, 29 U. S. C. § 181 (a). 2 N. L. R. B., Legislative History of the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947, pp. 1535, 1543. 1, id., at 221, 279. 73 Stat. 545, 29 U. S. C. (Supp. II) § 158 (f). See 1 and 2 N. L. R. B., supra, n. 9, at 94, 151, 221, 279, 297, 336-367, 399-400, 409, 421-424, 436, 475 (see id., at 441), 569-570, 873, 927, 993, 1013, 1014, 1037, 1043, 1044, 1065-1066, 1074, 1076, 1078, 1118, 1123-1124, 1128, 1133, 1145-1146, 1150, 1166, 1208, 1325, 1342-1343, 1446, 1456, 1461, 1483, 1488, 1497, 1524, 1539, 1543, 1557-1558, 1619, 1626, 1654. None of the many references to “collective bargaining contracts” evinces a consideration of the meaning or scope of that phrase. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

G

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. On application for vacation of the order of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit staying issuance of its mandate and for a stay of the order of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas and for such other orders as petitioners may be entitled to. Argued August 28, 1958. Having considered the oral arguments, the Court is in agreement with the view expressed by counsel for the respective parties and by the Solicitor General that petitioners’ present application respecting the stay of the mandate of the Court of Appeals and of the order of the District Court of June 21, 1958, necessarily involves consideration of the merits of the Court of Appeals decision reversing the order of Judge Lemley. The Court is advised that the opening date of the High School will be September 15. In light of this, and representations made .by counsel for the School Board as to the Board’s plan for filing its petition for certiorari, the Court makes the following order: 1. The School Board’s petition for certiorari may be filed not later than September 8, 1958. 2. The briefs of both parties on the merits may be filed not later than September 10, 1958. 3. The Solicitor General is invited to file a brief by September 10, 1958, and to present oral argument if he is so advised. Thurgood Marshall argued the cause for petitioners. With him on the brief were Wiley A. Branton, Jack Green-berg and William Coleman, Jr. Richard C. Butler argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief was A. F. House. Solicitor General Rankin, at the invitation of the Court, argued the cause for the United States, as amicus curiae, urging that the relief sought by petitioners should be granted. With him on the brief were Oscar H. Davis, Philip Elman and Ralph S. Spritzer. 4. The Rules of the Court requiring printing of the petition, briefs, and record are dispensed with. 5. Oral argument upon the petition for certiorari is set for September 11, 1958, at twelve o’clock noon. 6. Action on the petitioners’ application addressed to the stay of the mandate of the Court of Appeals and to the stay of the order of the District Court of June 21, 1958, is deferred pending the disposition of the petition for certiorari duly filed in accordance with the foregoing schedule. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. The issue here is whether an employer commits an unfair labor practice, National Labor Relations Act §8 (a)(5), when it refuses to bargain with a certified union over the union’s proposal for the adoption of the “agency shop.” More narrowly, since the employer is not obliged to bargain over a proposal that he commit an unfair labor practice, the question is whether the agency shop is an unfair labor practice under § 8 (a) (3) of the Act or else is exempted from the prohibitions of that section by the proviso thereto. We ha^e concluded that this type of arrangement does not constitute an unfair labor practice and that it is not prohibited by § 8. Respondent’s employees'are represented by the United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, UAW, in a single, multiplant, company-wide unit. The 1958 agreement • between union’ and company provides for maintenance of membership and the union shop. These provisions were not operative, however, in such States as Indiana where state law prohibited making union membership a condition of employment. In June 1959, the Indiana intermediate appellate court held that an agency shop arrangement would not violate the state right-to-work law. Meade Elec. Co. v. Hagberg, 129 Ind. App. 631, 159 N. E. 2d 408. As defined in that opinion, the term “agency shop” applies to an arrangement under which all employees are required as a condition of employment to pay dues to the union and pay the union’s initiation fee, but they need not actually become union members. The union thereafter sent respondent a letter proposing the negotiation of a contractual provision covering Indiana plants “generally similar to that set forth” in the Meade case. Continued employment in the Indiana plants would be conditioned upon the payment of sums equal to the initiation fee and regular monthly dues paid by the union members. The intent of the proposal, the National Labor Relations Board concluded, was not to require membership but to make membership available at the employees’ option and on nondiscriminatory terms. Employees choosing not to join would make the required payments and, in accordance with union custom, would share in union expenditures for strike benefits, educational and retired member benefits, and union publications and promotional activities, but they would not be entitled to attend union meetings, vote upon ratification of agreements negotiated by. the union, or have a voice in the internal affairs of the union. The respondent made no counterproposal, but replied to the union’s letter that the proposed agreement would violate the National Labor Relations Act and that respondent must therefore “respectfully décline to comply with your request for a meeting” to bargain over the proposal. The union thereupon filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board against respondent for its alleged refusal to bargain in good faith. In the Board’s view of the record, “the Union was not seeking to bargain over a clause requiring nonmember employees to pay sums equal to dues and fees as a condition of employment while at the same time maintaining a closed-union policy with respect to applicants for membership,” since the proposal contemplated an arrangement in which “all employees are given the option of becoming, or refraining from becoming, members of the Union.” Proceeding on this basis and putting aside the consequences of a closed-union policy upon the legality of the agency shop, the Board assessed the union’s proposal as comporting fully with the congressional declaration of policy in favor of union-security contracts and therefore a mandatory subject as to which the Act obliged respondent to bargain in good faith. At- the same time, it stated that it had “no doubt that an agency-shop agreement is a permissible form of union-security within the meaning of Sections 7 and 8 (a) (3) of the Act.” Accordingly, the Board ruled that respondent had committed an unfair labor practice by refusing to bargain in good faith with the certified bargaining representative of its employees, and it ordered respondent to bargain with the union over the proposed arrangement; no back-pay award is involved in this case. 133 N. L. R. B. 451, 456, 457. Respondent petitioned for review in the Court of Appeals, and the Board cross-petitioned for enforcement. The Court of Appeals set the order aside on the grounds that the Act tolerates only “an agreement requiring membership in a labor organization as a condition of employment” when such agreements do not violate state right-to-work laws, and that the Act does not authorize agreements requiring payment of membership dues to a union, in lieu of membership, as a condition of employment. It held that the proposed agency shop agreement would violate §§ 7, 8 (a)(1), and 8 (a)(3) of the Act and that the employer was therefore not obliged to bargain over it. 303 F. 2d 428 (C. A. 6th Cir.). We granted certiorari, 371 U. S. 908, and now reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals. Section 8 (3) under the Wagner Act was the predecessor to § 8 (a)(3) of the present law. Like § 8 (a)(3), § 8 (3) forbade employers to discriminate against employees to compel them to join a union. Because it was feared that § 8 (3) and § 7, if nothing were added to qualify them, might be held to outlaw union-security arrangements such as the closed shop, see 79 Cong. Rec. 7570 (statement of Senator Wagner), 7674 (statement of Senator Walsh); H. R. Rep. No. 972, 74th Cong., 1st Sess. 17; H. R. Rep. No. 1147, 74th Cong., 1st Sess. 19, the proviso to § 8 (3) was added expressly declaring: “Provided, That nothing in this Act ... or in any other statute-of the United States, shall preclude an employer from making an agreement with a labor organization ... to require as a condition of employment membership therein, if such labor organization is the representative of the employees as provided in section 9 (a) . . . The prevailing administrative and judicial view under the Wagner Act was or came to be that the proviso to § 8 (3) covered both the closed and union shop, as well as less onerous union-security arrangements, if they were otherwise legal. The National Labor Relations Board construed the proviso as shielding from an unfair labor practice charge less severe forms of union-security arrangements than the closed or the union shop, including an arrangement in Public Service Co. of Colorado, 89 N. L. R. B. 418, requiring nonunion members to pay to the union $2 a month “for the support of the bargaining unit.” And in Algoma Plywood Co. v. Wisconsin Board, 336 U. S. 301, 307, which involved a maintenance of membership agreement, the Court, in commenting on petitioner’s contention that the proviso of § 8 (3) affirmatively protected arrangements within its scope, cf. Garner v. Teamsters Union, 346 U. S. 485, said of its purpose: “The short answer is that § 8 (3) merely disclaims a national policy hostile to the closed shop or other forms of union-security agreement.” (Emphasis added.) When Congress enacted the Taft-Hartley Act, it added the following to the. language of the original proviso to §8(3):. “on or after the thirtieth day following the beginning of such employment- or the effective date of such agreement, whichever is the later . . . Provided further, That no employer shall justify any discrimination against an employee for nonmembership in a labor organization (A) if he has reasonable grounds for believing that such membership was not available to the employee on the same terms and conditions. generally applicable to other members, or (B) if he has reasonable grounds for believing that membership was denied or terminated for reasons other than the failure of the employee to tender the periodic dues 'and the initiation fees uniformly required as a condition of acquiring or retaining membership.” 29 U. S. C. § 158 (a)(3). These additions were intended to accomplish twin purposes. On the one hand, the most serious abuses of compulsory unionism were eliminated by abolishing the closed shop. On the other hand, Congress recognized that in the absence of a union-security provision “many employees sharing the benefits of what unions are able to accomplish by collective bargaining will refuse to pay their share of the cost.” S. Rep. No. 105, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 6, 1 Leg. Hist. L. M. R. A. 412. Consequently, under the new law “employers would still be permitted to enter into agreements requiring all the employees in a givén bargaining unit to become members 30 days after being hired,” but “expulsion from a union cannot be a ground of compulsory discharge if the worker is not delinquent in paying his initiation fee or dues.” S. Rep. No. 105, p. 7, 1 Leg. Hist. L. M. R. A. 413. The amendments were intended only to “remedy the most serious abuses of compulsory union membership and yet give employers and unions who feel that such agreements promoted stability by eliminating ‘free riders’ the right to continue such arrangements.” Ibid. As far as the federal law was concerned, all employees could be required to pay their way. The bill “abolishes the closed shop but permits voluntary agreements for requiring such forms of compulsory membership as the union shop or maintenance of membership . . . .” S. Rep. No. 105, p. 3, 1 Leg. Hist. L. M. R. A. 409. We find nothing in the legislative history of the Act indicating that Congress intended the amended proviso to §8(a)(3) to validate only the union shop and simultaneously to abolish, in addition to the closed shop, all other union-security arrangements permissible under state law. There is much to be said for the Board’s view that, if Congress desired in the Wagner Act to permit a closed or union shop and in the Taft-Hartley Act the union shop, then it also intended to preserve the status of less vigorous, less compulsory contracts which demanded less adherence to the union. • Respondent, however, relies upon the express words of the proviso which allow employment to be conditioned upon “membership”: since the union’s proposal here does not require actual membership but demands only initiation fees and monthly dues, it is not saved by the proviso. This position, of course, would reject administrative decisions concerning the scope of § 8 (3) of the Wagner Act, e. g., Public Service Co. of Colorado, supra, reaffirmed by the Board-under the Taft-Hartley amendments, American Seating Co., 98 N. L. R. B. 800. Moreover, the 1947 amendments not only abolished the closed shop but also made significant alterations in the meaning of “membership” for the purposes of union-security contracts. Under the second proviso to § 8 (a)(3), the burdens of membership upon which employment may be conditioned are expressly limited to the payment of initiation fees and monthly dues. It is permissible to condition employment upon membership, but membership, insofar as it has significance to employment rights, may in turn be conditioned only upon payment of fees and dues. “Membership” as a condition of employment is whittled down to its financial core. This Court has said as much before in Radio Officers’ Union v. Labor Board, 347 U. S. 17, 41: “This legislative history clearly indicates that Congress intended to prevent utilization of union security agreements for any purpose other than to compel payment of union dues and fees. Thus Congress recognized the validity of unions’ concern about ‘free riders,’ i. e., employees who receive the benefits of union representation but are unwilling to contribute their fair share of financial support to such union, and gave unions the power to contract to meet that problem while withholding from unions the power to cause the discharge of employees for any other reason. . . .” We are therefore confident that the proposal made by the union here conditioned employment upon the practical equivalent of union “membership,” as Congress used that term in the proviso to 18(a)(3). The proposal for requiring the payment of dues and fees imposes no burdens not imposed by a permissible, union shop contract and compels the performance of only those duties of membership which are enforceable by discharge under a union shop arrangement. If an employee in a union shop unit refuses to respect any union-imposed obligations other than the duty to pay dues and fees, and membership in the union is therefore denied or terminated, the condition of “membership” for § 8 (a)(3) purposes is nevertheless satisfied and the employee may not be discharged for nonmembership even though he is not a formal member. Of course, if the union chooses to extend membership even though the employee will meet only the minimum financial burden, and refuses to support or “join” the union in any other .affirmative way, the employee may have to become a “member” under a union shop contract, in the sense that the union may be able to place him on its rolls. The agency shop arrangement proposed here removes that choice from the union and places the option of membership in the employee while still requiring the same monetary support as does the union shop. Such a difference between the union and agency shop may be of great importance in some contexts, but for present purposes it is more formal than real. To the extent that it has any significance at all it serves, rather than violates, the desire of Congress to reduce the evils of compulsory unionism while allowing financial support for the bargaining agent. In short, the employer categorically refused to bargain with the union over a proposal for an agreement within the proviso to § 8 (a) (3) and as such lawful for the purposes of this case. By the same token, § 7, and derivatively §8 (a)(1), cannot be deemed to forbid the employer to enter such agreements, since it too is expressly limited by the § 8 (a) (3) proviso. We hold that the employer was not excused from his duty to bargain over the proposal on the theory that his acceding to it would necessarily involve him in an unfair labor practice. Whether a different result obtains in States which have declared such arrangements unlawful is an issue still to be resolved in Retail Clerks Assn. v. Schermerhorn, post, p. 746, and one which is of no relevance here because Indiana law does not forbid the present contract proposal. In the context of this case, then, the employer cannot justify his refusal to bargain. He violated § 8 (a)(5), and the Board properly ordered him to return to the bargaining table. Reversed and remanded. Mr. Justice Goldberg took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. “Sec. 8. (a) It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer— “(5) to refuse to bargain collectively with the representatives of his employees, subject to the provisions of section 9 (a).” “Sec.- 8. (a) It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer— “(3) by discrimination in regard to hire or tenure of employment or any term or condition of employment to encourage or discourage membership in any labor organization: Provided, That nothing in this Act, or in any other statute of the United States, shall preclude an employer from making an agreement with a labor organization . . . to require as a condition of employment membership therein on or after the thirtieth day following the beginning of such employment or the effective date of such agreement, whichever is the later “Union Security and Check-Off of Union Membership Dues “(4) An employe who is a member of the-Union at the time this Agreement becomes effective shall continue membership in the Union for the duration of this Agreement to the extent of paying an initiation fee and the membership dues uniformly required as a condition of acquiring or retaining membership in the Union. “(4a) An employe who is not a member of the Union at the time this Agreement becomes effective shall become a member of the Union within. 60 days after the thirtieth (30th) day following the effective date of this Agreement or within 60 days after the thirtieth (30th) day following employment, whichever is later, and shall remain a member of Union, to the extent of paying an initiation fee and the membership dues uniformly required as a condition of acquiring or retaining membership in the Union, whenever employed under, and for the duration of, this Agreement. “(4b) Anything herein to the contrary notwithstanding, an employe shall not be required to become a member of, or continue membership in, the Union, as a condition of employment, if employed in any state which prohibits, or otherwise makes unlawful, membership in a labor organization as a condition of employment. “(4c) The Union shall accept into membership each employe covered by this Agreement who tenders to the Union the periodic dues and initiation fees uniformly required as a condition of acquiring or retaining membership in the Union. “(4f) ‘MemDer of the Union’ as used in paragraphs (4) and (4a) above means any employe who is a member of the Union and is not more than sixty (60) days in arrears in the payment of membership dues.” The union’s vice-president so explained the union proposal, and. the Board seems to have accepted this view. 133 N. L. R. B. 451, at 456, n. 12. The Board also held that respondent’s refusal to bargain interfered with, restrained, and coerced its employees in the exercise of , their National Labor Relations Act § 7 rights, contrary to National Labor Relations Act §8 (a)(1). See, e. g., M. & J. Tracy, Inc., 12 N. L. R. B. 916, 931-934; J. E. Pearce Contracting & Stevedoring Co., Inc., 20 N. L. R. B. 1061, 1070-1073. And see the memorandum printed by the Senate committee, commenting upon the final bill, which indicated that the exemption of the proviso was not limited to the closed or union shop: “Unless this change is made as provided in S, 1958, most strikes for a closed shop or even for a preferential shop would by this act be declared to be for an illegal purpose .... “As the legislative history of [N. I. R. A. §] 7 (a) demonstrates, nothing in that section was intended to deprive labor of its existing rights in many States to contract or strike for a closed or preferential shop .... No.reason appears for a contrary view here.” 1 Leg. Hist. N. L. R. A. 1354-1355. This case was decided in 1950, but it was governed by the Wagner Act because the agreement was covered by the saving clause in the Labor Management Relations Act, § 102, 89 N. L. R. B., at 419-420. In that case, the Board stated: “As to the requirement in paragraph 4 that religious objectors who do not become members pay to the Intervenor sums equivalent to dues, the Board has ruled that closed-shop agreements providing for ‘support money’ payments did not violate the proviso to Section 8 (3) of the Wagner Act. As the precise language of the 8 (3) proviso in the Wagner Act was continued in the amended Act with certain added qualifications not pertinent-here, and because the legislative history of the amended Act indicates that.Congress intended not to illegalize the practice of obtaining support payments from nonunion members who would otherwise be ‘free riders,’ we find that the provision for support payments in the instant contract does not exceed the union-security' agreements authorized by the Act.” 98 N. L. R. B., at 802. Referring to the Canadian practice, Senator Taft stated that the rule adopted by the Conference Committee “is substantially the rule now in effect in Canada” which is that “the employee must, nevertheless, pay dues, even though he does not join the union” and that if he pays the dues without joining he has the right to be employed. 93 Cong. Rec. 4887, 2 Leg. Hist. L. R. M. A. 1422. Union Starch & Ref. Co. v. Labor Board, 186 F. 2d 1008 (C. A. 7th Cir.). See also Labor Board v. Food Fair Stores, 307 F. 2d 3 (C. A. 3d Cir.); Labor Board v. Local 815, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 290 F. 2d 99 (C. A. 2d Cir.); Labor Board v. Local 450, International Union of Operating Engineers, 281 F. 2d 313, 316-317 (C. A. 5th Cir.); Labor Board v. National Automotive Fibres, Inc., 277 F. 2d 779 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Labor Board v. Die & Tool Makers Lodge, 231 F. 2d 298 (C. A. 7th Cir.); Labor Board v. Mechanics Educational Society of America, 222 F. 2d 429 (C. A. 6th Cir.); Labor Board v. Pape Broadcasting Co., 217 F. 2d 197 (C. A. 5th Cir.); Labor Board v. Philadelphia Iron Works, 211 F. 2d 937 (C. A. 3d Cir.); Labor Board v. Eclipse Lumber Co., 199 F. 2d 684 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Utley Company, 108 N. L. R. B. 295, enforced, 217 F. 2d 885 (C. A. 6th Cir.); Washington Waterfront Employers, 98 N. L. R. B. 284, enforced, 211 F. 2d 946 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Electric Auto-Lite Co., 92 N. L. R. B. 1073, enforced, 196 F. 2d 500 (C. A. 6th Cir.). Cf. American Seating Co., 98 N. L. R. B. 800, 802, quoted supra. note 8, approving a provision protecting those who object on conscientious grounds from being required to become “members” in the conventional sense of that term. Also wide of the mark is respondent’s further suggestion that Congress contemplated the obligation to pay fees and dues to be imposed only in connection with actual - membership in the union, so as to insure the enjoyment of all union benefits, and rights by those from whom money is extracted. Congress, it is said, had no desire to open the door to compulsory contracts which extract money but exclude the contributing employees from union membership. But, as analyzed by the Board and as the case comes to us, there is no closed-union aspect to the present proposal by the union. Membership remains optional with the employee and the significance of desired, but unavailable, union membership, or the benefits of membership, in terms of permissible § 8 (a) (3) security contracts, we leave for another case. In view of the legislative history of the Taft-Hartley amendments to § 8' (a) (3) and of their purposes, we cannot say that optional membership, which is neither compulsory nor unavailable membership, vitiates an otherwise valid union-security arrangement. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

G

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. The judgments are affirmed by an equally divided Court. Mr. Justice Douglas took no part in the consideration or decision of these cases. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. The writ of habeas corpus stands as a safeguard against imprisonment of those held in violation of the law. Judges must be vigilant and independent in reviewing petitions for the writ, a commitment that entails substantial judicial resources. Those resources are diminished and misspent, however, and confidence in the writ and the law it vindicates undermined, if there is judicial disregard for the sound and established principles that inform its proper issuance. That judicial disregard is inherent in the opinion of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit here under review. The Court of Appeals, in disagreement with the contrary conclusions of the Supreme Court of the State of California and of a United States District Court, ordered habeas corpus relief granted to set aside the conviction of Joshua Richter, respondent here. This was clear error. Under 28 U. S. C. § 2254(d), the availability of federal ha-beas relief is limited with respect to claims previously “adjudicated on the merits” in state-court proceedings. The first inquiry this case presents is whether that provision applies when state-court relief is denied without an accompanying statement of reasons. If it does, the question is whether the Court of Appeals adhered to the statute’s terms, in this ease as it relates to ineffective-assistance claims judged by the standard set forth in Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S. 668 (1984). A second case decided today, Premo v. Moore, post, p. 115, presents similar issues. Here, as in that case, it is necessary to reverse the Court of Appeals for failing to accord required deference to the decision of a state court. I It is necessary to begin by discussing the details of a crime committed more than a decade and a half ago. A Sometime after midnight on December 20, 1994, sheriff’s deputies in Sacramento County, California, arrived at the home of a drug dealer named Joshua Johnson. Hours before, Johnson had been smoking marijuana in the company of Richter and two other men, Christian Branscombe and Patrick Klein. When the deputies arrived, however, they found only Johnson and Klein. Johnson was hysterical and covered in blood. Klein was lying on a couch in Johnson’s living room, unconscious and bleeding. Klein and Johnson each had been shot twice. Johnson recovered; Klein died of his wounds. Johnson gave investigators this account: After falling asleep, he awoke to find Richter and Branseombe in his bedroom, at which point Branseombe shot him. Johnson heard more gunfire in the living room and the sound of his assailants leaving. He got up, found Klein bleeding on the living •room couch, and called 911. A gun safe, a pistol, and $6,000 cash, all of which had been in the bedroom, were missing. Evidence at the scene corroborated Johnson’s account. Investigators found spent shell casings in the bedroom (where Johnson said he had been shot) and in the living room (where Johnson indicated Klein had been shot). In the living room there were two casings, a.32 caliber and a.22 caliber. One of the bullets recovered from Klein’s body was a.32 and the other was a.22. In the bedroom there were two more casings, both.32 caliber. In addition detectives found blood spatter near the living room couch and bloodstains in the bedroom. Pools of blood had collected in the kitchen and the doorway to Johnson’s bedroom. Investigators took only a few blood samples from the crime scene. One was from a blood splash on the wall near the bedroom doorway, but no sample was taken from the doorway blood pool itself. Investigators searched Richter’s residence and found Johnson’s gun safe, two boxes of.22-caliber ammunition, and a gun magazine loaded with cartridges of the same brand and type as the boxes. A ballistics expert later concluded the.22-caliber bullet that struck Klein and the.22-caliber shell found in the living room matched the ammunition found in Richter’s home and bore markings consistent with the model of gun for which the magazine was designed. Richter and Branseombe were arrested. At first Richter denied involvement. He would later admit taking Johnson’s pistol and disposing of it and of the.32-caliber weapon Brans-combe used to shoot Johnson and Hein. Richter’s counsel produced Johnson’s missing pistol, but neither of the guns used to shoot Johnson and Klein was found. B Branscombe and Richter were tried together on charges of murder, attempted murder, burglary, and robbery. Only Richter’s case is presented here. The prosecution built its case on Johnson’s testimony and on circumstantial evidence. Its opening statement took note of the shell casings found at the crime scene and the ammunition and gun safe found at Richter's residence. Defense counsel offered explanations for the circumstantial evidence and derided Johnson as a drug dealer, a paranoid, and a trigger-happy gun fanatic who had drawn a pistol on Brans-combe and Richter the last time he had seen them. And there were inconsistencies in Johnson’s story. In his 911 call, for instance, Johnson first said there were four or five men who had broken into his house, not two; and in the call he did not identify Richter and Branscombe among the intruders. Blood evidence does not appear to have been part of the prosecution's planned case prior to trial, and investigators had not analyzed the few blood samples taken from the crime scene. But the opening statement from the defense led the prosecution to alter its approach. Richter's attorney outlined the theory that Branscombe had fired on Johnson in self-defense and that Klein had been killed not on the living room couch but in the crossfire in the bedroom doorway. Defense counsel stressed deficiencies in the investigation, including the absence of forensic support for the prosecution's version of events. The prosecution took steps to adjust to the counterattack now disclosed. Without advance notice and over the objection of Richter’s attorney, one of the detectives who investigated the shootings testified for the prosecution as an expert in blood pattern evidence. He concluded it was unlikely Klein had been shot outside the living room and then moved to the couch, given the patterns of blood on Klein’s face, as well as other evidence including “high velocity” blood spatter near the couch consistent with the location of a shooting. The prosecution also offered testimony from a serologist. She testified the blood sample taken near the pool by the bedroom door could be Johnson’s but not Klein’s. Defense counsel’s cross-examination probed weaknesses in the testimony of these two witnesses. The detective who testified on blood patterns acknowledged that his inferences were imprecise, that it was unlikely Klein had been lying down on the couch when shot, and that he could not say the blood in the living room was from either of Klein’s wounds. Defense counsel elicited from the serologist a concession that she had not tested the bedroom blood sample for cross-contamination. She said that if the year-old sample had degraded, it would be difficult to tell whether blood of Klein’s type was also present in the sample. For the defense, Richter’s attorney called seven witnesses. Prominent among these was Richter himself. Richter testified he and Branscombe returned to Johnson’s house just before the shootings in order to deliver something to one of Johnson’s roommates. By Richter’s account, Branscombe entered the house alone while Richter waited in the driveway; but after hearing screams and gunshots, Richter followed inside. There he saw Klein lying not on the couch but in the bedroom doorway, with Johnson on the bed and Branscombe standing in the middle of the room. According to Richter, Branscombe said he shot at Johnson and Klein after they attacked him. Other defense witnesses provided some corroboration for Richter’s story. His former girlfriend, for instance, said she saw the gun safe at Richter’s house shortly before the shootings. The jury returned a verdict of guilty on all charges. Richter was sentenced to life without parole. On appeal, his conviction was affirmed. People v. Branscombe, 72 Cal. Rptr. 2d 773 (App. 1998) (officially depublished). The California Supreme Court denied a petition for review, People v. Branscombe, No. S069751, 1998 Cal. LEXIS 4252 (June 24, 1998), and Richter did not file a petition for certiorari with this Court. His conviction became final. C Richter later petitioned the California Supreme Court for a writ of habeas corpus. He asserted a number of grounds for relief, including ineffective assistance of counsel. As relevant here, he claimed his counsel was deficient for failing to present expert testimony on serology, pathology, and blood spatter patterns, testimony that, he argued, would disclose the source of the blood pool in the bedroom doorway. This, he contended, would bolster his theory that Johnson had moved Klein to the couch. He offered affidavits from three types of forensic experts. First, he provided statements from two blood serologists who said there was a possibility Klein’s blood was intermixed with blood of Johnson’s type in the sample taken from near the pool in the bedroom doorway. Second, he provided a statement from a pathologist who said the blood pool was too large to have come from Johnson given the nature of his wounds and his own account of his actions while waiting for the police. Third, he provided a statement from an expert in bloodstain analysis who said the absence of “a large number of satellite droplets” in photographs of the area around the blood in the bedroom doorway was inconsistent with the blood pool coming from Johnson as he stood in the doorway. App. 118. Richter argued this evidence established the possibility that the blood in the bedroom doorway came from Klein, not Johnson. If that were true, he argued, it would confirm his account, not Johnson’s. The California Supreme Court denied Richter’s petition in a one-sentence summary order. In re Richter, No. S082167 (Mar. 28, 2001), App. to Pet. for Cert. 22a. Richter did not seek certiorari from this Court. After the California Supreme Court issued its summary order denying relief, Richter filed a petition for habeas corpus in United States District Court for the Eastern District of California. He reasserted the claims in his state petition. The District Court denied his petition, and a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed. Richter v. Hickman, 521 F. 3d 1222 (2008). The Court of Appeals granted rehearing en banc and reversed the District Court’s decision. Richter v. Hickman, 578 F. 3d 944 (2009). As a preliminary matter, the Court of Appeals questioned whether 28 U. S. C. § 2254(d) was applicable to Richter’s petition, since the California Supreme Court issued only a summary denial when it rejected Ms Strickland claims; but it determined the California decision was unreasonable in any event and that Richter was entitled to relief. The court held Richter’s trial counsel was deficient for failing to consult experts on blood evidence in determining and pursuing a trial strategy and in preparing to rebut expert evidence the prosecution might — and later did — offer. Four judges dissented from the en banc decision. We granted certiorari. 559 U. S. 935 (2010). II The statutory authority of federal courts to issue habeas corpus relief for persons in state custody is provided by 28 U. S. C. § 2254, as amended by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA). The text of § 2254(d) states: “An application for a writ of habeas corpus on behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court shall not be granted with respect to any claim that was adjudicated on the merits in State court proceedings unless the adjudication of the claim— “(1) resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States; or “(2) resulted in a decision that was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding.” As an initial matter, it is necessary to decide whether § 2254(d) applies when a state court’s order is unaccompanied by an opinion explaining the reasons relief has been denied. By its terms § 2254(d) bars relitigation of any claim “adjudicated on the merits” in state court, subject only to the exceptions in §§ 2254(d)(1) and (2). There is no text in the statute requiring a statement of reasons. The statute refers only to a “decision,” which resulted from an “adjudication.” As every Court of Appeals to consider the issue has recognized, determining whether a state court’s decision resulted from an unreasonable legal or factual conclusion does not require that there be an opinion from the state court explaining the state court’s reasoning. See Chadwick v. Janecka, 312 F. 3d 597, 605-606 (CA3 2002); Wright v. Secretary for Dept. of Corrections, 278 F. 3d 1245, 1253-1254 (CA11 2002); Sellan v. Kuhlman, 261 F. 3d 303, 311-312 (CA2 2001); Bell v. Jarvis, 236 F. 3d 149, 158-162 (CA4 2000) (en banc); Harris v. Stovall, 212 F. 3d 940, 943, n. 1 (CA6 2000); Aycox v. Lytle, 196 F. 3d 1174, 1177-1178 (CA10 1999); James v. Bowersox, 187 F. 3d 866, 869 (CA8 1999). And as this Court has observed, a state court need not cite or even be aware of our cases under § 2254(d). Early v. Packer, 537 U. S. 3, 8 (2002) (per curiam). Where a state court’s decision is unaccompanied by an explanation, the habeas petitioner’s burden still must be met by showing there was no reasonable basis for the state court to deny relief. This is so whether or not the state court reveals which of the elements in a multipart claim it found insufficient, for § 2254(d) applies when a “claim,” not a component of one, has been adjudicated. There is no merit to the assertion that compliance with § 2254(d) should be excused when state courts issue summary rulings because applying § 2254(d) in those cases will encourage state courts to withhold explanations for their decisions. Opinion-writing practices in state courts are influenced by considerations other than avoiding scrutiny by collateral attack in federal court. Cf. In re Robbins, 18 Cal. 4th 770, 778, n. 1, 959 P. 2d 311, 316, n. 1 (1998) (state procedures limiting habeas are “a means of protecting the integrity of our own appeal and habeas corpus process,” rather than a device for “insulating our judgments from federal court review” (emphasis deleted)). At the same time, requiring a statement of reasons could undercut state practices designed to preserve the integrity of the case-law tradition. The issuance of summary dispositions in many collateral attack cases can enable a state judiciary to concentrate its resources on the cases where opinions are most needed. See Brief for California Attorneys for Criminal Justice et al. as Amici Curiae 8 (noting that the California Supreme Court disposes of close to 10,000 cases a year, including more than 3,400 original habeas corpus petitions). There is no merit either in Richter’s argument that § 2254(d) is inapplicable because the California Supreme Court did not say it was adjudicating his claim “on the merits.” The state court did not say it was denying the claim for any other reason. When a federal claim has been presented to a state court and the state court has denied relief, it may be presumed that the state court adjudicated the claim on the merits in the absence of any indication or state-law procedural principles to the contrary. Cf. Harris v. Reed, 489 U. S. 255, 265 (1989) (presumption of a merits determination when it is unclear whether a decision appearing to rest on federal grounds was decided on another basis). The presumption may be overcome when there is reason to think some other explanation for the state court’s decision is more likely. See, e. g., Ylst v. Nunnemaker, 501 U. S. 797, 803 (1991). Richter, however, does not make that showing. He mentions the theoretical possibility that the members of the California Supreme Court may not have agreed on the reasons for denying his petition. It is pure speculation, however, to suppose that happened in this case. And Richter’s assertion that the mere possibility of a lack of agreement prevents any attribution of reasons to the state court’s decision is foreclosed by precedent. See ibid. As has been noted before, the California courts or Legislature can alter the State’s practices or elaborate more fully on their import. Evans v. Chavis, 546 U. S. 189, 197, 199 (2006). But that has not occurred here. This Court now holds and reconfirms that § 2254(d) does not require a state court to give reasons before its decision can be deemed to have been “adjudicated on the merits.” Richter has failed to show that the California Supreme Court’s decision did not involve a determination of the merits of his claim. Section 2254(d) applies to his petition. Ill Federal habeas relief may not be granted for claims subject to § 2254(d) unless it is shown that the earlier state court’s decision “was contrary to” federal law then clearly established in the holdings of this Court, § 2254(d)(1); Williams v. Taylor, 529 U. S. 362, 412 (2000); or that it “involved an unreasonable application of” such law, § 2254(d)(1); or that it “was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts” in light of the record before the state court, § 2254(d)(2). The Court of Appeals relied on the second of these exceptions to §2254(d)’s relitigation bar, the exception in § 2254(d)(1) permitting relitigation where the earlier state decision resulted from an “unreasonable application of” clearly established federal law. In the view of the Court of Appeals, the California Supreme Court’s decision on Richter’s ineffective-assistance claim unreasonably applied the holding in Strickland. The Court of Appeals’ lengthy opinion, however, discloses an improper understanding of § 2254(d)’s unreasonableness standard and of its operation in the context of a Strickland claim. The pivotal question is whether the state court’s application of the Strickland standard was unreasonable. This is different from asking whether defense counsel’s performance fell below Strickland’s standard. Were that the inquiry, the analysis would be no different than if, for example, this Court were adjudicating a Strickland claim on direct review of a criminal conviction in a United States district court. Under AEDPA, though, it is a necessary premise that the two questions are different. For purposes of § 2254(d)(1), “an unreasonable application of federal law is different from an incorrect application of federal law.” Williams, supra, at 410. A state court must be granted a deference and latitude that are not in operation when the case involves review under the Strickland standard itself. A state court’s determination that a claim lacks merit precludes federal habeas relief so long as “fairminded jurists could disagree” on the correctness of the state court’s decision. Yarborough v. Alvarado, 541 U. S. 652, 664 (2004). And as this Court has explained, “[E]valuating whether a rule application was unreasonable requires considering the rule’s specificity. The more general the rule, the more leeway courts have in reaching outcomes in case-by-case determinations.” Ibid. “[I]t is not an unreasonable application of clearly established Federal law for a state court to decline to apply a specific legal rule that has not been squarely established by this Court.” Knowles v. Mirzayance, 556 U. S. 111, 122 (2009) (internal quotation marks omitted). Here it is not apparent how the Court of Appeals’ analysis would have been any different without AEDPA. The court explicitly conducted a de novo review, 578 F. 3d, at 952; and after finding a Strickland violation, it declared, without further explanation, that the “state court’s decision to the contrary constituted an unreasonable application of Strickland.” 578 F. 3d, at 969. AEDPA demands more. Under § 2254(d), a habeas court must determine what arguments or theories supported or, as here, could have supported, the state court’s decision; and then it must ask whether it is possible fair-minded jurists could disagree that those arguments or theories are inconsistent with the holding in a prior decision of this Court. The opinion of the Court of Appeals all but ignored “the only question that matters under § 2254(d)(1).” Lockyer v. Andrade, 538 U. S. 63, 71 (2003). The Court of Appeals appears to have treated the unreasonableness question as a test of its confidence in the result it would reach under de novo review: Because the Court of Appeals had little doubt that Richter’s Strickland claim had merit, the Court of Appeals concluded the state court must have been -unreasonable in rejecting it. This analysis overlooks arguments that would otherwise justify the state court’s result and ignores further limitations of § 2254(d), including its requirement that the state court’s decision be evaluated according to the precedents of this Court. See Renico v. Lett, 559 U. S. 766, 778-779 (2010). It bears repeating that even a strong case for relief does not mean the state court’s contrary conclusion was unreasonable. See Lockyer, supra, at 75. If this standard is difficult to meet, that is because it was meant to be. As amended by AEDPA, § 2254(d) stops short of imposing a complete bar on federal-court relitigation of claims already rejected in state proceedings. Cf. Felker v. Turpin, 518 U. S. 651, 664 (1996) (discussing AEDPA’s “modified res judicata rule” under § 2244). It preserves authority to issue the writ in cases where there is no possibility fair-minded jurists could disagree that the state court’s decision conflicts with this Court’s precedents. It goes no further. Section 2254(d) reflects the view that habeas corpus is a “guard against extreme malfunctions in the state criminal justice systems,” not a substitute for ordinary error correetion through appeal. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U. S. 307, 332, n. 5 (1979) (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment). As a condition for obtaining habeas corpus from, a federal court, a state prisoner must show that the state court’s ruling on the claim being presented in federal court was so lacking in justification that there was an error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any possibility for fair-minded disagreement. The reasons for this approach are familiar. “Federal ha-beas review of state convictions frustrates both the States’ sovereign power to punish offenders and their good-faith attempts to honor constitutional rights.” Calderon v. Thompson, 523 U. S. 538, 555-556 (1998) (internal quotation marks omitted). It “disturbs the State’s significant interest in repose for concluded litigation, denies society the right to punish some admitted offenders, and intrudes on state sovereignty to a degree matched by few exercises of federal judicial authority.” Reed, 489 U. S., at 282 (Kennedy, J., dissenting). Section 2254(d) is part of the basic structure of federal habeas jurisdiction, designed to confirm that state courts are the principal forum for asserting constitutional challenges to state convictions. Under the exhaustion requirement, a habeas petitioner challenging a state conviction must first attempt to present his claim in state court. 28 U. S. C. § 2254(b). If the state court rejects the claim on procedural grounds, the claim is barred in federal court unless one of the exceptions to the doctrine of Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S. 72, 82-84 (1977), applies. And if the state court denies the claim on the merits, the claim is barred in federal court unless one of the exceptions to § 2254(d) set out in §§ 2254(d)(1) and (2) applies. Section 2254(d) thus complements the exhaustion requirement and the doctrine of procedural bar to ensure that state proceedings are the central process, not just a preliminary step for a later federal habeas proceeding, see id., at 90. Here, however, the Court of Appeals gave § 2254(d) no operation or function in its reasoning. Its analysis illustrates a lack of deference to the state court’s determination and an improper intervention in state criminal processes, contrary to the purpose and mandate of AEDPA and to the now well-settled meaning and function of habeas corpus in the federal system. IV The conclusion of the Court of Appeals that Richter demonstrated an unreasonable application by the state court of the Strickland standard now must be discussed. To have been entitled to relief from the California Supreme Court, Richter had to show both that his counsel provided deficient assistance and that there was prejudice as a result. To establish deficient performance, a person challenging a conviction must show that “counsel’s representation fell below an objective standard of reasonableness.” 466 U. S., at 688. A court considering a claim of ineffective assistance must apply a “strong presumption” that counsel’s representation was within the “wide range” of reasonable professional assistance. Id., at 689. The challenger’s burden is to show “that counsel made errors so serious that counsel was not functioning as the 'counsel’ guaranteed the defendant by the Sixth Amendment.” Id., at 687. With respect to prejudice, a challenger must demonstrate “a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different. A reasonable probability is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome.” Id., at 694. It is not enough “to show that the errors had some conceivable effect on the outcome of the proceeding.” Id., at 693. Counsel’s errors must be “so serious as to deprive the defendant of a fair trial, a trial whose result is reliable.” Id., at 687. “Surmounting Strickland’s high bar is never an easy task.” Padilla v. Kentucky, 559 U. S. 356, 371 (2010). An ineffective-assistance claim can function as a way to escape rules of waiver and forfeiture and raise issues not presented at trial, and so the Strickland standard must be applied with scrupulous care, lest “intrusive post-trial inquiry” threaten the integrity of the very adversary process the right to counsel is meant to serve. Strickland, 466 U. S., at 689-690. Even under de novo review, the standard for judging counsel’s representation is a most deferential one. Unlike a later reviewing court, the attorney observed the relevant proceedings, knew of materials outside the record, and interacted with the client, with opposing counsel, and with the judge. It is “all too tempting” to “second-guess counsel’s assistance after conviction or adverse sentence.” Id., at 689; see also Bell v. Cone, 535 U. S. 685, 702 (2002); Lockhart v. Fretwell, 506 U. S. 364, 372 (1993). The question is whether an attorney’s representation amounted to incompetence under “prevailing professional norms,” not whether it deviated from best practices or most common custom. Strickland, 466 U. S., at 690. Establishing that a state court’s application of Strickland was unreasonable under § 2254(d) is all the more difficult. The standards created by Strickland and § 2254(d) are both “highly deferential,” id., at 689; Lindh v. Murphy, 521 U. S. 320, 333, n. 7 (1997), and when the two apply in tandem, review is “doubly” so, Knowles, 556 U. S., at 123. The Strickland standard is a general one, so the range of reasonable applications is substantial. 556 U. S., at 123. Federal ha-beas courts must guard against the danger of equating unreasonableness under Strickland with unreasonableness under § 2254(d). When § 2254(d) applies, the question is not whether counsel’s actions were reasonable. The question is whether there is any reasonable argument that counsel satisfied Strickland’s deferential standard. A With respect to defense counsel’s performance, the Court of Appeals held that because Richter’s attorney had not consulted forensic blood experts or introduced expert evidence, the California Supreme Court could not reasonably have concluded counsel provided adequate representation. This conclusion was erroneous. 1 The Court of Appeals first held that Richter’s attorney rendered constitutionally deficient service because he did not consult blood evidence experts in developing the basic strategy for Richter’s defense or offer their testimony as part of the principal case for the defense. Strickland, however, permits counsel to “make a reasonable decision that makes particular investigations unnecessary.” 466 U. S., at 691. It was at least arguable that a reasonable attorney could decide to forgo inquiry into the blood evidence in the circumstances here. Criminal cases will arise where the only reasonable and available defense strategy requires consultation with experts or introduction of expert evidence, whether pretrial, at trial, or both. There are, however, “countless ways to provide effective assistance in any given case. Even the best criminal defense attorneys would not defend a particular client in the same way.” Id., at 689. Rare are the situations in which the “wide latitude counsel must have in making tactical decisions” will be limited to any one technique or approach. Ibid. It can be assumed that in some cases counsel would be deemed ineffective for failing to consult or rely on experts, but even that formulation is sufficiently general that state courts would have wide latitude in applying it. Here it would be well within the bounds of a reasonable judicial determination for the state court to conclude that defense counsel could follow a strategy that did not require the use of experts regarding the pool in the doorway to Johnson’s bedroom. From the perspective of Richter’s defense counsel when he was preparing Richter’s defense, there were any number of hypothetical experts — specialists in psychiatry, psychology, ballistics, fingerprints, tire treads, physiology, or numerous other disciplines and subdisciplines — whose insight might possibly have been useful. An attorney can avoid activities that appear “distraetive from more important duties.” Bobby v. Van Hook, 558 U. S. 4, 11 (2009) (per curiam). Counsel was entitled to formulate a strategy that was reasonable at the time and to balance limited resources in accord with effective trial tactics and strategies. See Knowles, supra, at 125-126; Rompilla v. Beard, 545 U. S. 374, 383 (2005); Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U. S. 510, 525 (2003); Strickland, 466 U. S., at 699. In concluding otherwise the Court of Appeals failed to “reconstruct the circumstances of counsel’s challenged conduct” and “evaluate the conduct from counsel’s perspective at the time.” Id., at 689. In its view Klein’s location was “the single most critical issue in the case” given the differing theories of the prosecution and the defense, and the source of the blood in the doorway was therefore of central concern. 578 F. 3d, at 953-954. But it was far from a necessary conclusion that this was evident at the time of the trial. There were many factual differences between prosecution and defense versions of the events on the night of the shootings. It is only because forensic evidence has emerged concerning the source of the blood pool that the issue could with any plausibility be said to stand apart. Reliance on “the harsh light of hindsight” to cast doubt on a trial that took place now more than 15 years ago is precisely what Strickland and AEDPA seek to prevent. Cone, 535 U. S., at 702; see also Lockhart, supra, at 372. Even if it had been apparent that expert blood testimony could support Richter’s defense, it would be reasonable to conclude that a competent attorney might elect not to use it. The Court of Appeals opinion for the en banc majority rests in large part on a hypothesis that reasonably could have been rejected. The hypothesis is that without jeopardizing Richter’s defense, an expert could have testified that the blood in Johnson’s doorway could not have come from Johnson and could have come from Klein, thus suggesting that Richter’s version of the shooting was correct and Johnson’s a fabrication. This theory overlooks the fact that concentrating on the blood pool carried its own serious risks. If serological analysis or other forensic evidence demonstrated that the blood came from Johnson alone, Richter’s story would be exposed as an invention. An attorney need not pursue an investigation that would be fruitless, much less one that might be harmful to the defense. Strickland, supra, at 691. Here Richter’s attorney had reason to question the truth of his client’s account, given, for instance, Richter’s initial denial of involvement and the subsequent production of Johnson’s missing pistol. It would have been altogether reasonable to conclude that this concern justified the course Richter’s counsel pursued. Indeed, the Court of Appeals recognized this risk insofar as it pertained to the suggestion that counsel should have had the blood evidence tested. 578 F. 3d, at 956, n. 9. But the court failed to recognize that making a central issue out of blood evidence would have increased the likelihood of the prosecution’s producing its own evidence on the blood pool’s origins and composition; and once matters proceeded on this course, there was a serious risk that expert evidence could destroy Richter’s case. Even apart from this danger, there was the possibility that expert testimony could shift attention to esoteric matters of forensic science, distract the jury from whether Johnson was telling the truth, or transform the case into a battle of the experts. Accord, Bonin v. Calderon, 59 P. 3d 815, 836 (CA9 1995). True, it appears that defense counsel’s opening statement itself inspired the prosecution to introduce expert forensic evidence. But the prosecution’s evidence may well have been weakened by the fact that it was assembled late in the process; and in any event the prosecution’s response shows merely that the defense strategy did not work out as well as counsel had hoped, not that counsel was incompetent. To support a defense argument that the prosecution has not proved its case it sometimes is better to try to east pervasive suspicion of doubt than to strive to prove a certainty that exonerates. All that happened here is that counsel pursued a course that conformed to the first option. If this case presented a de novo review of Strickland, the foregoing might well suffice to reject Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Chief Justice ROBERTS delivered the opinion of the Court. The public is currently engaged in an active political debate over whether same-sex couples should be allowed to marry. That question has also given rise to litigation. In this case, petitioners, who oppose same-sex marriage, ask us to decide whether the Equal Protection Clause "prohibits the State of California from defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman." Pet. for Cert. i. Respondents, same-sex couples who wish to marry, view the issue in somewhat different terms: For them, it is whether California-having previously recognized the right of same-sex couples to marry-may reverse that decision through a referendum. Federal courts have authority under the Constitution to answer such questions only if necessary to do so in the course of deciding an actual "case" or "controversy." As used in the Constitution, those words do not include every sort of dispute, but only those "historically viewed as capable of resolution through the judicial process." Flast v. Cohen, 392 U.S. 83, 95, 88 S.Ct. 1942, 20 L.Ed.2d 947 (1968). This is an essential limit on our power: It ensures that we act as judges, and do not engage in policymaking properly left to elected representatives. For there to be such a case or controversy, it is not enough that the party invoking the power of the court have a keen interest in the issue. That party must also have "standing," which requires, among other things, that it have suffered a concrete and particularized injury. Because we find that petitioners do not have standing, we have no authority to decide this case on the merits, and neither did the Ninth Circuit. I In 2008, the California Supreme Court held that limiting the official designation of marriage to opposite-sex couples violated the equal protection clause of the California Constitution. In re Marriage Cases, 43 Cal.4th 757, 76 Cal.Rptr.3d 683, 183 P.3d 384. Later that year, California voters passed the ballot initiative at the center of this dispute, known as Proposition 8. That proposition amended the California Constitution to provide that "[o]nly marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California." Cal. Const., Art. I, § 7.5. Shortly thereafter, the California Supreme Court rejected a procedural challenge to the amendment, and held that the Proposition was properly enacted under California law. Strauss v. Horton, 46 Cal.4th 364, 474-475, 93 Cal.Rptr.3d 591, 207 P.3d 48, 122 (2009). According to the California Supreme Court, Proposition 8 created a "narrow and limited exception" to the state constitutional rights otherwise guaranteed to same-sex couples. Id., at 388, 93 Cal.Rptr.3d 591, 207 P.3d, at 61. Under California law, same-sex couples have a right to enter into relationships recognized by the State as "domestic partnerships," which carry "the same rights, protections, and benefits, and shall be subject to the same responsibilities, obligations, and duties under law... as are granted to and imposed upon spouses." Cal. Fam. Code Ann. § 297.5(a) (West 2004). In In re Marriage Cases, the California Supreme Court concluded that the California Constitution further guarantees same-sex couples "all of the constitutionally based incidents of marriage," including the right to have that marriage "officially recognized" as such by the State. 43 Cal.4th, at 829, 76 Cal.Rptr.3d 683, 183 P.3d, at 433-434. Proposition 8, the court explained in Strauss, left those rights largely undisturbed, reserving only "the official designation of the term'marriage' for the union of opposite-sex couples as a matter of state constitutional law." 46 Cal.4th, at 388, 93 Cal.Rptr.3d 591, 207 P.3d, at 61. Respondents, two same-sex couples who wish to marry, filed suit in federal court, challenging Proposition 8 under the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution. The complaint named as defendants California's Governor, attorney general, and various other state and local officials responsible for enforcing California's marriage laws. Those officials refused to defend the law, although they have continued to enforce it throughout this litigation. The District Court allowed petitioners-the official proponents of the initiative, see Cal. Elec.Code Ann. § 342 (West 2003)-to intervene to defend it. After a 12-day bench trial, the District Court declared Proposition 8 unconstitutional, permanently enjoining the California officials named as defendants from enforcing the law, and "directing the official defendants that all persons under their control or supervision" shall not enforce it. Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 704 F.Supp.2d 921, 1004 (N.D.Cal.2010). Those officials elected not to appeal the District Court order. When petitioners did, the Ninth Circuit asked them to address "why this appeal should not be dismissed for lack of Article III standing." Perry v. Schwarzenegger, Civ. No. 10-16696 (C.A.9, Aug. 16, 2010), p. 2, 2010 WL 3212786. After briefing and argument, the Ninth Circuit certified a question to the California Supreme Court: "Whether under Article II, Section 8 of the California Constitution, or otherwise under California law, the official proponents of an initiative measure possess either a particularized interest in the initiative's validity or the authority to assert the State's interest in the initiative's validity, which would enable them to defend the constitutionality of the initiative upon its adoption or appeal a judgment invalidating the initiative, when the public officials charged with that duty refuse to do so." Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 628 F.3d 1191, 1193 (2011). The California Supreme Court agreed to decide the certified question, and answered in the affirmative. Without addressing whether the proponents have a particularized interest of their own in an initiative's validity, the court concluded that "[i]n a postelection challenge to a voter-approved initiative measure, the official proponents of the initiative are authorized under California law to appear and assert the state's interest in the initiative's validity and to appeal a judgment invalidating the measure when the public officials who ordinarily defend the measure or appeal such a judgment decline to do so." Perry v. Brown, 52 Cal.4th 1116, 1127, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d 1002, 1007 (2011). Relying on that answer, the Ninth Circuit concluded that petitioners had standing under federal law to defend the constitutionality of Proposition 8. California, it reasoned, " 'has standing to defend the constitutionality of its [laws],' " and States have the "prerogative, as independent sovereigns, to decide for themselves who may assert their interests." Perry v. Brown, 671 F.3d 1052, 1070, 1071 (2012) (quoting Diamond v. Charles, 476 U.S. 54, 62, 106 S.Ct. 1697, 90 L.Ed.2d 48 (1986) ). "All a federal court need determine is that the state has suffered a harm sufficient to confer standing and that the party seeking to invoke the jurisdiction of the court is authorized by the state to represent its interest in remedying that harm." 671 F.3d, at 1072. On the merits, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the District Court. The court held the Proposition unconstitutional under the rationale of our decision in Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620, 116 S.Ct. 1620, 134 L.Ed.2d 855 (1996). 671 F.3d, at 1076, 1095. In the Ninth Circuit's view, Romer stands for the proposition that "the Equal Protection Clause requires the state to have a legitimate reason for withdrawing a right or benefit from one group but not others, whether or not it was required to confer that right or benefit in the first place." 671 F.3d, at 1083-1084. The Ninth Circuit concluded that "taking away the official designation" of "marriage" from same-sex couples, while continuing to afford those couples all the rights and obligations of marriage, did not further any legitimate interest of the State. Id., at 1095. Proposition 8, in the court's view, violated the Equal Protection Clause because it served no purpose "but to impose on gays and lesbians, through the public law, a majority's private disapproval of them and their relationships." Ibid. We granted certiorari to review that determination, and directed that the parties also brief and argue "Whether petitioners have standing under Article III, § 2, of the Constitution in this case." 568 U.S. ----, 133 S.Ct. 786, 184 L.Ed.2d 526 (2012). II Article III of the Constitution confines the judicial power of federal courts to deciding actual "Cases" or "Controversies." § 2. One essential aspect of this requirement is that any person invoking the power of a federal court must demonstrate standing to do so. This requires the litigant to prove that he has suffered a concrete and particularized injury that is fairly traceable to the challenged conduct, and is likely to be redressed by a favorable judicial decision. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-561, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992). In other words, for a federal court to have authority under the Constitution to settle a dispute, the party before it must seek a remedy for a personal and tangible harm. "The presence of a disagreement, however sharp and acrimonious it may be, is insufficient by itself to meet Art. III's requirements." Diamond, supra, at 62, 106 S.Ct. 1697. The doctrine of standing, we recently explained, "serves to prevent the judicial process from being used to usurp the powers of the political branches." Clapper v. Amnesty Int'l USA, 568 U.S. ----, ----, 133 S.Ct. 1138, 1146, 185 L.Ed.2d 264 (2013). In light of this "overriding and time-honored concern about keeping the Judiciary's power within its proper constitutional sphere, we must put aside the natural urge to proceed directly to the merits of [an] important dispute and to'settle' it for the sake of convenience and efficiency." Raines v. Byrd, 521 U.S. 811, 820, 117 S.Ct. 2312, 138 L.Ed.2d 849 (1997) (footnote omitted). Most standing cases consider whether a plaintiff has satisfied the requirement when filing suit, but Article III demands that an "actual controversy" persist throughout all stages of litigation. Already, LLC v. Nike, Inc., 568 U.S. ----, ----, 133 S.Ct. 721, 726, 184 L.Ed.2d 553 (2013) (internal quotation marks omitted). That means that standing "must be met by persons seeking appellate review, just as it must be met by persons appearing in courts of first instance." Arizonans for Official English v. Arizona, 520 U.S. 43, 64, 117 S.Ct. 1055, 137 L.Ed.2d 170 (1997). We therefore must decide whether petitioners had standing to appeal the District Court's order. Respondents initiated this case in the District Court against the California officials responsible for enforcing Proposition 8. The parties do not contest that respondents had Article III standing to do so. Each couple expressed a desire to marry and obtain "official sanction" from the State, which was unavailable to them given the declaration in Proposition 8 that "marriage" in California is solely between a man and a woman. App. 59. After the District Court declared Proposition 8 unconstitutional and enjoined the state officials named as defendants from enforcing it, however, the inquiry under Article III changed. Respondents no longer had any injury to redress-they had won-and the state officials chose not to appeal. The only individuals who sought to appeal that order were petitioners, who had intervened in the District Court. But the District Court had not ordered them to do or refrain from doing anything. To have standing, a litigant must seek relief for an injury that affects him in a "personal and individual way." Defenders of Wildlife, supra, at 560, n. 1, 112 S.Ct. 2130. He must possess a "direct stake in the outcome" of the case. Arizonans for Official English,supra, at 64, 117 S.Ct. 1055 (internal quotation marks omitted). Here, however, petitioners had no "direct stake" in the outcome of their appeal. Their only interest in having the District Court order reversed was to vindicate the constitutional validity of a generally applicable California law. We have repeatedly held that such a "generalized grievance," no matter how sincere, is insufficient to confer standing. A litigant "raising only a generally available grievance about government-claiming only harm to his and every citizen's interest in proper application of the Constitution and laws, and seeking relief that no more directly and tangibly benefits him than it does the public at large-does not state an Article III case or controversy." Defenders of Wildlife, supra, at 573-574, 112 S.Ct. 2130; see Lance v. Coffman, 549 U.S. 437, 439, 127 S.Ct. 1194, 167 L.Ed.2d 29 (2007) (per curiam ) ("Our refusal to serve as a forum for generalized grievances has a lengthy pedigree."); Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 754, 104 S.Ct. 3315, 82 L.Ed.2d 556 (1984) ("an asserted right to have the Government act in accordance with law is not sufficient, standing alone, to confer jurisdiction on a federal court"); Massachusetts v. Mellon, 262 U.S. 447, 488, 43 S.Ct. 597, 67 L.Ed. 1078 (1923) ("The party who invokes the [judicial] power must be able to show... that he has sustained or is immediately in danger of sustaining some direct injury... and not merely that he suffers in some indefinite way in common with people generally."). Petitioners argue that the California Constitution and its election laws give them a " 'unique,''special,' and 'distinct' role in the initiative process-one 'involving both authority and responsibilities that differ from other supporters of the measure.' " Reply Brief 5 (quoting 52 Cal.4th, at 1126, 1142, 1160, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1006, 1017-1018, 1030). True enough-but only when it comes to the process of enacting the law. Upon submitting the proposed initiative to the attorney general, petitioners became the official "proponents" of Proposition 8. Cal. Elec.Code Ann. § 342 (West 2003). As such, they were responsible for collecting the signatures required to qualify the measure for the ballot. §§ 9607-9609. After those signatures were collected, the proponents alone had the right to file the measure with election officials to put it on the ballot. § 9032. Petitioners also possessed control over the arguments in favor of the initiative that would appear in California's ballot pamphlets. §§ 9064, 9065, 9067, 9069. But once Proposition 8 was approved by the voters, the measure became "a duly enacted constitutional amendment or statute." 52 Cal.4th, at 1147, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1021. Petitioners have no role-special or otherwise-in the enforcement of Proposition 8. See id., at 1159, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1029 (petitioners do not "possess any official authority... to directly enforce the initiative measure in question"). They therefore have no "personal stake" in defending its enforcement that is distinguishable from the general interest of every citizen of California. Defenders of Wildlife, supra, at 560-561, 112 S.Ct. 2130. Article III standing "is not to be placed in the hands of 'concerned bystanders,' who will use it simply as a'vehicle for the vindication of value interests.' " Diamond, 476 U.S., at 62, 106 S.Ct. 1697. No matter how deeply committed petitioners may be to upholding Proposition 8 or how "zealous [their] advocacy," post, at 2669 (KENNEDY, J., dissenting), that is not a "particularized" interest sufficient to create a case or controversy under Article III. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S., at 560, and n. 1, 112 S.Ct. 2130; see Arizonans for Official English, 520 U.S., at 65, 117 S.Ct. 1055 ("Nor has this Court ever identified initiative proponents as Article-III-qualified defenders of the measures they advocated."); Don't Bankrupt Washington Committee v. Continental Ill. Nat. Bank & Trust Co. of Chicago, 460 U.S. 1077, 103 S.Ct. 1762, 76 L.Ed.2d 338 (1983) (summarily dismissing, for lack of standing, appeal by an initiative proponent from a decision holding the initiative unconstitutional). III A Without a judicially cognizable interest of their own, petitioners attempt to invoke that of someone else. They assert that even if they have no cognizable interest in appealing the District Court's judgment, the State of California does, and they may assert that interest on the State's behalf. It is, however, a "fundamental restriction on our authority" that "[i]n the ordinary course, a litigant must assert his or her own legal rights and interests, and cannot rest a claim to relief on the legal rights or interests of third parties." Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S. 400, 410, 111 S.Ct. 1364, 113 L.Ed.2d 411 (1991). There are "certain, limited exceptions" to that rule. Ibid. But even when we have allowed litigants to assert the interests of others, the litigants themselves still "must have suffered an injury in fact, thus giving [them] a sufficiently concrete interest in the outcome of the issue in dispute." Id., at 411, 111 S.Ct. 1364 (internal quotation marks omitted). In Diamond v. Charles, for example, we refused to allow Diamond, a pediatrician engaged in private practice in Illinois, to defend the constitutionality of the State's abortion law. In that case, a group of physicians filed a constitutional challenge to the Illinois statute in federal court. The State initially defended the law, and Diamond, a professed "conscientious object[or] to abortions," intervened to defend it alongside the State. 476 U.S., at 57-58, 106 S.Ct. 1697. After the Seventh Circuit affirmed a permanent injunction against enforcing several provisions of the law, the State chose not to pursue an appeal to this Court. But when Diamond did, the state attorney general filed a " 'letter of interest,' " explaining that the State's interest in the proceeding was " 'essentially co-terminous with the position on the issues set forth by [Diamond].' " Id., at 61, 106 S.Ct. 1697. That was not enough, we held, to allow the appeal to proceed. As the Court explained, "[e]ven if there were circumstances in which a private party would have standing to defend the constitutionality of a challenged statute, this [was] not one of them," because Diamond was not able to assert an injury in fact of his own. Id., at 65, 106 S.Ct. 1697 (footnote omitted). And without "any judicially cognizable interest," Diamond could not "maintain the litigation abandoned by the State." Id., at 71, 106 S.Ct. 1697. For the reasons we have explained, petitioners have likewise not suffered an injury in fact, and therefore would ordinarily have no standing to assert the State's interests. B Petitioners contend that this case is different, because the California Supreme Court has determined that they are "authorized under California law to appear and assert the state's interest" in the validity of Proposition 8. 52 Cal.4th, at 1127, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1007. The court below agreed: "All a federal court need determine is that the state has suffered a harm sufficient to confer standing and that the party seeking to invoke the jurisdiction of the court is authorized by the state to represent its interest in remedying that harm." 671 F.3d, at 1072. As petitioners put it, they "need no more show a personal injury, separate from the State's indisputable interest in the validity of its law, than would California's Attorney General or did the legislative leaders held to have standing in Karcher v. May, 484 U.S. 72, 108 S.Ct. 388, 98 L.Ed.2d 327 (1987)." Reply Brief 6. In Karcher, we held that two New Jersey state legislators-Speaker of the General Assembly Alan Karcher and President of the Senate Carmen Orechio-could intervene in a suit against the State to defend the constitutionality of a New Jersey law, after the New Jersey attorney general had declined to do so. 484 U.S., at 75, 81-82, 108 S.Ct. 388."Since the New Jersey Legislature had authority under state law to represent the State's interests in both the District Court and the Court of Appeals," we held that the Speaker and the President, in their official capacities, could vindicate that interest in federal court on the legislature's behalf. Id., at 82, 108 S.Ct. 388. Far from supporting petitioners' standing, however, Karcher is compelling precedent against it. The legislators in that case intervened in their official capacities as Speaker and President of the legislature. No one doubts that a State has a cognizable interest "in the continued enforceability" of its laws that is harmed by a judicial decision declaring a state law unconstitutional. Maine v. Taylor, 477 U.S. 131, 137, 106 S.Ct. 2440, 91 L.Ed.2d 110 (1986). To vindicate that interest or any other, a State must be able to designate agents to represent it in federal court. See Poindexter v. Greenhow, 114 U.S. 270, 288, 5 S.Ct. 903, 29 L.Ed. 185 (1885) ("The State is a political corporate body [that] can act only through agents"). That agent is typically the State's attorney general. But state law may provide for other officials to speak for the State in federal court, as New Jersey law did for the State's presiding legislative officers in Karcher. See 484 U.S., at 81-82, 108 S.Ct. 388. What is significant about Karcher is what happened after the Court of Appeals decision in that case. Karcher and Orechio lost their positions as Speaker and President, but nevertheless sought to appeal to this Court. We held that they could not do so. We explained that while they were able to participate in the lawsuit in their official capacities as presiding officers of the incumbent legislature, "since they no longer hold those offices, they lack authority to pursue this appeal." Id., at 81, 108 S.Ct. 388. The point of Karcher is not that a State could authorize private parties to represent its interests; Karcher and Orechio were permitted to proceed only because they were state officers, acting in an official capacity. As soon as they lost that capacity, they lost standing. Petitioners here hold no office and have always participated in this litigation solely as private parties. The cases relied upon by the dissent, see post, at 2673 - 2674, provide petitioners no more support. The dissent's primary authorities, in fact, do not discuss standing at all. See Young v. United States ex rel. Vuitton et Fils S. A., 481 U.S. 787, 107 S.Ct. 2124, 95 L.Ed.2d 740 (1987) ; United States v. Providence Journal Co., 485 U.S. 693, 108 S.Ct. 1502, 99 L.Ed.2d 785 (1988). And none comes close to establishing that mere authorization to represent a third party's interests is sufficient to confer Article III standing on private parties with no injury of their own. The dissent highlights the discretion exercised by special prosecutors appointed by federal courts to pursue contempt charges. See post, at 2673 (citing Young, supra, at 807, 107 S.Ct. 2124). Such prosecutors do enjoy a degree of independence in carrying out their appointed role, but no one would suppose that they are not subject to the ultimate authority of the court that appointed them. See also Providence Journal, supra, at 698-707, 108 S.Ct. 1502 (recognizing further control exercised by the Solicitor General over special prosecutors). The dissent's remaining cases, which at least consider standing, are readily distinguishable. See Vermont Agency of Natural Resources v. United States ex rel. Stevens, 529 U.S. 765, 771-778, 120 S.Ct. 1858, 146 L.Ed.2d 836 (2000) (justifying qui tam actions based on a partial assignment of the Government's damages claim and a "well nigh conclusive" tradition of such actions in English and American courts dating back to the 13th century); Whitmore v. Arkansas, 495 U.S. 149, 162-164, 110 S.Ct. 1717, 109 L.Ed.2d 135 (1990) (justifying "next friend" standing based on a similar history dating back to the 17th century, requiring the next friend to prove a disability of the real party in interest and a "significant relationship" with that party); Gollust v. Mendell, 501 U.S. 115, 124-125, 111 S.Ct. 2173, 115 L.Ed.2d 109 (1991) (requiring plaintiff in shareholder-derivative suit to maintain a financial stake in the outcome of the litigation, to avoid "serious constitutional doubt whether that plaintiff could demonstrate the standing required by Article III's case-or-controversy limitation"). C Both petitioners and respondents seek support from dicta in Arizonans for Official English v. Arizona, 520 U.S. 43, 117 S.Ct. 1055, 137 L.Ed.2d 170. The plaintiff in Arizonans for Official English filed a constitutional challenge to an Arizona ballot initiative declaring English " 'the official language of the State of Arizona.' " Id., at 48, 117 S.Ct. 1055. After the District Court declared the initiative unconstitutional, Arizona's Governor announced that she would not pursue an appeal. Instead, the principal sponsor of the ballot initiative-the Arizonans for Official English Committee-sought to defend the measure in the Ninth Circuit. Id., at 55-56, 58, 117 S.Ct. 1055. Analogizing the sponsors to the Arizona Legislature, the Ninth Circuit held that the Committee was "qualified to defend [the initiative] on appeal," and affirmed the District Court. Id., at 58, 61, 117 S.Ct. 1055. Before finding the case mooted by other events, this Court expressed "grave doubts" about the Ninth Circuit's standing analysis. Id., at 66, 117 S.Ct. 1055. We reiterated that "[s]tanding to defend on appeal in the place of an original defendant... demands that the litigant possess 'a direct stake in the outcome.' " Id., at 64, 117 S.Ct. 1055 (quoting Diamond, 476 U.S., at 62, 106 S.Ct. 1697). We recognized that a legislator authorized by state law to represent the State's interest may satisfy standing requirements, as in Karcher,supra, at 82, 108 S.Ct. 388, but noted that the Arizona committee and its members were "not elected representatives, and we [we]re aware of no Arizona law appointing initiative sponsors as agents of the people of Arizona to defend, in lieu of public officials, the constitutionality of initiatives made law of the State." Arizonans for Official English,supra, at 65, 117 S.Ct. 1055. Petitioners argue that, by virtue of the California Supreme Court's decision, they are authorized to act " 'as agents of the people' of California." Brief for Petitioners 15 (quoting Arizonans for Official English, supra, at 65, 117 S.Ct. 1055). But that Court never described petitioners as "agents of the people," or of anyone else. Nor did the Ninth Circuit. The Ninth Circuit asked-and the California Supreme Court answered-only whether petitioners had "the authority to assert the State's interest in the initiative's validity." 628 F.3d, at 1193, 52 Cal.4th, at 1124, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1005. All that the California Supreme Court decision stands for is that, so far as California is concerned, petitioners may argue in defense of Proposition 8. This "does not mean that the proponents become de facto public officials"; the authority they enjoy is "simply the authority to participate as parties in a court action and to assert legal arguments in defense of the state's interest in the validity of the initiative measure." Id., at 1159, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1029. That interest is by definition a generalized one, and it is precisely because proponents assert such an interest that they lack standing under our precedents. And petitioners are plainly not agents of the State-"formal" or otherwise, see post, at 2671. As an initial matter, petitioners' newfound claim of agency is inconsistent with their representations to the District Court. When the proponents sought to intervene in this case, they did not purport to be agents of California. They argued instead that "no other party in this case w[ould] adequately represent their interests as official proponents." Motion to Intervene in No. 09-2292 (ND Cal.), p. 6 (emphasis added). It was their "unique legal status" as official proponents-not an agency relationship with the people of California-that petitioners claimed "endow[ed] them with a significantly protectable interest" in ensuring that the District Court not "undo[ ] all that they ha[d] done in obtaining... enactment" of Proposition 8. Id., at 10, 11. More to the point, the most basic features of an agency relationship are missing here. Agency requires more than mere authorization to assert a particular interest. "An essential element of agency is the principal's right to control the agent's actions." 1 Restatement (Third) of Agency § 1.01, Comment f (2005) (hereinafter Restatement). Yet petitioners answer to no one; they decide for themselves, with no review, what arguments to make and how to make them. Unlike California's attorney general, they are not elected at regular intervals-or elected at all. See Cal. Const., Art. V, § 11. No provision provides for their removal. As one amicus explains, "the proponents apparently have an unelected appointment for an unspecified period of time as defenders of the initiative, however and to whatever extent they choose to defend it." Brief for Walter Dellinger 23. 23 "If the relationship between two persons is one of agency..., the agent owes a fiduciary obligation to the principal." 1 Restatement § 1.01, Comment e. But petitioners owe nothing of the sort to the people of California. Unlike California's elected officials, they have taken no oath of office. E.g., Cal. Const., Art. XX, § 3 (prescribing the oath for "all public officers and employees, executive, legislative, and judicial"). As the California Supreme Court explained, petitioners are bound simply by "the same ethical constraints that apply to all other parties in a legal proceeding." 52 Cal.4th, at 1159, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1029. They are free to pursue a purely ideological commitment to the law's constitutionality without the need to take cognizance of resource constraints, changes in public opinion, or potential ramifications for other state priorities. Finally, the California Supreme Court stated that "[t]he question of who should bear responsibility for any attorney fee award... is entirely distinct from the question" before it. Id., at 1161, 134 Cal.Rptr.3d 499, 265 P.3d, at 1031. (emphasis added). But it is hornbook law that "a principal has a duty to indemnify the agent against expenses and other losses incurred by the agent in defending against actions brought by third parties if the agent acted with actual authority in taking the action challenged by the third party's suit." 2 Restatement § 8.14, Comment d. If the issue of fees is entirely distinct from the authority question, then authority cannot be based on agency. Neither the California Supreme Court nor the Ninth Circuit ever described the proponents as agents of the State, and they plainly do not qualify as such. IV The dissent eloquently recounts the California Supreme Court's reasons for deciding that state law authorizes petitioners to defend Proposition 8. See post, at 2669 - 2670. We do not "disrespect[ ]" or "disparage[ ]" those reasons. Post, at 2674. Nor do we question California's sovereign right to maintain an initiative process, or the right of initiative proponents to defend their initiatives in California courts, where Article III does not apply. But as the dissent acknowledges, see post, at 2668, standing in federal court is a question of federal law, not state law. And no matter its reasons, the fact that a State thinks a private party should have standing to seek relief for a generalized grievance cannot override our settled law to the contrary. The Article III requirement that a party invoking the jurisdiction of a federal court seek relief for a personal, particularized injury serves vital interests going to the role of the Judiciary in our system of separated powers. "Refusing to entertain generalized grievances ensures that... courts exercise power that is judicial in nature," Lance, 549 U.S Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Chief Justice Burger delivered the opinion of the Court. We granted certiorari to the Appellate Department of the Superior Court of California for the County of Los Angeles to review the petitioner’s conviction for violation of California statutes regarding obscenity. Petitioner was the proprietor of the Peek-A-Boo Bookstore, one of the approximately 250 "adult” bookstores in the city of Los Angeles, California. On May 14, 1969, in response to citizen complaints, an undercover police officer entered the store and began to peruse several books and magazines. Petitioner advised the officer that the store "was not a library.” The officer then asked petitioner if he had “any good sexy books.” Petitioner replied that “all of our books are sexy” and exhibited a lewd photograph. At petitioner’s recommendation, and after petitioner had read aloud a sample paragraph, the officer purchased the book Suite 69. On the basis of this sale, petitioner was convicted by a jury of violating California Penal Code § 311.2, a misdemeanor. The book, Suite 69, has a plain cover and contains no pictures. It is made up entirely of repetitive descriptions of physical, sexual conduct, “clinically” explicit and offensive to the point of being nauseous; there is only the most tenuous “plot.” Almost every conceivable variety of sexual contact, homosexual and heterosexual, is described. Whether one samples every 5th, 10th, or 20th page, beginning at any point or page at random, the content is unvarying. At trial both sides presented testimony, by persons accepted to be “experts,” as to the content and nature of the book. The book itself was received in evidence, and read, in its entirety, to the jury. Each juror inspected the book. But the State offered no “expert” evidence that the book was “utterly without socially redeeming value,” or any evidence of “national standards.” On appeal, the Appellate Department of the Superior Court of California for the County of Los Angeles affirmed petitioner’s conviction. Relying on the dissenting opinions in Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U. S. 184, 199, 203 (1964), and Mr. Justice White’s dissent in Memoirs v. Massachusetts, 383 U. S. 413, 462 (1966), it concluded that evidence of a “national” standard of obscenity was not required. It also decided that the State did not always have to present “expert” evidence that the book lacked “socially redeeming value,” and that “[i]n light. . . of the circumstances surrounding the sale” and the nature of the book itself, there was sufficient evidence to sustain petitioner’s conviction. Finally, the state court considered petitioner’s argument that the. book was not “obscene” as a matter of constitutional law. Pointing out that petitioner was arguing, in part, that all books were constitutionally protected in an absolute sense, it rejected that thesis. On “independent review,” it concluded “Suite 69 appeals to a prurient interest in sex and is beyond the customary limits of candor within the State of California.” It held that the book was not protected by the First Amendment. We agree. This case squarely presents the issue of whether expression by words alone can be legally “obscene” in the sense of being unprotected by the First Amendment. When the Court declared that obscenity is not a form of expression protected by the First Amendment, no distinction was made as to the medium of the expression. See Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476, 481-485 (1957). Obscenity can, of course, manifest itself in conduct, in the pictorial representation of conduct, or in the written and oral description of conduct. The Court has applied similarly conceived First Amendment standards to moving pictures, to photographs, and to words in books. See Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U. S. 51, 57 (1965); Jacobellis v. Ohio, supra, at 187-188; Times Film Corp. v. Chicago, 365 U. S. 43, 46 (1961); id., at 51 (Warren, C. J., dissenting); Kingsley Pictures Corp. v. Regents, 360 U. S. 684, 689-690 (1959); Superior Films, Inc. v. Dept. of Education, 346 U. S. 587, 589 (1954) (Douglas, J., concurring) ; Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson, 343 U. S. 495, 503 (1952). Because of a profound commitment to protecting communication of ideas, any restraint on expression by way of the printed word or in speech stimulates a traditional and emotional response, unlike the response to obscene pictures of flagrant human conduct. A book seems to have a different and preferred place in our hierarchy of values, and so it should be. But this generalization, like so many, is qualified by the book’s content. As with pictures, films, paintings, drawings, and engravings, both oral utterance and the printed word have First Amendment protection until they collide with the long-settled position of this Court that obscenity is not protected by the Constitution. Miller v. California, ante, at 23-25; Both v. United States, supra, at 483-485. For good or ill, a book has a continuing life. It is passed hand to hand, and we can take note of the tendency of widely circulated books of this category to reach the impressionable young and have a continuing impact. A State could reasonably regard the “hard core” conduct described by Suite 69 as capable of encouraging or causing antisocial behavior, especially in its impact on young people. States need not wait until behavioral experts or educators can provide empirical data before enacting controls of commerce in obscene materials unprotected by the First Amendment or by a constitutional right to privacy. We have noted the power of a legislative body to enact such regulatory laws on the basis of unprovable assumptions. See Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, ante, at 60-63. Prior to trial, petitioner moved to dismiss the complaint on the basis that sale of sexually oriented material to consenting adults is constitutionally protected. In connection with this motion only, the prosecution stipulated that it did not claim that petitioner either disseminated any material to minors or thrust it upon the general public. The trial court denied the motion. Today, this Court, in Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, ante, at 68-69, reaffirms that commercial exposure and sale of obscene materials to anyone, including consenting adults, is subject to state regulation. See also United States v. Orito, post, at 141-144; United States v. 12 200-ft. Reels of Film, post, at 128; United States v. Thirty-seven Photographs, 402 U. S. 363, 376 (1971) (opinion of White, J.); United States v. Reidel, 402 U. S. 351, 355-356 (1971). The denial of petitioner’s motion was, therefore, not error. At trial the prosecution tendered the book itself into evidence and also tendered, as an expert witness, a police officer in the vice squad. The officer testified to extensive experience with pornographic materials and gave his opinion that Suite 69, taken as a whole, predominantly appealed to the prurient interest of the average person in the State of California, “applying contemporary standards,” and that the book went “substantially beyond the customary limits of candor” in the State of California. The witness explained specifically how the book did so, that it was a purveyor of perverted sex for its own sake. No “expert” state testimony was offered that the book was obscene under “national standards,” or that the book was “utterly without redeeming social importance,” despite “expert” defense testimony to the contrary. In Miller v. California, ante, p. 15, the Court today holds that the “ ‘contemporary community standards of the State of California,’ ” as opposed to “national standards,” are constitutionally adequate to establish whether a work is obscene. We also reject in Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, ante, p. 49, any constitutional need for “expert” testimony on behalf of the prosecution, or for any other ancillary evidence of obscenity, once the allegedly obscene material itself is placed in evidence. Paris Adult Theatre I, ante, at 56. The defense should be free to introduce appropriate expert testimony, see Smith v. California, 361 U. S. 147, 164-165 (1959) (Frankfurter, J., concurring), but in “the cases in which this Court has decided obscenity questions since Roth, it has regarded the materials as sufficient in themselves for the determination of the question.” Ginzburg v. United States, 383 U. S. 463, 465 (1966). See United States v. Groner, 479 F. 2d 577, 579-586 (CA5 1973). On the record in this case, the prosecution’s evidence was sufficient, as a matter of federal constitutional law, to support petitioner’s conviction. Both Miller v. California, supra, and this case involve California obscenity statutes. The judgment of the Appellate Department of the Superior Court of California for the County of Los Angeles is vacated, and the case remanded to that court for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion, Miller v. California, supra, and Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, supra. See United States v. 12 200-ft. Reels of Film, post, at 130 n. 7, decided today. Vacated and remanded. Mr. Justice Douglas would vacate and remand for dismissal of the criminal complaint under which petitioner was found guilty because “obscenity” as defined by the California courts and by this Court is too vague to satisfy the requirements of due process. See Miller v. California, ante, p. 37 (Douglas, J., dissenting). The number of these stores was so estimated by both parties at oral argument. These stores purport to bar minors from the premises. In this case there is no evidence that petitioner sold materials to juveniles. Cf. Miller v. California, ante, at 18-20. The California Penal Code § 311.2, at the time of the commission of the alleged offense, read in relevant part: “(a) Every person who knowingly: sends or causes to be sent, or brings or causes to be brought, into this state for sale or distribution, or in this state prepares, publishes, prints, exhibits, distributes, or offers to distribute, or has in his possession with intent to distribute or to exhibit or offer to distribute, any obscene matter is guilty of a misdemeanor. . . .” California Penal Code § 311, at the time of the commission of the alleged offense, provided as follows: “As used in this chapter: “(a) ‘Obscene’ means that to the average person, applying contemporary standards, the predominant appeal of the matter, taken as a whole, is to prurient interest, i. e., a shameful or morbid interest in nudity, sex, or excretion, which goes substantially beyond customary limits of candor in description or representation of such matters and is matter which is utterly without redeeming social importance. “(b) ‘Matter’ means any book, magazine, newspaper, or other printed or written material or any picture, drawing, photograph, motion picture, or other pictorial representation or any statue or other figure, or any recording, transcription or mechanical, chemical or electrical reproduction or any other articles, equipment, machines or materials. “(c) ‘Person’ means any individual, partnership, firm, association, corporation, or other legal entity. “(d) ‘Distribute’ means to transfer possession of, whether with or without consideration. “(e) ‘Knowingly’ means having knowledge that the matter is obscene.” This Court, since Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476 (1957), has only once held books to be obscene. That case was Mishkin v. New York, 383 U. S. 502 (1966), and the books involved were very similar in content to Suite 69. But most of the Mishkin books, if not all, were illustrated. See id., at 505, 514-515. Prior to Roth, this Court affirmed, by an equally divided Court, a conviction for sale of an unillustrated book. Doubleday & Co., Inc. v. New York, 335 U. S. 848 (1948). This Court has always rigorously scrutinized judgments involving books for possible violation of First Amendment rights, and has regularly reversed convictions on that basis. See Childs v. Oregon, 401 U. S. 1006 (1971); Walker v. Ohio, 398 U. S. 434 (1970); Keney v. New York, 388 U. S. 440 (1967); Friedman v. New York, 388 U. S. 441 (1967); Sheperd v. New York, 388 U. S. 444 (1967); Avansino v. New York, 388 U. S. 446 (1967); Corinth Publications, Inc. v. Wesberry, 388 U. S. 448 (1967); Books, Inc. v. United States, 388 U. S. 449 (1967); A Quantity of Books v. Kansas, 388 U. S. 452 (1967); Redrup v. New York, 386 U. S. 767 (1967); Memoirs v. Massachusetts, 383 U. S. 413 (1966); Tralins v. Gerstein, 378 U. S. 576 (1964); Grove Press, Inc. v. Gerstein, 378 U. S. 577 (1964); A Quantity of Books v. Kansas, 378 U. S. 205 (1964); Marcus v. Search Warrant, 367 U. S. 717 (1961); Smith v. California, 361 U. S. 147 (1959); Kingsley Books, Inc. v. Brown, 354 U. S. 436 (1957). See Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, ante, at 58 n. 7; Report of the Commission on Obscenity and Pornography 401 (1970) (Hill-Link Minority Report). As the prosecution’s introduction of the book itself into evidence was adequate, as a matter of federal constitutional law, to establish the book’s obscenity, we need not consider petitioner’s claim that evidence of pandering was wrongly considered on appeal to support the jury finding of obscenity. Petitioner’s additional claims that his conviction was affirmed on the basis of a “theory” of “pandering” not considered at trial and that he was subjected to retroactive application of a state statute are meritless on the record. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

C

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Thomas delivered the opinion of the Court. Respondent Ross-Simmons, a sawmill, sued petitioner Weyerhaeuser, alleging that Weyerhaeuser drove it out of business by bidding up the price of sawlogs to a level that prevented Ross-Simmons from being profitable. A jury returned a verdict in favor of Ross-Simmons on its monopolization claim, and the Ninth Circuit affirmed. We granted certiorari to decide whether the test we applied to claims of predatory pricing in Brooke Group Ltd. v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 509 U. S. 209 (1993), also applies to claims of predatory bidding. We hold that it does. Accordingly, we vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals. I This antitrust case concerns the acquisition of red alder sawlogs by the mills that process those logs in the Pacific Northwest. These hardwood-lumber mills usually acquire logs in one of three ways. Some logs are purchased on the open bidding market. Some come to the mill through standing short- and long-term agreements with timberland owners. And others are harvested from timberland owned by the sawmills themselves. The allegations relevant to our decision in this case relate to the bidding market. Ross-Simmons began operating a hardwood-lumber sawmill in Longview, Washington, in 1962. Weyerhaeuser entered the Northwestern hardwood-lumber market in 1980 by acquiring an existing lumber company. Weyerhaeuser gradually increased the scope of its hardwood-lumber operation, and it now owns six hardwood sawmills in the region. By 2001, Weyerhaeuser’s mills were acquiring approximately 65 percent of the alder logs available for sale in the region. App. 754a, 341a. From 1990 to 2000, Weyerhaeuser made more than $75 million in capital investments in its hardwood mills in the Pacific Northwest. Id., at 159a. During this period, production increased at every Northwestern hardwood mill that Weyerhaeuser owned. Id., at 160a. In addition to increasing production, Weyerhaeuser used “state-of-the-art technology,” id., at 500a, including sawing equipment, to increase the amount of lumber recovered from every log, id., at 500a, 549a. By contrast, Ross-Simmons appears to have engaged in little efficiency-enhancing investment. See id., at 438a-441a. Logs represent up to 75 percent of a sawmill’s total costs. See id., at 169a. And from 1998 to 2001, the price of alder sawlogs increased while prices for finished hardwood lumber fell. These divergent trends in input and output prices cut into the mills’ profit margins, and Ross-Simmons suffered heavy losses during this time. See id., at 155a (showing a negative net income from 1998 to 2000). Saddled with several million dollars in debt, Ross-Simmons shut down its mill completely in May 2001. Id., at 156a. Ross-Simmons blamed Weyerhaeuser for driving it out of business by bidding up input costs, and it filed an antitrust suit against Weyerhaeuser for monopolization and attempted monopolization under § 2 of the Sherman Act. See 26 Stat. 209, as amended, 15 U. S. C. §2 (2000 ed., Supp. IV). Ross-Simmons alleged that, among other anticompetitive acts, Weyerhaeuser had used “its dominant position in the alder sawlog market to drive up the prices for alder sawlogs to levels that severely reduced or eliminated the profit margins of Weyerhaeuser’s alder sawmill competition.” App. 135a. Proceeding in part on this “predatory-bidding” theory, Ross-Simmons argued that Weyerhaeuser had overpaid for alder sawlogs to cause sawlog prices to rise to artificially high levels as part of a plan to drive Ross-Simmons out of business. As proof that this practice had occurred, Ross-Simmons pointed to Weyerhaeuser’s large share of the alder purchasing market, rising alder sawlog prices during the alleged predation period, and Weyerhaeuser’s declining profits during that same period. Prior to trial, Weyerhaeuser moved for summary judgment on Ross-Simmons’ predatory-bidding theory. Id., at 6a-24a. The District Court denied the motion. Id., at 58a-69a. At the close of the 9-day trial, Weyerhaeuser moved for judgment as a matter of law, or alternatively, for a new trial. The motions were based in part on Weyerhaeuser’s argument that Ross-Simmons had not satisfied the standard this Court set forth in Brooke Group, supra. App. 940a-942a. The District Court denied Weyerhaeuser’s motion. Id., at 720a, App. to Pet. for Cert. 46a. The District Court also rejected proposed predatory-bidding jury instructions that incorporated elements of the Brooke Group test. App. 725a-730a, 978a. Ultimately, the District Court instructed the jury that Ross-Simmons could prove that Weyerhaeuser’s bidding practices were anticompetitive acts if the jury concluded that Weyerhaeuser “purchased more logs than it needed, or paid a higher price for logs than necessary, in order to prevent [Ross-Simmons] from obtaining the logs they needed at a fair price.” Id., at 978a. Finding that Ross-Simmons had proved its claim for monopolization, the jury returned a $26 million verdict against Weyerhaeuser. Id., at 967a. The verdict was trebled to approximately $79 million. Weyerhaeuser appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. There, Weyerhaeuser argued that Brooke Group's standard for claims of predatory pricing should also apply to claims of predatory bidding. The Ninth Circuit disagreed and affirmed the verdict against Weyerhaeuser. Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians of Ore. v. Weyerhaeuser Co., 411 F. 3d 1030, 1035-1036 (2005). The Court of Appeals reasoned that “buy-side predatory bidding” and “sell-side predatory pricing,” though similar, are materially different in that predatory bidding does not necessarily benefit consumers or stimulate competition in the way that predatory pricing does. Id., at 1037. Concluding that “the concerns that led the Brooke Group Court to establish a high standard of liability in the predatory pricing context do not carry over to this predatory bidding context with the same force,” the Court of Appeals declined to apply Brooke Group to Ross-Simmons’ claims of predatory bidding. 411 F. 3d, at 1038. The Court of Appeals went on to con-elude that substantial evidence supported a finding of liability on the predatory-bidding theory. Id., at 1045. We granted certiorari to decide whether Brooke Group applies to claims of predatory bidding. 548 U. S. 903 (2006). We hold that it does, and we vacate the Court of Appeals’ judgment. II In Brooke Group, we considered what a plaintiff must show in order to succeed on a claim of predatory pricing under §2 of the Sherman Act. In a typical predatory-pricing scheme, the predator reduces the sale price of its product (its output) to below cost, hoping to drive competitors out of business. Then, with competition vanquished, the predator raises output prices to a supracompetitive level. See Matsushita Elec. Industrial Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U. S. 574, 584-585, n. 8 (1986) (describing predatory pricing). For the scheme to make economic sense, the losses suffered from pricing goods below cost must be recouped (with interest) during the supracompetitive-pricing stage of the scheme. Id., at 588-589; Cargill, Inc. v. Monfort of Colo., Inc., 479 U. S. 104, 121-122, n. 17 (1986); see also R. Bork, The Antitrust Paradox 145 (1978). Recognizing this economic reality, we established two prerequisites to recovery on claims of predatory pricing. “First, a plaintiff seeking to establish competitive injury resulting from a rival’s low prices must prove that the prices complained of are below an appropriate measure of its rival’s costs.” Brooke Group, 509 U. S., at 222. Second, a plaintiff must demonstrate that “the competitor had ... a dangerous probability] of recouping its investment in below-cost prices.” Id., at 224. The first prong of the test — requiring that prices be below cost — is necessary because “[a]s a general rule, the exclusionary effect of prices above a relevant measure of cost either reflects the lower cost structure of the alleged predator, and so represents competition on the merits, or is beyond the practical ability of a judicial tribunal to control.” Id., at 223. We were particularly wary of allowing recovery for above-cost price cutting because allowing such claims could, perversely, “chil[l] legitimate price cutting,” which directly benefits consumers. See id., at 223-224; Atlantic Richfield Co. v. USA Petroleum Co., 495 U. S. 328,340 (1990) (“Low prices benefit consumers regardless of how those prices are set, and so long as they are above predatory levels, they do not threaten competition”). Thus, we specifically declined to allow plaintiffs to recover for above-cost price cutting, concluding that “discouraging a price cut and ... depriving consumers of the benefits of lower prices ... does not constitute sound antitrust policy.” Brooke Group, supra, at 224. The second prong of the Brooke Group test — requiring that there be a dangerous probability of recoupment of losses — is necessary because, without a dangerous probability of recoupment, it is highly unlikely that a firm would engage in predatory pricing. As the Court explained in Matsushita, a firm engaged in a predatory-pricing scheme makes an investment — the losses suffered plus the profits that would have been realized absent the scheme — at the initial, below-cost-selling phase. 475 U. S., at 588-589. For that investment to be rational, a firm must reasonably expect to recoup in the long run at least its original investment with supracompetitive profits. Ibid.; Brooke Group, 509 U. S., at 224. Without such a reasonable expectation, a rational firm would not willingly suffer definite, short-run losses. Recognizing the centrality of recoupment to a predatory-pricing scheme, we required predatory-pricing plaintiffs to “demonstrate that there is a likelihood that the predatory scheme alleged would cause a rise in prices above a competitive level that would be sufficient to compensate for the amounts expended on the predation, ineluding the time value of the money invested in it.” Id., at 225. We described the two parts of the Brooke Group test as “essential components of real market injury” that were “not easy to establish.” Id., at 226. We also reiterated that the costs of erroneous findings of predatory-pricing liability were quite high because “ ‘[t]he mechanism by which a firm engages in predatory pricing — lowering prices — is the same mechanism by which a firm stimulates competition,’” and, therefore, mistaken findings of liability would “ ‘ “chill the very conduct the antitrust laws are designed to protect.”’” Ibid, (quoting Cargill, supra, at 122, n. 17). III Predatory bidding, which Ross-Simmons alleges in this case, involves the exercise of market power on the buy side or input side of a market. In a predatory-bidding scheme, a purchaser of inputs “bids up the market price of a critical input to such high levels that rival buyers cannot survive (or compete as vigorously) and, as a result, the predating buyer acquires (or maintains or increases its) monopsony power.” Kirkwood, Buyer Power and Exclusionary Conduct, 72 Antitrust L. J. 625, 652 (2005) (hereinafter Kirkwood). Monopsony power is market power on the buy side of the market. Blair & Harrison, Antitrust Policy and Monopsony, 76 Cornell L. Rev. 297 (1991). As such, a monopsony is to the buy side of the market what a monopoly is to the sell side and is sometimes colloquially called a “buyer’s monopoly.” See id., at 301,320; Piraino, A Proposed Antitrust Approach to Buyers’ Competitive Conduct, 56 Hastings L. J. 1121,1125 (2005). A predatory bidder ultimately aims to exercise the monopsony power gained from bidding up input prices. To that end, once the predatory bidder has caused competing buyers to exit the market for purchasing inputs, it will seek to “restrict its input purchases below the competitive level,” thus “reduc[ing] the unit price for the remaining input[s] it purchases.” Salop, Anticompetitive Overbuying by Power Buyers, 72 Antitrust L. J. 669,672 (2005) (hereinafter Salop). The reduction in input prices will lead to “a significant cost saving that more than offsets the profit[s] that would have been earned on the output.” Ibid. If all goes as planned, the predatory bidder will reap monopsonistic profits that will offset any losses suffered in bidding up input prices. (In this case, the plaintiff was the defendant’s competitor in the input-purchasing market. Thus, this case does not present a situation of suppliers suing a monopsonist buyer under § 2 of the Sherman Act, nor does it present a risk of significantly increased concentration in the market in which the monopsonist sells, i. e., the market for finished lumber.) IV A Predatory-pricing and predatory-bidding claims are analytically similar. See Hovenkamp, The Law of Exclusionary Pricing, 2 Competition Policy Int’l, No. 1, pp. 21, 35 (Spring 2006). This similarity results from the close theoretical connection between monopoly and monopsony. See Kirkwood 653 (describing monopsony as the “mirror image” of monopoly); Khan v. State Oil Co., 93 F. 3d 1358, 1361 (CA7 1996) (“Monopsony pricing... is analytically the same as monopoly or cartel pricing and [is] so treated by the law”), vacated and remanded on other grounds, 522 U. S. 3 (1997); Vogel v. American Soc. of Appraisers, 744 F. 2d 598, 601 (C A7 1984) (“[M]onopoly and monopsony are symmetrical distortions of competition from an economic standpoint”); see also Hearing on Monopsony Issues in Agriculture: Buying Power of Processors in Our Nation’s Agricultural Markets before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, 108th Cong., 1st Sess., 13 (2004). The kinship between monopoly and monopsony suggests that similar legal standards should apply to claims of monopolization and to claims of monopsonization. Cf. Noll, “Buyer Power” and Economic Policy, 72 Antitrust L. J. 589, 591 (2005) (“[A]symmetric treatment of monopoly and monopsony has no basis in economic analysis”). Tracking the economic similarity between monopoly and monopsony, predatory-pricing plaintiffs and predatory-bidding plaintiffs make strikingly similar allegations. A predatory-pricing plaintiff alleges that a predator cut prices to drive the plaintiff out of business and, thereby, to reap monopoly profits from the output market. In parallel fashion, a predatory-bidding plaintiff alleges that a predator raised prices for a key input to drive the plaintiff out of business and, thereby, to reap monopsony profits in the input market. Both claims involve the deliberate use of unilateral pricing measures for anticompetitive purposes. And both claims logically require firms to incur short-term losses on the chance that they might reap supracompetitive profits in the future. B More importantly, predatory bidding mirrors predatory pricing in respects that we deemed significant to our analysis in Brooke Group. In Brooke Group, we noted that “ ‘predatory pricing schemes are rarely tried, and even more rarely successful.’ ” 509 U. S., at 226 (quoting Matsushita, 475 U. S., at 589). Predatory pricing requires a firm to suffer certain losses in the short term on the chance of reaping supracompetitive profits in the future. Id., at 588-589. A rational business will rarely make this sacrifice. Ibid. The same reasoning applies to predatory bidding. A predatory-bidding scheme requires a buyer of inputs to suffer losses today on the chance that it will reap supracompetitive profits in the future. For this reason, “[s]uccessful monopsony predation is probably as unlikely as successful monopoly predation.” R. Blair & J. Harrison, Monopsony 66 (1993). And like the predatory conduct alleged in Brooke Group, actions taken in a predatory-bidding scheme are often “ ‘ “the very essence of competition.’”” 509 U. S., at 226 (quoting Cargill, 479 U. S., at 122, n. 17, in turn quoting Matsushita, supra, at 594). Just as sellers use output prices to compete for purchasers, buyers use bid prices to compete for scarce inputs. There are myriad legitimate reasons — ranging from benign to affirmatively proeompetitive — why a buyer might bid up input prices. A firm might bid up inputs as a result of miscalculation of its input needs or as a response to increased consumer demand for its outputs. A more efficient firm might bid up input prices to acquire more inputs as a part of a proeompetitive strategy to gain market share in the output market. A firm that has adopted an input-intensive production process might bid up inputs to acquire the inputs necessary for its process. Or a firm might bid up input prices to acquire excess inputs as a hedge against the risk of future rises in input costs or future input shortages. See Salop 682-683; Kirkwood 655. There is nothing illicit about these bidding decisions. Indeed, this sort of high bidding is essential to competition and innovation on the buy side of the market. Brooke Group also noted that a failed predatory-pricing scheme may benefit consumers. 509 U. S., at 224. The potential benefit results from the difficulty an aspiring predator faces in recouping losses suffered from below-cost pricing. Without successful recoupment, “predatory pricing produces lower aggregate prices in the market, and consumer welfare is enhanced.” Ibid. Failed predatory-bidding schemes can also, but will not necessarily, benefit consumers. See Salop 677-678. In the first stage of a predatory-bidding scheme, the predator’s high bidding will likely lead to its acquisition of more inputs. Usually, the acquisition of more inputs leads to the manufacture of more outputs. And increases in output generally result in lower prices to consumers. Id., at 677; Blair & Harrison, supra, at 66-67. Thus, a failed predatory-bidding scheme can be a “boon to consumers” in the same way that we considered a predatory-pricing scheme to be. See Brooke Group, supra, at 224. In addition, predatory bidding presents less of a direct threat of consumer harm than predatory pricing. A predatory-pricing scheme ultimately achieves success by charging higher prices to consumers. By contrast, a predatory-bidding scheme could succeed with little or no effect on consumer prices because a predatory bidder does not necessarily rely on raising prices in the output market to recoup its losses. Salop 676. Even if output prices remain constant, a predatory bidder can use its power as the predominant buyer of inputs to force down input prices and capture monopsony profits. Ibid. C The general theoretical similarities of monopoly and monopsony combined with the theoretical and practical similarities of predatory pricing and predatory bidding convince us that our two-pronged Brooke Group test should apply to predatory-bidding claims. The first prong of Brooke Group’s test requires little adaptation for the predatory-bidding context. A plaintiff must prove that the alleged predatory bidding led to below-cost pricing of the predator’s outputs. That is, the predator’s bidding on the buy side must have caused the cost of the relevant output to rise above the revenues generated in the sale of those outputs. As with predatory pricing, the exclusionary effect of higher bidding that does not result in below-cost output pricing “is beyond the practical ability of a judicial tribunal to control without courting intolerable risks of chilling legitimate” procompetitive conduct. 509 U. S., at 223. Given the multitude of procompetitive ends served by higher bidding for inputs, the risk of chilling pro-competitive behavior with too lax a liability standard is as serious here as it was in Brooke Group. Consequently, only higher bidding that leads to below-cost pricing in the relevant output market will suffice as a basis for liability for predatory bidding. A predatory-bidding plaintiff also must prove that the defendant has a dangerous probability of recouping the losses incurred in bidding up input prices through the exercise of monopsony power. Absent proof of likely recoupment, a strategy of predatory bidding makes no economic sense because it would involve short-term losses with no likelihood of offsetting long-term gains. Cf. id., at 224 (citing Matsushita, supra, at 588-589). As with predatory pricing, making a showing on the recoupment prong will require “a close analysis of both the scheme alleged by the plaintiff and the structure and conditions of the relevant market.” Brooke Group, supra, at 226. Ross-Simmons has conceded that it has not satisfied the Brooke Group standard. Brief for Respondent 49; Tr. of Oral Arg. 49. Therefore, its predatory-bidding theory of liability cannot support the jury's verdict. V For these reasons, we vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Brooke Group dealt with a claim under the Robinson-Patman Act, but as we observed, “primary-line competitive injury under the RobinsonPatman Act is of the same general character as the injury inflicted by predatory pricing schemes actionable under § 2 of the Sherman Act.” 509 U. S., at 221. Because of this similarity, the standard adopted in Brooke Group applies to predatory-pricing claims under §2 of the Sherman Act. Id., at 222. If the predatory firm’s competitors in the input market and the output market are the same, then predatory bidding can also lead to the bidder’s acquisition of monopoly power in the output market. In that case, which does not appear to be present here, the monopsonist could, under certain market conditions, also recoup its losses by raising output prices to monopolistic levels. See Salop 679-682 (describing a monopsonist’s predatory strategy that depends upon raising prices in the output market). Predatory bidding on inputs is not analytically different from predatory overbuying of inputs. Both practices fall under the rubric of monopsony predation and involve an input purchaser’s use of input prices in an attempt to exclude rival input purchasers. The economic effect of the practices is identical: Input prices rise. In a predatory-bidding scheme, the purchaser causes prices to rise by offering to pay more for inputs. In a predatory-overbuying scheme, the purchaser causes prices to rise by demanding more of the input. Either way, input prices increase. Our use of the term “predatory bidding” is not meant to suggest that different legal treatment is appropriate for the economically identical practice of “predatory overbuying.” Higher prices for inputs obviously benefit existing sellers of inputs and encourage new firms to enter the market for input sales as well. Consumer benefit does not necessarily result at the first stage because the predator might not use its excess inputs to manufacture additional outputs. It might instead destroy the excess inputs. See Salop 677, n. 22. Also, if the same firms compete in the input and output markets, any increase in outputs by the predator could be offset by decreases in outputs from the predator’s struggling competitors. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Retinquist delivered the opinion of the Court. We postponed jurisdiction of this appeal from the Supreme Court of California to decide the important federal constitutional questions it presented. Those are whether state constitutional provisions, which permit individuals to exercise free speech and petition rights on the property of a privately owned shopping center to which the public is invited, violate the shopping center owner’s property rights under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments or his free speech rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. I Appellant PruneYard is a privately owned shopping center in the city of Campbell, Cal. It covers approximately 21 acres — 5 devoted to parking and 16 occupied by walkways, plazas, sidewalks, and buildings that contain more than 65 specialty shops, 10 restaurants, and a movie theater. The PruneYard is open to the public for the purpose of encouraging the patronizing of its commercial establishments. It has a policy not to permit any visitor or tenant to engage in any publicly expressive activity, including the circulation of petitions, that is not directly related to its commercial purposes. This policy has been strictly enforced in a nondiscriminatory fashion. The PruneYard is owned by appellant Fred Sahadi. Appellees are high school students who sought to solicit support for their opposition to a United Nations resolution against “Zionism.” On a Saturday afternoon they set up a card table in a corner of PruneYard’s central courtyard. They distributed pamphlets and asked passersby to sign petitions, which were to be sent to the President and Members of Congress. Their activity was peaceful and orderly and so far as the record indicates was not objected to by PruneYard’s patrons. Soon after appellees had begun soliciting signatures, a security guard informed them that they would have to leave because their activity violated PruneYard regulations. The guard suggested that they move to the public sidewalk at the PruneYard’s perimeter. Appellees immediatelv left the premises and later filed this lawsuit in the California Superior Court of Santa Clara County. They sought to enjoin appellants from denying them access to the PruneYard for the purpose of circulating their petitions. The Superior Court held that appellees were not entitled under either the Federal or California Constitution to exercise their asserted rights on the shopping center property. App. to Juris. Statement A-2. It concluded that there were “adequate, effective channels of communication for [appellees] other than soliciting on the private property of the [Prune-Yard].” Id., at A-3. The California Court of Appeal affirmed. The California Supreme Court reversed, holding that the California Constitution protects “speech and petitioning, reasonably exercised, in shopping centers even when the centers are privately owned.” 23 Cal. 3d 899, 910, 592 P. 2d 341, 347 (1979). It concluded that appellees were entitled to conduct their activity on PruneYard property. In rejecting appellants’ contention that such a result infringed property rights protected by the Federal Constitution, the California Supreme Court observed: “ ‘It bears repeated emphasis that we do not have under consideration the property or privacy rights of an individual homeowner or the proprietor of a modest retail establishment. As a result of advertising and the lure of a congenial environment, 25,000 persons are induced to congregate daily to take advantage of the numerous amenities offered by the [shopping center there]. A handful of additional orderly persons soliciting signatures and distributing handbills in connection therewith, under reasonable regulations adopted by defendant to assure that these activities do not interfere with normal business operations (see Diamond [v. Bland, 3 Cal. 3d 653, 665, 477 P. 2d 733, 741 (1970)]) would not markedly dilute defendant’s property rights.’ ([Diamond v. Bland, 11 Cal. 3d 331, 345, 521 P. 2d 460, 470 (1974)] (dis. opn. of Mosk, J.).)” Id., at 910-911, 592 P. 2d, at 347-348. The California Supreme Court thus expressly overruled its earlier decision in Diamond v. Bland, 11 Cal. 3d 331, 521 P. 2d 460 (Diamond II), cert, denied, 419 U. S. 885 (1974), which had reached an opposite conclusion. 23 Cal. 3d, at 910, 592 P. 2d, at 347. Before this Court, appellants contend that their constitutionally established rights under the Fourteenth Amendment to exclude appellees from adverse use of appellants’ private property cannot be denied by invocation of a state constitutional provision or by judicial reconstruction of a State’s laws of private property. We postponed consideration of the question of jurisdiction until the hearing of the case on the merits. 444 U. S. 949. We now affirm. II We initially conclude that this case is properly before us as an appeal under 28 U. S. C. § 1257 (2). It has long been established that a state constitutional provision is a “statute” within the meaning of § 1257 (2). See, e. g., Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U. S. 488, 489 (1961); Adamson v. California, 332 U. S. 46, 48, n. 2 (1947); Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. Virginia, 282 U. S. 440 (1931). Here the California Supreme Court decided that Art. 1, §§ 2 and 3, of the California Constitution gave appellees the right to solicit signatures on appellants’ property in exercising their state rights of free expression and petition. In so doing, the California Supreme Court rejected appellants’ claim that recognition of such a right violated appellants’ “right to exclude others,” which is a fundamental component of their federally protected property rights. Appeal is thus the proper method of review. Ill Appellants first contend that Lloyd Corp. v. Tanner, 407 U. S. 551 (1972), prevents the State from requiring a private shopping center owner to provide access to persons exercising their state constitutional rights of free speech and petition when adequate' alternative avenues of communication are available. Lloyd dealt with the question whether under the Federal Constitution a privately owned shopping center may prohibit the distribution of handbills on its property when the handbilling is unrelated to the shopping center’s operations. Id., at 552. The shopping center had adopted a strict policy against the distribution of handbills within the building complex and its malls, and it made no exceptions to this rule. Id.,'at 555. Respondents in Lloyd argued that because the shopping center was open to the public, the First Amendment prevents the private owner from enforcing the hand-billing restriction on shopping center premises. Id., at 564. In rejecting this claim we substantially repudiated the rationale of Food Employees v. Logan Valley Plaza, 391 U. S. 308 (1968), which was later overruled in Hudgens v. NLRB, 424 U. S. 507 (1976). We stated that property does not “lose its private character merely because the public is generally invited to use it for designated purposes,” and that “[t]he essentially private character of a store and its privately owned abutting property does not change by virtue of being large or clustered with other stores in a modem shopping center.” 407 U. S., at 569. Our reasoning in Lloyd, however, does not ex proprio vigore limit the authority of the State to exercise its police power or its sovereign right to adopt in its own Constitution individual liberties more expansive than those conferred by the Federal Constitution. Cooper v. California, 386 U. S. 58, 62 (1967). See also 407 U. S., at 569-570. In Lloyd, supra, there was no state constitutional or statutory provision that had been construed to create rights to the use of private property by strangers, comparable to those found to exist by the California Supreme Court here. It is, of course, well established that a State in the exercise of its police power may adopt reasonable restrictions on private property so long as the restrictions do not amount to a taking without just compensation or contravene any other federal constitutional provision. See, e. g., Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co., 272 U. S. 365 (1926); Young v. American Mini Theatres, Inc., 427 U. S. 50 (1976). Lloyd held that when a shopping center owner opens his private property to the public for the purpose of shopping, the First Amendment to the United States Constitution does not thereby create individual rights in expression beyond those already existing under applicable law. See also Hudgens v. NLRB, supra, at 517-521. IV Appellants next contend that a right to exclude others underlies the Fifth Amendment guarantee against the taking of property without just compensation and the Fourteenth Amendment guarantee against the deprivation of property without due process of law. It is true that one of the essential sticks in the bundle of property rights is the right to exclude others. Kaiser Aetna v. United States, 444 U. S. 164, 179-180 (1979). And here there has literally been a “taking” of that right to the extent that the California Supreme Court has interpreted the State Constitution to entitle its citizens to exercise free expression and petition rights on shopping center property. But it is well established that “not every destruction or injury to property by governmental action has been held to be a 'taking’ in the constitutional sense.” Armstrong v. United States, 364 U. S. 40, 48 (1960). Rather, the determination whether a state law unlawfully infringes a landowner’s property in violation of the Taking Clause requires an examination of whether the restriction on private property “forc[es] some people alone to bear public burdens which, in all fairness and justice, should be borne by the public as a whole.” Id., at 49. This examination entails inquiry into such factors as the character of the governmental action, its economic impact, and its interference with reasonable investment-backed expectations. Kaiser Aetna v. United States, supra, at 175. When “regulation goes too far it will be recognized as a taking.” Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U. S. 393, 415 (1922). Here the requirement that appellants permit appellees to exercise state-protected rights of free expression and petition on shopping center property clearly does not amount to an unconstitutional infringement of appellants’ property rights1 under the Taking Clause. There is nothing to suggest that preventing appellants from prohibiting this sort of activity will unreasonably impair the value or use of their property as a shopping center. The PruneYard is a large commercial complex that covers several city blocks, contains numerous separate business establishments, and is open to the public at large. The decision of the California Supreme Court makes it clear that the PruneYard may restrict expressive activity by adopting time, place, and manner regulations that will minimize any interference with its commercial functions. Appellees were orderly, and they limited their activity to the common areas of the shopping center. In these circumstances, the fact that they may have “physically invaded” appellants’ property cannot be viewed as determinative. This case is quite different from Kaiser Aetna v. United States, supra. Kaiser Aetna was a case in which the owners of a private pond had invested substantial amounts of money in dredging the pond, developing it into an exclusive marina, and building a surrounding marina community. The marina was open only to fee-paying members, and the fees were paid in part to “maintain the privacy and security of the pond.” Id., at 168. The Federal Government sought to compel free public use of the private marina on the ground that the marina became subject to the federal navigational servitude because the owners had dredged a channel connecting it to “navigable water.” The Government’s attempt to create a public right of access to the improved pond interfered with Kaiser Aetna’s “reasonable investment backed expectations.” We held that it went “so far beyond ordinary regulation or improvement for navigation as to amount to a taking. . . .” Id., at 178. Nor as a general proposition is the United States, as opposed to the several States, possessed of residual authority that enables it to define “property” in the first instance. A State is, of course, bound by the Just Compensation Clause of the Fifth Amendment, Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Chicago, 166 U. S. 226, 233, 236-237 (1897), but here appellants have failed to demonstrate that the “right to exclude others” is so essential to the use or economic value of their property that the state-authorized limitation of it amounted to a “taking.” There is also little merit to appellants’ argument that they have been denied their property without due process of law. In Nebbia v. New York, 291 U. S. 502 (1934), this Court stated: “[N] either property rights nor contract rights are absolute. . . . Equally fundamental with the private right is that of the public to regulate it in the common interest. . . . . . [T]he guaranty of due process, as has often been held, demands only that the law shall not be unreasonable, arbitrary or capricious, and that the means selected shall have a real and substantial relation to the objective sought to be attained.” Id., at 523, 525. See also Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. New York, 336 U. S. 106 (1949); Exxon Corp. v. Governor of Maryland, 437 U. S. 117, 124-125 (1978). Appellants have failed to provide sufficient justification for concluding that this test is not satisfied by the State’s asserted interest in promoting more expansive rights of free speech and petition than conferred by the Federal Constitution. V Appellants finally contend that a private property owner has a First Amendment right not to be forced by the State to use his property as a forum for the speech of others. They state that in Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U. S. 705 (1977), this Court concluded that a State may not constitutionally require an individual to participate in the dissemination of an ideological message by displaying it on his private property in a manner and for the express purpose that it be observed and read by .the public. This rationale applies here, they argue, because the message of Wooley is that the State may not force an individual to display any message at all. Wooley, however, was a case in which the government itself prescribed the message, required it to be displayed openly on appellee’s personal property that was used “as part of his daily life,” and refused to permit him to take any measures to cover up the motto even though the Court found that the display of the motto served no important state interest. Here, by contrast, there are a number of distinguishing factors. Most important, the shopping center by choice of its owner is not limited to the personal use of appellants. It is instead a business establishment that is open to the public to come and go as they please. The views expressed by members of the public in passing out pamphlets or seeking signatures for a petition thus will not likely be identified with those of the owner. Second, no specific message is dictated by the State to be displayed on appellants’ property. There consequently is no danger of governmental discrimination for or against a particular message. Finally, as far as appears here appellants can expressly disavow any connection with the message by simply posting signs in the area where the speakers or handbillers stand. Such signs, for example, could disclaim any sponsorship of the message and could explain that the persons are communicating their own messages by virtue of state law. Appellants also argue that their First Amendment rights have been infringed in light of West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624 (1943), and Miami Herald Publishing Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U. S. 241 (1974). Barnette is inapposite because it involved the compelled recitation of a message containing an affirmation of belief. This Court held such compulsion unconstitutional because it “require [d] the individual to communicate by word and sign his acceptance” of government-dictated political ideas, whether or not he subscribed to them. 319 U. S.-, at 633. Appellants are not similarly being compelled to affirm their belief in any govemmentally prescribed position or view, and they are free to publicly dissociate themselves from the views of the speakers or handbillers. Tornillo struck down a Florida statute requiring a newspaper to publish a political candidate’s reply to criticism previously published in that newspaper. It rests on the principle that the State cannot tell a newspaper what it must print. The Florida statute contravened this principle in that it “exact[ed] a penalty on the basis of the content of a newspaper.” 418 U. S., at 256. There also was a danger in Tor-nillo that the statute would “dampe[n] the vigor and limi[t] the variety of public debate” by deterring editors from publishing controversial political statements that might trigger the application of the statute. Id., at 257. Thus, the statute was found to be an “intrusion into the function of editors.” Id., at 258. These concerns obviously are not present here. We conclude that neither appellants’ federally recognized property rights nor their First Amendment rights have been infringed by the California Supreme Court’s decision recognizing a right of appellees to exercise state-protected rights of expression and petition on appellants’ property. The judgment of the Supreme Court of California is therefore Affirmed. Mr. Justice Blackmun joins the opinion of the Court-except that sentence thereof, ante, at 84, which rdads: “Nor as a general proposition is the United States, as opposed to the several States, possessed of residual authority that enables it to define 'property’ in the first instance.” The California Supreme Court in Diamond II had reasoned: “In this case, as in Lloyd ]_Corp. v. Tanner, 407 U. S. 551 (1972)], plaintiffs have alternative, effective channels of communication, for the customers and employees of the center may be solicited on any public sidewalks, parks and streets adjacent to the Center and in the communities in which such persons reside. Unlike the situation in Marsh [v. Alabama, 326 U. S. 501 (1946)] and [Food Employees v. Logan Valley Plaza, 391 U. S. 308 (1968)], no reason appears why such alternative means of communication would be ineffective, and plaintiffs concede that, unlike Logan, their initiative petition bears no particular relation to the shopping center, its individual stores or patrons.” 11 Cal. 3d, at 335, 521 P. 2d, at 463. Diamond II thus held that the shopping center owner’s property rights outweighed the rights of free expression and petition asserted by the plaintiffs. Ibid. Article 1, §2, of the California Constitution provides: “Every person may freely speak, write and publish his or her sentiments on aE subjects, being responsible for the abuse of this right. A law may not restrain or abridge liberty of speech or press.” Article 1, § 3, of the California Constitution provides: “[P]eople have the right to . . . petition government for redress of grievances.” The center had banned handbiEing because it “was considered Bkely to annoy customers, to create Etter, potentially to create disorders, and generally to be incompatible with the purpose of the Center and the atmosphere sought to be preserved.” 407 U. S., at 555-556. Respondents rehed on Marsh v. Alabama, 326 U. S. 501 (1946), and Food Employees v. Logan. Valley Plaza, 391 U. S. 308 (1968), in support of their claim that the shopping center’s permission to the public to enter its property for the purpose of shopping caused its property to lose its private character, thereby permitting members of the pubhe to exercise the same free speech rights as they would have on similar public facilities or the streets of a city or town. Both of those cases, however, involved no state law authorizing the conduct of the solicitors or handbillers. Appellants do not maintain that this is a condemnation case. Reply Brief for Appellants 2. Rather, they argue that “[t]he rights of a property owner . . . are rooted in the Fifth Amendment guarantee against the taking of property without just compensation and are incorporated in the Fourteenth Amendment guarantee against the deprivation of property without due process of law.” Brief for Appellants 10. Here, of course, if the law required the conclusion that there was a “talcing,” there was concededly no compensation, just or otherwise, paid to appellants. This argument falls within appellants’ contention that Lloyd is controlling, see 407 U. S., at 567, and was adequately presented below. See New York ex rel. Bryant v. Zimmerman, 278 U. S. 63, 67 (1928). The term “property” as used in the Taking Clause includes the entire “group of rights inhering in the citizen’s [ownership].” United States v. General Motors Corp., 323 U. S. 373 (1945). It is not used in the “vulgar and untechnical sense of the physical thing with respect to which the citizen exercises rights recognized by law. [Instead, it] denote[s] the group of rights inhering in the citizen’s relation to the physical thing, as the right to possess, use and dispose of it. . . . The constitutional provision is addressed to every sort of interest the citizen may possess.” Id., at 377-378. Thus, as this Court stated in Monongahela Navigation. Co. v. United States, 148 U. S. 312, 325 (1893), a case which has since been characterized as resting primarily on “estoppel,” see, e. g., United States v. Bands, 389 U. S. 121, 126 (1967), the Fifth Amendment “prevents the public from loading upon one individual more than his just share of the burdens of government, and says that when he surrenders to the public something more and different from that which is exacted from other members of the public, a full and just equivalent shall be returned to him.” See also Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City, 438 U. S. 104, 123-125 (1978); Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U. S. 393, 416 (1922), Although appellants contend there are adequate alternative avenues of communication available for appellees, it does not violate the United States Constitution for the State Supreme Court to conclude that access to appellants’ property in the manner required here is necessary to the promotion of state-protected rights of free speech and petition. Appellees contend that this issue is not properly before us because appellants have not met their burden of showing that it was raised in the state courts. It is well settled that in challenging the validity of a state law on the ground that it is repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, “[n]o particular form of words or phrases is essential, but only that the claim of invalidity on the ground therefor be brought to the attention of the state court with fair precision and in due time. And if the record as a whole shows either expressly or by clear intendment that this was done, the claim is to be regarded as having been adequately presented.” New York ex rel. Bryant v. Zimmerman, 278 U. S., at 67. Before the Supreme Court of California, appellants argued: “The constitutional right to exclude potential communicants from private property is inextricably intertwined with the right of the property owner to select the way he wishes to use his property. . . . The right, which has been recognized as deriving from the owner’s status as owner, also derives from the owner’s status as himself a potential communicant. Defendant urges that his constitutional right to free speech would be infringed if he were required to make his property available to others for the purpose of their expressive activity.” Brief in Response to Amici Curiae Briefs in No. S. F. 23812, p. 39 (Sup. Ct. Cal.). In making this argument appellants explicitly relied on Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U. S. 705 (1977), and West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624 (1943). Brief in Response to Amici Curiae Briefs, supra, at 40-42. Before this Court appellants contend that “[t]he constitutional rights of private property owners also have their origins in the First Amendment right of the property owner not to be forced by the state to use his property as a forum for the speech of others.” Brief for Appellants 12. See also Juris. Statement 12. And appellants throughout this litigation have been asserting their federal constitutional right to prohibit public expressive activity on their property that is not directly related to PruneYard’s commercial purposes. In addition, this Court has held federal claims to have been adequately presented even though not raised in lower state courts when the highest state court renders an unexpected interpretation of state law or reverses its prior interpretation. Brinkerhoff-Paris Trust & Savings Co. v. Hill, 281 U. S. 673, 677-678 (1930); Missouri ex rel. Missouri Ins. Co. v. Gekner, 281 U. S. 313, 320 (1930); Saunders v. Shaw, 244 U. S. 317, 320 (1917). Here prior to its decision below, the California Supreme Court had expressly decided to follow Lloyd Corp. v. Tanner, 407 U. S. 551 (1972), in defining the scope of state constitutional rights of free speech and petition. Diamond II, 11 Cal. 3d, at 335, 521 P. 2d, at 463. It was not until the’instant case that the California Supreme Court overruled Diamond II, supra, and held that the California Constitution can and does require shopping center owners to grant access to individuals exercising their state rights of free expression and petition. Prior to reaching the California Supreme Court, appellants argued that the Diamond II decision bound the California Superior Court and Court of Appeal to rule in appellants’ favor. Appellants prevailed in these courts, and Diamond II was held to be controlling. Once before the California Supreme Court, as noted above, appellants explicitly presented their federal constitutional right to prohibit public expression on their property in terms of Wooley and Barnette. It was not until that time that they could have reasonably expected that the validity of the earlier Diamond II decision would be questioned. In these circumstances we conclude that appellants have adequately raised the federal question. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

D

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Per Curiam. This case presents the question of the constitutionality under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the New Jersey “Assistance to Families of the Working Poor” program, N, J. Stat. Ann. § 44:13-1 et seg., that allegedly discriminates against illegitimate children in the provision of financial assistance and other services. Specifically, appellants challenge that aspect of the program that limits benefits to only those otherwise qualified families “which consist of a household composed of two adults of the opposite sex ceremonially married to each other who have at least one minor child ... of both, the natural child of one and adopted by the other, or a child adopted by both . . . .” N. J. Stat. Ann. §44:13-3 (a). Appellants do not challenge the statute’s “household” requirement. Rather, they argue that although the challenged classification turns upon the marital status of the parents as well as upon the parent-child relationship, in practical effect it operates almost invariably to deny benefits to illegitimate children while granting benefits to those children who are legitimate. Although apparently conceding the correctness of this position, the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, sitting as a three-judge court, upheld the statutory scheme on the grqund that it was designed “to preserve and strengthen family life.” 349 F. Supp. 491, 496 (1972). Confronted with similar arguments in the past, we have specifically declared that: “The status of illegitimacy has expressed through the ages society’s condemnation of irresponsible liaisons beyond the bonds of marriage. But visiting this condemnation on the head of an infant is illogical and unjust. Moreover, imposing disabilities on the illegitimate child is contrary to the basic concept of our system that legal burdens should bear some relationship to individual responsibility or wrongdoing. Obviously, no child is responsible for his birth and penalizing the illegitimate child is an ineffectual — as well as an unjust — way of deterring the parent.” Weber v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 406 U. S. 164, 175 (1972). Thus, in Weber we held that under the Equal Protection Clause a State may not exclude illegitimate children from sharing equally with other children in the recovery of workmen’s compensation benefits for the death of their parent. Similarly, in Levy v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 68 (1968), we held that a State may not create a right of action in favor of children for the wrongful death of a parent and' exclude illegitimate children from the benefit of such a right. And only this Term, in Gomez v. Perez, 409 U. S. 535 (1973), we held that once a State posits a judicially enforceable right on behalf of children to needed support from their natural father, there is no constitutionally sufficient justification for denying such an essential right to illegitimate children. See also Davis v. Richardson, 342 F. Supp. 588 (Conn.), aff’d, 409 U. S. 1069 (1972); Griffin v. Richardson, 346 F. Supp. 1226 (Md.), aff’d, 409 U. S. 1069 (1972). Those decisions compel the conclusion that appellants’ claim of the denial of equal protection must be sustained, for there can be no doubt that the benefits extended under the challenged program are as indispensable to the health and well-being of illegitimate children as to those who are legitimate. Accordingly, we grant the motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis, reverse the judgment of the District Court, and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. The Chief Justice concurs in the result. In prior proceedings in this case, a single judge of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, in an unreported opinion, denied appellants’ petition to convene a three-judge court on the ground that no substantial constitutional question was presented, and dismissed the complaint. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit held that a substantial constitutional claim had been presented and therefore remanded the case with directions to convene a three-judge court. 448 F. 2d 1247, 1248 (1971). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court. We granted certiorari to decide whether the Secretary of Health and Human Services may immediately appeal a district court order effectively declaring invalid regulations that limit the kinds of inquiries that must be made to determine whether a person is entitled to disability insurance benefits and remanding a claim for benefits to the Secretary for consideration without those restrictions. We hold that the Secretary may appeal such an order as a “final decision” under 28 U. S. C. § 1291. I Respondent Finkelstein is the widow of a wage earner who died in 1980 while fully insured under Title II of the Social Security Act, 49 Stat. 622, as amended, 42 U. S. C. § 401 et seq. (1982 ed.). In 1983, respondent applied to the Social Security Administration for widow’s disability benefits, claiming that her heart condition made her disabled within the meaning of the section of the Social Security Act providing for surviving spouses’ disability insurance benefit payments, § 223, as added, 70 Stat. 815, and as amended, 42 U. S. C. §§ 423(d)(1)(A), (d)(2)(B) (1982 ed. and Supp. V). Section 423(d)(2)(B) states that a widow shall not be determined to be disabled unless her impairment is of a level of severity which, “under regulations prescribed by the Secretary,” is deemed sufficient to preclude an individual from engaging in any gainful activity. Under regulations promulgated by the Secretary, 20 CFR §§ 404.1577, 404.1578(a)(1) (1989), a surviving spouse is deemed disabled only if the spouse suffers from a physical or mental impairment meeting or equaling the severity of an impairment included in the Secretary’s Listing of Impairments located at Appendix 1 to 20 CFR pt. 404, subpt. P (1989). If the surviving spouse’s, impairment does not meet or equal one of the listed impairments, the Secretary will not find the spouse disabled; in particular, the Secretary will not consider whether the spouse’s impairment nonetheless makes the spouse disabled, given the spouse’s age, education, and work experience. The Secretary’s practice for spouses’ disability insurance benefits thus differs significantly from the regulations for determining whether a wage earner is entitled to disability insurance benefits. For wage earners, the Secretary has established a “five-step sequential evaluation process for determining whether a person is disabled.” Bowen v. Yuckert, 482 U. S. 137, 140 (1987). Under that five-step process, even if a wage earner’s impairment does not meet or equal one of the listed impairments, the wage earner may nonetheless be entitled to disability insurance benefits if the Secretary determines that his “impairment in fact prevents him from working.” Sullivan v. Zebley, 493 U. S. 521, 535 (1990). The Secretary maintains that the difference between the wage earner regulations and the surviving spouse regulations is supported by a difference between the two pertinent statutory definitions of disability. Compare 42 U. S. C. § 423(d)(2)(A) with § 423(d)(2)(B) (1982 ed. and Supp. V). Respondent’s application for benefits was denied on the ground that her heart condition did not meet or equal a listed impairment. After exhausting administrative remedies, respondent sought judicial review of the Secretary’s decision in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, invoking § 205(g) of the Social Security Act, as amended, 53 Stat. 1370, 42 U. S. C. § 405(g) (1982 ed.). The District Court sustained the Secretary’s conclusion that respondent did not suffer from an impairment that met or equaled a listed impairment. See App. to Pet. for Cert. 16a. The District Court nonetheless concluded that “the case must be remanded to the Secretary,” id., at 17a, because the record was “devoid of any findings” regarding respondent’s inability to engage in any gainful activity even though her impairment was not equal to one of the listed impairments, see ibid. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit dismissed the Secretary’s appeal for lack of jurisdiction. Finkelstein v. Bowen, 869 F. 2d 215 (1989). The Court of Appeals relied on its past decisions holding that “'remands to administrative agencies are not ordinarily appealable.’ ” Id., at 217 (citation omitted). Although the Court of Appeals acknowledged an exception to that rule for cases “in which an important legal issue is finally resolved and review of that issue would be foreclosed ‘as a practical matter’ if an immediate appeal were unavailable,” ibid, (citation omitted), that exception was deemed inapplicable in this case because the Secretary might persist in refusing benefits even after consideration of respondent’s residual functional capacity on remand, and the District Court might thereafter order that benefits be granted, thereby providing the Secretary with an appealable final decision. Id., at 220. The Court of Appeals conceded that the Secretary might not be able to obtain review at a later point if he concluded on remand that respondent was entitled to benefits based on her lack of residual functional capacity, but it believed this argument for immediate appeal-ability to be foreclosed by a prior decision of the Circuit. Ibid. We granted certiorari, 493 U. S. 1055 (1990). II We begin by noting that the issue before us is not the broad question whether remands to administrative agencies are always immediately appealable. There is, of course, a great variety in remands, reflecting in turn the variety of ways in which agency action may be challenged in the district courts and the possible outcomes of such challenges. The question before us rather is whether orders of the type entered by the District Court in this case are immediately appealable by the Secretary. It is necessary therefore to consider precisely what the District Court held and why it remanded this case to the Secretary. Although the District Court sustained the Secretary’s conclusion that respondent did not suffer from an impairment that met or equaled the severity of a listed impairment, it concluded that the Secretary’s ultimate conclusion that respondent was not disabled could not be sustained because other medical evidence suggested that respondent might not be able to engage in any gainful activity. Considering it “anomalous” that an impairment actually leaving respondent without the residual functional capacity to perform any gainful activity could be insufficient to warrant benefits just because it was not equal to one of the listed impairments, the District Court directed the Secretary “to inquire whether [respondent] may or may not engage in any gainful activity, as contemplated by the Act.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 18a. The District Court’s order thus essentially invalidated, as inconsistent with the Social Security Act, the Secretary’s regulations restricting spouses’ disability insurance benefits to those claimants who can show that they have impairments with “specific clinical findings that are the same as ... or are medically equivalent to” one of the listed impairments, 20 CFR § 404.1578(a)(1) (1989). Cf. Heckler v. Campbell, 461 U. S. 458, 465-466 (1983). The District Court stated that it was “remand[ing]” the case to the Secretary because the record contained no findings about the functional impact of respondent’s impairment; in effect it ordered the Secretary to address respondent’s ailment without regard for the regulations that would have precluded such consideration. The District Court’s order thus reversed the Secretary’s conclusion that respondent was not disabled and remanded for further consideration of respondent’s medical condition. Once the nature of the District Court’s action is clarified, it becomes clear how this action fits into the structure of § 405 (g). The first sentence of § 405(g) provides that an individual denied benefits by a final decision of the Secretary may obtain judicial review of that decision by filing “a civil action” in federal district court. The use of the term “a civil action” suggests that at least in the context of § 405(g), each final decision of the Secretary will be reviewable by a separate piece of litigation. The fourth and eighth sentences of § 405(g) buttress this conclusion. The fourth sentence states that in such a civil action, the district court shall have the power to enter “a judgment affirming, modifying, or reversing the decision of the Secretary, with or without remanding the cause for a rehearing.” (Emphasis added.) This sentence describes the action that the District Court actually took in this case. In particular, although the fourth sentence clearly foresees the possibility that a district court may remand a cause to the Secretary for rehearing (as the District Court did here), nonetheless such a remand order is a “judgment” in the terminology of § 405(g). What happened in this case is that the District Court entered “a judgment . . . reversing the decision of the Secretary, with . . . remanding the cause for a rehearing.” The District Court’s remand order was unquestionably a “judgment,” as it terminated the civil action challenging the Secretary’s final determination that respondent was not entitled to benefits, set aside that determination, and finally decided that the Secretary could not follow his own regulations in considering the disability issue. Furthermore, should the Secretary on remand undertake the inquiry mandated by the District Court and award benefits, there would be grave doubt, as the Court of Appeals recognized, whether he could appeal his own order. Thus it is that the eighth sentence of § 405(g) provides that “[t]he judgment of the court shall be final except that it shall be subject to review in the same manner as a judgment in other civil actions.” (Emphasis added.) Respondent makes several arguments countering this construction of § 405(g) and of the District Court’s order, none of which persuade us. First, respondent argues that the remand in this case was ordered not pursuant to the fourth sentence of § 405(g), but under the sixth sentence of that section, which states in pertinent part that the District Court may “at any time order additional evidence to be taken before the Secretary, but only upon a showing that there is new evidence which is material and that there is good cause for the failure to incorporate such evidence into the record in a prior proceeding.” Respondent points out that the District Court stated that it was ordering a remand because the evidence on the record was insufficient to support the Secretary’s conclusion and that further factfinding regarding respondent’s ailment was necessary. We do not agree with respondent that the District Court’s action in this case was a “sixth-sentence remand.” The sixth sentence of § 405(g) plainly describes an entirely different kind of remand, appropriate when the district court learns of evidence not in existence or available to the claimant at the time of the administrative proceeding that might have changed the outcome of that proceeding. For the same reason, we reject respondent’s argument, based on the seventh sentence of § 405(g), that the district court may enter an appealable final judgment upon reviewing the Secretary’s postremand “additional or modified findings of fact and decision.” The postremand review conducted by the District Court under the seventh sentence refers only to cases that were previously remanded under the sixth sentence. The seventh sentence states that the district court may review “[s]uch additional or modified findings of fact,” a reference to the second half of the sixth sentence of § 405(g), which requires that “the Secretary shall, after the case is remanded, and after hearing such additional evidence if so ordered, modify or affirm his findings of fact or his decision, or both, and shall file with the court any such additional and modified findings of fact and decision . . . The phrase “such additional evidence” refers in turn to the “additional evidence” mentioned in the first half of the sixth sentence that the district court may order the Secretary to take in a sixth-sentence remand. See supra, at 625-626. But as the first half of the sixth sentence makes clear, the taking of this additional evidence may be ordered only upon a showing that there is material new evidence. The postremand judicial review contemplated by the seventh sentence of § 405(g) does not fit the kind of remand ordered by the District Court in this case. Respondent also argues that the eighth sentence of § 405(g), providing that the judgment of the district court “shall be final except that it shall be subject to review in the same manner as a judgment in other civil actions,” does not compel the conclusion that a judgment entered pursuant to the fourth sentence is immediately appealable. In respondent’s view, Congress used the the term “final” in the eighth sentence only to make clear that a court’s decision reviewing agency action could operate as law of the case and res judicata. Cf. City of Tacoma v. Taxpayers of Tacoma, 357 U. S. 320, 336 (1958). But even if it is true that Congress used the term “final” to mean “conclusively decided,” this reading does not preclude the construction of “final” to include “appealable,” a meaning with which “final” is usually coupled. Nor does respondent consider the significance of Congress’ use of the term “judgment” to describe the action taken by the District Court in this case. Although respondent argues that the words “final decisions,” as used in 28 U. S. C. § 1291, encompass no more than what was meant by the terms “final judgments and decrees” in the predecessor statute to § 1291, respondent recognizes that “final judgments” are at the core of matters appealable under § 1291, and respondent does not contest the power of Congress to define a class of orders as “final judgments” that by inference would be appealable under § 1291. Cf. Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. Mackey, 351 U. S. 427, 434 (1956). This is what Congress has done in the fourth sentence of § 405(g). More generally, respondent argues that a power in the district court to remand to an agency is always incident to the power to review agency action and that § 405(g) only expanded the district courts’ equitable powers; therefore, she insists, it is improper to construe § 405(g) as a limit on the district courts’ power to remand. This argument misapprehends what Congress sought to accomplish in § 405(g). The fourth sentence of § 405(g) does not “limit” the district courts’ authority to remand. Rather, the fourth sentence directs the entry of a final, appealable judgment even though that judgment may be accompanied by a remand order. The fourth sentence does not require the district court to choose between entering a final judgment and remanding; to the contrary, it specifically provides that a district court may enter judgment “with or without remanding the cause for a rehearing.” Finally, respondent argues that we already decided last Term, in Sullivan v. Hudson, 490 U. S. 877 (1989), that a remand order of the kind entered in this case is not appealable as a final decision. Although there is language in Hudson supporting respondent’s interpretation of that case, we do not find that language sufficient to sustain respondent’s contentions here. In Hudson, we held that under the EAJA, 28 U. S. C. § 2412(d)(1)(A), a federal court may award a Social Security claimant attorney’s fees for representation during administrative proceedings held pursuant to a district court order remanding the action to the Secretary. We were concerned there with interpreting the term “any civil action” in the EAJA, not with deciding whether a remand order could be appealed as a “final decision” under 28 U. S. C. § 1291. We noted in Hudson that the language of § 2412(d)(1)(A) must be construed with reference to the purpose of the EAJA and the realities of litigation against the Government. The purpose of the EAJA was to counterbalance the financial disincentives to vindicating rights against the Government through litigation; given this purpose, we could not believe that Congress would “throw the Social Security claimant a lifeline that it knew was a foot short” by denying her attorney’s fees for the mandatory proceedings on remand. Hudson, supra, at 890. We also recognized that even if a claimant had obtained a remand from the district court, she would not be a “prevailing party” for purposes of the EAJA until the result of the administrative proceedings held on remand was known. 490 U. S., at 887-888. We therefore concluded that for purposes of the EAJA, the administrative proceedings on remand “should be considered part and parcel of the action for which fees may be awarded.” Id., at 888. We did not say that proceedings on remand to an agency are “part and parcel” of a civil action in federal district court for all purposes, and we decline to do so today. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Title 28 U. S. C. § 1291 provides that “[t]he courts of appeals . . . shall have jurisdiction of appeals from all final decisions of the district courts . . . except where a direct review may be had in the Supreme Court.” Title 42 U. S. C. § 405(g) (1982 ed.) provides: “Any individual, after any final decision of the Secretary made after a hearing to which he was a party, irrespective of the amount in controversy, may obtain a review of such decision by a civil action commenced within sixty days after the mailing to him of notice of such decision or within such further time as the Secretary may allow. Such action shall be brought in the district court of the United States for the judicial district in which the plaintiff resides, or has his principal place of business, or, if he does not reside or have his principal place of business within any such judicial district, in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. As part of his answer the Secretary shall file a certified copy of the transcript of the record including the evidence upon which the findings and decision complained of are based. The court shall have power to enter, upon the pleadings and transcript of the record, a judgment affirming, modifying, or reversing the decision of the Secretary, with or without remanding the cause for a rehearing. The findings of the Secretary as to any fact, if supported by substantial evidence, shall be conclusive, and where a claim has been denied by the Secretary or a decision is rendered under subsection (b) of this section which is adverse to an individual who was a party to the hearing before the Secretary, because of failure of the claimant or such individual to submit proof in conformity with any regulation prescribed under subsection (a) of this section, the court shall review only the question of conformity with such regulations and the validity of such regulations. The court may, on motion of the Secretary made for good cause shown before he files his answer, remand the case to the Secretary for further action by the Secretary, and it may at any time order additional evidence to be taken before the Secretary, but only upon a showing that there is new evidence which is material and that there is good cause for the failure to incorporate such evidence into the record in a prior proceeding; and the Secretary shall, after the case is remanded, and after hearing such additional evidence if so ordered, modify or affirm his findings of fact or his decision, or both, and shall file with the court any such additional and modified findings of fact and decision, and a transcript of the additional record and testimony upon which his action in modifying or affirming was based. Such additional or modified findings of fact and decision shall be reviewable only to the extent provided for review of the original findings of fact and decision. The judgment of the court shall be final except that it shall be subject to review in the same manner as a judgment in other civil actions. Any action instituted in accordance with this subsection shall survive notwithstanding any change in the person occupying the office of Secretary or any vacancy in such office.” For example, a district court may on occasion order a remand to an agency even though the district court action was filed by the agency, not someone seeking judicial review, e. g., United States v. Alcon Laboratories, 636 F. 2d 876 (CA1), cert. denied, 451 U. S. 1017 (1981). In other cases the district court may order a remand to the agency but the person seeking judicial review may seek to appeal on the ground that broader relief should have been granted by the district court, e. g., Bohms v. Gardner, 381 F. 2d 283 (CA8 1967), cert. denied, 390 U. S. 964 (1968). None of these situations are presented in this case, and we express no opinion about appealability in those circumstances. Specifically, the District Court noted that an Administrative Law Judge “found that the ‘medical findings shown in the medical evidence of record establish the existence of mitral valve prolapse,’” App. to Pet. for Cert. 17a, which does not meet or equal one of the listed impairments but might, in the District Court’s view, prevent respondent from engaging in any gainful activity, ibid. Neither party suggests that the Secretary’s decision denying respondent benefits without considering her mitral valve prolapse was not a “final decision of the Secretary” within the meaning of § 405(g). See, e. g., Caulder v. Bowen, 791 F. 2d 872 (CA11 1986); Borders v. Heckler, 777 F. 2d 954, 955 (CA4 1985); Newhouse v. Heckler, 753 F. 2d 283, 287 (CA3 1985); Booz v. Secretary of Health and Human Services, 734 F. 2d 1378, 1381 (CA9 1984); Dorsey v. Heckler, 702 F. 2d 597, 604-605 (CA5 1983); Cagle v. Califano, 638 F. 2d 219, 221 (CA10 1981). Although all the Circuits recognize that new evidence must be “material” to warrant a sixth-sentence remand, it is not clear whether the Circuits have interpreted the requirement of materiality in the same way. See Dorsey, supra, at 605, n. 9 (criticizing “stricter position” of Fourth and Tenth Circuits); Godsey v. Bowen, 832 F. 2d 443, 444 (CA7 1987) (expressing skepticism about existence of conflict); Borders, supra, at 956 (also skeptical). We express no opinion on the proper definition of materiality in this context. It is true, as respondent maintains, that the District Court did not caption its order as a “judgment,” much less a “final judgment.” The label used by the District Court of course cannot control the order’s appealability in this case, any more than it could when a district court labeled a non-appealable interlocutory order as a “final judgment.” See Liberty Mutual Ins. Co. v. Wetzel, 424 U. S. 737 (1976). Respondent also makes two arguments based on subsequent legislative history to counter the conclusion that Congress intended orders entered under the fourth sentence of § 405(g) to be appealable final judgments. First, she relies on a committee print prepared by the Social Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee which, in summarizing amendments to the Social Security Act, stated that under prior law, a district court could remand a case to the Secretary on its own motion and that the judgment of the district court would be final after the Secretary filed any modified findings of fact and decision with the court, and that no change had been made by the amendments. See The Social Security Amendments of 1977: Brief Summary of Major Provisions and Detailed Comparison With Prior Law, WMCP No. 95-72, p. 26 (1978) (Brief Summary). The committee print’s observations are entirely consistent with the construction we have placed on remands ordered under the sixth sentence of § 405(g). Moreover, leaving aside all the usual difficulties inherent in relying on subsequent legislative history, see, e. g., United States v. Mine Workers, 330 U. S. 258, 281-282 (1947), we note that the print specifically warned that it was prepared by the subcommittee staff for informational purposes only and was not considered or approved by the subcommittee, and that it was designed not to be a section-by-section analysis of the amendments but only a “narrative synopsis.” Brief Summary, at I, V. We therefore cannot assign this committee print any significant weight. Second, respondent relies on a House Judiciary Committee Report on amendments to the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), stating that a district court’s remand decision under § 405(g) is not a “final judgment.” H. R. Rep. No. 99-120, p. 19 (1985). Again, we cannot conclude that this subsequent legislative history overthrows the language of § 405(g). In the first place, this part of this particular Committee Report concerned the proper time period for filing a petition for attorney’s fees under EAJA, not appealability. Second, the Committee relied in particular on Guthrie v. Schweiker, 718 F. 2d 104 (CA4 1983), for the proposition that a remand order is not a final judgment, but Guthrie also concerned the time for filing an attorney’s fees petition, and it is far from clear that Guthrie did not involve a sixth-sentence remand. Guthrie, in turn, relied on Gilcrist v. Schweiker, 645 F. 2d 818, 819 (CA9 1981), which, quite unlike the present case, involved an appeal from a district court remand order that did “no more than order clarification of the administrative decision.” Title 28 U. S. C. § 2412(d)(1)(A) provides in pertinent part: “Except as otherwise specifically provided by statute, a court shall award to a prevailing party other than the United States fees and other expenses . . . incurred by that party in any civil action . . . including proceedings for judicial review of agency action, brought by or against the United States in any court having jurisdiction of that action, unless the court finds that the position of the United States was substantially justified or that special circumstances make an award unjust.” Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Breyer delivered the opinion of the Court. The Class Action Fairness Act of 2005 (CAFA) provides that the federal “district courts shall have original jurisdiction” over a civil “class action” if, among other things, the “matter in controversy exceeds the sum or value of $5,000,000.” 28 U. S. C. §§ 1332(d)(2), (5). The statute adds that “to determine whether the .matter in controversy exceeds the sum or value of $5,000,000,” the “claims of the individual class members shall be aggregated.” § 1332(d)(6). The question presented concerns a class-action plaintiff who stipulates, prior to certification of the class, that he, and the class he seeks to represent, will not seek damages that exceed $5 million in total. Does that stipulation remove the case from CAFA’s scope? In our view, it does not. r—I In April 2011 respondent, Greg Knowles, filed this proposed class action in an Arkansas state court against petitioner, the Standard Fire Insurance Company. Knowles claimed that, when the company had made certain homeowner’s insurance loss payments, it had unlawfully failed to include a general contractor fee. And Knowles sought to certify a class of “hundreds, and possibly thousands,” of similarly harmed Arkansas policyholders. App. to Pet. for Cert. 66. In describing the.relief sought, the complaint says that the “Plaintiff and Class stipulate they will seek to recover total aggregate damages of less than five million dollars.” Id., at 60. An attached affidavit stipulates that Knowles “will not at any time during this case ... seek damages for the class ... in excess of $5,000,000 in the aggregate.” Id., at 75. On May 18, 2011, the company, pointing to CAFA’s jurisdictional provision, removed the case to Federal District Court. See 28 U. S. C. § 1332(d); § 1453. Knowles argued for remand on the ground that the District Court lacked jurisdiction. He claimed that the “sum or value” of the “amount in controversy” fell beneath the $5 million threshold. App. to Pet. for Cert. 2. On the basis of evidence presented by the company, the District Court found that the “sum or value” of the “amount in controversy” would, in the absence of the stipulation, have fallen just above the $5 million threshold. Id., at 2, 8. Nonetheless, in light of Knowles’ stipulation, the court concluded that the amount fell beneath the threshold. The court consequently ordered the case remanded to the state court. Id., at 15. The company appealed from the remand order, but the Eighth Circuit declined to hear the appeal. Id., at 1. See 28 U. S. C. § 1453(c)(1) (2006 ed., Supp. V) (providing discretion to hear an appeal from a remand order). The company petitioned for a writ of certiorari. And, in light of divergent views in the lower courts, we granted the writ. Compare Frederick v. Hartford Underwriters Ins. Co., 683 F. 3d 1242, 1247 (CA10 2012) (a proposed class-action representative’s “attempt to limit damages in the complaint is not dispositive when determining the amount in controversy”), with Rolwing v. Nestle Holdings, Inc., 666 F. 3d 1069, 1072 (CA8 2012) (a precertification “binding stipulation limiting damages sought to an amount not exceeding $5 million can be used to defeat CAFA jurisdiction”). t—i HH CAFA provides the federal district courts with “original jurisdiction” to hear a “class action” if the class has more than 100 members, the parties are minimally diverse, and the “matter in controversy exceeds the sum or value of $5,000,000.” 28 U. S. C. §§ 1332(d)(2), (5)(B). To “determine whether the matter in controversy” exceeds that sum, “the claims of the individual class members shall be aggregated.” § 1332(d)(6). And those “class members” include “persons (named or unnamed) who fall within the definition of the proposed or certified class.” § 1332(d)(1)(D) (emphasis added). As applied here, the statute tells the District Court to determine whether it has jurisdiction by adding up the value of the claim of each person who falls within the definition of Knowles’ proposed class and determine whether the resulting sum exceeds $5 million. If so, there is jurisdiction and the court may proceed with the case. The District Court in this case found that resulting sum would have exceeded $5 million but for the stipulation. And we must decide whether the stipulation makes a critical difference. In our view, it does not. Our reason is a simple one: Stipulations must be binding. See 9 J. Wigmore, Evidence §2588, p. 821 (J. Chadbourn rev. 1981) (defining a “judicial admission or stipulation” as an “express waiver made ... by the party or his attorney conceding for the purposes of the trial the truth of some alleged fact” (emphasis deleted)); Christian Legal Soc. Chapter of Univ. of Cal., Hastings College of Law v. Martinez, 561 U. S. 661, 677 (2010) (describing a stipulation as “ ‘binding and conclusive’ ” and “ ‘not subject to subsequent variation’” (quoting 83 C. J. S., Stipulations § 93 (2000))); 9 Wigmore, supra, § 2590, at 822 (the “vital feature” of a judicial admission is “universally conceded to be its conclusiveness upon the party making it”). The stipulation Knowles proffered to the District Court, however, does not speak for those he purports to represent. That is because a plaintiff who files a proposed class action cannot legally bind members of the proposed class before the class is certified. See Smith v. Bayer Corp., 564 U. S. 299, 315 (2011) (“Neither a proposed class action nor a rejected class action may bind nonparties”); id., at 313 (“‘[A] nonnamed class member is [not] a party to the class-action litigation before the class is certified’ ” (quoting Devlin v. Scardelletti, 536 U. S. 1, 16, n. 1 (2002) (Scalia, J., dissenting))); Brief for Respondent 12 (conceding that “a damages limitation . . . cannot have a binding effect on the merits of absent class members’ claims unless and until the class is certified”). Because his precertification stipulation does not bind anyone but himself, Knowles has not reduced the value of the putative class members’ claims. For jurisdictional purposes, our inquiry is limited to examining the case “as of the time it was filed in state court,” Wisconsin Dept. of Corrections v. Schacht, 524 U. S. 381, 390 (1998). At that point, Knowles lacked the authority to concede the amount-in-controversy issue for the absent class members. The Federal District Court, therefore, wrongly concluded that Knowles’ precertification stipulation could overcome its finding that the CAFA jurisdictional threshold had been met. Knowles concedes that “[fjederal jurisdiction cannot be based on contingent future events.” Brief for Respondent 20. Yet the two legal principles to which we have just referred—that stipulations must be binding and that a named plaintiff cannot bind precertification class members—mean that the amount to which Knowles has stipulated is in effect contingent. If, for example, as Knowles’ complaint asserts, “hundreds, and possibly thousands,” of persons in Arkansas have similar claims, App. to Pet. for Cert. 66, and. if each of those claims places a significant sum in controversy, the state court might certify the class and permit the case to proceed, but only on the condition that the stipulation be excised. Or a court might find that Knowles is an inadequate representative due to the artificial cap he purports to impose on the class’ recovery. E. g., Back Doctors Ltd. v. Metropolitan Property & Cas. Ins. Co., 637 F. 3d 827, 830-831 (CA7 2011) (noting a class representative’s fiduciary duty not to “throw away what eould be a major component of the class’s recovery”). Similarly, another class member could intervene with an amended complaint (without a stipulation), and the District Court might permit the action to proceed with a new representative. See 5 A. Conte & H. Newberg, Class Actions §16:7, p. 164 (4th ed. 2002) (“[Mjembers of a class have a right to intervene if their interests are not adequately represented by existing parties”). Even were these possibilities remote in Knowles’ own case, there is no reason to think them farfetched in other cases where similar stipulations could have more dramatic amount-lowering effects. The strongest counterargument, we believe, takes a syllogistic form: First, this complaint contains a presently nonbinding stipulation that the class will seek damages that amount to less than $5 million. Second, if the state court eventually certifies that class, the stipulation will bind those who choose to remain as class members. Third, if the state court eventually insists upon modification of the stipulation (thereby permitting class members to obtain more than $5 million), it will have in effect created a new, different case. Fourth, CAFA, however, permits the federal court to consider only the complaint that the plaintiff has filed, i. e., this complaint, not a new, modified (or amended) complaint that might eventually emerge. Our problem with this argument lies in its conclusion. We do not agree that CAFA forbids the federal court to consider, for purposes of determining the amount in controversy, the very real possibility that a nonbinding, amount-limiting, stipulation may not survive the class certification process. This potential outcome does not result in the creation of a new case not now before the federal court. To hold otherwise would, for CAFA jurisdictional purposes, treat a nonbinding stipulation as if it were binding, exalt form over substance, and run directly counter tq CAFA’s primary objective: ensuring “Federal court consideration of interstate cases of national importance.” § 2(b)(2), 119 Stat. 5. It would also have the effect of allowing the subdivision of a $100 million action into 21 just-below-$5-million state-court actions simply by including nonbinding stipulations; such an outcome would squarely conflict with the statute’s objective. We agree with Knowles that a federal district court might find it simpler to value the amount in controversy on the basis of a stipulation than to aggregate the value of the individual claims of all who meet the class description. We also agree that, when judges must decide jurisdictional matters, simplicity is a virtue. See Hertz Corp. v. Friend, 559 U. S. 77, 94 (2010). But to ignore a nonbinding stipulation does no more than require the federal judge to do what she must do in cases without a stipulation and what the statute requires, namely, “aggregat[e]” the “claims of the individual class members.” 28 U. S. C. § 1332(d)(6). Knowles also points out that federal courts permit individual plaintiffs, who are the masters of their complaints, to avoid removal to federal court, and to obtain a remand to state court, by stipulating to amounts at issue that fall below the federal jurisdictional requirement. That is so. See St. Paul Mercury Indemnity Co. v. Red Cab Co., 303 U. S. 283, 294 (1938) (“If [a plaintiff] does not desire to try his case in the federal court he may resort to the expedient of suing for less than the jurisdictional amount, and though he would be justly entitled to more, the defendant cannot remove”). But the key characteristic about those stipulations is that they are legally binding on all plaintiffs. See 14AA C. Wright, A. Miller, & E. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure §3702.1, p. 335 (4th ed. 2011) (federal court, as condition for remand, can insist on a “binding affidavit or stipulation that the plaintiff will continue to claim less than the jurisdictional amount” (emphasis added)). That essential feature is missing here, as Knowles cannot yet bind the absent class. Knowles argues in the alternative that a stipulation is binding to the extent it limits attorney's fees so that the amount in controversy remains below the CAFA threshold. We do not consider this issue because Knowles’ stipulation did not provide for that option. In sum, the stipulation at issue here can tie Knowles’ hands, but it does not resolve the amount-in-controversy question in light of his inability to bind the rest of the class. For this reason, we believe the District Court, when following the statute to aggregate the proposed class members’ claims, should have ignored that stipulation. Because it did not, we vacate the judgment below and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Kehnquist announced the judgment of the Court in an opinion in which The Chief Justice and Mr. Justice White join. This case presents the question of whether a defendant may be convicted for the sale of contraband which he procured from a Government informant or agent. The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit held he could be, and we agree. I Petitioner was convicted of two counts of distributing heroin in violation of 21 U. S. C. §841 (a)(1) in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and sentenced to concurrent terms of five years’ imprisonment (suspended). The case arose from two sales of heroin by petitioner to agents of the Federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in St. Louis on February 25 and 26, 1974. The sales were arranged by one Hutton, who was a pool-playing acquaintance of petitioner at the Pud bar in St. Louis and also a DEA informant. According to the Government’s witnesses, in late February 1974, Hutton and petitioner were shooting pool at the Pud when petitioner, after observing “track” (needle) marks on Hutton's arms told Hutton that he needed money and knew where he could get some heroin. Hutton responded that he could find a buyer and petitioner suggested that he “get in touch with those people.” Hutton then called DEA Agent Terry Sawyer and arranged a sale for 10 p. m. on February 25. At the appointed time, Hutton and petitioner went to a prearranged meetingplace and were met by Agent Sawyer and DEA Agent McDowell, posing as narcotics dealers. Petitioner produced a tinfoil packet from his cap and turned it over to the agents who tested it, pronounced it “okay,” and negotiated a price of $145 which was paid to petitioner. Before they parted, petitioner told Sawyer that he could obtain larger quantities of heroin and gave Sawyer a phone number where he could be reached. The next day Sawyer called petitioner and arranged for another “buy” that afternoon. Petitioner got Hutton to go along and they met the agents again near where they had been the previous night. They all entered the agents’ car, and petitioner again produced a tinfoil packet from his cap. The agents again field-tested it and pronounced it satisfactory. Petitioner then asked for $500 which Agent Sawyer said he would get from the trunk. Sawyer got out and opened the trunk which was a signal to other agents to move in and arrest petitioner, which they did. Petitioner’s version of events was quite different. According to him, in response to his statement that he was short of cash, Hutton said that he had a friend who was a pharmacist who could produce a nonnarcotic counterfeit drug which would give the same reaction as heroin. Hutton proposed selling this drug to gullible acquaintances who would be led to believe they were buying heroin. Petitioner testified that they successfully duped one buyer with this fake drug and that the sales which led to the arrest were solicited by petitioner in an effort to profit further from this ploy. Petitioner contended that he neither intended to sell, nor knew that he was dealing in heroin and that all of the drugs he sold were supplied by Hutton. His account was at least partially disbelieved by the jury which was instructed that in order to convict petitioner they had to find that the Government proved “that the defendant knowingly did an act which the law forbids, purposely intending to violate the law.” Thus the guilty verdict necessarily implies that the jury rejected petitioner's claim that he did not know the substance was heroin, and petitioner himself admitted both soliciting and carrying out sales. The only relevance of his version of the facts, then, lies in his having requested an instruction embodying that version. He did not request a standard entrapment instruction but he did request the following: “The defendant asserts that he was the victim of entrapment as to the crimes charged in the indictment. “If you find that the defendant’s sales of narcotics were sales of narcotics supplied to him by an informer in the employ of or acting on behalf of the government, then you must acquit the defendant because the law as a matter of policy forbids his conviction in such a case. “Furthermore, under this particular defense, you need not consider the predisposition of the defendant to commit the offense charged, because if the governmental involvement through its informer reached the point that I have just defined in your own minds, then the predisposition of the defendant would not matter.” Brief for Petitioner 9. The trial court refused the instruction and petitioner was found guilty. He appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, claiming that if the jury had believed that the drug was supplied by Hutton he should have been acquitted. The Court of Appeals rejected this argument and affirmed the conviction, relying on our opinion in United States v. Russell, 411 U. S. 423 (1973). 507 F. 2d 832 (1974). II In Russell we held that the statutory defense of entrapment was not available where it was conceded that a Government agent supplied a necessary ingredient in the manufacture of an illicit drug. We reaffirmed the principle of Sorrells v. United States, 287 U. S. 435 (1932), and Sherman v. United States, 356 U. S. 369 (1958), that the entrapment defense “focus[es] on the intent or predisposition of the defendant to commit the crime,” Russell, supra, at 429, rather than upon the conduct of the Government’s agents. We ruled out the possibility that the defense of entrapment could ever be based upon governmental misconduct in a case, such as this one, where the predisposition of the defendant to commit the crime was established. In holding that “[i]t is only when the Government’s deception actually implants the criminal design in the mind of the defendant that the defense of entrapment comes into play,” 411 U. S., at 436, we, of course, rejected the contrary view of the dissents in that case and the concurrences in Sorrells and Sherman. In view of these holdings, petitioner correctly recognizes that his case does not qualify as one involving “entrapment” at all. He instead relies on the language in Russell that “we may some day be presented with a situation in which the conduct of law enforcement agents is so outrageous that due process principles would absolutely bar the government from invoking judicial processes to obtain a conviction, cf. Rochin v. California, 342 U. S. 165 (1952) . . . .” 411 U. S., at 431-432. In urging that this case involves a violation of his due process rights, petitioner misapprehends the meaning of the quoted language in Russell, supra. Admittedly petitioner’s case is different from Russell’s but the difference is one of degree, not of kind. In Russell the ingredient supplied by the Government agent was a legal drug which the defendants demonstrably could have obtained from other sources besides the Government. Here the drug which the Government informant allegedly supplied to petitioner both was illegal and constituted the corpus delicti for the sale of which the petitioner was convicted. The Government obviously played a more significant role in enabling petitioner to sell contraband in this case than it did in Russell. But in each case the Government agents were acting in concert with the defendant, and in each case either the jury found or the defendant conceded that he was predisposed to commit the crime for which he was convicted. The remedy of the criminal defendant with respect to the acts of Government agents, which, far from being resisted, are encouraged by him, lies solely in the defense of entrapment. But, as noted, petitioner's conceded predisposition rendered this defense unavailable to him. To sustain petitioner’s contention here wo Id run directly contrary to our statement in Russell that the defense of entrapment is not intended “to give the federal judiciary a ‘chancellor’s foot’ veto over law enforcement practices of which it did not approve. The execution of the federal laws under our Constitution is confided primarily to the Executive Branch of the Government, subject to applicable constitutional and statutory limitations and to judicially fashioned rules to enforce those limitations.” 411 U. S., at 435. The limitations of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment come into play only when the Government activity in question violates some protected right of the defendant. Here, as we have noted, the police, the Government informant, and the defendant acted in concert with one another. If the result of the governmental activity is to “implant in the mind of an innocent person the disposition to commit the alleged offense and induce its commission . . . ,” Sorrells, supra, at 442, the defendant is protected by the defense of entrapment. If the police engage in illegal activity in concert with a defendant beyond the scope of their duties the remedy lies, not in freeing the equally culpable defendant, but in prosecuting the police under' the applicable provisions of state or federal law. See O’Shea v. Littleton, 414 U. S. 488, 503 (1974); Imbler v. Pachtman, 424 U. S. 409, 428-429 (1976). But the police conduct here no more deprived defendant of any right secured to him by the United States Constitution than did the police conduct in Bussell deprive Russell of any rights. Affirmed. Mr. Justice Stevens took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. Petitioner was placed on five years’ probation which, was to run concurrently with the remainder of a 28- to 30-year. state armed robbery sentence from which petitioner had escaped. The testimony of Hutton is confused as to the dates. At one point he indicated that the initial conversation and the sale both occurred on February 25. At another point he testified that they occurred on two separate days. On appeal, petitioner’s counsel, who was also his counsel at trial, conceded that petitioner was predisposed to commit this offense. 507 F. 2d 832, 836 n. 5 (CA8 1974). The Court of Appeals treated the proffered instruction on its merits, rather than inquiring as to whether its refusal, in light of the other instructions given and of the jury’s verdict, may have been harmless error. We therefore do likewise. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Certiorari, 346 U. S. 854, to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Per Curiam: The judgment is vacated and the case is remanded to the District Court with directions to dismiss the complaint. Heikkila v. Barber, 345 U. S. 229. Mr. Justice Black would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals. Mb. Justice Douglas and Mb. Justice Jackson dissent. Jack Wasserman argued the cause and filed a brief for petitioner. Murray L. Schwartz argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief were Acting Solicitor General Stern, Assistant Attorney General Olney, Beatrice Rosenberg, J. F. Bishop, L. Paul Winings and Maurice A. Roberts. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Clark delivered the opinion of the Court. This is a libel filed pursuant to the Public Vessels Act, 46 U. S. C. § 781 et seq., and involving the liability of a shipowner for injuries suffered by an employee of an independent contractor while working inside the main engine of a vessel as it was undergoing a’ complete overhaul at the contractor’s repair docks in Philadelphia. Petitioner claims the vessel was unseaworthy and that respondent" was negligent, in any event, in not furnishing him a safe place to work. The District Court'denied recovery, 143 F. Supp. 473, and the Court of Appeals affirmed, 256 F. 2d 671. We granted certiorari. 359 U. S. 924. We affirm the judgment. The findings of the trial judge, approved by the Court-of Appeals, show that the S. S. Mary Austin is owned bj& the United States and was built during World War II as a “Liberty” ship. It had been in the “moth-ball fleet” at Norfolk, Virginia, in total deactivation for several yéars, with its pipes, boilers, and tanks completely drained, and an oil preservative injected through them ,to prevent rusting. In 1951 the vessel was ordered reactivated and a contractor, Atlantic P&rt Contractors, Inc., was selected to prepare her for sea duty. . Under the specifications of the contract, Atlantic was to overhaul and eactivate the 'Mary/ Austin completely, “cleaning and repairing all water lines, replacement of all defective or missing plugs and other parts, and the testing of all lines before closing anc[ placing them in active operating condition.” The contractor was to have complete responsibility and control of the making of the repairs, with, the right in the Únited States to inspect the work and materials to insure compliance with the contract. For this purpose, the United States placed six of ifs men — a captain, chief mate, second mate, chief enginéer, assistant engineer, and steward — on board the vessel. However, they signed no shipping articles and had no “control of the ship in the ordinarily accepted context,” their sole function being to serve as inspectors for the United States. Thereafter the respondent towed the Mary Austin to the repair docks of the contractor at Philadelphia and turned her over to it for the performance of the repair contract. The petitioner, a shore-based. employee of the contractor, was working inside the low pressure cylinder of the main engine of the ship when he was injured. He was kneeling on his right knee when an end plug from a one-inch pipe in the water system was propelled through the top of the open cylinder and hit his left knee. The findings indicate that the plug was loosely fitted on an overhead water pipe and that, when another employee of the contractor turned on the water without warning, the plug was forced off, hitting petitioner. Recovery was sought on the theory that the vessel- was unseaworthy in that the plug had been fitted insecurely on the pipe and was therefore incapable of withstanding the water pressure exerted upon it. In addition, petitioner claimed that the United States was liable for negligence in not maintaining a safe place for him to work, a duty asserted to be nondelegable and absolute. I, Petitioner contends that he comes under the doctrine of Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U. S. 85 (1946), and subsequent cases, holding that the warranty of seaworthiness applies to shore-based workers while on board ship and performing work traditionally done by seamen. We do not think so. In Sieracki, the Court said that the warranty applied because such a shore worker “is, in short a seaman . . . doing a seaman’s work and incurring a seaman’s hazards.” Id., 99. The findings here, however, show that; for several years, the Mary Austin was withdrawn from any operation whatever while in storage with the “moth-ball fleet.” The water had been drained from her water system and an antirust preservative was injected therein. Her subsequent towing to Philadelphia was for the specific purpose of delivery to Atlantic to render her seaworthy. The representation of the repair contract specifications was t}iat she was not seaworthy'for a voyage and that the major repairs called for therein, would be necessary before one would be undertaken. It is evident that the sole purpose of the ship’s being at Atlantic’s repair dock at Philadelphia was to make her seaworthy. The totality of the reparation on the vessel included compliance with the hundreds of specifications in the contract calling dor the repairing, réconditioning, and replacement, where necessary, of equipment so as to make fit all the machinery, equipment, gear, and every part of the vessel. Strangely enough, the defective water fine and the .metal plug specifically pointed to by petitioner as being defective were listed in the specifications for “cleaning and repairing” and the “replacement of all defective or missing plugs.” In short, as the trial court said, the work to be done on the vessel was equivalent to “home port structural repairs.” On the other hand, the vessels involved in the cases' depended upon by petitioner were, at the times of the injuries, in the hands and under the control of the owners or charterers and, instead of undergoing general repairs, were in active maritime service in the course of loading or unloading cargo pursuant to voyages. .The workmen, like the seamen, depended upon the seaworthiness of the ships, their equipment,, and gear. They were obliged to work with whatever the shipowners supplied and it was only fair for the latter to be subjected to the absolute warranty that the ships were seaworthy. But no such situation is present here. The Mary Austin, as anyone could see, was not in maritime service. She was undergoing major repairs and complete renovation, as the petitioner knew. Furthermore, he took his orders from the contractor, not the shipowner. He knew who was in control. This undertaking was not “ship’s work” but a complete overhaul of such nature, magnitude, and importance as to require the vessel to be turned over to a ship repair contractor and docked at its pier for the sole purpose of making her seaworthy. It would be an unfair contradiction to say that the owner held the vessel out as seaworthy in such a case. It would appear that the focus should be upon the status of the ship, the pattern of the repairs, and the extensive nature of the work contracted to be done, rather than the specific type of work that each of the numerous shore-based workmen is doing on shipboard at the moment of injury. The job analysis which the latter would call for would lead to fortuitous results. We, therefore, do not believe that the Sieracki line of cases is applicable, which' obviates any necessity of our discussion of situations where the vessels themselves áre not in the status of the Mary Austin. Here there could be no express or implied warranty of seaworthiness to any person. II. In presenting his alternative ground of recovery,- the petitioner has a dual theory. He first says that the duty to furnish a safe place to work is a nondelegable duty, the violation of which does not depend on fault. If unsuccessful in this position, he insists that respondent’s failure to keep the water plug tight was negligence. Other than the doctrine of seaworthiness, whose non-relevancy to this case we have set forth, our decisions establish no basis of liability apart from fault. Of course, one aspect of the shipowner’s duty to refrain from negligent conduct is embodied in his duty to exercise reasonable care to furnish a safe place to work. But we do not believe that such a duty was owed under the circumstances of this case. Petitioner overlooks that here the respondent had no control over the vessel, or power either to supervise or to control the repair work in which petitioner was engaged. We believe this to be decisive against both aspects of plaintiff’s dual theory. There was no hidden defect in the water system. It was one of the objects to be repaired and its plugs were to be replaced where necessary. Its testing was to be done by the contractor — not by the shipowner. It appears manifestly unfair to apply the requirement of a safe place to work to the shipowner when he has no control oyer the ship or the repairs, and the work of repair in effect creates the danger which makes the place unsafe. The respondent, having hired Atlantic to perform the overhaul and reconditioning of the vessel — including the testing — was under no duty to protect petitioner from risks that were inherent in the carrying out of the contract. The Courts of Appeals seem to have followed this rule. See Filipek v. Moore-McCormack Lines, 258 F. 2d 734. Although some of respondent’s employees were on board-the ship' here, this would not attach liability since they gave no orders, and did not participate in the work or supervise its progress, but were simply inspectors or observers. Id., at 737. Petitioner cites Crumady v. The Joachim Hendrik Fisser, 358 U. S. 423 (1959), as the chief support for his contention. There the vessel was being unloaded of cargo and its employees had set the safety cutoff device on its winch at twice the tonnage limit of the rigging. When the stevedore, unaware of this situation, brought the winch into play, the rigging snapped and the injury resulted. We found that the safety cutoff had been adjusted by employees of the vessel in a way that made it unsafe and dangerous, and therefore the vessel was liable. But that situation is not comparable. There the vessel was in control of the owner, and he was liable under the absolute warranty of seaworthiness, as well as .for the negligence of the ship’s employees in setting the ship’s safety cutoff device. Any culpability here could be chargeable only to the Contractor, not to the shipowner. Nor was United Pilots Assn. v. Halecki, 358 U. S. 613 (1959), a similar situation. In that case the shipowner directed the use of carbon tetrachloride in the confined spaces of the engine room. The resulting fumes fatally injured the shore-based workman, necessitating a remand on the negligence question. But here the owner had no control of the ship ; it had been turned over to a repair contractor for extensive overhaul, which was not performed under the direction of "the shipowner. • While there might be instances of hidden or inherent defects, sometimes called “latent,” that would make the owner guilty of negligence, even though he had no control of the repairs, we hold that under the circumstances here the shipowner could not be so chargeable. The judgment is therefore Affirmed. This obviates the necessity of deciding the respondent’s claim over and against the contractor. Atlantic Transport Co. v. Imbrovek, 234 U. S. 52 (1914); International Stevedoring Co. v. Haverty, 272 U. S. 50 (1926); Pope & Talbot v. Hawn, 346 U. S. 406 (1953); Alaska Steamship Co. v. Petterson, 347 U. S. 396 (1954); Crumady v. The Joachim Hendrik Fisser, 358 U. S. 423 (1959). There is no claim of negligence in the selection of Atlantic to perform the overhaul on the Mary Austin. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Scalia delivered the opinion of the Court. This case arises out of a “detainer,” which is a request filed by a criminal justice agency with the institution in which a prisoner is incarcerated, asking that the prisoner be held for the agency, or that the agency be advised when the prisoner’s release is imminent. Indiana and Michigan, along with 46 other States, the District of Columbia, and the United States, are parties to the Interstate Agreement on Detainers (IAD). See Ind. Code §35-33-10-4 (1988); Mich. Comp. Laws §780.601 (1979); Pub. L. 91-538, 84 Stat. 1397-1403, 18 U.S.C. App. §2; 11 U. L. A. 213-214 (Supp. 1992) (listing jurisdictions). Two provisions of that interstate agreement give rise to the present suit: Article III and Article V(c), which are set forth in the margin. On February 29, 1988, petitioner was charged in Jackson County, Michigan, with armed robbery, possession of a firearm during a felony, and assault with intent to murder. At the time, he was held in connection with unrelated offenses at the Westville Correctional Center in Westville, Indiana. The Jackson County Prosecuting Attorney therefore lodged a detainer against him. On September 7, 1988, the Indiana correctional authorities informed petitioner of the detainer, and he gave them his request for final disposition of the Michigan charges. On September 22, the prison authorities mailed petitioner’s request; and on September 26, 1988, the Jackson County Prosecuting Attorney and the Jackson County Circuit Court received it. Petitioner’s trial on the Michigan charges began on March 22, 1989, 177 days after his request was delivered to the Michigan officials and 196 days after petitioner gave his request to the Indiana prison authorities. 439 Mich. 117, 118, 479 N. W. 2d 625 (1992) (per curiam). Prior to trial, petitioner moved for dismissal with prejudice pursuant to Article V(c) of the I AD, on the ground that his trial would not begin until after the 180-day time limit set forth in Article 111(a). The trial court denied the motion, reasoning that the 180-day time period did not commence until the Michigan prosecutor’s office received petitioner’s request. App. 36. Petitioner was convicted on all charges except assault with intent to murder, but his conviction was set aside by the Michigan Court of Appeals, which held that “the commencement of the 180-day statutory period was triggered by [petitioner’s] request for final disposition to the [Indiana] prison officials.” Id., at 39. The Supreme Court of Michigan summarily reversed. 439 Mich. 117, 479 N. W. 2d 625 (1992) (per curiam). We granted certiorari. 504 U. S. 908 (1992). The outcome of the present case turns upon the meaning of the phrase, in Article 111(a), “within one hundred and eighty days after he shall have caused to be delivered.” The issue, specifically, is whether, within the factual context before us, that phrase refers to (1) the time at which petitioner transmitted his notice and request (hereinafter simply “request”) to the Indiana correctional authorities; or rather (2) the time at which the Michigan prosecutor and court (hereinafter simply “prosecutor”) received that request. Respondent argues that no one can have “caused something to be delivered” unless delivery in fact occurs. That is self-evidently true, and so we must reject petitioner’s contention that a prisoner’s transmittal of an IAD request to the prison authorities commences the 180-day period even if the request gets lost in the mail and is never delivered to the “receiving” State (i. e., the State lodging the detainer, see Article 11(c)). That still leaves open the textual possibility, however, that, once delivery has been made, the 180 days must be computed, not from the date of delivery but from the date of transmittal to the prison authorities. That is the only possibility the balance of our discussion will consider; and for convenience we shall refer to it as petitioner’s interpretation. Respondent places great reliance upon the provision’s use of the future perfect tense {“shall have caused to be delivered”). It seems to us, however, that the future perfect would be an appropriate tense for both interpretations: The prisoner’s transmittal of his request to the warden (if that is the triggering event), or the prosecutor’s receipt of the request (if that is the triggering event), is to be completed (“perfected”) at some date in the future (viewed from the time of the IAD’s adoption) before some other date in the future that is under discussion (expiration of the 180 days). We think it must be acknowledged that the language will literally bear either interpretation — i. e., that the crucial point is the prisoner’s transmittal of his request, or that it is the prosecutor’s receipt of the request. One can almost be induced to accept one interpretation or the other on the basis of which words are emphasized: “shall have caused to be delivered” versus “shall have caused to be delivered ” Though the text alone is indeterminate, we think resolution of the ambiguity is readily to be found in what might be called the sense of the matter, and in the import of related provisions. As to the former: Petitioner would have us believe that the choice of “triggers” for the 180-day time period lies between, on the one hand, the date the request is received by the prosecutor and, on the other hand, the date the request is delivered to the warden of the prison. In fact, however, while the former option is clearly identified by the textual term “delivered,” there is no textual identification of a clear alternative at the other end. If one seeks to determine the moment at which a prisoner “caused” the later delivery of a properly completed request, nothing in law or logic suggests that it must be when he placed the request in the hands of the warden. Perhaps it was when he gave the request to a fellow inmate to deliver to the warden — or even when he mailed it to the warden (Article II 1(b) provides that the request “shall be given or sent by the prisoner to the warden” (emphasis added)). It seems unlikely that a legislature would select, for the starting point of a statute of limitations, a concept so indeterminate as “caused.” It makes more sense to think that, as respondent contends, delivery is the key concept, and that paragraph (a) includes the notion of causality (rather than referring simply to “delivery” by the prisoner) merely to be more precise, anticipating the requirement of paragraph (b) that delivery be made by the warden upon the prisoner’s initiation. Another commonsense indication pointing to the same conclusion is to be found in what might be termed (in current political jargon) the “worst-case scenarios” under the two interpretations of the IAD. Under respondent’s interpretation, it is possible that a warden, through negligence or even malice, can delay forwarding of the request and thus postpone the starting of the 180-day clock. At worst, the prisoner (if he has not checked about the matter for half a year) will not learn about the delay until several hundred days have elapsed with no trial. The result is that he will spend several hundred additional days under detainer (which entails certain disabilities, such as disqualification from certain rehabilitative programs, see United States v. Mauro, 436 U. S. 340, 359 (1978)), and will have his trial delayed several hundred days. That result is bad, given the intent of the IAD. It is, however, no worse than what regularly occurred before the IAD was adopted, and in any event cannot be entirely avoided by embracing petitioner's view that transmittal to the warden is the measuring event. As we have said, the IAD unquestionably requires delivery, and only after that has occurred can one entertain the possibility of counting the 180 days from the transmittal to the warden. Thus, the careless or malicious warden, under petitioner’s interpretation, may be unable to delay commencement of the 180-day period, but can prevent it entirely, by simply failing to forward the request. More importantly, however, the worst-case scenario under petitioner’s interpretation produces results that are significantly worse: If, through negligence of the warden, a prisoner’s IAD request is delivered to the prosecutor more than 180 days after it was transmitted to the warden, the prosecution will be precluded before the prosecutor even knows it has been requested. It is possible, though by no means certain, that this consequence could be avoided by the receiving state court’s invocation of the “good-cause continuance” clause of Article 111(a) — but it seems to us implausible that such a plainly undesirable result was meant to be avoided only by resort to the (largely discretionary) application of that provision. It is more reasonable to think that the receiving State’s prosecutors are in no risk of losing their case until they have been informed of the request for trial. Indications in the text of Article III confirm, in our view, that the receiving State’s receipt of the request starts the clock. The most significant is the provision of Article 111(b) requiring the warden to forward the prisoner’s request and accompanying documents “by registered or certified mail, return receipt requested.” The IAD thus provides for documentary evidence of the date on which the request is delivered to the officials of the receiving State, but requires no record of the date on which it is transmitted to the warden (assuming that is to be considered the act of “causing”). That would be peculiar if the latter rather than the former were the critical date. Another textual clue, we think, is the IAD’s apparent indifference as to the manner of transmittal to the warden: Article 111(b) says only that the request “shall be given or sent by the prisoner to the warden” (emphasis added). A strange nonchalance, if the giving or sending (either one) is to start the 180 days. Petitioner avoids .this difficulty by simply positing that it is the warden’s receipt, no matter what the manner of giving or sending, that starts the clock — but there is simply no textual basis for that; surely the “causing” which petitioner considers central occurs upon the giving or sending. Petitioner makes the policy argument that “[fjairness requires the burden of compliance with the requirements of the IAD to be placed entirely on the law enforcement officials involved, since the prisoner has little ability to enforce compliance,” Brief for Petitioner 8, and that any other approach would “frustrate the higher purpose” of the IAD, leaving “neither a legal nor a practical limit on the length of time prison authorities could delay forwarding a [request],” id., at 20. These arguments, however, assume the availability of a reading that would give effect to a request that is never delivered at all. (Otherwise, it remains within the power of the warden to frustrate the IAD by simply not forwarding.) As we have observed, the textual requirement “shall have caused to be delivered” is simply not susceptible of such a reading. Petitioner’s “fairness” and “higher purpose” arguments are, in other words, more appropriately addressed to the legislatures of the contracting States, which adopted the IAD’s text. Our discussion has addressed only the second question presented in the petition for writ of certiorari; we have concluded that our grant as to the first question was improvident, and do not reach the issue it presents. We hold that the 180-day time period in Article 111(a) of the IAD does not commence until the prisoner’s request for final disposition of the charges against him has actually been delivered to the court and prosecuting officer of the jurisdiction that lodged the detainer against him. The judgment of the Supreme Court of Michigan is affirmed. It is so ordered. Title 18 U. S. C. App. § 2 contains the full text of the IAD, and we refer to its provisions by their original article numbers, as set forth there. Article III of the IAD provides in relevant part as follows: “(a) Whenever a person has entered upon a term of imprisonment in a penal or correctional institution of a party State, and whenever during the continuance of the term of imprisonment there is pending in any other party State any untried indictment, information, or complaint on the basis of which a detainer has been lodged against the prisoner, he shall be brought to trial within one hundred and eighty days after he shall have caused to be delivered to the prosecuting officer and the appropriate court of the prosecuting officer’s jurisdiction written notice of the place of his imprisonment and his request for a final disposition to be made of the' indictment, information, or complaint: Provided, That, for good cause shown in open court, the prisoner or his counsel being present, the court having jurisdiction of the matter may grant any necessary or reasonable continuance. The request of the prisoner shall be accompanied by a certificate of the appropriate official having custody of the prisoner, stating the term of commitment under which the prisoner is being held, the time already served, the time remaining to be served on the sentence, the amount of good time earned, the time of parole eligibility of the prisoner, and any decision of the State parole agency relating to the prisoner. “(b) The written notice and request for final disposition referred to in paragraph (a) hereof shall be given or sent by the prisoner to the warden, commissioner of corrections, or other official having custody of him, who shall promptly forward it together with the certificate to the appropriate prosecuting official and court by registered or certified mail, return receipt requested. “(c) The warden, commissioner of corrections, or other official having custody of the prisoner shall promptly inform him of the source and contents of any detainer lodged against him and shall also inform him of his right to make a request for final disposition of the indictment, information, or complaint on which the detainer is based.” Article V(c) of the IAD provides, in relevant part: “[I]n the event that an action on the indictment, information, or complaint on the basis of which the detainer has been lodged is not brought to trial within the period provided in article III... hereof, the appropriate court of the jurisdiction where the indictment, information, or complaint has been pending shall enter an order dismissing the same with prejudice, and any detainer based thereon shall cease to be of any force or effect.” Not, however, to the dissent: “The fact that the rule for marking the start of the 180-day period is written in a fashion that contemplates actual delivery . . . does not mean that it cannot apply if the request is never delivered.” Post, at 55. Of course it vastly understates the matter to say that the provision is “written in a fashion that contemplates actual delivery,” as one might say Hamlet was written in a fashion that contemplates 16th-century dress. Causation of delivery is the very condition of this provision’s operation — and the dissent says it does not matter whether delivery is caused. The dissent asserts that “the logical way to express the idea that receipt must be perfected before the provision applies would be to start the clock 180 days ‘after he has caused the request to have been delivered.”’ Post, at 53. But that reformulation changes the meaning in two respects that have nothing to do with whether receipt must be perfected: First, by using the perfect indicative (“after he has caused”) rather than the future perfect (“after he shall have caused”), it omits the notion that the “causing” is to occur not merely before the statutory deadline, but in the future; second, by using the perfect infinitive (“to have been delivered”) rather than the present (“to be delivered”), it adds the utterly fascinating notion that the receipt is to occur before the causing of receipt. The omission of futurity and the addition of a requirement of antecedence are the only differences between saying, for example, “after he shall have found the hostages to be well treated” and “after he has found the hostages to have been well treated.” In both cases good treatment must be established, just as under both the statutory text and the dissent’s reformulation delivery must be established. The dissent contends that the phrase “he shall have caused” puts the focus “on the prisoner’s act, and that act is complete when he transmits his request to the warden.” Ibid. It is not evident to us that the act of “causing to be delivered” is complete before delivery. Nor can we agree that, unless it has the purpose of starting the clock running upon transmittal to the warden, the phrase “he shall have caused” is “superfluous.” Ibid. It sets the stage for the succeeding paragraph, making it clear to the reader that the notice at issue is a notice which (as paragraph (b) will clarify) the prisoner is charged with providing. There is no substance to the dissent’s assertion that one of the “reason[s] for the IAD’s creation” was to prevent the inmate from being “deprived of an opportunity to obtain a sentence to run concurrently with the sentence being served at the time the detainer is filed.” Post, at 56, 57 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). Since the IAD does not require detainers to be filed, giving a prisoner the opportunity to achieve concurrent sentencing on outstanding offenses is obviously an accidental consequence of the scheme rather than its objective. Moreover, we are unaware of any studies showing that judges willing to impose concurrent sentences are not willing (in the same circumstances) to credit out-of-state time. If they are (as they logically should be), the opportunity of obtaining a concurrent sentence would ordinarily have zero value. Some courts have held that a continuance must be requested and granted before the 180-day period has expired. See, e. g., Dennett v. State, 19 Md. App. 376,381, 311 A. 2d 437, 440 (1973) (citing Hoss v. State, 266 Md. 136, 143, 292 A. 2d 48, 51 (1972)); Commonwealth v. Fisher, 451 Pa. 102, 106, 301 A. 2d 605, 607 (1973); State v. Patterson, 273 S. C. 361, 363, 256 S. E. 2d 417, 418 (1979). But see, e. g., State v. Lippolis, 107 N. J. Super. 137, 147, 257 A. 2d 705, 711 (App. Div. 1969), rev’d, 55 N. J. 354, 262 A. 2d 203 (1970) (per curiam) (reversing on reasoning of dissent in Appellate Division). We express no view on this point. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. The State of Michigan exempts from taxation all retirement benefits paid by the State or its political subdivisions, but levies an income tax on retirement benefits paid by all other employers, including the Federal Government. The question presented by this case is whether Michigan’s tax scheme violates federal law. I Appellant Paul S. Davis, a Michigan resident, is a former employee of the United States Government. He receives retirement benefits pursuant to the Civil Service Retirement Act, 5 U. S. C. §8831 et seq. In each of the years 1979 through 1984, appellant paid Michigan state income tax on his federal retirement benefits in accordance with Mich. Comp. Laws Ann. §206.30(l)(f) (Supp. 1988). That statute defines taxable income in a manner that excludes all retirement benefits received from the State or its political subdivisions, but includes most other forms of retirement benefits. The effect of this definition is that the retirement benefits of retired state employees are exempt from state taxation while the benefits received by retired federal employees are not. In 1984, appellant petitioned for refunds of state taxes paid on his federal retirement benefits between 1979 and 1983. After his request was denied, appellant filed suit in the Michigan Court of Claims. Appellant’s complaint, which was amended to include the 1984 tax year, averred that his federal retirement benefits were “not legally taxable under the Michigan Income Tax Law” and that the State’s inconsistent treatment of state and federal retirement benefits discriminated against federal retirees in violation of 4 U. S. C. § 111, which preserves federal employees’ immunity from discriminatory state taxation. See Public Salary Tax Act of 1939, ch. 59, §4, 53 Stat. 575, codified, as amended, at 4 U. S. C. § 111. The Court of Claims, however, denied relief. No. 84-9451 (Oct. 30, 1985), App. to Juris. Statement A10. The Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed. 160 Mich. App. 98, 408 N. W. 2d 433 (1987). The court first rejected appellant’s claim that 4 U. S. C. § 111 invalidated the State’s tax on appellant’s federal benefits. Noting that §111 applies only to federal “employees,” the court determined that appellant’s status under federal law was that of an “annuitant” rather than an employee. As a consequence, the court concluded that § 111 “has no application to [Davis], since [he] cannot be considered an employee within the meaning of that act.” Id., at 104, 408 N. W. 2d, at 435. The Michigan Court of Appeals next rejected appellant’s contention that the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity rendered the State’s tax treatment of federal retirement benefits unconstitutional. Conceding that “a tax may be held invalid ... if it operates to discriminate against the federal government and those with whom it deals,” id., at 104, 408 N. W. 2d, at 436, the court examined the State’s justifications for the discrimination under a rational-basis test. Ibid. The court determined that the State’s interest in “attracting and retaining . . . qualified employees” was a “legitimate state objective which is rationally achieved by a retirement plan offering economic inducements,” and it upheld the statute. Id., at 105, 408 N. W. 2d, at 436. The Supreme Court of Michigan denied appellant’s application for leave to appeal. 429 Mich. 854 (1987). We noted probable jurisdiction. 487 U. S. 1217 (1988). II Appellant places principal reliance on 4 U. S. C. § 111. In relevant part, that section provides: “The United States consents to the taxation' of pay or compensation for personal service as an officer or employee of the United States ... by a duly constituted taxing authority having jurisdiction, if the taxation does not discriminate against the officer or employee because of the source of the pay or compensation.” As a threshold matter, the State argues that § 111 applies only to current employees of the Federal Government, not to retirees such as appellant. In our view, however, the plain language of the statute dictates the opposite conclusion. Section 111 by its terms applies to “the taxation of pay or compensation for personal services as an officer or employee of the United States.” (Emphasis added). While retirement pay is not actually disbursed during the time an individual is working for the Government, the amount of benefits to be received in retirement is based and computed upon the individual’s salary and years of service. 5 U. S. C. § 8339(a). We have no difficulty concluding that civil service retirement benefits are deferred compensation for past years of service rendered to the Government. See, e. g., Zucker v. United States, 758 F. 2d 637, 639 (CA Fed.), cert. denied, 474 U. S. 842 (1985); Kizas v. Webster, 227 U. S. App. D. C. 327, 339, 707 F. 2d 524, 536, (1983), cert. denied, 464 U. S. 1042 (1984); Clark v. United States, 691 F. 2d 837, 842 (CA7 1982). And because these benefits accrue to employees on account of their service to the Government, they fall squarely within the category of compensation for services rendered “as an officer or employee of the United States.” Appellant’s federal retirement benefits are deferred compensation earned “as” a federal employee, and so are subject to § 111. The State points out, however, that the reference to “compensation for personal services as an officer or employee” occurs in the first part of § 111, which defines the extent of Congress’ consent to state taxation, and not in the latter part of the section, which provides that the consent does not extend to taxes that discriminate against federal employees. Instead, the nondiscrimination clause speaks only in terms of “discriminat[ion] against the officer or employee because of the source of the pay or compensation.” From this the State concludes that, whatever the scope of Congress’ consent to taxation in the first portion of § 111, the nondiscrimination clause applies only to current federal employees. Although the State’s hypertechnical reading of the nondiscrimination clause is not inconsistent with the language of that provision examined in isolation, statutory language cannot be construed in a vacuum. It is a fundamental canon of statutory construction that the words of a statute must be read in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme. See United States v. Morton, 467 U. S. 822, 828 (1984). When the first part of §111 is read together with the nondiscrimination clause, the operative words of the statute are as follows: “The United States consents to the taxation of pay or compensation ... if the taxation does not discriminate . . . because of the source of the pay or compensation.” The reference to “the pay or compensation” in the last clause of § 111 must, in context, mean the same “pay or compensation” defined in the first part of the section. Since that “pay or compensation” includes retirement benefits, the nondiscrimination clause must include them as well. Any other interpretation of the nondiscrimination clause would be implausible at best. It is difficult to imagine that Congress consented to discriminatory taxation of the pensions of retired federal civil servants while refusing to permit such taxation of current employees, and nothing in the statutory language or even in the legislative history suggests this result. While Congress could perhaps have used more precise language, the overall meaning of § 111 is unmistakable: it waives whatever immunity past and present federal employees would otherwise enjoy from state taxation of salaries, retirement benefits, and other forms of compensation paid on account of their employment with the Federal Government, except to the extent that such taxation discriminates on account of the source of the compensation. 1 — 1 HH hH Section 111 was enacted as part of the Public Salary Tax Act of 1939, the primary purpose of which was to impose federal income tax on the salaries of all state and local government employees. Prior to adoption of the Act, salaries of most government employees, both state and federal, generally were thought to be exempt from taxation by another sovereign under the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity. This doctrine had its genesis in McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316 (1819), which held that the State of Maryland could not impose a discriminatory tax on the Bank of the United States. Chief Justice Marshall’s opinion for the Court reasoned that the Bank was an instrumentality of the Federal Government used to carry into effect the Government’s delegated powers, and taxation by the State would unconstitutionally interfere with the exercise of those powers. Id., at 425-437. For a time, McCulloch was read broadly to bar most taxation by one sovereign of the employees of another. See Collector v. Day, 11 Wall. 113, 124-128 (1871) (invalidating federal income tax on salary of state judge); Dobbins v. Com missioners of Erie County, 16 Pet. 435 (1842) (invalidating state tax on federal officer). This rule “was based on the rationale that any tax on income a party received under a contract with the government was a tax on the contract and thus a tax ‘on’ the government because it burdened the government’s power to enter into the contract.” South Carolina v. Baker, 485 U. S. 505, 518 (1988). In subsequent cases, however, the Court began to turn away from its more expansive applications of the immunity doctrine. Thus, in Helvering v. Gerhardt, 304 U. S. 405 (1938), the Court held that the Federal Government could levy nondiscriminatory taxes on the incomes of most state employees. The following year, Graves v. New York ex rel. O’Keefe, 306 U. S. 466, 486-487 (1939), overruled the Day-Dobbins line of cases that had exempted government employees from nondiscriminatory taxation. After Graves, therefore, intergovernmental tax immunity barred only those taxes that were imposed directly on one sovereign by the other or that discriminated against a sovereign or those with whom it dealt. It was in the midst of this judicial revision of the immunity doctrine that Congress decided to extend the federal income tax to state and local government employees. The Public Salary Tax Act was enacted after Helvering v. Gerhardt, supra, had upheld the imposition of federal income taxes on state civil servants, and Congress relied on that decision as support for its broad assertion of federal taxing authority. S. Rep. No. 112, 76th Cong., 1st Sess., 5-9 (1939); H. R. Rep. No. 26, 76th Cong., 1st Sess., 2-3 (1939). However, the Act was drafted, considered in Committee, and passed by the House of Representatives before the announcement of the decision in Graves v. New York ex rel. O’Keefe, supra, which for the first time permitted state taxation of federal employees. As a result, during most of the legislative process leading to adoption of the Act it was unclear whether state taxation of federal employees was still barred by intergovernmental tax immunity despite the abrogation of state employees’ immunity from federal taxation. See H. R. Rep. No. 26, swpra, at 2 (“There are certain indications in the case of McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316 (1819), . . . that . . . Federal officers and employees may not, without the consent of the United States, be subjected to income taxation under the authority of the various States”). Dissatisfied with this uncertain state of affairs, and concerned that considerations of fairness demanded equal tax treatment for state and federal employees, Congress decided to ensure that federal employees would not remain immune from state taxation at the same time that state government employees were being required to pay federal income taxes. See S. Rep. No. 112, supra, at 4; H. R. Rep. No. 26, supra, at 2. Accordingly, §4 of the proposed Act (now §111) expressly waived whatever immunity would have otherwise shielded federal employees from nondiscriminatory state taxes. By the time the statute was enacted, of course, the decision in Graves had been announced, so the constitutional immunity doctrine no longer proscribed nondiscriminatory state taxation of federal employees. In effect, § 111 simply codified the result in Graves and foreclosed the possibility that subsequent judicial reconsideration of that case might reestablish the broader interpretation of the immunity doctrine. Section 111 did not waive all aspects of intergovernmental tax immunity, however. The final clause of the section contains an exception for state taxes that discriminate against federal employees on the basis of the source of their compensation. This nondiscrimination clause closely parallels the nondiscrimination component of the constitutional immunity doctrine which has, from the time of McCulloch v. Maryland, barred taxes that “operat[e] so as to discriminate against the Government or those with whom it deals.” United States v. City of Detroit, 355 U. S. 466, 473 (1958). See also McCulloch v. Maryland, supra, at 436-437; Miller v. Milwaukee, 272 U. S. 713, 714-715 (1927); Helvering v. Gerhardt, supra, at 413; Phillips Chemical Co. v. Dumas Independent School Dist., 361 U. S. 376, 385 (1960); Memphis Bank & Trust Co. v. Gamer, 459 U. S. 392, 397, and n. 7 (1983). In view of the similarity of language and purpose between the constitutional principle of nondiscrimination and the statutory nondiscrimination clause, and given that § 111 was consciously drafted against the background of the Court’s tax immunity cases, it is reasonable to conclude that Congress drew upon the constitutional doctrine in defining the scope of the immunity retained in § 111. When Congress codifies a judicially defined concept, it is presumed, absent an express statement to the contrary, that Congress intended to adopt the interpretation placed on that concept by the courts. See Midlantic National Bank v. New Jersey Dept. of Environmental Protection, 474 U. S. 494, 501 (1986); Morissette v. United States, 342 U. S. 246, 263 (1952). Hence, we conclude that the retention of immunity in § 111 is coextensive with the prohibition against discriminatory taxes embodied in the modern constitutional doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity. Cf. Memphis Bank & Trust, supra, at 396-397 (construing 31 U. S. C. §742, which permits only ‘“nondiscriminatory’” state taxation of interest on federal obligations, as “principally a restatement of the constitutional rule”). On its face, § 111 purports to be nothing more than a partial congressional consent to nondiscriminatory state taxation of federal employees. It can be argued, however, that by negative implication §111 also constitutes an affirmative statutory grant of immunity from discriminatory state taxation in addition to, and coextensive with, the pre-existing protection afforded by the constitutional doctrine. Regardless of whether § 111 provides an independent basis for finding immunity or merely preserves the traditional constitutional prohibition against discriminatory taxes, however, the inquiry is the same. In either case, the scope of the immunity granted or retained by the nondiscrimination clause is to be determined by reference to the constitutional doctrine. Thus, the dispositive question in this case is whether the tax imposed on appellant is barred by the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity. IV It is undisputed that Michigan’s tax system discriminates in favor of retired state employees and against retired federal employees. The State argues, however, that appellant is not entitled to claim the protection of the immunity doctrine, and that in any event the State’s inconsistent treatment of Federal and State Government retirees is justified by meaningful differences between the two classes. A In support of its first contention, the State points out that the purpose of the immunity doctrine is to protect governments and not private entities or individuals. As a result, so long as the challenged tax does not interfere with the Federal Government’s ability to perform its governmental functions, the constitutional doctrine has not been violated. It is true that intergovernmental tax immunity is based on the need to protect each sovereign’s governmental operations from undue interference by the other. Graves, 306 U. S., at 481; McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat., at 435-436. But it does not follow that private entities or individuals who are subjected to discriminatory taxation on account of their dealings with a sovereign cannot themselves receive the protection of the constitutional doctrine. Indeed, all precedent is to the contrary. In Phillips Chemical Co., supra, for example, we considered a private corporation’s claim that a state tax discriminated against private lessees of federal land. We concluded that the tax “discriminate[d] unconstitutionally against the United States and its lessee,” and accordingly held that the tax could not be exacted. Id., at 387 (emphasis added). See also Memphis Bank & Trust, supra; Moses Lake Homes, Inc. v. Grant County, 365 U. S. 744 (1961); Collector v. Day, 11 Wall. 113 (1871); Dobbins v. Commissioners of Erie County, 16 Pet. 435 (1842). The State offers no reasons for departing from this settled rule, and we decline to do so. B Under our precedents, “[t]he imposition of a heavier tax burden on [those who deal with one sovereign] than is imposed on [those who deal with the other] must be justified by significant differences between the two classes.” Phillips Chemical Co. v. Dumas Independent School Dist., 361 U. S., at 383. In determining whether this standard of justification has been met, it is inappropriate to rely solely on the mode of analysis developed in our equal protection cases. We have previously observed that “our decisions in [the equal protection] field are not necessarily controlling where problems of intergovernmental tax immunity are involved,” because “the Government’s interests must be weighed in the balance.” Id., at 385. Instead, the relevant inquiry is whether the inconsistent tax treatment is directly related to, and justified by, “significant differences between the two classes.” Id., at 383-385. The State points to two allegedly significant differences between federal and state retirees. First, the State suggests that its interest in hiring and retaining qualified civil servants through the inducement of a tax exemption for retirement benefits is sufficient to justify the preferential treatment of its retired employees. This argument is wholly beside the point, however, for it does nothing to demonstrate that there are “significant differences between the two classes” themselves; rather, it merely demonstrates that the State has a rational reason for discriminating between two similar groups of retirees. The State’s interest in adopting the discriminatory tax, no matter how substantial, is simply irrelevant to an inquiry into the nature of the two classes receiving inconsistent treatment. See id., at 384. Second, the State argues that its retirement benefits are significantly less munificent than those offered by the Federal Government, in terms of vesting requirements, rate of accrual, and computation of benefit amounts. The substantial differences in the value of the retirement benefits paid the two classes should, in the State’s view, justify the inconsistent tax treatment. Even assuming the State’s estimate of the relative value of state and federal retirement benefits is generally correct, we do not believe this difference suffices to justify the type of blanket exemption at issue in this case. While the average retired federal civil servant receives a larger pension than his state counterpart, there are undoubtedly many individual instances in which the opposite holds true. A tax exemption truly intended to account for differences in retirement benefits would not discriminate on the basis of the source of those benefits, as Michigan’s statute does; rather, it would discriminate on the basis of the amount of benefits received by individual retirees. Cf. Phillips Chemical Co., supra, at 384-385 (rejecting proffered rationale for State’s unfavorable tax treatment of lessees of federal property, because an evenhanded application of the rationale would have resulted in inclusion of some lessees of state property in the disfavored class as well). V For these reasons, we conclude that the Michigan Income Tax Act violates principles of intergovernmental tax immunity by favoring retired state and local government employees over retired federal employees. The State having conceded that a refund is appropriate in these circumstances, see Brief for Appellee 63, to the extent appellant has paid taxes pursuant to this invalid tax scheme, he is entitled to a refund. See Iowa-Des Moines National Bank v. Bennett, 284 U. S. 239, 247 (1931). Appellant also seeks prospective relief from discriminatory taxation. With respect to this claim, however, we are not in the best position to ascertain the appropriate remedy. While invalidation of Michigan’s income tax law in its entirety obviously would eliminate the constitutional violation, the Constitution does not require such a drastic solution. We have recognized, in cases involving invalid classifications in the distribution of government benefits, that the appropriate remedy “is a mandate of equal treatment, a result that can be accomplished by withdrawal of benefits from the favored class as well as by extension of benefits to the excluded class.” Heckler v. Mathews, 465 U. S. 728, 740 (1984). See Iowa-Des Moines National Bank, supra, at 247; see also Welsh v. United States, 398 U. S. 333, 361 (1970) (Harlan, J., concurring in judgment). In this case, appellant’s claim could be resolved either by extending the tax exemption to retired federal employees (or to all retired employees), or by eliminating the exemption for retired state and local government employees. The latter approach, of course, could be construed as the direct imposition of a state tax, a remedy beyond the power of a federal court. See Moses Lake Homes, Inc. v. Grant County, 365 U. S., at 752 (“Federal courts may not assess or levy taxes”). The permissibility of either approach, moreover, depends in part on the severability of a portion of §206.30(l)(f) from the remainder of the Michigan Income Tax Act, a question of state law within the special expertise of the Michigan courts. See Louis K. Liggett Co. v. Lee, 288 U. S. 517, 540-541 (1933). It follows that the Michigan courts are in the best position to determine how to comply with the mandate of equal treatment. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. As a result of a series of amendments, this subsection has been variously designated as (l)(f), (l)(g), and (l)(h) at times relevant to this litigation. This opinion will refer only to the current statutory designation, §206.30(l)(f). In pertinent part, the statute provides: “(1) ‘Taxable income’. . . means adjusted gross income as defined in the internal revenue code subject to the following adjustments: “(f) Deduct to the extent included in adjusted gross income: “(i) Retirement or pension benefits received from a public retirement system of or created by an act of this state or a political subdivision of this state. “(iv) Retirement or pension benefits from any other retirement or pension system as follows: “(A) For a single return, the sum of not more than $7,500.00. “(B) For a joint return, the sum of not more than $10,000.00.” Mich. Comp. Laws Ann. § 206.30(l)(f) (Supp. 1988). Subsection (f)(iv) of this provision exempts a portion of otherwise taxable retirement benefits from taxable income, but appellant’s retirement pay from all nonstate sources exceeded the applicable exemption amount in each of the tax years relevant to this case. The State suggests that the legislative history does not support this interpretation of § 111, pointing to statements in the Committee Reports that describe the scope of § 111 without using the phrase “service as an officer or employee.” The language of the statute leaves no room for doubt on this point, however, so the State’s attempt to establish a minor inconsistency with the legislative history need not detain us. Legislative history is irrelevant to the interpretation of an unambiguous statute. United Air Lines, Inc. v. McMann, 434 U. S. 192, 199 (1977). The dissent argues that this tax is nondiscriminatory, and thus constitutional, because it “draws no distinction between the federal employees or retirees and the vast majority of voters in the State.” Post, at 823. In Phillips Chemical Co., however, we faced that precise situation: an equal tax burden was imposed on lessees of private, tax-exempt property and lessees of federal property, while lessees of state property paid a lesser tax, or in some circumstances none at all. Although we concluded that “[ujnder these circumstances, there appears to be no discrimination between the Government’s lessees and lessees of private property,” 361 U. S., at 381, we nonetheless invalidated the State’s tax. This result is consistent with the underlying rationale for the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity. The danger that a State is engaging in impermissible discrimination against the Federal Government is greatest when the State acts to benefit itself and those in privity with it. As we observed in Phillips Chemical Co., “it does not seem too much to require that the State treat those who deal with the Government as well as it treats those with whom it deals itself.” Id.., at 385. We also take issue with the dissent’s assertion that “it is peculiarly inappropriate to focus solely on the treatment of state governmental employees” because “[t]he State may always compensate in pay or salary for what it assesses in taxes.” Post, at 824. In order to provide the same after-tax benefits to all retired state employees by means of increased salaries or benefit payments instead of a tax exemption, the State would have to increase its outlays by more than the cost of the current tax exemption, since the increased payments to retirees would result in higher federal income tax payments in some circumstances. This fact serves to illustrate the impact on the Federal Government of the State’s discriminatory tax exemption for state retirees. Taxes enacted to reduce the State’s employment costs at the expense of the federal treasury are the type of discriminatory legislation that the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity is intended to bar. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

J

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. The case before us presents a single issue: whether an Article I military appellate court has jurisdiction to entertain a petition for a writ of error coram nobis to challenge its earlier, and final, decision affirming a criminal conviction. The military court which had affirmed the conviction and where the writ of coram nobis was sought is the Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals (NMCCA). Its ruling that it had jurisdiction to grant the writ, but then denying its issuance for lack of merit, was appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (CAAF). After the CAAF agreed that the NMCCA has jurisdiction to issue the writ, it remanded for further proceedings on the merits. The Government of the United States, contending that a writ of coram nobis directed to a final judgment of conviction is beyond the jurisdiction of the military courts, now brings the case to us. I Respondent Jacob Denedo came to the United States in 1984 from his native Nigeria. He enlisted in the Navy in 1989 and became a lawful permanent resident in 1990. In 1998, military authorities charged him with conspiracy, larceny, and forgery — in contravention of Articles 81, 121, and 123 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), 10 U. S. C. §§881, 921, 923 — all for his role in a scheme to defraud a community college. With the assistance of both military and civilian counsel, respondent made a plea bargain to plead guilty to reduced charges. In exchange for his plea the convening authority referred respondent’s case to a special court-martial, § 819, which, at that time, could not impose a sentence greater than six months’ confinement. The special court-martial, consisting of a single military judge, accepted respondent’s guilty plea after determining that it was both knowing and voluntary. The court convicted respondent of conspiracy and larceny. It sentenced him to three months’ confinement, a bad-conduct discharge, and a reduction to the lowest enlisted pay grade. Respondent appealed on the ground that his sentence was unduly severe. The NMCCA affirmed. App. to Pet. for Cert. 64a-67a. Respondent did not seek further review in the CAAF, and he was discharged from the Navy on May 30, 2000. In 2006, the Department of Homeland Security commenced removal proceedings against respondent based upon his special court-martial conviction. To avoid deportation, respondent decided to challenge his conviction once more, though at this point it had been final for eight years. He maintained, in a petition for a writ of coram nobis filed with the NMCCA, that the conviction it had earlier affirmed must be deemed void because his guilty plea was the result of ineffective assistance of counsel. Respondent alleged that he informed his civilian attorney during plea negotiations that “ ‘his primary concern and objective’ ” was to avoid deportation and that he was willing to “ ‘risk... going to jail’ ” to avert separation from his family. 66 M. J. 114, 118 (CAAF 2008). On respondent’s account, his attorney — an alcoholic who was not sober during the course of the special court-martial proceeding — erroneously assured him that “‘if he agreed to plead guilty at a special-court-martial he would avoid any risk of deportation.'” Ibid. Respondent argued that the NMCCA could set aside its earlier decision by issuing a writ of coram nobis under the authority of the All Writs Act, 28 U. S. C. § 1651(a). The Government filed a motion to dismiss for want of jurisdiction. It contended that the NMCCA had no authority to conduct postconviction proceedings. In a terse, four-sentence order, the NMCCA summarily denied both the Government’s motion and respondent’s petition for a writ of coram nobis. App. to Pet. for Cert. 63a. Respondent appealed and the CAAF, dividing 3 to 2, affirmed in part and reversed in part. The CAAF agreed with the NMCCA that standing military courts have jurisdiction to conduct “collateral review under the All Writs Act.” 66 M. J., at 119. This is so, the CAAF explained, because “when a petitioner seeks collateral relief to modify an action that was taken within the subject matter jurisdiction of the military justice system... a writ that is necessary or appropriate may be issued under the All Writs Act ‘in aid of’ the court’s existing jurisdiction.” Id., at 120 (citing 28 U. S. C. § 1651(a)). Satisfied that it had jurisdiction, the CAAF next turned to whether the writ of coram nobis should issue. It held that a nondefaulted, ineffective-assistance claim that was yet to receive a fall and fair review “within the military justice system” could justify issuance of the writ. 66 M. J., at 125. Finding that respondent’s ineffective-assistance claim satisfied “the threshold criteria for coram nobis review,” the CAAF remanded to the NMCCA so it could ascertain in the first instance “whether the merits of [respondent's] petition can be resolved on the basis of the written submissions, or whether a factfinding hearing is required.” Id., at 126, 130. Judge Stueky filed a dissenting opinion. Assuming that the majority had correctly determined its jurisdiction to grant the requested relief, he concluded that respondent’s ineffective-assistance claim lacked merit. Id., at 131. Judge Ryan also dissented. Reasoning that the majority had misapplied this Court’s holding in Clinton v. Goldsmith, 526 U. S. 529 (1999), she concluded that the UCMJ does not confer jurisdiction upon military tribunals to conduct “post-finality collateral review.” 66 M. J., at 136. We granted certiorari, 555 U. S. 1041 (2008), and now affirm. II Before we address another court’s subject-matter jurisdiction we must first determine our own. See Ashcroft v. Iqbal, ante, at 671 (“Subject-matter jurisdiction... should be considered when fairly in doubt”). The Government, upon which the burden to demonstrate subject-matter jurisdiction lies, DaimlerChrysler Corp. v. Cuno, 547 U. S. 332, 342 (2006), claims that our power to hear this appeal rests on 28 U. S. C. § 1259(4). That jurisdictional provision permits us to review CAAF decisions in “[c]ases... in which the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces granted relief.” Respondent maintains that we lack jurisdiction because the CAAF did not “‘grant relief’”; “all it did was remand” to the NMCCA. Brief for Respondent 6-7 (brackets omitted). Respondent’s parsimonious construction of the word “relief” need not detain us long. Though § 1259 does not define the term, its familiar meaning encompasses any “redress or benefit” provided by a court. Black’s Law Dictionary 1317 (8th ed. 2004). The CAAF’s judgment reversing the NMCCA satisfies that definition. The NMCCA denied respondent’s petition for a writ of coram nobis, while the CAAF’s decision reversed and remanded so that the NMCCA could determine anew if the writ should issue. That decision conferred a palpable benefit on respondent; for a chance of success on the merits, however slight, is superior to no possibility at all. To be sure, respondent would have preferred the CAAF to issue a writ of coram nobis or to direct the NMCCA to do so rather than remanding for the NMCCA to conduct further proceedings. We have jurisdiction, however, to review any decision granting “relief,” not just those providing “ultimate relief” or “complete relief.” Indeed, appellate courts reverse and remand lower court judgments — rather than issuing complete relief — -with regularity. See, e.g., FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc., ante, at 513. There is no merit to the view that a decision granting partial relief should be construed as granting no relief at all. Because the CAAF “granted relief” to respondent, the text of § 1259 is satisfied here. We have jurisdiction to determine whether the CAAF was correct in ruling that the NMCCA had authority to entertain the petition for a writ of coram nobis. Ill A The writ of coram nobis is an ancient common-law remedy designed “to correct errors of fact.” United States v. Morgan, 346 U. S. 502, 507 (1954). In American jurisprudence the precise contours of coram nobis have not been “well defined,” Bronson v. Schulten, 104 U. S. 410, 416 (1882), but the writ traces its origins to the King’s Bench and the Court of Common Pleas. United States v. Plumer, 27 F. Cas. 561, 573 (No. 16, 056) (CC Mass. 1859) (opinion for the court by Clifford, Circuit Justice); see also Morgan, supra, at 507, n. 9 (citing 2 W. Tidd, Practice of Courts of King’s Bench and Common Pleas 1136 (4th Am. ed. 1856)). In English practice the office of the writ was to foster respect for judicial rulings by enabling the same court “where the action was commenced and where the judgment was rendered” to avoid the rigid strictures of judgment finality by correcting technical errors “such as happened through the fault of the clerk in the record of the proceedings prior to the judgment.” Plumer, supra, at 572-573. Any rationale confining the writ to technical errors, however, has been superseded; for in its modern iteration coram nobis is broader than its common-law predecessor. This is confirmed by our opinion in Morgan. In that case we found that a writ of coram nobis can issue to redress a fundamental error, there a deprivation of counsel in violation of the Sixth Amendment, as opposed to mere technical errors. 346 U. S., at 513. The potential universe of cases that range from technical errors to fundamental ones perhaps illustrates, in the case of coram nobis, the “tendency of a principle to expand itself to the limit of its logic.” B. Cardozo, The Nature of the Judicial Process 51 (1921). To confine the use of coram nobis so that finality is not at risk in a great number of cases, we were careful in Morgan to limit the availability of the writ to “extraordinary” cases presenting circumstances compelling its use “to achieve justice.” 346 U. S., at 511. Another limit, of course, is that an extraordinary remedy may not issue when alternative remedies, such as habeas corpus, are available. See id., at 510-511. In federal courts the authority to grant a writ of coram nobis is conferred by the All Writs Act, which permits “courts established by Act of Congress” to issue “all writs necessary or appropriate in aid of their respective jurisdictions.” 28 U. S. C. § 1651(a). Though military courts, like Article III tribunals, are empowered to issue extraordinary writs under the All Writs Act, Noyd v. Bond, 395 U. S. 683, 695, n. 7 (1969), that authority does not determine the anterior question whether military courts have jurisdiction to entertain a petition for coram nobis. As the text of the All Writs Act recognizes, a court’s power to issue any form of relief — extraordinary or otherwise — is contingent on that court’s subject-matter jurisdiction over the case or controversy. Assuming no constraints or limitations grounded in the Constitution are implicated, it is for Congress to determine the subject-matter jurisdiction of federal courts. Bowles v. Russell, 551 U. S. 205, 212 (2007) (“Within constitutional bounds, Congress decides what cases the federal courts have jurisdiction to consider”). This rule applies with added force to Article I tribunals, such as the NMCCA and CAAF, which owe their existence to Congress’ authority to enact legislation pursuant to Article I, §8, of the Constitution. Goldsmith, 526 U. S., at 533-534. Our decision in Goldsmith demonstrates these teachings. There an Air Force officer, James Goldsmith, was convicted of various crimes by general court-martial and sentenced to six years’ confinement. Id., at 531. Following his conviction, Congress enacted a statute authorizing the President to drop convicted officers from the rolls of the Armed Forces. When the Air Force notified Goldsmith that he would be dropped from the rolls, he lodged a petition before the Air Force Court of Criminal Appeals (AFCCA) claiming that the proposed action contravened the Ex Post Facto Clause of the Constitution. Id., at 532-533. Goldsmith sought extraordinary relief as authorized by the All Writs Act to enjoin the President from removing him from the rolls. The AFCCA denied relief, but the CAAF granted it. Concluding that the UCMJ does not authorize military courts to review executive action — including a decision to drop an officer from the rolls — we held that the AFCCA and the CAAF lacked jurisdiction over Goldsmith’s case. Id., at 535. This was so, we unequivocally found, irrespective of the military court’s authority to issue extraordinary relief pursuant to the All Writs Act and its previous jurisdiction over Goldsmith’s criminal proceeding. The power to issue relief depends upon, rather than enlarges, a court’s jurisdiction. Id., at 536-537. That principle does not control the question before us. Because coram nobis is but an extraordinary tool to correct a legal or factual error, an application for the writ is properly viewed as a belated extension of the original proceeding during which the error allegedly transpired. See Morgan, swpra, at 505, n. 4 {coram nobis is “a step in the criminal ease and not, like habeas corpus where relief is sought in a separate case and record, the beginning of a separate civil proceeding”); see also United States v. Beggerly, 524 U. S. 38, 46 (1998) (noting that an “independent action” — which, like coram nobis, is an equitable means to obtain relief from a judgment — “ ‘may be regarded as ancillary to the [prior] suit, so that the relief asked may be granted by the court which made the decree in that suit.... The bill, though an original bill in the chancery sense of the word, is a continuation of the former suit, on the question of the jurisdiction of the [court]’” (quoting Pacific R. Co. of Mo. v. Missouri Pacific R. Co., 111 U. S. 505, 522 (1884))). It follows that to issue respondent a writ of coram nobis on remand, the NMCCA must have had statutory subject-matter jurisdiction over respondent’s original judgment of conviction. B In the critical part of its opinion discussing the jurisdiction and authority of the NMCCA to issue a writ of coram nobis in an appropriate case, the CAAF describes respondent’s request for review as one “under the All Writs Act.” 66 M. J., at 119. This is correct, of course, if it simply confirms that the Act authorizes federal courts to issue writs “in aid of” their jurisdiction; but it does not advance the inquiry into whether jurisdiction exists. And there are limits to the use of coram nobis to alter or interpret earlier judgments. As Goldsmith makes plain, the All Writs Act and the extraordinary relief the statute authorizes are not a source of subject-matter jurisdiction. 526 U. S., at 534-535. Statutes which address the power of a court to use certain writs or remedies or to decree certain forms of relief, for instance to award damages in some specifled measure, in some circumstances might be construed also as a grant of jurisdiction to hear and determine the underlying cause of action. Cf. Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137 (1803). We have long held, however, that the All Writs Act should not be interpreted in this way. Goldsmith, supra, at 536; Plumer, 27 F. Cas., at 574 (jurisdiction cannot be acquired “by means of the writ to be issued”). The authority to issue a writ under the All Writs Act is not a font of jurisdiction. See Syngenta Crop Protection, Inc. v. Henson, 537 U. S. 28, 31 (2002). Quite apart from the All Writs Act, we conclude that the NMCCA has jurisdiction to entertain respondent’s request for a writ of coram nobis. Article 66 of the UCMJ provides: “For the purpose of reviewing court-martial cases, the [Court of Criminal Appeals] may sit....” 10 U. S. C. § 866(a). Because respondent’s request for coram nobis is simply a further “step in [his] criminal” appeal, Morgan, 346 U. S., at 505, n. 4, the NMCCA’s jurisdiction to issue the writ derives from the earlier jurisdiction it exercised to hear and determine the validity of the conviction on direct review. As even the Government concedes, the textual authority under the UCMJ to “‘revie[w] court-martial cases’” provided the NMCCA with jurisdiction to hear an appeal of respondent’s judgment of conviction. See Brief for United States 17-18. That jurisdiction is sufficient to permit the NMCCA to entertain respondent’s petition for coram nobis. See also Cts. Crim. App. Rule Prac. & Proc. 2(b), 44 M. J. LXV (1996) (recognizing NMCCA discretionary authority to entertain petitions for extraordinary writs). It is true that when exercising its jurisdiction under § 866(a), the NMCCA “may act only with respect to the findings and sentence as approved by the convening authority.” § 866(c). That limitation does not bar respondent’s request for a writ of coram nobis. An alleged error in the original judgment predicated on ineffective assistance of counsel challenges the validity of a conviction, see Knowles v. Mir zayance, ante, at 115, so respondent’s Sixth Amendment claim is “with respect to” the special court-martial’s “findings of guilty,” 10 U. S. C. § 866(c). Pursuant to the UCMJ, the NMCCA has subject-matter jurisdiction to hear respondent’s request for extraordinary relief. Because the NMCCA had jurisdiction over respondent’s petition for comm nobis, the CAAF had jurisdiction to entertain respondent’s appeal from the NMCCA’s judgment. When exercising its jurisdiction, the CAAF’s authority is confined “to matters of law” connected to “the findings and sentence as approved by the convening authority and as affirmed or set aside... by the Court of Criminal Appeals,” § 867(c), but these limitations pose no obstacle to respondent’s requested review of the NMCCA’s decision. Respondent’s Sixth Amendment claim presents a “matte[r] of law” “with respect to the [guilty] findings... as approved by the [special court-martial] and as affirmed... by the Court of Criminal Appeals.” Ibid. The CAAF had subject-matter jurisdiction to review the NMCCA’s denial of respondent’s petition challenging the validity of his original conviction. C The Government counters that Article 76 of the UCMJ, 10 U. S. C. § 876, “affirmatively prohibit^] the type of collateral review sought by respondent.” Brief for United States 18. That is incorrect. The Government’s argument commits the error of “conflating the jurisdictional question with the merits” of respondent’s petition. Arthur Andersen LLP, ante, at 628. Article 76 states in relevant part: “The appellate review of records of trial provided by this chapter, the proceedings, findings, and sentences of courts-martial as approved, reviewed, or affirmed as required by this chapter, and all dismissals and discharges carried into execution under sentences by courts-martial following approval, review, or affirmation as required by this chapter, are final and conclusive. Orders publishing the proceedings of courts-martial and all action taken pursuant to those proceedings are binding upon all departments, courts, agencies, and officers of the United States____” 10 U. S. C. § 876. Article 76 codifies the common-law rule that respects the finality of judgments. Schlesinger v. Councilman, 420 U. S. 738, 749 (1975). Just as the rules of finality did not jurisdictionally bar the court in Morgan from examining its earlier judgment, neither does the principle of finality bar the NMCCA from doing so here. The Government may ultimately be correct that the facts of respondent’s case are insufficient to set aside the final judgment that Article 76 makes binding. No doubt, judgment finality is not to be lightly cast aside; and courts must be cautious so that the extraordinary remedy of coram nobis issues only in extreme cases. But the long-recognized authority of a court to protect the integrity of its earlier judgments impels the conclusion that the finality rule is not so inflexible that it trumps each and every competing consideration. Our holding allows military courts to protect the integrity of their dispositions and processes by granting relief from final judgments in extraordinary cases when it is shown that there were fundamental flaws in the proceedings leading to their issuance. The Government remains free to argue that respondent’s is a merely ordinary case that is not entitled to extraordinary relief. But respondent’s entitlement to relief is a merits question outside the scope of the jurisdictional question presented. The Government’s contention that coram nobis permits a court “to correct its own errors, not... those of an inferior court,” Brief for United States 36, can be disposed of on similar grounds. Just as respondent’s request for coram nobis does not confer subject-matter jurisdiction, the Government’s argument that the relief should not issue “in light of the writ’s traditional scope” does not undermine it, ibid. (emphasis deleted). In sum, the Government’s argument speaks to the scope of the writ, not the NMCCA’s jurisdiction to issue it. The CAAF rejected the former argument. Only the latter one is before us. We hold that Article I military courts have jurisdiction to entertain coram nobis petitions to consider allegations that an earlier judgment of conviction was flawed in a fundamental respect. That conclusion is consistent with our holding that Article III courts have a like authority. Morgan, 346 U. S., at 508. The result we reach today is of central importance for military courts. The military justice system relies upon courts that must take all appropriate means, consistent with their statutory jurisdiction, to ensure the neutrality and integrity of their judgments. Under the premises and statutes we have relied upon here, the jurisdiction and the responsibility of military courts to reexamine judgments in rare cases where a fundamental flaw is alleged and other judicial processes for correction are unavailable are consistent with the powers Congress has granted those courts under Article I and with the system Congress has designed. * * * We do not prejudge the merits of respondent’s petition. To be sure, the writ of error coram nobis is an extraordinary writ; and “an extraordinary remedy... should not be granted in the ordinary case.” Nken v. Holder, ante, at 437 (Kennedy, J., concurring). The relative strength of respondent’s ineffective-assistance claim, his delay in lodging his petition, when he learned or should have learned of his counsel’s alleged deficiencies, and the effect of the rule of judgment finality expressed in Article 76 are all factors the NMCCA can explore on remand. We hold only that the military appellate courts had jurisdiction to hear respondent’s request for a writ of coram nobis. The judgment of the CAAF is affirmed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Chief Justice Roberts, with whom Justice Scalia, Justice Thomas, and Justice Alito join, concurring in part and dissenting in part. The Court’s approach is simple: Jurisdiction to issue writs of coram nobis is a “belated extension” of a court’s original, statutory jurisdiction. Ante, at 913. The military courts here had original jurisdiction over Denedo’s case. Those courts therefore have implicit “extended” jurisdiction to consider Denedo’s coram nobis petition. The flaw in this syllogism is at the first step: The only arguable authority for the proposition that coram nobis jurisdiction marches hand in hand with original jurisdiction is a footnote in United States v. Morgan, 346 U. S. 502 (1954), and that case concerned Article III courts. The military courts are markedly different. They are Article I courts whose jurisdiction is precisely limited at every turn. Those careful limits cannot be overridden by judicial “extension” of statutory jurisdiction, or the addition of a “further step” to the ones marked out by Congress. Ante, at 914 (internal quotation marks omitted). I agree with the majority that this Court has jurisdiction to review the decision below, but respectfully dissent from its holding that military courts have jurisdiction to issue writs of coram nobis. I “Traditionally, military justice has been a rough form of justice emphasizing summary procedures, speedy convictions and stern penalties with a view to maintaining obedience and fighting fitness in the ranks.” Reid v. Covert, 354 U. S. 1, 35-36 (1957) (plurality opinion). Courts-martial are composed of active service members who sit only to hear the particular case before them. Once a court-martial reaches a judgment and imposes a sentence, it is dissolved, and its members return to their regular duties. Prior to the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), military courts of appeals did not exist. If a service member wanted to challenge a court-martial conviction, he pursued a collateral attack in an Article III court. There, review was limited to whether the conviction was void “because of lack of jurisdiction or some other equally fundamental defect,” Schlesinger v. Councilman, 420 U. S. 738, 747 (1975); beyond that, Article III courts adhered to “the general rule that the acts of a court martial, within the scope of its jurisdiction and duty, cannot be controlled or reviewed in the civil courts,” Smith v. Whitney, 116 U. S. 167, 177 (1886). The UCMJ established a “complete system of [military] review,” Burns v. Wilson, 346 U. S. 137, 140 (1953) (plurality opinion), including direct review in what are now the Courts of Criminal Appeals (CCAs) and the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (CAAF). But in keeping with the historical backdrop against which these courts were created, Congress did not grant military courts of appeals “broad responsibility with respect to administration of military justice”; on the contrary, their jurisdiction is “narrowly circumscribed” by the governing statutes. Clinton v. Goldsmith, 526 U. S. 529, 534, 535 (1999) (internal quotation marks omitted). The CCAs provide direct, record-based review of court-martial judgments, but they may only review eases referred by the judge advocate general, who in turn refers only those cases in which specific sentences are imposed. 10 U. S. C. §§ 866(b), (c). When reviewing that subset of court-martial judgments, a CCA “may act only with respect to the findings and sentence as approved by the convening authority.” § 866(c). If a case is reviewed by the CCA, the CCA’s decision may then be reviewed by the CAAF. § 867(a). But that court, too, conducts limited direct review: It “may act only with respect to the findings and sentence as approved by the convening authority and as affirmed or set aside as incorrect in law by the [CCA].” § 867(c). Once direct review in the CCA and the CAAF is complete, and review in this Court is exhausted or waived, a judgment as to the legality of the court-martial proceedings is final, and the sentence imposed may be executed. § 871(c)(1). The UCMJ provides only one avenue for reconsideration of a final court-martial conviction: a petition for a new trial under Article 73. See § 873. An Article 73 petition may be brought “within two years after approval by the convening authority of a court-martial sentence,” meaning it may be brought before or after a conviction becomes final. Ibid. If direct review is still pending before a CCA or the CAAF when the petition is filed, the judge advocate general (to whom the petition must be directed) will refer the petition to that court. Ibid. But once the conviction is final, only the judge advocate general may act on an Article 73 petition. Ibid. Article 76 “ ‘describes] the terminal point for proceedings within the court-martial system.’” Councilman, supra, at 750 (quoting Gusik v. Schilder, 340 U. S. 128, 132 (1950)). Under that provision, final court-martial judgments are “binding upon all departments, courts, agencies, and officers of the United States, subject only to action upon a petition for a new trial [under Article 73],” or to action by the appropriate Secretary or the President. 10 U. S. C. §876 (emphasis added). Once an Article 73 petition is denied, a service member has no relief left to seek within the court-martial system. See Gusik, supra, at 133-134. Federal courts are authorized to issue extraordinary writs such as coram nobis only as “neeessary or appropriate in aid of their respective jurisdictions.” 28 U. S. C. § 1651(a). The All Writs Act “confine[s] the power of the CAAF to issuing process ‘in aid of’ its existing statutory jurisdiction” and “does not enlarge that jurisdiction.” Goldsmith, supra, at 534-535; see also Noyd v. Bond, 395 U. S. 683, 695, n. 7 (1969) (although military courts can issue extraordinary writs in aid of their direct review jurisdiction, “[a] different question would, of course, arise in a ease which the [courts are] not authorized to review under the governing statutes”). The UCMJ grants military courts of appeals no jurisdiction over final court-martial judgments, so there is no jurisdiction for a postconviction extraordinary writ to “aid.” A petition for coram nobis by its nature seeks postconviction review; it is therefore beyond the scope of these courts’ “narrowly circumscribed” statutory jurisdiction. Goldsmith, supra, at 535. The majority overrides these careful limits on military court jurisdiction by maintaining that later jurisdiction to issue coram nobis is a “belated extension” of the statutory jurisdiction, that “jurisdiction to issue [coram nobis3 derives from the earlier jurisdiction.” Ante, at 913, 914. The authority the Court cites for this key jurisdictional analysis is — a footnote. See ante, at 913 (citing Morgan, 346 U. S., at 505, n. 4); ante, at 914 (same). Now, footnotes are part of an opinion, too, even if not the most likely place to look for a key jurisdictional ruling. But since footnote 4 plays such an indispensable role in the majority’s analysis, it must be read with care. The first thing you notice in doing so is that the footnote does not mention the word “jurisdiction” at all. That is because it has nothing to do with jurisdiction. The issue addressed in the paragraph to which the footnote was appended was “choice of remedy.” 346 U. S., at 505. The Court concluded that coram nobis was the appropriate one. The footnote simply addressed the concern that the remedy might not be available because the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure had abolished coram nobis as a remedy; the concern was dismissed because the Court concluded the criminal rules, not the civil rules, applied. Id., at 505, n. 4; see also United States v. Keogh, 391 F. 2d 138, 140 (CA2 1968) (Friendly, J.) (“The problem to which the footnote was addressed was that F. R. Civ. P. 60(b) had abolished writs of error coram nobis”). The point is further confirmed by the text in the body of the opinion: The Court’s conclusion in the paragraph in which the footnote appears is that since the remedy sought was “in the nature of... coram nobis,” the trial court could “properly exercise its jurisdiction.” 346 U. S., at 505 (emphasis added). The issue was not the existence of jurisdiction, but whether the court had the authority to exercise it. The Court in the present case recognizes the distinction. See ante, at 915 (“When exercising its jurisdiction, the CAAF's authority is confined to matters of law” (internal quotation marks omitted)); ante, at 914 (“The authority to issue a writ under the All Writs Act is not a font of jurisdiction”). Even accepting the majority’s reading of Morgan’s hitherto obscure footnote, that reading would only establish the “belated jurisdiction” theory for Article III courts. The military courts are Article I courts. The distinction has direct pertinence to the point at issue in this case. Legal doctrines “must be placed in their historical setting. They cannot be wrenched from it and mechanically transplanted into an alien, unrelated context without suffering mutilation or distortion.” Reid, 354 U. S., at 50 (Frankfurter, J., concurring in result). The Article III courts have been given broad jurisdiction. I can understand, if not necessarily agree with, the notion that they might enjoy some implicit “long-recognized authority” to correct their earlier judgments. See ante, at 916. But not so for Article I courts. The principle that Congress defines the jurisdiction of the lower federal courts “applies with added force to Article I tribunals.” Ante, at 912. That is especially true with respect to military courts. The military justice system is the last place courts should go about finding “extensions” of jurisdiction beyond that conferred by statute. As we expressly recognized in Goldsmith, “there is no source of continuing jurisdiction for the CAAF over all actions administering sentences that the CAAF at one time had the power to review.” 526 U. S., at 536 (emphasis added). Since the UCMJ grants military courts no postconviction jurisdiction, conferring on them perpetual authority to entertain coram nobis petitions plainly contravenes that basic principle. Ill Even if the majority’s reading of Morgan’s footnote could be transplanted to the military context, the majority’s conclusion would still not follow. “‘[T]he All Writs Act is a residual source of authority to issue writs that are not otherwise covered by statute. Where a statute specifically addresses the particular issue at hand, it is that authority, and not the All Writs Act, that is controlling.’” Carlisle v. United States, 517 U. S. 416, 429 (1996) (quoting Pennsylvania Bureau of Correction v. United States Marshals Service, 474 U. S. 34, 43 (1985)). The UCMJ contains not one, but two provisions specifically limiting the circumstances under which postconviction relief (other Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

I

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. There was a cement plant in Merced County, California, which was sold to petitioner — a corporation of Colombia — for export to South America. An export license was obtained and a letter of credit in favor of the seller deposited here. Title passed' and possession was taken for the purchaser. A company, which was a common carrier, was employed to do the dismantling and packaging for shipment. As the dismantling proceeded, shipments were labeled with appellant’s name as consignee and delivered to a rail carrier. Respondent, acting under a California statute, levied a personal property tax on the property for the tax year 1945-1946. The tax date was March 5, 1945. On that date 12 per cent of the plant had been shipped out of the county. That portion was relieved of the tax. The balance was taxed. That included the 10 per cent which had been dismantled and crated or prepared for shipment, 34 per cent which had been dismantled but not crated or prepared for shipment, and 44 per cent which had not -been dismantled. But before the end of January, 1946, all the property had been shipped by rail to a port and was en route to South America by ocean carriér. . Article I, § 10, Cl. 2 of the Constitution provides in part that, “No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports, except what may be absolutely necessary .for executing it’s inspection Laws . . . .” Appellant claimed that this tax was laid on an export and was therefore unconstitutional. It paid the tax under protest and brought this suit to recover it. The trial court, holding that the entire plant was an export on the tax assessment day, granted judgment for appellant. The Supreme Courvt of California reversed. 32 Cal. 2d 68, 194 P. 2d •527. The case is here on appeal. 28 U. S. C. § 1257 (2). “. . \ goods do not cease tó be part of the general mass of property in the State, subject, as such, to its jurisdiction, and to taxation in the usual way, until they have been shipped, or entered with a common carrier for transportation to another State, or have been started upon such transportation in a continuous route or journey.” Coe v. Errol, 116 U. S. 517, 527. That test was fashioned to determine the validity under the Commerce Clause of a nondiscriminatory state tax. But as we noted in Richfield Oil Corp. v. State Board, 329 U. S. 69, 79, it is. equally applicable to cases arising either under Art. I, § 10, Cl. 2 (the Import-Export Clause) or under Art. I, § 9, Cl. 5, which prohibits Congress, from laying any tax on “Articles .exported from any State.” Under that test it is not enough that there is an intent to export, or a plan which contemplates exportation, or an integrated series of events which will end with it. See Turpin v. Burgess, 117 U. S. 504; Cornell v. Coyne, 192 U. S. 418. The' tax immunity runs to the process of. Exportation and the transactions and documents embraced in it. Fairbank v. United States, 181 U. S. 283; United States v. Huoslef, 237 U. S. 1; Thames & Mersey Ins. Co. v. United States, 237 U. S. 19. Delivery of packages to an exporting carrier for shipment abroad (Spalding & Bros. v. Edwards, 262 U. S. 66) and the delivery of oil into the hold of the .ship furnished by the foreign purchaser to carry the oil abroad (Richfield Oil Corp. v. State Board, supra) have been held sufficient. It is the entrance of. the articles into the export stream that marks the start of the process of exportation. Then there is certainty that the goods are headed for their foreign destination and will not be diverted to domestic use. Nothing less will suffice. So in this case it is not enough that on the tax date there was a purpose and plan to export this property. Nor is it sufficient that in due course that plan was fully executed. Part of the plant that is taxed was dismantled, but it had not been delivered to any carrier for export or otherwise started on its journey on the tax date. It might still have been diverted into the domestic market. The fact that any such diversion would entail a breach of contract, that a part of the plant had already started on its export journey, that an export license had been obtained and a letter of Credit deposited in this country increases the expectation on the tax daté that exportation of the entire plant would eventuate. But that prospect, no matter how bright, does not start the process of exportation. On the tax date the movement to foreign shores had neither started nor been committed. Some reliance is apparently placed on the fact that the dismantler was a licensed carrier for interstate and foreign commerce and that its employment included the loading of the property on railroad cars for shipment to the seaboard. But the dismantler had not in this case started the movement of the property to the rail carrier. Hence we need not determine whether that intermediate transportation would be part of the export process. Affirmed. Rev. and Tax. Code (Deering, 1939), Div. I, §§103, 106, 201, 202 (e), 405. The meaning of “export” is the same under the two Clauses. See Richfield Oil Corp. v. State Board, 329 U. S. 69, 83 and cases cited. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Burton delivered the opinion of the Court. The issue before us is whether the discharge of certain employees by their employer constituted an unfair labor practice, within the meaning of §§8 (a)(1) and 7 of the Taft-Hartley Act, justifying their reinstatement by the National Labor Relations Board. For the reason that their discharge was “for cause” within the meaning of § 10 (c) of that Act, we sustain the Board in not requiring their reinstatement. In 1949, the Jefferson Standard Broadcasting Company (here called the company) was a North Carolina corporation engaged in interstate commerce. Under a license from the Federal Communications Commission, it operated, at Charlotte, North Carolina, a 50,000-watt radio station, with call letters WBT. It broadcast 10 to 12 hours daily by radio and television. The television service, which it started July 14, 1949, representing an investment of about $500,000, was the only such service in the area. Less than 50% of the station’s programs originated in Charlotte. The others were piped in over leased wires, generally from New York, California or Illinois from several different networks. Its annual gross revenue from broadcasting operations exceeded $100,000 but its television enterprise caused it a monthly loss of about $10,000 during the first four months of that operation, including the period here involved. Its rates for television advertising were geared to the number of receiving sets in the area. Local dealers had large inventories of such sets ready to meet anticipated demands. The company employed 22 technicians. In December 1948, negotiations to settle the terms of their employment after January 31, 1949, were begun between representatives of the company and of the respondent Local Union No. 1229, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, American Federation of Labor (here called the union). The negotiations reached an impasse in January 1949, and the existing contract of employment expired January 31. The technicians, nevertheless, continued to work for the company and their collective-bargaining negotiations were resumed in July, only to break down again July 8. The main point of disagreement arose from the union’s demand for the renewal of a provision that all discharges from employment be subject to arbitration and the company’s counterproposal that such arbitration be limited to the facts material to each discharge, leaving it to the company to determine whether those facts gave adequate cause for discharge. July 9, 1949, the union began daily peaceful picketing of the company’s station. Placards and handbills on the picket line charged the company with unfairness to its technicians and emphasized the company’s refusal to renew the provision for arbitration of discharges. The placards and handbills named the union as the representative of the WBT technicians. The employees did not strike. They confined their respective tours of picketing to their off-duty hours and continued to draw full pay. There was no violence or threat of violence and no one has taken exception to any of the above conduct. But on August 24, 1949, a new procedure made its appearance. Without warning, several of its technicians launched a vitriolic attack on the quality of the company’s television broadcasts. Five thousand handbills were printed over the designation “WBT TECHNICIANS.” These were distributed on the picket line, on the public square two or three blocks from the company’s premises, in barber shops, restaurants and busses. Some were mailed to local businessmen. The handbills made no reference to the union, to a labor controversy or to collective bargaining. They read: “IS CHARLOTTE A SECOND-CLASS CITY? “You might think so from the kind of Television programs being presented by the Jefferson Standard Broadcasting Co. over WBTV. Have you seen one of their television programs lately? Did you know that all the programs presented over WBTV are on film and may be from one day to five years old. There are no local programs presented by WBTV. You cannot receive the local baseball games, football games or other local events because WBTV does not have the proper equipment to make these pickups. Cities like New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington receive such programs nightly. Why doesn’t the Jefferson Standard Broadcasting Company purchase the needed equipment to bring you the same type of programs enjoyed by other leading American cities? Could it be that they consider Charlotte a second-class community and only entitled to the pictures now being presented to them? “WBT TECHNICIANS” This attack continued until September 3, 1949, when' the company discharged ten of its technicians, whom it charged with sponsoring or distributing these handbills. The company’s letter discharging them tells its side of the story. September 4, the union’s picketing resumed its original tenor and, September 13, the union filed with the Board a charge that the company, by discharging the above-mentioned ten technicians, had engaged in an unfair labor practice. The General Counsel for the Board filed a complaint based on those charges and, after hearing, a trial examiner made detailed findings and a recommendation that all of those discharged be reinstated with back pay. 94 N. L. R. B. 1507, 1527. The Board found that one of the discharged men had neither sponsored nor distributed the “Second-Class City” handbill and ordered his reinstatement with back pay. It then found that the other nine had sponsored or distributed the handbill and held that the company, by discharging them for such conduct, had not engaged in an unfair labor practice. The Board, accordingly, did not order their reinstatement. One member dissented. Id,., at 1507 et seq. Under § 10 (f) of the Taft-Hartley Act, the union petitioned the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit for a review of the Board’s order and for such a modification of it as would reinstate all ten of the discharged technicians with back pay. That court remanded the cause to the Board for further consideration and for a finding as to the “unlawfulness” of the conduct of the employees which had led to their discharge. 91 U. S. App. D. C. 333, 202 F. 2d 186. We granted certiorari because of the importance of the case in the administration of the Taft-Hartley Act. 345 U. S. 947. In its essence, the issue is simple. It is whether these employees, whose contracts of employment had expired, were discharged “for cause.” They were discharged solely because, at a critical time in the initiation of the company’s television service, they sponsored or distributed 5,000 handbills making a sharp, public, disparaging attack upon the quality of the company’s product and its business policies, in a manner reasonably calculated to harm the company’s reputation and reduce its income. The attack was made by them expressly as “WBT TECHNICIANS.” It continued ten days without indication of abatement. The Board found that— “It [the handbill] occasioned widespread comment in the community, and caused Respondent to apprehend a loss of advertising revenue due to dissatisfaction with its television broadcasting service. “In short, the employees in this case deliberately undertook to alienate their employer’s customers by impugning the technical quality of his product. As the Trial Examiner found, they did not misrepresent, at least wilfully, the facts they cited to support their disparaging report. And their ultimate purpose — to extract a concession from the employer with respect to the terms of their employment — was lawful. That purpose, however, was undisclosed; the employees purported to speak as experts, in the interest of consumers and the public at large. They did not indicate that they sought to secure any benefit for themselves, as employees, by casting discredit upon their employer.” 94 N. L. R. B., at 1511. The company’s letter shows that it interpreted the handbill as a demonstration of such detrimental-disloyalty as to provide “cause" for its refusal to continue in its employ the perpetrators of the attack. We agree. Section 10 (c) of the Taft-Hartley Act expressly provides that “No order of the Board shall require the reinstatement of any individual as an employee who has been suspended or discharged, or the payment to him of any back pay, if such individual was suspended or discharged for cause.” There is no more elemental cause for discharge of an employee than disloyalty to his employer. It is equally elemental that the Taft-Hartley Act seeks to strengthen, rather than to weaken, that cooperation, continuity of service and cordial contractual relation between employer and employee that is born of loyalty to their common enterprise. Congress, while safeguarding, in § 7, the right of employees to engage in “concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection,” did not weaken the underlying contractual bonds and loyalties of employer and employee. The conference report that led to the enactment of the law said: “[T]he courts have firmly established the rule that under the existing provisions of section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act, employees are not given any right to engage in unlawful or other improper conduct. . . . “. . . Furthermore, in section 10 (c) of the amended act, as proposed in the conference agreement, it is specifically provided that no order of the Board shall require the reinstatement of any individual or the payment to him of any back pay if such individual was suspended or discharged for cause, and this, of course, applies with equal force whether or not the acts constituting the cause for discharge were committed in connection with a concerted activity.” H. R. Rep. No. 510, 80th Cong., 1st Sess. 38-39. This has been clear since the early days of the Wagner Act. In 1937, Chief Justice Hughes, writing for the Court, said: “The Act does not interfere with the normal exercise of the right of the employer to select its employees or to discharge them. The employer may not, under cover of that right, intimidate or coerce its employees with respect to their self-organization and representation, and, on the other hand, the Board is not entitled to make its authority a pretext for interference with the right of discharge when that right is exercised for other reasons than such intimidation and coercion.” Labor Board v. Jones & Laughlin, 301 U. S. 1, 45-46. See also, Labor Board v. Fansteel Corp., 306 U. S. 240, 252-258; Auto. Workers v. Wisconsin Board, 336 U. S. 245, 260-263. Many cases reaching their final disposition in the Courts of Appeals furnish examples emphasizing the importance of enforcing industrial plant discipline and of maintaining loyalty as well as the rights of concerted activities. The courts have refused to reinstate employees discharged for “cause” consisting of insubordination, disobedience or disloyalty. In such cases, it often has been necessary to identify individual employees, somewhat comparable to the nine discharged in this case, and to recognize that their discharges were for causes which were separable from the concerted activities of others whose acts might come within the protection of § 7. It has been equally important to identify employees, comparable to the tenth man in the instant case, who participated in simultaneous concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection but who refrained from joining the others in separable acts of insubordination, disobedience or disloyalty. In the latter instances, this sometimes led to a further inquiry to determine whether their concerted activities were carried on in such a manner as to come within the protection of § 7. See, e. g., Hoover Co. v. Labor Board, 191 F. 2d 380; Maryland Drydock Co. v. Labor Board, 183 F. 2d 538; Albrecht v. Labor Board, 181 F. 2d 652; Labor Board v. Kelco Corp., 178 F. 2d 578; Joanna Cotton Mills Co. v. Labor Board, 176 F. 2d 749; Labor Board v. Reynolds Pen Co., 162 F. 2d 680; Home Beneficial Life Ins. Co. v. Labor Board, 159 F. 2d 280; Labor Board v. Montgomery Ward & Co., 157 F. 2d 486; Labor Board v. Draper Corp., 145 F. 2d 199; Labor Board v. Aintree Corp., 135 F. 2d 395; United Biscuit Co. v. Labor Board, 128 F. 2d 771; Labor Board v. Condenser Corp., 128 F. 2d 67; Hazel-Atlas Glass Co. v. Labor Board, 127 F. 2d 109; Conn, Ltd. v. Labor Board, 108 F. 2d 390. The above cases illustrate the responsibility that falls upon the Board to find the facts material to such decisions. The legal principle that insubordination, disobedience or disloyalty is adequate cause for discharge is plain enough. The difficulty arises in determining whether, in fact, the discharges are made because of such a separable cause or because of some other concerted activities engaged in for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection which may not be adequate cause for discharge. Cf. Labor Board v. Peter Cailler Kohler Co., 130 F. 2d 503. In the instant case the Board found that the company’s discharge of the nine offenders resulted from their sponsoring and distributing the “Second-Class City” handbills of August 24 — September 3, issued in their name as the “WBT TECHNICIANS.” Assuming that there had been no pending labor controversy, the conduct of the “WBT TECHNICIANS” from August 24 through September 3 unquestionably would have provided adequate cause for their disciplinary discharge within the meaning of § 10 (c). Their attack.related itself to no labor practice of the company. It made no reference to wages, hours or working conditions. The policies attacked were those of finance and public relations for which management, not technicians, must be responsible. The attack asked for no public sympathy or support. It was a continuing attack, initiated while off duty, upon the very interests which the attackers were being paid to conserve and develop. Nothing could be further from the purpose of the Act than to require an employer to finance such activities. Nothing would contribute less to the Act’s declared purpose of promoting industrial peace and stability. The fortuity of the coexistence of a labor dispute affords these technicians no substantial defense. While they were also union men and leaders in the labor controversy, they took pains to separate those categories. In contrast to their claims on the picket line as to the labor controversy, their handbill of August 24 omitted all reference to it. The handbill diverted attention from the labor controversy. It attacked public policies of the company which had no discernible relation to that controversy. The only connection between the handbill and the labor controversy was an ultimate and undisclosed purpose or motive on the part of some of the sponsors that, by the hoped-for financial pressure, the attack might extract from the company some future concession. A disclosure of that motive might have lost more public support for the employees than it would have gained, for it would have given the handbill more the character of coercion than of collective bargaining. Referring to the attack, the Board said “In our judgment, these tactics, in the circumstances of this case, were hardly less ‘indefensible’ than acts of physical sabotage.” 94 N. L. R. B., at 1511. In any event, the findings of the Board effectively separate the attack from the labor controversy and treat it solely as one made by the company’s technical experts upon the quality of the company’s product. As such, it was as adequate a cause for the discharge of its sponsors as if the labor controversy had not been pending. The technicians, themselves, so handled their attack as thus to bring their discharge under § 10 (c). The Board stated “We ... do not decide whether the disparagement of product involved here would have justified the employer in discharging the employees responsible for it, had it been uttered in the context of a conventional appeal for support of the union in the labor dispute.” Id., at 1512, n. 18. This underscored the Board’s factual conclusion that the attack of August 24 was not part of an appeal for support in the pending dispute. It was a concerted separable attack purporting to be made in the interest of the public rather than in that of the employees. We find no occasion to remand this cause to the Board for further specificity of findings. Even if the attack were to be treated, as the Board has not treated it, as a concerted activity wholly or partly within the scope of those mentioned in § 7, the means used by the technicians in conducting the attack have deprived the attackers of the protection of that section, when read in the light and context of the purpose of the Act. Accordingly, the order of the Court of Appeals remanding the cause to the National Labor Relations Board is set aside, and the cause is remanded to the Court of Appeals with instructions to dismiss respondent’s petition to modify the order of the Board. It is so ordered. “Sec. 7. Employees shall have the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection, and shall also have the right to refrain from any or all of such activities except to the extent that such right may be affected by an agreement requiring membership in a labor organization as a condition of employment as authorized in section 8 (a) (3). “Sec. 8. (a) It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer— “(1) to interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in section 7 National Labor Relations Act, as amended by the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947, 61 Stat. 140, 29 U. S. C. (Supp. V) §§ 157, 158 (a)(1). “Sec. 10. . . . “(c) ... If upon the preponderance of the testimony taken the Board shall be of the opinion that any person named in the complaint has engaged in or is engaging in any such unfair labor practice, then the Board shall state its findings of fact and shall issue and cause to be served on such person an order requiring such person to cease and desist from such unfair labor practice, and to take such affirmative action including reinstatement of employees with or without back pay, as will effectuate the policies of this Act: Provided, That where an order directs reinstatement of an employee, back pay may be required of the employer or labor organization, as the case may be, responsible for the discrimination suffered by him: .... If upon the preponderance of the testimony taken the Board shall not be of the opinion that the person named in the complaint has engaged in or is engaging in any such unfair labor practice, then the Board shall state its findings of fact and shall issue an order dismissing the said complaint. No order of the Board shall require the reinstatement of any individual as an employee who has been suspended or discharged, or the payment to him of any back pay, if such individual was suspended or discharged for cause. . . (Emphasis supplied in last sentence.) 61 Stat. 146, 147, 29 U. S. C. (Supp. V) § 160 (c). Pursuant to proceedings begun in October 1948, and to an election in May 1949, under the supervision of the Board, the union (by a vote of 12 to 2 of the 14 technicians participating) was chosen as the exclusive collective-bargaining representative of the company’s technicians. May 9, 1949, the union was so certified by the Board. 94 N. L. R. B. 1507, 1529. “Dear Mr. . . . , “When you and some of our other technicians commenced early in July to picket against this Company, we felt that your action was very ill-considered. We were paying you a salary of . . . per week, to say nothing of other benefits which you receive as an employee of our Company, such as time-and-a-half pay for all work beyond eight hours in any one day, three weeks vacation each year with full pay, unlimited sick leave with full pay, liberal life insurance and hospitalization, for you and your family, and retirement and pension benefits unexcelled anywhere. Yet when we were unable to agree upon the terms of a contract with your Union, you began to denounce us publicly as ‘unfair.’ “And ever since early July while you have been walking up and down the street with placards and literature attacking us, you have continued to hold your job and receive your pay and all the other benefits referred to above. “Even when you began to put out propaganda which contained many untruths about our Company and great deal of personal abuse and slander, we still continued to treat you exactly as before. For it has been our understanding that under our labor laws, you have a very great latitude in trying to make the public believe that your employer is unfair to you. “Now, however, you have turned from trying to persuade the public that we are unfair to you and are trying to persuade the public that we give inferior service to them. While we are struggling to expand into and develop a new field, and incidentally losing large sums of money in the process, you are busy trying to turn customers and the public against us in every possible way, even handing out leaflets on the public streets advertising that our operations are ‘second-class,’ and endeavoring in various ways to hamper and totally destroy our business. Certainly we are not required by law or common sense to keep you in our employment and pay you a substantial salary while you thus do your best to tear down and bankrupt our business. “You are hereby discharged from our employment. Although there is nothing requiring us to do so, and the circumstances certainly do not call for our doing so, we are enclosing a check payable to your order for two weeks’ advance or severance pay. “Very truly yours, “Jefferson Standard Broadcasting Company “By: Charles H. Crutchfield “Vice President “Enclosure” Allegations based on the same facts and charging violations of § 8 (a) (3) and (5) of the Tart-Hartley Act do not require discussion here. 61 Stat. 148-149, 29 U. S. C. (Supp. V) § 160 (f). The Court of Appeals said: “Protection under § 7 of the Act ... is withdrawn only from those concerted activities which contravene either (a) specific provisions or basic policies of the Act or of related federal statutes, or (b) specific rules of other federal or local law that is not incompatible with the Board’s governing statute. . . . “We think the Board failed to make the finding essential to its conclusion that the concerted activity was unprotected. Sound practice in judicial review of administrative orders precludes this court from determining ‘unlawfulness’ without a prior consideration and finding by the Board.” 91 U. S. App. D. C., at 335, 336, 202 F. 2d, at 188, 189. See note 2, supra. The Act’s declaration of the policy says: “Section 1. . . . “(b) Industrial strife which interferes with the normal flow of commerce and with the full production of articles and commodities for commerce, can be avoided or substantially minimized if employers, employees, and labor organizations each recognize under law one another’s legitimate rights in their relations with each other, and above all recognize under law that neither party has any right in its relations with any other to engage in acts or practices which jeopardize the public health, safety, or interest. “It is the purpose and policy of this Act, in order to promote the full flow of commerce, to prescribe the legitimate rights of both employees and employers in their relations affecting commerce, to provide orderly and peaceful procedures for preventing the interference by either with the legitimate rights of the other, to protect the rights of individual employees in their relations with labor organizations whose activities affect commerce, to define and proscribe practices on the part of labor and management which affect commerce and are inimical to the general welfare, and to protect the rights of the public in connection with labor disputes affecting commerce.” 61 Stat. 136, 29 U. S. C. (Supp. V) § 141 (b). See note 1, supra. National Labor Relations Act of July 5, 1935, 49 Stat. 449, 29 U. S. C. § 151 et seq. “. . . An employee can not work and strike at the same time. He can not continue in his employment and openly or secretly refuse to do his work. He can not collect wages for his employment, and, at the same time, engage in activities to injure or destroy his employer’s business.” Hoover Co. v. Labor Board, 191 F. 2d 380, 389, and see Labor Board v. Montgomery Ward & Co., 157 F. 2d 486, 496; United Biscuit Co. v. Labor Board, 128 F. 2d 771. See Labor Board v. Rockaway News Co., 345 U. S. 71 (discharge, for violation of an obligation to make deliveries, even though crossing a picket line, sustained); Auto. Workers v. Wisconsin Board, 336 U. S. 245, 255-263 (arbitrary unannounced interruptions of work, not protected by § 7); Southern S. S. Co. v. Labor Board, 316 U. S. 31 (discharge of seamen, for disobedience on shipboard while away from home port, sustained); Allen-Bradley Local v. Wisconsin Board, 315 U. S. 740 (mass picketing, unprotected); Hotel Employees’ Local v. Wisconsin Board, 315 U. S. 437 (violence, while picketing, unprotected); Labor Board v. Sands Manufacturing Co., 306 U. S. 332 (discharge, for repudiation of employee’s agreement, sustained); Labor Board v. Fansteel Corp., 306 U. S. 240 (discharge, for tortious conduct, violence or sit-down strike, sustained); and see Associated Press v. Labor Board, 301 U. S. 103, 132; Labor Board v. Jones & Laughlin, 301 U. S. 1, 45-46. See also, Cox, The Right to Engage in Concerted Activities, 26 Ind. L. J. 319 (1951); Recent Cases, 66 Harv. L. Rev. 1321 (1953). Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

G

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice THOMAS delivered the opinion of the Court. The question in this case is whether the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards, June 10, 1958, 21 U.S.T. 2517, T.I.A.S. No. 6997, conflicts with domestic equitable estoppel doctrines that permit the enforcement of arbitration agreements by nonsignatories. We hold that it does not. I In 2007, ThyssenKrupp Stainless USA, LLC, entered into three contracts with F.L. Industries, Inc., for the construction of cold rolling mills at ThyssenKrupp's steel manufacturing plant in Alabama. Each of the contracts contained an identical arbitration clause. The clause provided that "[a]ll disputes arising between both parties in connection with or in the performances of the Contract ... shall be submitted to arbitration for settlement." App. 171. After executing these agreements, F.L. Industries, Inc., entered into a subcontractor agreement with petitioner GE Energy Power Conversion France SAS, Corp. (GE Energy), then known as Converteam SAS. Under that agreement, GE Energy agreed to design, manufacture, and supply motors for the cold rolling mills. Between 2011 and 2012, GE Energy delivered nine motors to the Alabama plant for installation. Soon thereafter, respondent Outokumpu Stainless USA, LLC, acquired ownership of the plant from ThyssenKrupp. According to Outokumpu, GE Energy's motors failed by the summer of 2015, resulting in substantial damages. In 2016, Outokumpu and its insurers filed suit against GE Energy in Alabama state court. GE Energy removed the case to federal court under 9 U.S.C. § 205, which authorizes the removal of an action from state to federal court if the action "relates to an arbitration agreement ... falling under the Convention [on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards]." GE Energy then moved to dismiss and compel arbitration, relying on the arbitration clauses in the contracts between F.L. Industries, Inc., and ThyssenKrupp. The District Court granted GE Energy's motion to dismiss and compel arbitration with Outokumpu and Sompo Japan Insurance Company of America. Outokumpu Stainless USA LLC v. Converteam SAS , 2017 WL 401951 (SD Ala., Jan. 30, 2017). The court held that GE Energy qualified as a party under the arbitration clauses because the contracts defined the terms "Seller" and "Parties" to include subcontractors. Id. , at *4. Because the court concluded that both Outokumpu and GE Energy were parties to the agreements, it declined to address GE Energy's argument that the agreement was enforceable under equitable estoppel. Id. , at *1, n. 1. The Eleventh Circuit reversed the District Court's order compelling arbitration. Outokumpu Stainless USA, LLC v. Converteam SAS , 902 F.3d 1316 (2018). The court interpreted the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (New York Convention or Convention) to include a "requirement that the parties actually sign an agreement to arbitrate their disputes in order to compel arbitration." Id. , at 1326 (emphasis in original). The court concluded that this requirement was not satisfied because "GE Energy is undeniably not a signatory to the Contracts." Ibid. It then held that GE Energy could not rely on state-law equitable estoppel doctrines to enforce the arbitration agreement as a nonsignatory because, in the court's view, equitable estoppel conflicts with the Convention's signatory requirement. Id. , at 1326-1327. Given a conflict between the Courts of Appeals on this question, we granted certiorari. 588 U.S. ----, 139 S.Ct. 2776, 204 L.Ed.2d 1156 (2019). II A Chapter 1 of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) permits courts to apply state-law doctrines related to the enforcement of arbitration agreements. Section 2 of that chapter provides that an arbitration agreement in writing "shall be ... enforceable, save upon such grounds as exist at law or in equity for the revocation of any contract." 9 U.S.C. § 2. As we have explained, this provision requires federal courts to "place [arbitration] agreements ' "upon the same footing as other contracts." ' " Volt Information Sciences, Inc. v. Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Junior Univ. , 489 U.S. 468, 474, 109 S.Ct. 1248, 103 L.Ed.2d 488 (1989) (quoting Scherk v. Alberto-Culver Co. , 417 U.S. 506, 511, 94 S.Ct. 2449, 41 L.Ed.2d 270 (1974) ). But it does not "alter background principles of state contract law regarding the scope of agreements (including the question of who is bound by them)." Arthur Andersen LLP v. Carlisle , 556 U.S. 624, 630, 129 S.Ct. 1896, 173 L.Ed.2d 832 (2009). The "traditional principles of state law" that apply under Chapter 1 include doctrines that authorize the enforcement of a contract by a nonsignatory. Id. , at 631, 129 S.Ct. 1896 (internal quotation marks omitted). For example, we have recognized that arbitration agreements may be enforced by nonsignatories through " 'assumption, piercing the corporate veil, alter ego, incorporation by reference, third-party beneficiary theories, waiver and estoppel.' " Ibid. (quoting 21 R. Lord, Williston on Contracts § 57:19, p. 183 (4th ed. 2001) ). This case implicates domestic equitable estoppel doctrines. Generally, in the arbitration context, "equitable estoppel allows a nonsignatory to a written agreement containing an arbitration clause to compel arbitration where a signatory to the written agreement must rely on the terms of that agreement in asserting its claims against the nonsignatory." Id. , at 200 (2017). In Arthur Andersen , we recognized that Chapter 1 of the FAA permits a nonsignatory to rely on state-law equitable estoppel doctrines to enforce an arbitration agreement. 556 U.S. at 631-632, 129 S.Ct. 1896. B The New York Convention is a multilateral treaty that addresses international arbitration. 21 U.S.T. 2517, T.I.A.S. No. 6997. It focuses almost entirely on arbitral awards. Article I(1) describes the Convention as applying only to "the recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards." Id., at 2519. Articles III, IV, and V contain recognition and enforcement obligations related to arbitral awards for contracting states and for parties seeking the enforcement of arbitral awards. Id., at 2519-2520. Article VI addresses when an award can be set aside or suspended. Id., at 2520. And Article VII(1) states that the "Convention shall not ... deprive any interested party of any right he may have to avail himself of an arbitral award in the manner and to the extent allowed by the law or the treaties of the country where such award is sought to be relied upon." Id., at 2520-2521. Only one article of the Convention addresses arbitration agreements-Article II. That article contains only three provisions, each one sentence long. Article II(1) requires "[e]ach Contracting State [to] recognize an agreement in writing under which the parties undertake to submit to arbitration all or any differences which have arisen or which may arise between them in respect of a defined legal relationship, whether contractual or not, concerning a subject matter capable of settlement by arbitration." Id., at 2519. Article II(2) provides that "[t]he term 'agreement in writing' shall include an arbitral clause in a contract or an arbitration agreement, signed by the parties or contained in an exchange of letters or telegrams." Ibid. Finally, Article II(3) states that "[t]he court of a Contracting State, when seized of an action in a matter in respect of which the parties have made an agreement within the meaning of this article, shall, at the request of one of the parties, refer the parties to arbitration, unless it finds that the said agreement is null and void, inoperative or incapable of being performed." Ibid. C In 1970, the United States acceded to the New York Convention, and Congress enacted implementing legislation in Chapter 2 of the FAA. See 84 Stat. 692, 9 U.S.C. §§ 201 - 208. Chapter 2 grants federal courts jurisdiction over actions governed by the Convention, § 203; establishes venue for such actions, § 204; authorizes removal from state court, § 205 ; and empowers courts to compel arbitration, § 206. Chapter 2 also states that "Chapter 1 applies to actions and proceedings brought under this chapter to the extent that [Chapter 1] is not in conflict with this chapter or the Convention." § 208. III We must determine whether the equitable estoppel doctrines permitted under Chapter 1 of the FAA, see supra, at 1643 - 1644, "conflict with ... the Convention." § 208. Applying familiar tools of treaty interpretation, we conclude that they do not conflict. A "The interpretation of a treaty, like the interpretation of a statute, begins with its text." Medellín v. Texas , 552 U.S. 491, 506, 128 S.Ct. 1346, 170 L.Ed.2d 190 (2008). The text of the New York Convention does not address whether nonsignatories may enforce arbitration agreements under domestic doctrines such as equitable estoppel. The Convention is simply silent on the issue of nonsignatory enforcement, and in general, "a matter not covered is to be treated as not covered"-a principle "so obvious that it seems absurd to recite it," A. Scalia & B. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 93 (2012). This silence is dispositive here because nothing in the text of the Convention could be read to otherwise prohibit the application of domestic equitable estoppel doctrines. Only one Article of the Convention addresses arbitration agreements-Article II-and only one provision of Article II addresses the enforcement of those agreements-Article II(3). The text of Article II(3) states that courts of a contracting state "shall ... refer the parties to arbitration" when the parties to an action entered into a written agreement to arbitrate and one of the parties requests referral to arbitration. The provision, however, does not restrict contracting states from applying domestic law to refer parties to arbitration in other circumstances. That is, Article II(3) provides that arbitration agreements must be enforced in certain circumstances, but it does not prevent the application of domestic laws that are more generous in enforcing arbitration agreements. Article II(3) contains no exclusionary language; it does not state that arbitration agreements shall be enforced only in the identified circumstances. Given that the Convention was drafted against the backdrop of domestic law, it would be unnatural to read Article II(3) to displace domestic doctrines in the absence of exclusionary language. Cf. Marx v. General Revenue Corp. , 568 U.S. 371, 380-384, 133 S.Ct. 1166, 185 L.Ed.2d 242 (2013). This interpretation is especially appropriate in the context of Article II. Far from displacing domestic law, the provisions of Article II contemplate the use of domestic doctrines to fill gaps in the Convention. For example, Article II(1) refers to disputes "capable of settlement by arbitration," but it does not identify what disputes are arbitrable, leaving that matter to domestic law. Mitsubishi Motors Corp. v. Soler Chrysler-Plymouth, Inc. , 473 U.S. 614, 639, n. 21, 105 S.Ct. 3346, 87 L.Ed.2d 444 (1985). Similarly, Article II(3) states that it does not apply to agreements that are "null and void, inoperative or incapable of being performed," but it fails to define those terms. Again, the Convention requires courts to rely on domestic law to fill the gaps; it does not set out a comprehensive regime that displaces domestic law. In sum, the only provision of the Convention that addresses the enforcement of arbitration agreements is Article II(3). We do not read the nonexclusive language of that provision to set a ceiling that tacitly precludes the use of domestic law to enforce arbitration agreements. Thus, nothing in the text of the Convention "conflict[s] with" the application of domestic equitable estoppel doctrines permitted under Chapter 1 of the FAA. 9 U.S.C. § 208. B "Because a treaty ratified by the United States is 'an agreement among sovereign powers,' we have also considered as 'aids to its interpretation' the negotiation and drafting history of the treaty as well as 'the postratification understanding' of signatory nations." Medellín , 552 U.S. at 507, 128 S.Ct. 1346 (quoting Zicherman v. Korean Air Lines Co. , 516 U.S. 217, 226, 116 S.Ct. 629, 133 L.Ed.2d 596 (1996) ). These aids confirm our interpretation of the Convention's text. 1 Our precedents have looked to the "negotiating and drafting history" of a treaty as an aid in determining the shared understanding of the treaty. Id. , at 226, 116 S.Ct. 629. Invoking this interpretive aid, Outokumpu argues that the Convention's drafting history establishes a "rule of consent" that "displace[s] varying local laws." Brief for Respondents 27. We are unpersuaded. For one, nothing in the text of the Convention imposes a "rule of consent" that displaces domestic law-let alone a rule that allows some domestic-law doctrines and not others, as Outokumpu proposes. The only time the Convention uses the word "consent" is in Article X(3), which addresses ratification and accession procedures. Moreover, the statements relied on by Outokumpu do not address the specific question whether the Convention prohibits the application of domestic law that would allow nonsignatories to compel arbitration. Cherry-picked "generalization[s]" from the negotiating and drafting history cannot be used to create a rule that finds no support in the treaty's text. Zicherman , 516 U.S. at 227, 116 S.Ct. 629. To the extent the drafting history sheds any light on the meaning of the Convention, it shows only that the drafters sought to impose baseline requirements on contracting states. As this Court has recognized, "[i]n their discussion of [Article II], the delegates to the Convention voiced frequent concern that courts of signatory countries ... should not be permitted to decline enforcement of such agreements on the basis of parochial views of their desirability or in a manner that would diminish the mutually binding nature of the agreements." Scherk , 417 U.S. at 520, n. 15, 94 S.Ct. 2449 (citing G. Haight, Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards: Summary Analysis of Record of United Nations Conference, May/June 1958, pp. 24-28 (1958)). Nothing in the drafting history suggests that the Convention sought to prevent contracting states from applying domestic law that permits nonsignatories to enforce arbitration agreements in additional circumstances. 2 "[T]he postratification understanding" of other contracting states may also serve as an aid to our interpretation of a treaty's meaning. Medellín , 552 U.S. at 507, 128 S.Ct. 1346 (internal quotation marks omitted). To discern this understanding, we have looked to the "[d]ecisions of the courts of other Convention signatories," El Al Israel Airlines, Ltd. v. Tsui Yuan Tseng , 525 U.S. 155, 175, 119 S.Ct. 662, 142 L.Ed.2d 576 (1999), as well as the "postratification conduct" of the governments of contracting states, Zicherman , 516 U.S. at 227, 116 S.Ct. 629. Here, the weight of authority from contracting states indicates that the New York Convention does not prohibit the application of domestic law addressing the enforcement of arbitration agreements. The courts of numerous contracting states permit enforcement of arbitration agreements by entities who did not sign an agreement. See 1 G. Born, International Commercial Arbitration § 10.02, pp. 1418-1484 (2d ed. 2014) (compiling cases). The United States identifies at least one contracting state with domestic legislation illustrating a similar understanding. See Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 28 (discussing Peru's national legislation). And GE Energy points to a recommendation issued by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law that, although not directly addressing Article II(3), adopts a nonexclusive interpretation of Article II(1) and (2). Report of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law on the Work of Its Thirty-Ninth Session, Recommendation Regarding the Interpretation of Article II, Paragraph 2, and Article VII, Paragraph 1, of the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards ¶¶1, 2, U. N. Doc. A/61/17, annex II (July 7, 2006) (UN recommendation). These sources, while generally pointing in one direction, are not without their faults. The court decisions, domestic legislation, and UN recommendation relied on by the parties occurred decades after the finalization of the New York Convention's text in 1958. This diminishes the value of these sources as evidence of the original shared understanding of the treaty's meaning. Moreover, unlike the actions and decisions of signatory nations, we have not previously relied on UN recommendations to discern the meaning of treaties. See also Yang v. Majestic Blue Fisheries, LLC , 876 F.3d 996, 1000-1001 (CA9 2017) (declining to give weight to the 2006 UN recommendation). But to the extent this evidence is given any weight, it confirms our interpretation of the Convention's text. 3 Finally, the parties dispute whether the Executive's interpretation of the New York Convention should affect our analysis. The United States claims that we should apply a " 'canon of deference' " and give " ' "great weight" ' " to an interpretation set forth by the Executive in an amicus brief submitted to the D C. Circuit in 2014. Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 30 (quoting Abbott v. Abbott , 560 U.S. 1, 15, 130 S.Ct. 1983, 176 L.Ed.2d 789 (2010) ); see also Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae in No. 13-7004 (CADC), pp. 7, 9. GE Energy echoes this request. Outokumpu, on the other hand, argues that the Executive's noncontemporaneous interpretation sheds no light on the meaning of the treaty, asserting that the Executive expressed the "opposite ... view at the time of the Convention's adoption." Brief for Respondents 33. Outokumpu asserts that this Court has repeatedly rejected executive interpretations that contradict the treaty's text or the political branches' previous understanding of a treaty. Id. , at 34-35 (citing, e.g., Chan v. Korean Air Lines, Ltd. , 490 U.S. 122, 136, 109 S.Ct. 1676, 104 L.Ed.2d 113 (1989) (Brennan, J., concurring in judgment); Perkins v. Elg , 307 U.S. 325, 328, 337-349, 59 S.Ct. 884, 83 L.Ed. 1320 (1939) ). We have never provided a full explanation of the basis for our practice of giving weight to the Executive's interpretation of a treaty. Nor have we delineated the limitations of this practice, if any. But we need not resolve these issues today. Our textual analysis aligns with the Executive's interpretation so there is no need to determine whether the Executive's understanding is entitled to "weight" or "deference." Cf. Edelman v. Lynchburg College , 535 U.S. 106, 114-115, n. 8, 122 S.Ct. 1145, 152 L.Ed.2d 188 (2002) ("[T]here is no need to resolve deference issues when there is no need for deference"). IV The Court of Appeals did not analyze whether Article II(3) of the New York Convention conflicts with equitable estoppel. Instead, the court held that Article II(1) and (2) include a "requirement that the parties actually sign an agreement to arbitrate their disputes in order to compel arbitration." 902 F.3d at 1326. But those provisions address the recognition of arbitration agreements, not who is bound by a recognized agreement. Article II(1) simply requires contracting states to "recognize an agreement in writing," and Article II(2) defines the term "agreement in writing." Here, the three agreements at issue were both written and signed. Only Article II(3) speaks to who may request referral under those agreements, and it does not prohibit the application of domestic law. See supra, at 1644 - 1645. Because the Court of Appeals concluded that the Convention prohibits enforcement by nonsignatories, the court did not determine whether GE Energy could enforce the arbitration clauses under principles of equitable estoppel or which body of law governs that determination. Those questions can be addressed on remand. We hold only that the New York Convention does not conflict with the enforcement of arbitration agreements by nonsignatories under domestic-law equitable estoppel doctrines. * * * For the foregoing reasons, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. The District Court later granted GE Energy's motion to compel arbitration with additional insurers. Outokumpu Stainless USA LLC v. Converteam SAS , 2017 WL 480716 (SD Ala., Feb. 3, 2017). Compare 902 F.3d 1316, 1326 (CA11 2018), and Yang v. Majestic Blue Fisheries, LLC , 876 F.3d 996, 1001-1002 (CA9 2017), with Aggarao v. MOL Ship Mgmt. Co. , 675 F.3d 355, 375 (CA4 2012), and Sourcing Unlimited, Inc. v. Asimco Int'l, Inc. , 526 F.3d 38, 48 (CA1 2008). We do not address whether Article II(2) requires a signed agreement. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Frankfurter delivered the opinion of the Court. This is a prosecution for contempt arising from petitioner’s refusal to answer a series of questions propounded to him by a federal grand jury. In every respect but one, this case is a replica of Brown v. United States, 359 U. S. 41, and as to all common issues it is controlled by that case. In Brown, however, we expressly declined to decide the effect of claimed “secrecy” upon proceedings culminating in the petitioner’s sentencing for contempt, “because the record does not show this to be the fact.” 359 U. S., at 51, n. 11. Here, it appears that the contemptuous conduct, the adjudication of guilt, and the imposition of sentence all took place after the public had been excluded from the courtroom, in what began and was continued as “a Grand Jury proceeding.” The effect of this continuing exclusion in the circumstances of the case is the sole question presented. On the morning of April 18, 1957, pursuant to a subpoena, petitioner appeared as a witness before a federal grand jury in the Southern District of New York engaged in investigating violations of the Interstate Commerce Act. He was asked six questions relevant to the grand jury’s investigation. After consultation with his attorney, who was in an anteroom, he refused to answer them on the ground that they might tend to incriminate him. He persisted in this refusal after having been directed to answer by the foreman of the grand jury and advised by government counsel that applicable statutes gave him complete immunity from prosecution concerning any matter as to which he might testify. See 49 U. S. C. §305 (d). Later that day the grand jury, government counsel, petitioner and his attorney appeared before Judge Levet, sitting in the District Court for the Southern District of New York, the grand jury having sought “the aid and assistance of the Court, in a direction to a witness, Morry Levine, who has this morning appeared before the Grand Jury and declined to answer certain questions that have been put to him." The record of the morning's proceedings before the grand jury was read. After argument by counsel, the judge ruled that the adequate immunity conferred by statute deprived petitioner of the right to refuse to answer the questions put to him. Petitioner was ordered to appear before the grand jury on April 22, and was directed by the court then to answer the questions. On the morning of April 22 petitioner appeared before the grand jury. The questions were again put to him and he again refused to answer. Once again the grand jury, government counsel, petitioner and his counsel went before Judge Levet, for “the assistance of the Court in regard to the witness Morry Levine.” At this time the record shows the following: “The Court: Will those who have no other business in the courtroom please leave now? I have a Grand Jury proceeding. “The Clerk: The Marshal will clear the court room. “(Court room cleared by the Marshals.)” Petitioner, his counsel, the grand jury, government counsel and the court reporter remained. Petitioner objected to further participation by the court in the process of compelling his testimony, except according to the procedures prescribed by Rule 42 (b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. That provision, which relates to contempts generally, excluding those “committed in the actual presence of the court” as to which the judge certifies “that he saw or heard the conduct constituting the contempt,” provides in effect for a conventional trial. In petitioner’s view the court was compelled to regard his contempt, if any, as having already been committed out of the presence of the court, through petitioner’s disobedience before the grand jury that morning of the court’s order of April 18. The judge, however, did not treat petitioner’s renewed refusal to answer the grand jury’s questions as a definitive contempt. He chose to proceed just as he had two weeks earlier in the' case of Brown, reviewed here as Brown v. United States, supra, 359 U. S. 41. The morning’s grand jury proceedings, showing petitioner’s refusals to answer, were read, and petitioner was ordered by the judge to take the stand. The court indicated it was proceeding as “[t]he Court and the Grand Jury” “in accordance with Rule 42 (a),” which relates to the procedure in cases of contempt “committed in the actual presence of the court.” Over objection, the court then put to petitioner the six questions which he had refused to answer when propounded by the grand jury. Petitioner again refused to answer these questions on the claim of the privilege against self-incrimination. In answer to a question by the court he stated that he would continue to refuse on that ground should the grand jury again put the questions to him. Government counsel asked that petitioner be adjudged in contempt “committed in the physical presence of the Judge.” The court asked for reasons “why I should not so adjudicate this witness in contempt.” Petitioner’s counsel made three points: (1) that the procedures had not been in accordance with “the requirements of due process”; (2) that the procedures had not followed the requirements of Rule 42 (b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure; and (3) that, on the merits of the charge, the statutory immunity was not sufficiently extensive to deprive petitioner of his privilege not to answer. No reference was made to the exclusion of the general public from the proceedings. Petitioner was adjudicated in contempt and, after submission by counsel of views regarding sentence, one year’s imprisonment was imposed. The conviction was affirmed by the Court of Appeals, 267 F. 2d 335, and we granted certiorari, 361 U. S. 860, limiting our grant to the question left open in Brown v. United States, namely, whether the “secrecy” of the proceedings offended either the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution or the public-trial requirement of the Sixth Amendment. The course of proceeding followed by the District Court in this case for compelling petitioner’s testimony was the one approved in Brown. Specifically, it was established by that case that, after petitioner had disobeyed the court’s direction to answer the grand jury’s questions before that body, it was proper for the court, upon application of the grand jury, (1) to disregard any contempt committed outside its presence; (2) to put the questions directly to petitioner in the court’s presence as well as in the presence of the grand jury; and (3) to punish summarily under Rule 42 (a) as a contempt committed “in the actual presence of the court” petitioner’s refusal thereupon to answer. It was surely not error for the judge initially to have cleared the courtroom on April 22 when the grand jury appeared before him for the second time seeking his “assistance ... in regard to the witness Morry Levine.” The secrecy of grand jury proceedings is enjoined by statute (see 18 U. S. C. § 1508, and Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure 6 (d) and (e)), and a necessary initial step in the proceedings was to read the record of the morning’s grand jury proceedings. The precise question involved in this case, therefore, is whether it was error, once the courtroom had been properly, indeed necessarily, cleared, for petitioner’s contempt, summary conviction and sentencing to occur without inviting the general public back into the courtroom. From the very beginning of this Nation and throughout its history the power to convict for criminal contempt has been deemed an essential and inherent aspect of the very existence of our courts. The First Congress, out of whose 95 members 20, among them some of the most distinguished lawyers, had been members of the Philadelphia Convention, explicitly conferred the power of contempt upon the federal courts. Section 17 of the Judiciary Act of 1789, 1 Stat. 73, 83. That power was recognized by this Court as early as 1812, in a striking way. United States v. Hudson, 7 Cranch 32, 34. As zealous a guardian of the procedural safeguards of the Bill of Rights as the first Mr. Justice Harlan, in sustaining the power summarily to punish contempts committed in the face of the court, described the power in this way: “the offender may, in . . . [the court’s] discretion, be instantly apprehended and immediately imprisoned, without trial or issue, and without other proof than its actual knowledge of what occurred; . . . such power, although arbitrary in its nature and liable to abuse, is absolutely essential to the protection of the courts in the discharge of their functions.” Ex parte Terry, 128 U. S. 289, 313 (1888). It is a particular exercise of this power of summary punishment of contempt committed in the court’s presence which is at issue in this case. This Court has not been wanting in effective alertness to check abusive exercises of that power by federal judges. See Cooke v. United States, 267 U. S. 517; Offutt v. United States, 348 U. S. 11. It would, however, be throwing the baby out with the bath to find it necessary, in the name of the Constitution, to strangle a power “absolutely essential” for the functioning of an independent judiciary, which is the ultimate reliance of citizens in safeguarding rights guaranteed by the Constitution. Procedural safeguards for criminal contempts do not derive from the Sixth Amendment. Criminal contempt proceedings are not within “all criminal prosecutions” to which that Amendment applies. Ex parte Terry, 128 U. S. 289, 306-310; Cooke v. United States, 267 U. S. 517, 534-535; Offutt v. United States, 348 U. S. 11, 14. But while the right to a “public trial” is explicitly guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment only for “criminal prosecutions,” that provision is a reflection of the notion, deeply rooted in the common law, that “justice must satisfy the appearance of justice.” Offutt v. United States, 348 U. S. 11, at 14. Accordingly, due process demands appropriate regard for the requirements of a public proceeding in cases of criminal contempt, see In re Oliver, 333 U. S. 257, as it does for all adjudications through the exercise of the judicial power, barring narrowly limited categories of exceptions such as may be required by the exigencies of war, see Amendment to Rule 46 of the Admiralty Rules, June 8, 1942, 316 U. S. 717, revoked May 6, 1946, 328 U. S. 882, or for the protection of children, see 18 U. S. C. § 5033. Inasmuch as the petitioner’s claim thus derives from the Due Process Clause and not from one of the explicitly defined procedural safeguards of the Constitution, decision must turn on the particular circumstances of the case, and not upon a question-begging because abstract and absolute right to a “public trial.” Cf. Snyder v. Massachusetts, 291 U. S. 97, 114-117. The narrow question is whether, in light of the facts that the grand jury, petitioner and his counsel were present throughout and that petitioner never specifically made objection to the continuing so-called “secrecy” of the proceedings or requested that the judge open the courtroom, he was denied due process because the general public remained excluded from the courtroom. The grand jury is an arm of the court and its in camera proceedings constitute “a judicial inquiry.” Hale v. Henkel, 201 U. S. 43, 66. “The Constitution itself makes the grand jury a part of the judicial process. It must initiate prosecution for the most important federal crimes. It does so under general instructions from the court to which it is attached and to which, from time to time, it reports its findings.” Cobbledick v. United States, 309 U. S. 323, 327. Unlike an ordinary judicial inquiry, where publicity is the rule, grand jury proceedings are secret. In the ordinary course, therefore, contempt of the court committed through a refusal to answer questions put before the grand jury does not occur in a public proceeding. Publicity fully satisfying the requirements of due process is achieved in such a case when a public trial upon notice is held on the charge of contempt under Rule 42 (b) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Brown v. United States, supra, established that a grand jury as an arm of the court has available to it another course to vindicate its authority over a lawlessly recalcitrant witness. Appeal may be made to the court under whose aegis the grand jury sits to have the witness ordered to answer the grand jury’s inquiries in the judge’s physical presence, so that the court’s persuasive exertion to induce obedience, and its power summarily to commit for contempt should its authority be ignored, may be brought to bear upon him. Since such a summary adjudication of contempt occurs in the midst of a grand jury proceeding, a clash may arise between the interest, sanctioned by history and statute, in preserving the secrecy of grand jury proceedings, and the interest, deriving from the Due Process Clause, in preserving the public nature of court proceedings. In the present case grand jury secrecy freely gave way insofar as petitioner’s counsel was present and was permitted to be fully active in behalf of his client throughout the proceedings before Judge Levet. Petitioner had ample notice of the court’s intention to put the grand jury’s questions directly to him, and to proceed against him summarily should he persist in his refusal to answer. Had petitioner requested, and the court denied his wish, that the courtroom be opened to the public before the final stage of these proceedings we would have a different case. Petitioner had no right to have the general public present while the grand jury’s questions were being read. However, after the record of the morning’s grand jury proceedings had been read, and the six questions put to petitioner with a direction that he answer them in the court’s presence, there was no further cause for enforcing secrecy in the sense of excluding the general public. Having refused to answer each question in turn, and having resolved not to answer at all, petitioner then might well have insisted that, as summary punishment was to be imposed, the courtroom be opened so that the act of contempt, that is, his definitive refusal to comply with the court’s direction to answer the previously propounded questions, and the consequent adjudication and sentence might occur in public. See Cooke v. United States, 267 U. S. 517, 534-536. To repeat, such a claim evidently was not in petitioner’s thought, and no request to open the courtroom was made at any stage of the proceedings. The continuing exclusion of the public in this case is not to be deemed contrary to the requirements of the Due Process Clause without a request having been made to the trial judge to open the courtroom at the final stage of the proceeding, thereby giving notice of the claim now made and affording the judge an opportunity to avoid reliance on it. This was not a case of the kind of secrecy that deprived petitioner of effective legal assistance and rendered irrelevant his failure to insist upon the claim he now makes. Counsel was present throughout, and it is not claimed that he was not fully aware of the exclusion of the general public. The proceedings properly began out of the public’s presence and one stage of them flowed naturally into the next. There was no obvious point at which, in light of the presence of counsel, it can be said that the onus was imperatively upon the trial judge to interrupt the course of proceedings upon his own motion and establish a conventional public trial. We cannot view petitioner’s untenable general objection to the nature of the proceedings by invoking Rule 42 (b) as constituting appropriate notice of an objection to the exclusion of the general public in the circumstances of this proceeding under Rule 42 (a). This case is wholly unlike In re Oliver, 333 U. S. 257. This is not a case where it is or could be charged that the judge deliberately enforced secrecy in order to be free of the safeguards of the public’s scrutiny; nor is it urged that publicity would in the slightest have affected the conduct of the proceedings or their result. Nor are we dealing with a situation where prejudice, attributable to secrecy, is found to be sufficiently impressive to render irrelevant failure to make a timely objection at proceedings like these. This is obviously not such a case. Due regard generally for the public nature of the judicial process does not require disregard of the solid demands of the fair administration of justice in favor of a party who, at the appropriate time and acting under advice of counsel, saw no disregard of a right, but raises an abstract claim only as an afterthought on appeal. Affirmed. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Chief Justice ROBERTS delivered the opinion of the Court. Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, foreign nationals seeking entry into the United States undergo a vetting process to ensure that they satisfy the numerous requirements for admission. The Act also vests the President with authority to restrict the entry of aliens whenever he finds that their entry "would be detrimental to the interests of the United States." 8 U.S.C. § 1182(f). Relying on that delegation, the President concluded that it was necessary to impose entry restrictions on nationals of countries that do not share adequate information for an informed entry determination, or that otherwise present national security risks. Presidential Proclamation No. 9645, 82 Fed. Reg. 45161 (2017) (Proclamation). The plaintiffs in this litigation, respondents here, challenged the application of those entry restrictions to certain aliens abroad. We now decide whether the President had authority under the Act to issue the Proclamation, and whether the entry policy violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. I A Shortly after taking office, President Trump signed Executive Order No. 13769, Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States. 82 Fed. Reg. 8977 (2017) (EO-1). EO-1 directed the Secretary of Homeland Security to conduct a review to examine the adequacy of information provided by foreign governments about their nationals seeking to enter the United States. § 3(a). Pending that review, the order suspended for 90 days the entry of foreign nationals from seven countries-Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen-that had been previously identified by Congress or prior administrations as posing heightened terrorism risks. § 3(c). The District Court for the Western District of Washington entered a temporary restraining order blocking the entry restrictions, and the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denied the Government's request to stay that order. Washington v. Trump, 847 F.3d 1151 (2017) (per curiam ). In response, the President revoked EO-1, replacing it with Executive Order No. 13780, which again directed a worldwide review. 82 Fed. Reg. 13209 (2017) (EO-2). Citing investigative burdens on agencies and the need to diminish the risk that dangerous individuals would enter without adequate vetting, EO-2 also temporarily restricted the entry (with case-by-case waivers) of foreign nationals from six of the countries covered by EO-1: Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. §§ 2(c), 3(a). The order explained that those countries had been selected because each "is a state sponsor of terrorism, has been significantly compromised by terrorist organizations, or contains active conflict zones." § 1(d). The entry restriction was to stay in effect for 90 days, pending completion of the worldwide review. These interim measures were immediately challenged in court. The District Courts for the Districts of Maryland and Hawaii entered nationwide preliminary injunctions barring enforcement of the entry suspension, and the respective Courts of Appeals upheld those injunctions, albeit on different grounds. International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP ) v. Trump, 857 F.3d 554 (C.A.4 2017) ; Hawaii v. Trump, 859 F.3d 741 (C.A.9 2017) (per curiam ). This Court granted certiorari and stayed the injunctions-allowing the entry suspension to go into effect-with respect to foreign nationals who lacked a "credible claim of a bona fide relationship" with a person or entity in the United States. Trump v. IRAP, 582 U.S. ----, ----, 137 S.Ct. 2080, 2088, 198 L.Ed.2d 643 (2017) (per curiam ). The temporary restrictions in EO-2 expired before this Court took any action, and we vacated the lower court decisions as moot. Trump v. IRAP, 583 U.S. ----, 138 S.Ct. 353, 199 L.Ed.2d 203 (2017) ; Trump v. Hawaii, 583 U.S. ----, 138 S.Ct. 377, 199 L.Ed.2d 275 (2017). On September 24, 2017, after completion of the worldwide review, the President issued the Proclamation before us-Proclamation No. 9645, Enhancing Vetting Capabilities and Processes for Detecting Attempted Entry Into the United States by Terrorists or Other Public-Safety Threats. 82 Fed. Reg. 45161. The Proclamation (as its title indicates) sought to improve vetting procedures by identifying ongoing deficiencies in the information needed to assess whether nationals of particular countries present "public safety threats." § 1(a). To further that purpose, the Proclamation placed entry restrictions on the nationals of eight foreign states whose systems for managing and sharing information about their nationals the President deemed inadequate. The Proclamation described how foreign states were selected for inclusion based on the review undertaken pursuant to EO-2. As part of that review, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in consultation with the State Department and several intelligence agencies, developed a "baseline" for the information required from foreign governments to confirm the identity of individuals seeking entry into the United States, and to determine whether those individuals pose a security threat. § 1(c). The baseline included three components. The first, "identity-management information," focused on whether a foreign government ensures the integrity of travel documents by issuing electronic passports, reporting lost or stolen passports, and making available additional identity-related information. Second, the agencies considered the extent to which the country discloses information on criminal history and suspected terrorist links, provides travel document exemplars, and facilitates the U.S. Government's receipt of information about airline passengers and crews traveling to the United States. Finally, the agencies weighed various indicators of national security risk, including whether the foreign state is a known or potential terrorist safe haven and whether it regularly declines to receive returning nationals following final orders of removal from the United States. Ibid. DHS collected and evaluated data regarding all foreign governments. § 1(d). It identified 16 countries as having deficient information-sharing practices and presenting national security concerns, and another 31 countries as "at risk" of similarly failing to meet the baseline. § 1(e). The State Department then undertook diplomatic efforts over a 50-day period to encourage all foreign governments to improve their practices. § 1(f). As a result of that effort, numerous countries provided DHS with travel document exemplars and agreed to share information on known or suspected terrorists. Ibid. Following the 50-day period, the Acting Secretary of Homeland Security concluded that eight countries-Chad, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, and Yemen-remained deficient in terms of their risk profile and willingness to provide requested information. The Acting Secretary recommended that the President impose entry restrictions on certain nationals from all of those countries except Iraq. §§ 1(g), (h). She also concluded that although Somalia generally satisfied the information-sharing component of the baseline standards, its "identity-management deficiencies" and "significant terrorist presence" presented special circumstances justifying additional limitations. She therefore recommended entry limitations for certain nationals of that country. § 1(i). As for Iraq, the Acting Secretary found that entry limitations on its nationals were not warranted given the close cooperative relationship between the U.S. and Iraqi Governments and Iraq's commitment to combating ISIS. § 1(g). After consulting with multiple Cabinet members and other officials, the President adopted the Acting Secretary's recommendations and issued the Proclamation. Invoking his authority under 8 U.S.C. §§ 1182(f) and 1185(a), the President determined that certain entry restrictions were necessary to "prevent the entry of those foreign nationals about whom the United States Government lacks sufficient information"; "elicit improved identity-management and information-sharing protocols and practices from foreign governments"; and otherwise "advance [the] foreign policy, national security, and counterterrorism objectives" of the United States. Proclamation § 1(h). The President explained that these restrictions would be the "most likely to encourage cooperation" while "protect[ing] the United States until such time as improvements occur." Ibid. The Proclamation imposed a range of restrictions that vary based on the "distinct circumstances" in each of the eight countries. Ibid. For countries that do not cooperate with the United States in identifying security risks (Iran, North Korea, and Syria), the Proclamation suspends entry of all nationals, except for Iranians seeking nonimmigrant student and exchange-visitor visas. §§ 2(b)(ii), (d)(ii), (e)(ii). For countries that have information-sharing deficiencies but are nonetheless "valuable counterterrorism partner[s]" (Chad, Libya, and Yemen), it restricts entry of nationals seeking immigrant visas and nonimmigrant business or tourist visas. §§ 2(a)(i), (c)(i), (g)(i). Because Somalia generally satisfies the baseline standards but was found to present special risk factors, the Proclamation suspends entry of nationals seeking immigrant visas and requires additional scrutiny of nationals seeking nonimmigrant visas. § 2(h)(ii). And for Venezuela, which refuses to cooperate in information sharing but for which alternative means are available to identify its nationals, the Proclamation limits entry only of certain government officials and their family members on nonimmigrant business or tourist visas. § 2(f)(ii). The Proclamation exempts lawful permanent residents and foreign nationals who have been granted asylum. § 3(b). It also provides for case-by-case waivers when a foreign national demonstrates undue hardship, and that his entry is in the national interest and would not pose a threat to public safety. § 3(c)(i); see also § 3(c)(iv) (listing examples of when a waiver might be appropriate, such as if the foreign national seeks to reside with a close family member, obtain urgent medical care, or pursue significant business obligations). The Proclamation further directs DHS to assess on a continuing basis whether entry restrictions should be modified or continued, and to report to the President every 180 days. § 4. Upon completion of the first such review period, the President, on the recommendation of the Secretary of Homeland Security, determined that Chad had sufficiently improved its practices, and he accordingly lifted restrictions on its nationals. Presidential Proclamation No. 9723, 83 Fed. Reg. 15937 (2018). B Plaintiffs in this case are the State of Hawaii, three individuals (Dr. Ismail Elshikh, John Doe # 1, and John Doe # 2), and the Muslim Association of Hawaii. The State operates the University of Hawaii system, which recruits students and faculty from the designated countries. The three individual plaintiffs are U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents who have relatives from Iran, Syria, and Yemen applying for immigrant or nonimmigrant visas. The Association is a nonprofit organization that operates a mosque in Hawaii. Plaintiffs challenged the Proclamation-except as applied to North Korea and Venezuela-on several grounds. As relevant here, they argued that the Proclamation contravenes provisions in the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 66 Stat. 187, as amended. Plaintiffs further claimed that the Proclamation violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, because it was motivated not by concerns pertaining to national security but by animus toward Islam. The District Court granted a nationwide preliminary injunction barring enforcement of the entry restrictions. The court concluded that the Proclamation violated two provisions of the INA: § 1182(f), because the President did not make sufficient findings that the entry of the covered foreign nationals would be detrimental to the national interest, and § 1152(a)(1)(A), because the policy discriminates against immigrant visa applicants on the basis of nationality. 265 F.Supp.3d 1140, 1155-1159 (Haw.2017). The Government requested expedited briefing and sought a stay pending appeal. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit granted a partial stay, permitting enforcement of the Proclamation with respect to foreign nationals who lack a bona fide relationship with the United States. This Court then stayed the injunction in full pending disposition of the Government's appeal. 583 U.S. ----, --- S.Ct. ----, --- L.Ed.2d ---- (2017). The Court of Appeals affirmed. The court first held that the Proclamation exceeds the President's authority under § 1182(f). In its view, that provision authorizes only a "temporary" suspension of entry in response to "exigencies" that "Congress would be ill-equipped to address." 878 F.3d 662, 684, 688 (2017). The court further reasoned that the Proclamation "conflicts with the INA's finely reticulated regulatory scheme" by addressing "matters of immigration already passed upon by Congress." Id., at 685, 690. The Ninth Circuit then turned to § 1152(a)(1)(A) and determined that the entry restrictions also contravene the prohibition on nationality-based discrimination in the issuance of immigrant visas. The court did not reach plaintiffs' Establishment Clause claim. We granted certiorari. 583 U.S. ----, 138 S.Ct. 923, 199 L.Ed.2d 620 (2018). II Before addressing the merits of plaintiffs' statutory claims, we consider whether we have authority to do so. The Government argues that plaintiffs' challenge to the Proclamation under the INA is not justiciable. Relying on the doctrine of consular nonreviewability, the Government contends that because aliens have no "claim of right" to enter the United States, and because exclusion of aliens is "a fundamental act of sovereignty" by the political branches, review of an exclusion decision "is not within the province of any court, unless expressly authorized by law." United States ex rel. Knauff v. Shaughnessy, 338 U.S. 537, 542-543, 70 S.Ct. 309, 94 L.Ed. 317 (1950). According to the Government, that principle barring review is reflected in the INA, which sets forth a comprehensive framework for review of orders of removal, but authorizes judicial review only for aliens physically present in the United States. See Brief for Petitioners 19-20 (citing 8 U.S.C. § 1252 ). The justiciability of plaintiffs' challenge under the INA presents a difficult question. The Government made similar arguments that no judicial review was available in Sale v. Haitian Centers Council, Inc., 509 U.S. 155, 113 S.Ct. 2549, 125 L.Ed.2d 128 (1993). The Court in that case, however, went on to consider on the merits a statutory claim like the one before us without addressing the issue of reviewability. The Government does not argue that the doctrine of consular nonreviewability goes to the Court's jurisdiction, see Tr. of Oral Arg. 13, nor does it point to any provision of the INA that expressly strips the Court of jurisdiction over plaintiffs' claims, see Sebelius v. Auburn Regional Medical Center, 568 U.S. 145, 153, 133 S.Ct. 817, 184 L.Ed.2d 627 (2013) (requiring Congress to "clearly state[ ]" that a statutory provision is jurisdictional). As a result, we may assume without deciding that plaintiffs' statutory claims are reviewable, notwithstanding consular nonreviewability or any other statutory nonreviewability issue, and we proceed on that basis. III The INA establishes numerous grounds on which an alien abroad may be inadmissible to the United States and ineligible for a visa. See, e.g., 8 U.S.C. §§ 1182(a)(1) (health-related grounds), (a)(2) (criminal history), (a)(3)(B) (terrorist activities), (a)(3)(C) (foreign policy grounds). Congress has also delegated to the President authority to suspend or restrict the entry of aliens in certain circumstances. The principal source of that authority, § 1182(f), enables the President to "suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens" whenever he "finds" that their entry "would be detrimental to the interests of the United States." Plaintiffs argue that the Proclamation is not a valid exercise of the President's authority under the INA. In their view, § 1182(f) confers only a residual power to temporarily halt the entry of a discrete group of aliens engaged in harmful conduct. They also assert that the Proclamation violates another provision of the INA- 8 U.S.C. § 1152(a)(1)(A) -because it discriminates on the basis of nationality in the issuance of immigrant visas. By its plain language, § 1182(f) grants the President broad discretion to suspend the entry of aliens into the United States. The President lawfully exercised that discretion based on his findings-following a worldwide, multi-agency review-that entry of the covered aliens would be detrimental to the national interest. And plaintiffs' attempts to identify a conflict with other provisions in the INA, and their appeal to the statute's purposes and legislative history, fail to overcome the clear statutory language. A The text of § 1182(f) states: "Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate." By its terms, § 1182(f) exudes deference to the President in every clause. It entrusts to the President the decisions whether and when to suspend entry ("[w]henever [he] finds that the entry" of aliens "would be detrimental" to the national interest); whose entry to suspend ("all aliens or any class of aliens"); for how long ("for such period as he shall deem necessary"); and on what conditions ("any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate"). It is therefore unsurprising that we have previously observed that § 1182(f) vests the President with "ample power" to impose entry restrictions in addition to those elsewhere enumerated in the INA. Sale, 509 U.S., at 187, 113 S.Ct. 2549 (finding it "perfectly clear" that the President could "establish a naval blockade" to prevent illegal migrants from entering the United States); see also Abourezk v. Reagan, 785 F.2d 1043, 1049, n. 2 (C.A.D.C.1986) (describing the "sweeping proclamation power" in § 1182(f) as enabling the President to supplement the other grounds of inadmissibility in the INA). The Proclamation falls well within this comprehensive delegation. The sole prerequisite set forth in § 1182(f) is that the President "find[ ]" that the entry of the covered aliens "would be detrimental to the interests of the United States." The President has undoubtedly fulfilled that requirement here. He first ordered DHS and other agencies to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of every single country's compliance with the information and risk assessment baseline. The President then issued a Proclamation setting forth extensive findings describing how deficiencies in the practices of select foreign governments-several of which are state sponsors of terrorism-deprive the Government of "sufficient information to assess the risks [those countries' nationals] pose to the United States." Proclamation § 1(h)(i). Based on that review, the President found that it was in the national interest to restrict entry of aliens who could not be vetted with adequate information -both to protect national security and public safety, and to induce improvement by their home countries. The Proclamation therefore "craft[ed]... country-specific restrictions that would be most likely to encourage cooperation given each country's distinct circumstances," while securing the Nation "until such time as improvements occur." Ibid. Plaintiffs believe that these findings are insufficient. They argue, as an initial matter, that the Proclamation fails to provide a persuasive rationale for why nationality alone renders the covered foreign nationals a security risk. And they further discount the President's stated concern about deficient vetting because the Proclamation allows many aliens from the designated countries to enter on nonimmigrant visas. Such arguments are grounded on the premise that § 1182(f) not only requires the President to make a finding that entry "would be detrimental to the interests of the United States," but also to explain that finding with sufficient detail to enable judicial review. That premise is questionable. See Webster v. Doe, 486 U.S. 592, 600, 108 S.Ct. 2047, 100 L.Ed.2d 632 (1988) (concluding that a statute authorizing the CIA Director to terminate an employee when the Director "shall deem such termination necessary or advisable in the interests of the United States" forecloses "any meaningful judicial standard of review"). But even assuming that some form of review is appropriate, plaintiffs' attacks on the sufficiency of the President's findings cannot be sustained. The 12-page Proclamation-which thoroughly describes the process, agency evaluations, and recommendations underlying the President's chosen restrictions-is more detailed than any prior order a President has issued under § 1182(f). Contrast Presidential Proclamation No. 6958, 3 C.F.R. 133 (1996) (President Clinton) (explaining in one sentence why suspending entry of members of the Sudanese government and armed forces "is in the foreign policy interests of the United States"); Presidential Proclamation No. 4865, 3 C.F.R. 50-51 (1981) (President Reagan) (explaining in five sentences why measures to curtail "the continuing illegal migration by sea of large numbers of undocumented aliens into the southeastern United States" are "necessary"). Moreover, plaintiffs' request for a searching inquiry into the persuasiveness of the President's justifications is inconsistent with the broad statutory text and the deference traditionally accorded the President in this sphere. "Whether the President's chosen method" of addressing perceived risks is justified from a policy perspective is "irrelevant to the scope of his [ § 1182(f) ] authority." Sale, 509 U.S., at 187-188, 113 S.Ct. 2549. And when the President adopts "a preventive measure... in the context of international affairs and national security," he is "not required to conclusively link all of the pieces in the puzzle before [courts] grant weight to [his] empirical conclusions." Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, 561 U.S. 1, 35, 130 S.Ct. 2705, 177 L.Ed.2d 355 (2010). The Proclamation also comports with the remaining textual limits in § 1182(f). We agree with plaintiffs that the word "suspend" often connotes a "defer[ral] till later," Webster's Third New International Dictionary 2303 (1966). But that does not mean that the President is required to prescribe in advance a fixed end date for the entry restrictions. Section 1182(f) authorizes the President to suspend entry "for such period as he shall deem necessary." It follows that when a President suspends entry in response to a diplomatic dispute or policy concern, he may link the duration of those restrictions, implicitly or explicitly, to the resolution of the triggering condition. See, e.g., Presidential Proclamation No. 5829, 3 C.F.R. 88 (1988) (President Reagan) (suspending the entry of certain Panamanian nationals "until such time as... democracy has been restored in Panama"); Presidential Proclamation No. 8693, 3 C.F.R. 86-87 (2011) (President Obama) (suspending the entry of individuals subject to a travel restriction under United Nations Security Council resolutions "until such time as the Secretary of State determines that [the suspension] is no longer necessary"). In fact, not one of the 43 suspension orders issued prior to this litigation has specified a precise end date. Like its predecessors, the Proclamation makes clear that its "conditional restrictions" will remain in force only so long as necessary to "address" the identified "inadequacies and risks" within the covered nations. Proclamation Preamble, and § 1(h); see ibid. (explaining that the aim is to "relax[ ] or remove[ ]" the entry restrictions "as soon as possible"). To that end, the Proclamation establishes an ongoing process to engage covered nations and assess every 180 days whether the entry restrictions should be modified or terminated. §§ 4(a), (b). Indeed, after the initial review period, the President determined that Chad had made sufficient improvements to its identity-management protocols, and he accordingly lifted the entry suspension on its nationals. See Proclamation No. 9723, 83 Fed. Reg. 15937. Finally, the Proclamation properly identifies a "class of aliens"-nationals of select countries-whose entry is suspended. Plaintiffs argue that "class" must refer to a well-defined group of individuals who share a common "characteristic" apart from nationality. Brief for Respondents 42. But the text of § 1182(f), of course, does not say that, and the word "class" comfortably encompasses a group of people linked by nationality. Plaintiffs also contend that the class cannot be "overbroad." Brief for Respondents 42. But that simply amounts to an unspoken tailoring requirement found nowhere in Congress's grant of authority to suspend entry of not only "any class of aliens" but "all aliens." In short, the language of § 1182(f) is clear, and the Proclamation does not exceed any textual limit on the President's authority. B Confronted with this "facially broad grant of power," 878 F.3d, at 688, plaintiffs focus their attention on statutory structure and legislative purpose. They seek support in, first, the immigration scheme reflected in the INA as a whole, and, second, the legislative history of § 1182(f) and historical practice. Neither argument justifies departing from the clear text of the statute. 1 Plaintiffs' structural argument starts with the premise that § 1182(f) does not give the President authority to countermand Congress's considered policy judgments. The President, they say, may supplement the INA, but he cannot supplant it. And in their view, the Proclamation falls in the latter category because Congress has already specified a two-part solution to the problem of aliens seeking entry from countries that do not share sufficient information with the United States. First, Congress designed an individualized vetting system that places the burden on the alien to prove his admissibility. See § 1361. Second, instead of banning the entry of nationals from particular countries, Congress sought to encourage information sharing through a Visa Waiver Program offering fast-track admission for countries that cooperate with the United States. See § 1187. We may assume that § 1182(f) does not allow the President to expressly override particular provisions of the INA. But plaintiffs have not identified any conflict between the statute and the Proclamation that would implicitly bar the President from addressing deficiencies in the Nation's vetting system. To the contrary, the Proclamation supports Congress's individualized approach for determining admissibility. The INA sets forth various inadmissibility grounds based on connections to terrorism and criminal history, but those provisions can only work when the consular officer has sufficient (and sufficiently reliable) information to make that determination. The Proclamation promotes the effectiveness of the vetting process by helping to ensure the availability of such information. Plaintiffs suggest that the entry restrictions are unnecessary because consular officers can simply deny visas in individual cases when an alien fails to carry his burden of proving admissibility-for example, by failing to produce certified records regarding his criminal history. Brief for Respondents 48. But that misses the point: A critical finding of the Proclamation is that the failure of certain countries to provide reliable information prevents the Government from accurately determining whether an alien is inadmissible or poses a threat. Proclamation § 1(h). Unless consular officers are expected to apply categorical rules and deny entry from those countries across the board, fraudulent or unreliable documentation may thwart their review in individual cases. And at any rate, the INA certainly does not require that systemic problems such as the lack of reliable information be addressed only in a progression of case-by-case admissibility determinations. One of the key objectives of the Proclamation is to encourage foreign governments to improve their practices, thus facilitating the Government's vetting process overall. Ibid. Nor is there a conflict between the Proclamation and the Visa Waiver Program. The Program allows travel without a visa for short-term visitors from 38 countries that have entered into a "rigorous security partnership" with the United States. DHS, U.S. Visa Waiver Program (Apr. 6, 2016), http://www.dhs.gov/visa-waiver-program (as last visited June 25, 2018). Eligibility for that partnership involves "broad and consequential assessments of [the country's] foreign security standards and operations." Ibid. A foreign government must (among other things) undergo a comprehensive evaluation of its "counterterrorism, law enforcement, immigration enforcement, passport security, and border management capabilities," often including "operational site inspections of airports, seaports, land borders, and passport production and issuance facilities." Ibid. Congress's decision to authorize a benefit for "many of America's closest allies," ibid., did not implicitly foreclose the Executive from imposing tighter restrictions on nationals of certain high-risk countries. The Visa Waiver Program creates a special exemption for citizens of countries that maintain exemplary security standards and offer "reciprocal [travel] privileges" to United States citizens. 8 U.S.C. § 1187(a)(2)(A). But in establishing a select partnership covering less than 20% of the countries in the world, Congress did not address what requirements should govern the entry of nationals from the vast majority of countries that fall short of that gold standard-particularly those nations presenting heightened terrorism concerns. Nor did Congress attempt to determine-as the multi-agency review process did-whether those high-risk countries provide a minimum baseline of information to adequately vet their nationals. Once again, this is not a situation where "Congress has stepped into the space and solved the exact problem." Tr. of Oral Arg. 53. Although plaintiffs claim that their reading preserves for the President a flexible power to "supplement" the INA, their understanding of the President's authority is remarkably cramped: He may suspend entry by classes of aliens "similar in nature" to the existing categories of inadmissibility-but not too similar-or only in response to "some exigent circumstance" that Congress did not already touch on in the INA. Brief for Respondents 31, 36, 50; see also Tr. of Oral Arg. 57 ("Presidents have wide berth in this area... if there's any sort of emergency."). In any event, no Congress that wanted to confer on the President only a residual authority to address emergency situations would ever use language of the sort in § 1182(f). Fairly read, the provision vests authority in the President to impose additional limitations on entry beyond the grounds for exclusion set forth in the INA-including in response to circumstances that might affect the vetting system or other "interests of the United States." Because plaintiffs do not point to any contradiction with another provision of the INA, the President has not exceeded his authority under § 1182(f). 2 Plaintiffs seek to locate additional limitations on the scope of § 1182(f) in the statutory background and legislative history. Given the clarity of the text, we need not consider such extra-textual evidence. See State Farm Fire & Casualty Co. v. United States ex rel. Rigsby, 580 U.S. ----, ----, 137 S.Ct. 436, 444, 196 L.Ed.2d 340 (2016). At any rate, plaintiffs' evidence supports the plain meaning of the provision. Drawing on legislative debates over § 1182(f), plaintiffs suggest that the President's suspension power should be limited to exigencies where it would be difficult for Congress to react promptly. Precursor provisions enacted during the First and Second World Wars confined the President's exclusion authority to times of "war" and "national emergency." See Act of May 22, 1918, § 1(a), 40 Stat. 559; Act of June 21, 1941, ch. 210, § 1, 55 Stat. 252. When Congress enacted § 1182(f) in 1952, plaintiffs note, it borrowed "nearly verbatim" from those predecessor statutes, and one of the bill's sponsors affirmed that the provision would apply only during a time of crisis. According to plaintiffs, it therefore follows that Congress sought to delegate only a similarly tailored suspension power in § 1182(f). Brief for Respondents 39-40. If anything, the drafting history suggests the opposite. In borrowing "nearly verbatim" from the pre-existing statute, Congress made one critical alteration-it removed the national emergency standard that plaintiffs now seek to reintroduce in another form. Weighing Congress's conscious departure from its wartime statutes against an isolated floor statement, the departure is far more probative. See NLRB v. SW General, Inc., 580 U.S. ----, ----, 137 S.Ct. 929, 943, 197 L.Ed.2d 263 (2017) ("[F]loor statements by individual legislators rank among the least illuminating forms of legislative history."). When Congress wishes to condition an exercise of executive authority on the President's finding of an exigency or crisis, it knows how to say just that. See, e.g., 16 U.S.C. § 824o -1(b) ; 42 U.S.C. § 5192 ; 50 U.S.C. §§ 1701, 1702. Here, Congress instead chose to condition the President's exercise of the suspension authority on a different finding: that the entry of an alien or class of aliens would be "detrimental to the interests of the United States." Plaintiffs also strive to infer limitations from executive practice. By their count, every previous suspension order under § 1182(f) can be slotted into one of two categories. The vast majority targeted discrete groups of foreign nationals engaging in conduct "deemed harmful by the immigration laws." And the remaining entry restrictions that focused on entire nationalities-namely, President Carter's response to the Iran hostage crisis and President Reagan's suspension of immigration from Cuba-were, in their view, designed as a response to diplomatic emergencies "that the immigration laws do not address." Brief for Respondents 40-41. Even if we were willing to confine expansive language in light of its past applications, the historical evidence is more equivocal than plaintiffs acknowledge. Presidents have repeatedly suspended entry not because the covered nationals themselves engaged in harmful acts but instead to retaliate for conduct by their governments that conflicted with U.S. foreign policy interests. See, e.g., Exec. Order No. 13662, 3 C.F.R. 233 (2014) (President Obama) (suspending entry of Russian nationals working in the financial services, energy, mining, engineering, or defense sectors, in light of the Russian Federation's "annexation of Crimea and its use of force in Ukraine"); Presidential Proclamation No. 6958, 3 C.F.R. 133 (1997) (President Clinton) (suspending entry of Sudanese governmental and military personnel, citing "foreign policy interests of the United States" based on Sudan's refusal to comply with United Nations resolution). And while some of these reprisals were directed at subsets of aliens from the countries at issue, others broadly suspended entry on the basis of nationality due to ongoing diplomatic disputes. For example, President Reagan invoked § 1182(f) to suspend entry "as immigrants" by almost all Cuban nationals, to apply pressure on the Cuban Government. Presidential Proclamation No. 5517, 3 C.F.R. 102 (1986). Plaintiffs try to fit this latter Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

B

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Chief Justice Burger delivered the opinion of the Court. We granted certiorari to consider whether, at respondent Williams’ second murder trial in state court, evidence pertaining to the discovery and condition of the victim’s body was properly admitted on the ground that it would ultimately or inevitably have been discovered even if no violation of any constitutional or statutory provision had taken place. On December 24, 1968, 10-year-old Pamela Powers disappeared from a YMCA building in Des Moines, Iowa, where she had accompanied her parents to watch an athletic contest. Shortly after she disappeared, Williams was seen leaving the YMCA carrying a large bundle wrapped in a blanket; a 14-year-old boy who had helped Williams open his car door reported that he had seen “two legs in it and they were skinny and white.” Williams’ car was found the next day 160 miles east of Des Moines in Davenport, Iowa. Later several items of clothing belonging to the child, some of Williams’ clothing, and an army blanket like the one used to wrap the bundle that Williams carried out of the YMCA were found at a rest stop on Interstate 80 near Grinnell, between Des Moines and Davenport. A warrant was issued for Williams’ arrest. Police surmised that Williams had left Pamela Powers or her body somewhere between Des Moines and the Grinnell rest stop where some of the young girl’s clothing had been found. On December 26, the Iowa Bureau of Criminal Investigation initiated a large-scale search. Two hundred volunteers divided into teams began the search 21 miles east of Grinnell, covering an area several miles to the north and south of Interstate 80. They moved westward from Poweshiek County, in which Grinnell was located, into Jasper County. Searchers were instructed to check all roads, abandoned farm buildings, ditches, culverts, and any other place in which the body of a small child could be hidden. Meanwhile, Williams surrendered to local police in Davenport, where he was promptly arraigned. Williams contacted a Des Moines attorney who arranged for an attorney in Davenport to meet Williams at the Davenport police station. Des Moines police informed counsel they would pick Williams up in Davenport and return him to Des Moines without questioning him. Two Des Moines detectives then drove to Davenport, took Williams into custody, and proceeded to drive him back to Des Moines. During the return trip, one of the policemen, Detective Learning, began a conversation with Williams, saying: “I want to give you something to think about while we’re traveling down the road. .. . They are predicting several inches of snow for tonight, and I feel that you yourself are the only person that knows where this little girl’s body is . . . and if you get a snow on top of it you yourself may be unable to find it. And since we will be going right past the area [where the body is] on the way into Des Moines, I feel that we could stop and locate the body, that the parents of this little girl should be entitled to a Christian burial for the little girl who was snatched away from them on Christmas [E]ve and murdered. . . . [A]fter a snow storm [we may not be] able to find it at all.” Learning told Williams he knew the body was in the area of Mitchellville — a town they would be passing on the way to Des Moines. He concluded the conversation by saying: “I do not want you to answer me. . . . Just think about it . . . .” Later, as the police car approached Grinnell, Williams asked Learning whether the police had found the young girl’s shoes. After Learning replied that he was unsure, Williams directed the police to a point near a service station where he said he had left the shoes; they were not found. As they continued the drive to Des Moines, Williams asked whether the blanket had been found and then directed the officers to a rest area in Grinnell where he said he had disposed of the blanket; they did not find the blanket. At this point Learning and his party were joined by the officers in charge of the search. As they approached Mitchellville, Williams, without any further conversation, agreed to direct the officers to the child’s body. The officers directing the search had called off the search at 3 p. m., when they left the Grinnell Police Department to join Learning at the rest area. At that time, one search team near the Jasper County-Polk County line was only two and one-half miles from where Williams soon guided Learning and his party to the body. The child’s body was found next to a culvert in a ditch beside a gravel road in Polk County, about two miles south of Interstate 80, and essentially within the area to be searched. B First Trial In February 1969 Williams was indicted for first-degree murder. Before trial in the Iowa court, his counsel moved to suppress evidence of the body and all related evidence including the condition of the body as shown by the autopsy. The ground for the motion was that such evidence was the “fruit” or product of Williams’ statements made during the automobile ride from Davenport to Des Moines and prompted by Learning’s statements. The motion to suppress was denied. The jury found Williams guilty of first-degree murder; the judgment of conviction was affirmed by the Iowa Supreme Court. State v. Williams, 182 N. W. 2d 396 (1970). Williams then sought release on habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa. That court concluded that the evidence in question had been wrongly admitted at Williams’ trial, Williams v. Brewer, 375 F. Supp. 170 (1974); a divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit agreed. 509 F. 2d 227 (1974). We granted certiorari, 423 U. S. 1031 (1975), and a divided Court affirmed, holding that Detective Learning had obtained incriminating statements from Williams by what was viewed as interrogation in violation of his right to counsel. Brewer v. Williams, 430 U. S. 387 (1977). This Court’s opinion noted, however, that although Williams’ incriminating statements could not be introduced into evidence at a second trial, evidence of the body’s location and condition “might well be admissible on the theory that the body would have been discovered in any event, even had incriminating statements not been elicited from Williams.” Id., at 407, n. 12. C Second Trial At Williams’ second trial in 1977 in the Iowa court, the prosecution did not offer Williams’ statements into evidence, nor did it seek to show that Williams had directed the police to the child’s body. However, evidence of the condition of her body as it was found, articles and photographs of her clothing, and the results of post mortem medical and chemical tests on the body were admitted. The trial court concluded that the State had proved by a preponderance of the evidence that, if the search had not been suspended and Williams had not led the police to the victim, her body would have been discovered “within a short time” in essentially the same condition as it was actually found. The trial court also ruled that if the police had not located the body, “the search would clearly have been taken up again where it left off, given the extreme circumstances of this case and the body would [have] been found in short order” App. 86 (emphasis added). In finding that the body would have been discovered in essentially the same condition as it was actually found, the court noted that freezing temperatures had prevailed and tissue deterioration would have been suspended. Id., at 87. The challenged evidence was admitted and the jury again found Williams guilty of first-degree murder; he was sentenced to life in prison. On appeal, the Supreme Court of Iowa again affirmed. 285 N. W. 2d 248 (1979). That court held that there was in fact a “hypothetical independent source” exception to the exclusionary rule: “After the defendant has shown unlawful conduct on the part of the police, the State has the burden to show by a preponderance of the evidence that (1) the police did not act in bad faith for the purpose of hastening discovery of the evidence in question, and (2) that the evidence in question would have been discovered by lawful means.” Id., at 260. As to the first element, the Iowa Supreme Court, having reviewed the relevant cases, stated: “The issue of the propriety of the police conduct in this case, as noted earlier in this opinion, has caused the closest possible division of views in every appellate court which has considered the question. In light of the legitimate disagreement among individuals well versed in the law of criminal procedure who were given the opportunity for calm deliberation, it cannot be said that the actions of the police were taken in bad faith.” Id., at 260-261. The Iowa court then reviewed the evidence de novo and concluded that the State had shown by a preponderance of the evidence that, even if Williams had not guided police to the child’s body, it would inevitably have been found by lawful activity of the search party before its condition had materially changed. In 1980 Williams renewed his attack on the state-court conviction by seeking a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa. The District Court conducted its own independent review of the evidence and concluded, as had the state courts, that the body would inevitably have been found by the searchers in essentially the same condition it was in when Williams led police to its discovery. The District Court denied Williams’ petition. 528 F. Supp. 664 (1981). The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit reversed, 700 F. 2d 1164 (1983); an equally divided court denied rehearing en banc. Id., at 1175. That court assumed, without deciding, that there is an inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule and that the Iowa Supreme Court correctly stated that exception to require proof that the police did not act in bad faith and that the evidence would have been discovered absent any constitutional violation. In reversing the District Court’s denial of habeas relief, the Court of Appeals stated: “We hold that the State has not met the first requirement. It is therefore unnecessary to decide whether the state courts’ finding that the body would have been discovered anyway is fairly supported by the record. It is also unnecessary to decide whether the State must prove the two elements of the exception by clear and convincing evidence, as defendant argues, or by a preponderance of the evidence, as the state courts held. “The state trial court, in denying the motion to suppress, made no finding one way or the other on the question of bad faith. Its opinion does not even mention the issue and seems to proceed on the assumption — contrary to the rule of law later laid down by the Supreme Court of Iowa — that the State needed to show only that the body would have been discovered in any event. The Iowa Supreme Court did expressly address the issue . . . and a finding by an appellate court of a state is entitled to the same presumption of correctness that attaches to trial-court findings under 28 U. S. C. § 2254(d). . . . We conclude, however, that the state Supreme Court’s finding that the police did not act in bad faith is not entitled to the shield of §2254(d) . . . .” Id., at 1169-1170 (footnotes omitted). We granted the State’s petition for certiorari, 461 U. S. 956 (1983), and we reverse. a > The Iowa Supreme Court correctly stated that the “vast majority” of all courts, both state and federal, recognize an inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule. We are now urged to adopt and apply the so-called ultimate or inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule. Williams contends that evidence of the body’s location and condition is “fruit of the poisonous tree,” i. e., the “fruit” or product of Detective Learning’s plea to help the child’s parents give her “a Christian burial,” which this Court had already held equated to interrogation. He contends that admitting the challenged evidence violated the Sixth Amendment whether it would have been inevitably discovered or not. Williams also contends that, if the inevitable discovery doctrine is constitutionally permissible, it must include a threshold showing of police good faith. B The doctrine requiring courts to suppress evidence as the tainted “fruit” of unlawful governmental conduct had its genesis in Silverthome Lumber Co. v. United States, 251 U. S. 385 (1920); there, the Court held that the exclusionary rule applies not only to the illegally obtained evidence itself, but also to other incriminating evidence derived from the primary evidence. The holding of Silverthome was carefully limited, however, for the Court emphasized that such information does not automatically become “sacred and inaccessible.” Id., at 392. “If knowledge of [such facts] is gained from an independent source, they may be proved like any others . . . .” Ibid, (emphasis added). Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U. S. 471 (1963), extended the exclusionary rule to evidence that was the indirect product or “fruit” of unlawful police conduct, but there again the Court emphasized that evidence that has been illegally obtained need not always be suppressed, stating: “We need not hold that all evidence is ‘fruit of the poisonous tree’ simply because it would not have come to light but for the illegal actions of the police. Rather, the more apt question in such a case is ‘whether, granting establishment of the primary illegality, the evidence to which instant objection is made has been come at by exploitation of that illegality or instead by means sufficiently distinguishable to be purged of the primary taint. Id., at 487-488 (emphasis added) (quoting J. Maguire, Evidence of Guilt 221 (1959)). The Court thus pointedly negated the kind of good-faith requirement advanced by the Court of Appeals in reversing the District Court. Although Silverthorne and Wong Sun involved violations of the Fourth Amendment, the “fruit of the poisonous tree” doctrine has not been limited to cases in which there has been a Fourth Amendment violation. The Court has applied the doctrine where the violations were of the Sixth Amendment, see United States v. Wade, 388 U. S. 218 (1967), as well as of the Fifth Amendment. The core rationale consistently advanced by this Court for extending the exclusionary rule to evidence that is the fruit of unlawful police conduct has been that this admittedly drastic and socially costly course is needed to deter police from violations of constitutional and statutory protections. This Court has accepted the argument that the way to ensure such protections is to exclude evidence seized as a result of such violations notwithstanding the high social cost of letting persons obviously guilty go unpunished for their crimes. On this rationale, the prosecution is not to be put in a better position than it would have been in if no illegality had transpired. By contrast, the derivative evidence analysis ensures that the prosecution is not put in a worse position simply because of some earlier police error or misconduct. The independent source doctrine allows admission of evidence that has been discovered by means wholly independent of any constitutional violation. That doctrine, although closely related to the inevitable discovery doctrine, does not apply here; Williams’ statements to Learning indeed led police to the child’s body, but that is not the whole story. The independent source doctrine teaches us that the interest of society in deterring unlawful police conduct and the public interest in having juries receive all probative evidence of a crime are properly balanced by putting the police in the same, not a worse, position that they would have been in if no police error or misconduct had occurred. See Murphy v. Waterfront Comm’n of New York Harbor, 378 U. S. 52, 79 (1964); Kastigar v. United States, 406 U. S. 441, 457, 458-459 (1972). When the challenged evidence has an independent source, exclusion of such evidence would put the police in a worse position than they would have been in absent any error or violation. There is a functional similarity between these two doctrines in that exclusion of evidence that would inevitably have been discovered would also put the government in a worse position, because the police would have obtained that evidence if no misconduct had taken place. Thus, while the independent source exception would not justify admission of evidence in this case, its rationale is wholly consistent with and justifies our adoption of the ultimate or inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule. It is clear that the cases implementing the exclusionary rule “begin with the premise that the challenged evidence is in some sense the product of illegal governmental activity.” United States v. Crews, 445 U. S. 463, 471 (1980) (emphasis added). Of course, this does not end the inquiry. If the prosecution can establish by a preponderance of the evidence that the information ultimately or inevitably would have been discovered by lawful means — here the volunteers’ search— then the deterrence rationale has so little basis that the evidence should be received. Anything less would reject logic, experience, and common sense. The requirement that the prosecution must prove the absence of bad faith, imposed here by the Court of Appeals, would place courts in the position of withholding from juries relevant and undoubted truth that would have been available to police absent any unlawful police activity. Of course, that view would put the police in a worse position than they would have been in if no unlawful conduct had transpired. And, of equal importance, it wholly fails to take into account the enormous societal cost of excluding truth in the search for truth in the administration of justice. Nothing in this Court’s prior holdings supports any such formalistic, pointless, and punitive approach. The Court of Appeals concluded, without analysis, that if an absence-of-bad-faith requirement were not imposed, “the temptation to risk deliberate violations of the Sixth Amendment would be too great, and the deterrent effect of the Exclusionary Rule reduced too far.” 700 F. 2d, at 1169, n. 5. We reject that view. A police officer who is faced with the opportunity to obtain evidence illegally will rarely, if ever, be in a position to calculate whether the evidence sought would inevitably be discovered. Cf. United States v. Ceccolini, 435 U. S. 268, 283 (1978): “[T]he concept of effective deterrence assumes that the police officer consciously realizes the probable consequences of a presumably impermissible course of conduct” (opinion concurring in judgment). On the other hand, when an officer is aware that the evidence will inevitably be discovered, he will try to avoid engaging in any questionable practice. In that situation, there will be little to gain from taking any dubious “shortcuts” to obtain the evidence. Significant disincentives to obtaining evidence illegally — including the possibility of departmental discipline and civil liability — also lessen the likelihood that the ultimate or inevitable discovery exception will promote police misconduct. See Bivens v. Six Unknown Federal Narcotics Agents, 403 U. S. 388, 397 (1971). In these circumstances, the societal costs of the exclusionary rule far outweigh any possible benefits to deterrence that a good-faith requirement might produce. Williams contends that because he did not waive his right to the assistance of counsel, the Court may not balance competing values in deciding whether the challenged evidence was properly admitted. He argues that, unlike the exclusionary rule in the Fourth Amendment context, the essential purpose of which is to deter police misconduct, the Sixth Amendment exclusionary rule is designed to protect the right to a fair trial and the integrity of the factfinding process. Williams contends that, when those interests are at stake, the societal costs of excluding evidence obtained from responses presumed involuntary are irrelevant in determining whether such evidence should be excluded. We disagree. Exclusion of physical evidence that would inevitably have been discovered adds nothing to either the integrity or fairness of a criminal trial. The Sixth Amendment right to counsel protects against unfairness by preserving the adversary process in which the reliability of proffered evidence may be tested in cross-examination. See United States v. Ash, 413 U. S. 300, 314 (1973); Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U. S. 218, 241 (1973). Here, however, Detective Learning’s conduct did nothing to impugn the reliability of the evidence in question — the body of the child and its condition as it was found, articles of clothing found on the body, and the autopsy. No one would seriously contend that the presence of counsel in the police car when Learning appealed to Williams’ decent human instincts would have had any bearing on the reliability of the body as evidence. Suppression, in these circumstances, would do nothing whatever to promote the integrity of the trial process, but would inflict a wholly unacceptable burden on the administration of criminal justice. Nor would suppression ensure fairness on the theory that it tends to safeguard the adversary system of justice. To assure the fairness of trial proceedings, this Court has held that assistance of counsel must be available at pretrial confrontations where “the subsequent trial [cannot] cure a[n otherwise] one-sided confrontation between prosecuting authorities and the uncounseled defendant.” United States v. Ash, supra, at 315. Fairness can be assured by placing the State and the accused in the same positions they would have been in had the impermissible conduct not taken place. However, if the government can prove that the evidence would have been obtained inevitably and, therefore, would have been admitted regardless of any overreaching by the police, there is no rational basis to keep that evidence from the jury in order to ensure the fairness of the trial proceedings. In that situation, the State has gained no advantage at trial and the defendant has suffered no prejudice. Indeed, suppression of the evidence would operate to undermine the adversary system by putting the State in a worse position than it would have occupied without any police misconduct. Williams’ argument that inevitable discovery constitutes impermissible balancing of values is without merit. More than a half century ago, Judge, later Justice, Cardozo made his seminal observation that under the exclusionary rule “[t]he criminal is to go free because the constable has blundered.” People v. Defore, 242 N. Y. 13, 21, 150 N. E. 585, 587 (1926). Prophetically, he went on to consider “how far-reaching in its effect upon society” the exclusionary rule would be when “[t]he pettiest peace officer would have it in his power through overzeal or indiscretion to confer immunity upon an offender for crimes the most flagitious.” Id., at 23, 150 N. E., at 588. Some day, Cardozo speculated, some court might press the exclusionary rule to the outer limits of its logic — or beyond— and suppress evidence relating to the “body of a murdered” victim because of the means by which it was found. Id., at 23-24, 150 N. E., at 588. Cardozo’s prophecy was fulfilled in Killough v. United States, 114 U. S. App. D. C. 305, 309, 315 F. 2d 241, 245 (1962) (en banc). But when, as here, the evidence in question would inevitably have been discovered without reference to the police error or misconduct, there is no nexus sufficient to provide a taint and the evidence is admissible. C The Court of Appeals did not find it necessary to consider whether the record fairly supported the finding that the volunteer search party would ultimately or inevitably have discovered the victim’s body. However, three courts independently reviewing the evidence have found that the body of the child inevitably would have been found by the searchers. Williams challenges these findings, asserting that the record contains only the “post hoc rationalization” that the search efforts would have proceeded two and one-half miles into Polk County where Williams had led police to the body. When that challenge was made at the suppression hearing preceding Williams’ second trial, the prosecution offered the testimony of Agent Ruxlow of the Iowa Bureau of Criminal Investigation. Ruxlow had organized and directed some 200 volunteers who were searching for the child’s body. Tr. of Hearings on Motion to Suppress in State v. Williams, No. CR 55805, p. 34 (May 31, 1977). The searchers were instructed “to check all the roads, the ditches, any culverts .... If they came upon any abandoned farm buildings, they were instructed to go onto the property and search those abandoned farm buildings or any other places where a small child could be secreted.” Id., at 35. Ruxlow testified that he marked off highway maps of Poweshiek and Jasper Counties in grid fashion, divided the volunteers into teams of four to six persons, and assigned each team to search specific grid areas. Id., at 34. Ruxlow also testified that, if the search had not been suspended because of Williams’ promised cooperation, it would have continued into Polk County, using the same grid system. Id., at 36, 39-40. Although he had previously marked off into grids only the highway maps of Poweshiek and Jasper Counties, Ruxlow had obtained a map of Polk County, which he said he would have marked off in the same manner had it been necessary for the search to continue. Id., at 39. The search had commenced at approximately 10 a. m. and moved westward through Poweshiek County into Jasper County. At approximately 3 p. m., after Williams had volunteered to cooperate with the police, Detective Learning, who was in the police car with Williams, sent word to Ruxlow and the other Special Agent directing the search to meet him at the Grinnell truck stop and the search was suspended at that time. Id., at 51-52. Ruxlow also stated that he was “under the impression that there was a possibility” that Williams would lead them to the child’s body at that time. Id., at 61. The search was not resumed once it was learned that Williams had led the police to the body, id., at 57, which was found two and one-half miles from where the search had stopped in what would have been the easternmost grid to be searched in Polk County, id., at 39. There was testimony that it would have taken an additional three to five hours to discover the body if the search had continued, id., at 41; the body was found near a culvert, one of the kinds of places the teams had been specifically directed to search. On this record it is clear that the search parties were approaching the actual location of the body, and we are satisfied, along with three courts earlier, that the volunteer search teams would have resumed the search had Williams not earlier led the police to the body and the body inevitably would have been found. The evidence asserted by Williams as newly discovered, i. e., certain photographs of the body and deposition testimony of Agent Ruxlow made in connection with the federal habeas proceeding, does not demonstrate that the material facts were inadequately developed in the suppression hearing in state court or that Williams was denied a full, fair, and adequate opportunity to present all relevant facts at the suppression hearing. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Iowa law provides for de novo appellate review of factual as well as legal determinations in cases raising constitutional challenges. See, e. g., Armento v. Baughman, 290 N. W. 2d 11, 15 (Iowa 1980); State v. Ege, 274 N. W. 2d 350, 352 (Iowa 1979). Every Federal Court of Appeals having jurisdiction over criminal matters, including the Eighth Circuit in a case decided after the instant case, has endorsed the inevitable discovery doctrine. See Wayne v. United States, 115 U. S. App. D. C. 234, 238, 318 F. 2d 205, 209, cert. denied, 375 U. S. 860 (1963); United States v. Bienvenue, 632 F. 2d 910, 914 (CA1 1980); United States v. Fisher, 700 F. 2d 780, 784 (CA2 1983); Government of Virgin Islands v. Gereau, 502 F. 2d 914, 927-928 (CA3 1974), cert. denied, 420 U. S. 909 (1975); United States v. Seohnlein, 423 F. 2d 1051, 1053 (CA4), cert. denied, 399 U. S. 913 (1970); United States v. Brookins, 614 F. 2d 1037, 1042, 1044 (CA5 1980); Papp v. Jago, 656 F. 2d 221, 222 (CA6 1981); United States ex rel. Owens v. Twomey, 508 F. 2d 858, 865-866 (CA7 1974); United States v. Apker, 705 F. 2d 293, 306-307 (CA8 1983); United States v. Schmidt, 573 F. 2d 1057, 1065-1066, n. 9 (CA9), cert. denied, 439 U. S. 881 (1978); United States v. Romero, 692 F. 2d 699, 704 (CA10 1982); United States v. Roper, 681 F. 2d 1354, 1358 (CA11 1982). In Murphy v. Waterfront Comm’n of New York Harbor, 378 U. S. 52, 79 (1964), the Court held that “a state witness may not be compelled to give testimony which may be incriminating under federal law unless the compelled testimony and its fruits cannot be used in any manner by federal officials in connection with a criminal prosecution against him.” The Court added, however, that “[o]nce a defendant demonstrates that he has testified, under a state grant of immunity, to matters related to the federal prosecution, the federal authorities have the burden of showing that their evidence is not tainted by establishing that they had an independent, legitimate source for the disputed evidence.” Id., at 79, n. 18; see id., at 103 (White, J., concurring). Application of the independent source doctrine in the Fifth Amendment context was reaffirmed in Kastigar v. United States, 406 U. S. 441, 460-461 (1972). The ultimate or inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule is closely related in purpose to the harmless-error rule of Chapman v. California, 386 U. S. 18, 22 (1967). The harmless-constitutional-error rule “serve[s] a very useful purpose insofar as [it] block[s] setting aside convictions for small errors or defects that have little, if any, likelihood of having changed the result of the trial.” The purpose of the inevitable discovery rule is to block setting aside convictions that would have been obtained without police misconduct. As to the quantum of proof, we have already established some relevant guidelines. In United States v. Matlock, 415 U. S. 164, 178, n. 14 (1974) (emphasis added), we stated that “the controlling burden of proof at suppression hearings should impose no greater burden than proof by a preponderance of the evidence.” In Lego v. Twomey, 404 U. S. 477, 488 (1972), we observed “from our experience [that] no substantial evidence has accumulated that federal rights have suffered from determining admissibility by a preponderance of the evidence” and held that the prosecution must prove by a preponderance of the evidence that a confession sought to be used at trial was voluntary. We are unwilling to impose added burdens on the already difficult task of proving guilt in criminal cases by enlarging the barrier to placing evidence of unquestioned truth before juries. Williams argues that the preponderance-of-the-evidence standard used by the Iowa courts is inconsistent with United States v. Wade, 388 U. S. 218 (1967). In requiring clear and convincing evidence of an independent source for an in-court identification, the Court gave weight to the effect an uncounseled pretrial identification has in “crystallizing] the witnesses’ identification of the defendant for future reference.” Id., at 240. The Court noted as well that possible unfairness at the lineup “may be the sole means of attack upon the unequivocal courtroom identification,” ibid., and recognized the difficulty of determining whether an in-court identification was based on independent recollection unaided by the lineup identification, ■id., at 240-241. By contrast, inevitable discovery involves no speculative elements but focuses on demonstrated historical facts capable of ready verification or impeachment and does not require a departure from the usual burden of proof at suppression hearings. Williams had presented to the District Court newly discovered evidence consisting of “previously overlooked photographs of the body at the site of its discovery and recent deposition testimony of the investigative officer in charge of the search [Ruxlow].” 528 F. Supp., at 671, n. 6. He contends that Ruxlow’s testimony was no more than “post hoc rationalization” and challenges Ruxlow’s credibility. However, the state trial court and Federal District Court that heard Ruxlow’s testimony credited it. The District Court found that the newly discovered evidence “neither adds much to nor subtracts much from the suppression hearing evidence.” Ibid. In view of our holding that the challenged evidence was admissible under the inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule, we find it unnecessary to decide whether Stone v. Powell, 428 U. S. 465 (1976), should be extended to bar federal habeas corpus review of Williams’ Sixth Amendment claim, and we express no view on that issue. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Marshall delivered the opinion of the Court. This case presents the question whether the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB or Board), in evaluating an employer’s claim that it had a reasonable basis for doubting a union’s majority support, must presume that striker replacements oppose the union. We hold that the Board acted within its discretion in refusing to adopt a presumption of replacement opposition to the union and therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals. I Upon certification by the NLRB as the exclusive bargaining agent for a unit of employees, a union enjoys an irrebuttable presumption of majority support for one year. Fall River Dyeing & Finishing Corp. v. NLRB, 482 U. S. 27, 37 (1987). During that time, an employer’s refusal to bargain with the union is per se an unfair labor practice under §§ 8(a)(1) and 8(a)(5) of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), 49 Stat. 452, as amended, 29 U. S. C. §§ 158(a)(1), 158(a)(5). See Celanese Corp. of America, 95 N. L. R. B. 664, 672 (1951); R. Gorman, Labor Law, Unionization and Collective Bargaining 109 (1976). After the first year, the presumption continues but is rebuttable. Fall River, supra, at 38. Under the Board’s longstanding approach, an employer may rebut that presumption by showing that, at the time of the refusal to bargain, either (1) the union did not in fact enjoy majority support, or (2) the employer had a “good-faith” doubt, founded on a sufficient objective basis, of the union’s majority support. Station KKHI, 284 N. L. R. B. 1339 (1987), enf’d, 891 F. 2d. 230 (CA9 1989). The question presented in this case is whether the Board must, in determining whether an employer has presented sufficient objective evidence of a good-faith doubt, presume that striker replacements oppose the union. The Board has long presumed that new employees hired in nonstrike circumstances support the incumbent union in the same proportion as the employees they replace. See, e. g., National Plastic Products Co., 78 N. L. R. B. 699, 706 (1948). The Board’s approach to evaluating the union sentiments of employees hired to replace strikers, however, has not been so consistent. Initially, the Board appeared to assume that replacements did not support the union. See, e. g., Stoner Rubber Co., 123 N. L. R. B. 1440, 1444 (1959) (stating that it was not “unreasonable [for the employer] to assume that none of the... permanent replacements were union adherents”); Jackson Mfg. Co., 129 N. L. R. B. 460, 478 (1960) (stating that it was “most improbable” that replacements desired representation by the strikers’ union); Titan Metal Mfg. Co., 135 N. L. R. B. 196, 215 (1962) (finding that employer had “good cause to doubt the Union’s majority” because “no evidence that any of the replacements had authorized the Union to represent them” had been presented); S & M Mfg. Co., 172 N. L. R. B. 1008, 1009 (1968) (same). A1974 decision, Peoples Gas System, Inc., 214 N. L. R. B. 944 (1974), rev’d and remanded on other grounds sub nom. Teamsters Local Union 769 v. NLRB, 174 U. S. App. D. C. 310, 316, 532 F. 2d 1385, 1391 (1976), signalled a shift in the Board’s approach. The Board recognized that “it is of course possible that the replacements, who had chosen not to engage in the strike activity, might nevertheless have favored union representation.” 214 N. L. R. B., at 947. Still, the Board held that “it was not unreasonable for [the employer] to infer that the degree of union support among these employees who had chosen to ignore a Union-sponsored picket line might well be somewhat weaker than the support offered by those who had vigorously engaged in concerted activity on behalf on [sic] Union-sponsored objectives.” Ibid. A year later, in Cutten Supermarket, 220 N. L. R. B. 507 (1975), the Board reversed course completely, stating that striker replacements, like new employees generally, are presumed to support the union in the same ratio as the strikers they replaced. Id., at 509. The Board’s initial adherence to this new approach, however, was equivocal. In Arkay Packaging Corp., 227 N. L. R. B. 397 (1976), review denied sub nom. New York Printing Pressmen & Offset Workers Union, No. 51 v. NLRB, 575 F. 2d 1045 (CA2 1978), the Board stated that “it would be wholly unwarranted and unrealistic to presume as a matter of law that, when hired, the replacements for the union employees who had gone out on strike favored representation by the Unions to the same extent as the strikers.” 227 N. L. R. B., at 397-398. See also Beacon Upholstery Co., 226 N. L. R. B. 1360, 1368 (1976) (distinguishing Cutten Supermarket on the ground that the strikers in Beacon Upholstery had been lawfully discharged, so there were no striking employees in the bargaining unit). Nevertheless, in Windham Community Memorial Hospital, 230 N. L. R. B. 1070 (1977), enf’d, 577 F. 2d 805 (CA2 1978), the Board explicitly reaffirmed Cutten Supermarket, stating that “[t]he general rule... is that new employees, including striker replacements, are presumed to support the union in the same ratio as those whom they have replaced.” 230 N. L. R. B., at 1070. The Board distinguished Arkay Packaging as a “limited exception” to this rule based on “the unique circumstance that the union had apparently abandoned the bargaining unit.” 230 N. L. R. B., at 1070. Finally, in 1980, the Board reiterated that the presumption that new employees support the union applies equally to striker replacements. Pennco, Inc., 250 N. L. R. B. 716, 717-718 (1980), enf’d, 684 F. 2d 340 (CA6), cert. denied, 459 U. S. 994 (1982). In 1987, after several Courts of Appeals rejected the Board’s approach, the Board determined that no universal generalizations could be made about replacements’ union sentiments that would justify a presumption either of support for or of opposition to the union. Station KKHI, 284 N. L. R. B. 1339 (1987). On the one hand, the Board found that the prounion presumption lacked empirical foundation because “incumbent unions and strikers sometimes have shown hostility toward the permanent replacements,” and “replacements are typically aware of the union’s primary concern for the striker’s welfare, rather than that of the replacements.” Id., at 1344. On the other hand, the Board found that an antiunion presumption was “equally unsupportable” factually. Ibid. The Board observed that a striker replacement “may be forced to work for financial reasons, or may disapprove of the strike in question but still desire union representation and would support other union initiatives.” Ibid. Moreover, the Board found as a matter of policy that adoption of an antiunion presumption would “substantially impair the employees’ right to strike by adding to the risk of replacement the risk of loss of the bargaining representative as soon as replacements equal in number to the strikers are willing to cross the picket line. ” Ibid. See also Pennco, Inc., 250 N. L. R. B., at 717. Accordingly, the Board held that it would not apply any presumption regarding striker replace-merits’ union sentiments, but would determine their views on a case-by-case basis. 284 N. L. R. B., at 1344-1345. II We now turn to the Board’s application of its Station KKHI no-presumption approach in this case. Respondent Curtin Matheson Scientific, Inc., buys and sells laboratory instruments and supplies. In 1970, the Board certified Teamsters Local 968, General Drivers, Warehousemen and Helpers (hereinafter Union) as the collective-bargaining agent for respondent’s production and maintenance employees. On May 21, 1979, the most recent bargaining agreement between respondent and the Union expired. Respondent made its final offer for a new agreement on May 25, but the Union rejected that offer. Respondent then locked out the 27 bargaining-unit employees. On June 12, respondent renewed its May 25 offer, but the Union again rejected it. The Union then commenced an economic strike. The record contains no evidence of any strike-related violence or threats of violence. Five employees immediately crossed the picket line and reported for work. On June 25, while the strike was still in effect, respondent hired 29 permanent replacement employees to replace the 22 strikers. The Union ended its strike on July 16, offering to accept unconditionally respondent’s May 25 contract offer. On July 20, respondent informed the Union that the May 25 offer was no longer available. In addition, respondent withdrew recognition from the Union and refused to bargain further, stating that it doubted that the Union was supported by a majority of the employees in the unit. Respondent subsequently refused to provide the Union with information it had requested concerning the total number of bargaining-unit employees on the payroll, and the job classification and seniority of each employee. As of July 20, the bargaining unit consisted of 19 strikers, 25 permanent replacements, and the 5 employees who had crossed the picket line at the strike’s inception. On July 30, the Union filed an unfair labor practice charge with the Board. Following an investigation, the General Counsel issued a complaint, alleging that respondent’s withdrawal of recognition, refusal to execute a contract embodying the terms of the May 25 offer, and failure to provide the requested information violated §§ 8(a)(1) and 8(a)(5) of the NLRA, 29 U. S. C. §§ 158(a)(1), 158(a)(5). In its defense to the charge, respondent claimed that it had a reasonably based, good-faith doubt of the Union’s majority status. The Administrative Law Judge agreed with respondent and dismissed the complaint. The Board, however, reversed, holding that respondent lacked sufficient objective basis to doubt the Union’s majority support. 287 N. L. R. B. 350 (1987). First, the Board noted that the crossover of 5 of the original 27 employees did not in itself support an inference that the 5 had repudiated the Union, because their failure to join the strike may have “indicate® their economic concerns rather than a lack of support for the union.” 287 N. L. R. B., at 352. Second, the Board found that the resignation from their jobs of two of the original bargaining-unit employees, including the chief shop steward, after the commencement of the strike did not indicate opposition to the Union, but merely served to reduce the size of the bargaining unit as of the date of respondent’s withdrawal of recognition. Ibid. Third, the Board discounted statements made by six employees to a representative of respondent during the strike. Although some of these statements may have indicated rejection of the Union as the bargaining representative, the Board noted, others “appealed] ambiguous at best.” Id., at 353. Moreover, the Board stated, “[e]ven attributing to them the meaning most favorable to the Respondent, it would merely signify that 6 employees of a total bargaining unit of approximately 50 did not desire to keep the Union as the collective-bargaining representative.” Ibid Finally, regarding respondent’s hiring of striker replacements, the Board stated that, in acccordance with the Station KKHI approach, it would “not use any presumptions with respect to [the replacements’] union sentiments,” but would instead “take a case-by-case approach [and] require additional evidence of a lack of union support on the replacements’ part in evaluating the significance of this factor in the employer’s showing of good-faith doubt.” 287 N. L. R. B., at 352. The Board noted that respondent’s only evidence of the replacements’ attitudes toward the Union was its employee relations director’s account of a conversation with one of the replacements. The replacement employee reportedly told her that he had worked in union and nonunion workplaces and did not see any need for a union as long as the company treated him well; in addition, he said that he did not think the Union in this case represented the employees. Id., at 351; see n. 4, supra. The Board did not determine whether this statement indicated the replacement employee’s repudiation of the Union, but found that the statement was, in any event, an insufficient basis for “inferring the union sentiments of the replacement employees as a group.” 287 N. L. R. B., at 353. The Board therefore concluded that “the evidence [was] insufficient to rebut the presumption of the Union’s continuing majority status.” Ibid. Accordingly, the Board held that respondent had violated §§ 8(a)(1) and 8(a)(5) by withdrawing recognition from the Union, failing to furnish the requested information, and refusing to execute a contract embodying the terms respondent had offered on May 25, 1979. The Board ordered respondent to bargain with the Union on request, provide the requisite information, execute an agreement, and make the bargaining-unit employees whole for whatever losses they had suffered from respondent’s failure to execute a contract. The Court of Appeals, in a divided opinion, refused to enforce the Board’s order, holding that respondent was justified in doubting the Union’s majority support. 859 F. 2d 362 (CA5 1988). Specifically, the court rejected the Board’s decision not to apply any presumption in evaluating striker replacements’ union sentiments and endorsed the so-called “Gorman presumption” that striker replacements oppose the union. We granted certiorari, 492 U. S. 905 (1989), to resolve a Circuit split on the question whether the Board must presume that striker replacements oppose the union. Ill A This Court has emphasized often that the NLRB has the primary responsibility for developing and applying national labor policy. See, e. g., Beth Israel Hospital v. NLRB, 437 U. S. 483, 500-501 (1978); NLRB v. Erie Resistor Corp., 373 U. S. 221, 236 (1963); NLRB v. Truck Drivers, 353 U. S. 87, 96 (1957). “Because it is to the Board that Congress entrusted the task of ‘applying the Act’s general prohibitory language in the light of the infinite combinations of events which might be charged as violative of its terms,’ that body, if it is to accomplish the task which Congress set for it, necessarily must have authority to formulate rules to fill the interstices of the broad statutory provisions.” Beth Israel Hospital, supra, at 500-501 (quoting Republic Aviation Corp. v. NLRB, 324 U. S. 793, 798 (1945)). This Court therefore has accorded Board rules considerable deference. See Fall River Dyeing & Finishing Corp. v. NLRB, 482 U. S., at 42; NLRB v. Iron Workers, 434 U. S. 335, 350 (1978). We will uphold a Board rule as long as it is rational and consistent with the Act, Fall River, supra, at 42, even if we would have formulated a different rule had we sat on the Board, Charles D. Bonanno Linen Service, Inc. v. NLRB, 454 U. S. 404, 413, 418 (1982). Furthermore, a Board rule is entitled to deference even if it represents a departure from the Board’s prior policy. See NLRB v. J. Weingarten, Inc., 420 U. S. 251, 265-266 (1975) (“The use by an administrative agency of the evolutional approach is particularly fitting. To hold that the Board’s earlier decisions froze the development of this important aspect of the national labor law would misconceive the nature of administrative decisionmaking”). Accord, Iron Workers, supra, at 351. B Before assessing the Board’s justification for rejecting the antiunion presumption, we will make clear precisely how that presumption would differ in operation from the Board’s current approach. As noted above, see supra, at 777-778, the starting point for the Board’s analysis is the basic presumption that the union is supported by a majority of bargaining-unit employees. The employer bears the burden of rebutting that presumption, after the certification year, either by showing that the union in fact lacks majority support or by demonstrating a sufficient objective basis for doubting the union’s majority status. Respondent here urges that in evaluating an employer’s claim of a good-faith doubt, the Board must adopt a second, subsidiary presumption — that replacement employees oppose the union. Under this approach, if a majority of employees in the bargaining unit were striker replacements, the employer would not need to offer any objective evidence of the employees’ union sentiments to rebut the presumption of the union’s continuing majority status. The presumption of the replacements’ opposition to the union would, in effect, override the presumption of continuing majority status. In contrast, under its no-presumption approach, the Board “take[s] into account the particular circumstances surrounding each strike and the hiring of replacements, while retaining the long-standing requirement that the employer must come forth with some objective evidence to substantiate his doubt of continuing maj ority status. ” 859 F. 2d, at 370 (Williams, J., dissenting). C We find the Board’s no-presumption' approach rational as an empirical matter. Presumptions normally arise when proof of one fact renders the existence of another fact “so probable that it is sensible and timesaving to assume the truth of [the inferred] fact... until the adversary disproves it.” E. Cleary, McCormick on Evidence §343, p. 969 (3d ed. 1984). Although replacements often may not favor the incumbent union, the Board reasonably concluded, in light of its long experience in addressing these issues, that replacements may in some circumstances desire union representation despite their willingness to cross the picket line. Economic concerns, for instance, may force a replacement employee to work for a struck employer even though he otherwise supports the union and wants the benefits of union representation. In this sense the replacement worker is no different from a striker who, feeling the financial heat of the strike on himself and his family, is forced to abandon the picket line and go back to work. Cf. Lyng v. Automobile Workers, 485 U. S. 360, 371 (1988) (recognizing that “a striking individual faces an immediate and often total drop in income during a strike”). In addition, a replacement, like a nonstriker or a strike crossover, may disagree with the purpose or strategy of the particular strike and refuse to support that strike, while still wanting that union’s representation at the bargaining table. Respondent insists that the interests of strikers and replacements are diametrically opposed and that unions inevitably side with the strikers. For instance, respondent argues, picket-line violence often stems directly from the hiring of replacements. Furthermore, unions often negotiate with employers for strike settlements that would return the strikers to their jobs, thereby displacing some or all of the replacements. See Belknap, Inc. v. Hale, 463 U. S. 491, 513-514 (1983) (Blackmun, J., concurring in judgment). Respondent asserts that replacements, aware of the union’s loyalty to the strikers, most likely would not support the union. See, e. g., Leveld Wholesale, Inc., 218 N. L. R. B. 1344, 1350 (1975) (“Strike replacements can reasonably foresee that, if the union is successful, the strikers will return to work and the strike replacements will be out of a job”). In a related argument, respondent contends that the Board’s no-presumption approach is irreconcilable with the Board’s decisions holding that employers have no duty to bargain with a striking union over replacements’ employment terms because the “inherent conflict” between strikers and replacements renders the union incapable of “bargaining] simultaneously in the best interests of both strikers and their replacements.” Service Electric Co., 281 N. L. R. B. 633, 641 (1986); see also Leveld Wholesale, supra, at 1350. These arguments do not persuade us that the Board’s position is irrational. Unions do not inevitably demand displacement of all strike replacements. In Dold Foods, Inc., 289 N. L. R. B. 1323 (1988), the Board based its refusal to presume that the replacements opposed the union in part on this ground: “[U]nions often demand, at least in the first instance, that the replacements be discharged and the strikers rehired. Frequently, as in the instant case, the union’s position may be modified in the course of the negotiations on the issues underlying the strike. Indeed, in the instant case, as the strike wore on, the Union took a progressively weaker position until... it requested only that the Respondent discharge those replacements (about 32 out of 201 total replacements) who had not yet completed the probationary period.” Ibid, (citation omitted). The extent to which a union demands displacement of permanent replacement workers logically will depend on the union’s bargaining power. Under this Court’s decision in NLRB v. Mackay Radio & Telegraph Co., 304 U. S. 333 (1938), an employer is not required to discharge permanent replacements at the conclusion of an economic strike to make room for returning strikers; rather, the employer must only reinstate strikers as vacancies arise. The strikers’ only chance for immediate reinstatement, then, lies in the union’s ability to force the employer to discharge the replacements as a condition for the union’s ending the strike. Unions’ leverage to compel such a strike settlement will vary greatly from strike to strike. If, for example, the jobs at issue do not require highly trained workers and the replacements perform as well as the strikers did, the employer will have little incentive to hire back the strikers and fire the replacements; consequently, the union will have little bargaining power. Consumers’ reaction to a strike will also determine the union’s bargaining position. If the employer’s customers have no reluctance to cross the picket line and deal with the employer, the union will be in a poor position to bargain for a favorable settlement. Thus, a union’s demands will inevitably turn on the strength of the union’s hand in negotiations. A union with little bargaining leverage is unlikely to press the employer — at least not very forcefully or for very long — to discharge the replacements and reinstate all the strikers. Cognizant of the union’s weak position, many if not all of the replacements justifiably may not fear that they will lose their jobs at the end of the strike. They may still want that union’s representation after the strike, though, despite the union’s lack of bargaining strength during the strike, because of the union’s role in processing grievances, monitoring the employer’s actions, and performing other nonstrike roles. Because the circumstances of each strike and the leverage of each union will vary greatly, it was not irrational for the Board to reject the antiunion presumption and adopt a case-by-case approach in determining replacements’ union sentiments. Moreover, even if the interests of strikers and replacements conflict during the strike, those interests may converge after the strike, once job rights have been resolved. Thus, while the strike continues, a replacement worker whose job appears relatively secure might well want the union to continue to represent the unit regardless of the union’s bargaining posture during the strike. Surely replacement workers are capable of looking past the strike in considering whether or not they desire representation by the union. For these reasons, the Board’s refusal to adopt an antiunion presumption is not irreconcilable with its position in Service Electric, supra, and Leveld Wholesale, 218 N. L. R. B. 1344 (1975), regarding an employer’s obligation to bargain with a striking union over replacements’ employment terms. Furthermore, the Board has not deemed picket-line violence or a union’s demand that replacements be terminated irrelevant to its evaluation of replacements’ attitudes toward the union. The Board’s position, rather, is that “the hiring of permanent replacements who cross a picket line, in itself, does not support an inference that the replacements repudiate the union as collective-bargaining representative.” Station KKHI, 284 N. L. R. B., at 1344 (emphasis added). In both Station KKHI and this case, the Board noted that the picket line was peaceful, id., at 1345; 287 N. L. R. B., at 352; and in neither case did the employer present evidence that the union was actively negotiating for ouster of the replacements. To the extent that the Board regards evidence of these factors relevant to its evaluation of replacements’ union sentiments, then, respondent’s contentions ring hollow. Cf. Stormor, Inc., 268 N. L. R. B. 860, 866-867 (1984) (concluding that replacements’ crossing of picket line in face of continued violence, together with other evidence, overcame Board’s former presumption that replacements favored the union); IT Services, 263 N. L. R. B. 1183, 1185-1188 (1982) (holding that picket line violence and union’s adamant demand that replacements be terminated, together with anti-union statements by most of replacements, overcame pro-union presumption). In sum, the Board recognized that the circumstances surrounding each strike and replacements’ reasons for crossing a picket line vary greatly. Even if replacements often do not support the union, then, it was not irrational for the Board to conclude that the probability of replacement opposition to the union is insufficient to justify an antiunion presumption. D The Board’s refusal to adopt an antiunion presumption is also consistent with the Act’s “overriding policy” of achieving “‘industrial peace.’” Fall River, 482 U. S., at 38 (quoting Brooks v. NLRB, 348 U. S. 96, 103 (1954)). In Fall River, the Court held that the presumption of continuing majority support for a union “further[s] this policy by ‘promoting] stability in collective-bargaining relationships, without impairing the free choice of employees.’” 482 U. S., at 38 (citation omitted). The Court reasoned that this presumption “enable[s] a union to concentrate on obtaining and fairly administering a collective-bargaining agreement without worrying that, unless it produces immediate results, it will lose majority support.” Ibid, (citing Brooks v. NLRB, supra, at 100). In addition, this presumption “remove[s] any temptation on the part of the employer to avoid good-faith bargaining in the hope that, by delaying, it will undermine the union’s support among the employees.” 482 U. S., at 38. The Board’s approach to determining the union views of strike replacements is directed at this same goal because it limits employers’ ability to oust a union without adducing any evidence of the employees’ union sentiments and encourages negotiated solutions to strikes. It was reasonable for the Board to conclude that the antiunion presumption, in contrast, could allow an employer to eliminate the union merely by hiring a sufficient number of replacement employees. That rule thus might encourage the employer to avoid good-faith bargaining over a strike settlement, and instead to use the strike as a means of removing the union altogether. Cf. id., at 40 (“Without the presumptions of majority support..., an employer could use a successor enterprise as a way of getting rid of a labor contract and of... eliminating the union’s] continuing presence”). Restricting an employer’s ability to use a strike as a means of terminating the bargaining relationship serves the policies of promoting industrial stability and negotiated settlements. Cf. NLRB v. Erie Resistor Corp., 373 U. S. 221, 233-234 (1963) (“[The Act’s] repeated solicitude for the right to strike is predicated upon the conclusion that a strike when legitimately employed is an economic weapon which in great measure implements and supports the principles of the collective bargaining system”). Furthermore, it was reasonable for the Board to decide that the antiunion presumption might chill employees’ exercise of their statutory right to engage in “concerted activities,” including the right to strike. See 49 Stat. 452, as amended, 29 U. S. C. § 157 (“Employees shall have the right... to engage in... concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection”). If an employer could remove a union merely by hiring a sufficient number of replacements, employees considering a strike would face not only the prospect of being permanently replaced, but also a greater risk that they would lose their bargaining representative, thereby diminishing their chance of obtaining reinstatement through a strike settlement. It was rational for the Board to conclude, then, that adoption of the antiunion presumption could chill employees’ exercise of their right to strike. Although the Board generally may not act “as an arbiter of the sort of economic weapons the parties can use,” NLRB v. Insurance Agents, 361 U. S. 477, 497 (1960), it may adopt rules restricting conduct that threatens to destroy the collective-bargaining relationship or that may impair employees’ right to engage in concerted activity. See, e. g., Charles D. Bonanno Linen Service v. NLRB, 454 U. S., at 412, 418-419 (upholding Board rule prohibiting employer’s unilateral withdrawal from multiemployer bargaining unit during impasse, “although it may deny an employer a particular economic weapon,” because rule advanced “pre-eminent goal” of stability in bargaining process); NLRB v. Erie Resistor Corp., supra, at 230-237 (upholding Board decision prohibiting employers from granting superseniority to strike replacements and strike crossovers because of damage superseniority would do to concerted activity and to future bargaining relationship); NLRB v. Great Dane Trailers, Inc., 388 U. S. 26, 34-35 (1967) (upholding Board decision that employer’s payment of vacation benefits to replacements, crossovers, and nonstrikers but not to strikers violated Act because of its destructive effect on concerted activity). The Board’s no-presumption approach is rationally directed at protecting the bargaining process and preserving employees’ right to engage in concerted activity. We therefore find, in light of the considerable deference we accord Board rules, see supra, at 786-787, that the Board’s approach is consistent with the Act. IV We hold that the Board’s refusal to adopt a presumption that striker replacements oppose the Union is rational and consistent with the Act. We therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. Section 8 of the National Labor Relations Act provides, in pertinent part: “(a) It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer— “(1) to interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in section 157 of this title; “(5) to refuse to bargain collectively with the representatives of his employees, subject to the provisions of section 159(a) of this title.” 29 U. S. C. §§ 158(a)(1), 158(a)(5). Justice Scalia’s assertion, post, at 801, 807 (dissenting opinion), that the question presented is whether “substantial evidence” supported the Board’s “factual finding” that a good-faith doubt was not established in this case misconstrues the issue. The question on which we granted the Board’s petition for certiorari is whether, in assessing whether a particular employer possessed a good-faith doubt, the Board must adopt a general presumption of replacement opposition to the union. See Pet. for Cert. I (“Whether, in assessing the reasonableness of an employer’s asserted doubt that an incumbent union enjoys continued majority support, the Board may refuse to apply any presumption regarding the extent of union support among replacements for striking employees”). Accord, Brief for Petitioner I. Whether the Board permissibly refused to adopt a general presumption applicable to all cases of this type is not an evidentiary question concerning the facts of this particular ease. The substantial evidence standard is therefore inapplicable to the issue before us. Rather, we must determine whether the Board’s refusal to adopt the presumption is rational and consistent with the Act. NLRB v. Baptist Hospital, Inc., 442 U. S. 773, 787 (1979) (“[T]he courts have the duty to review the Board’s presumptions both ‘for consistency with the Act, and for rationality’ ”) (quoting Beth Israel Hospital v. NLRB, 437 U. S. 483, 501 (1978)). Whether substantial evidence supports the Board’s finding that respondent did not possess an objectively reasonable doubt is a question for the Court of Appeals to consider, without applying any presumption about replacements’ views, on remand. See n. 7, infra. The Board also found that statements made by chief shop steward Shady Goodson before his resignation did not indicate his lack of support for the Union. Goodson reportedly told respondent’s employee relations director that he was in the middle of an uncomfortable situation in that the employees did not want the strike, that he was having difficulty staffing the picket line, and that the Union was not providing sufficient assistance in maintaining the picket line. The Board found that these statements “conveyed only a disapproval of the Union’s conduct of the strike,” and could not be “reasonably interpreted as a repudiation of the Union as the employees’ representative.” 287 N. L. R. B., at 352. According to respondent’s director of employee relations, Elizabeth Price, two of the crossover employees, Tony Lopez and Bill Lee, told her that the Union had done nothing for the employees and that they would not pay their union dues because they would not support the Union. Price also stated that striker J. R. Blackshire expressed his anger over the Union’s handling of strike payments and requested reinstatement. Black-shire also reportedly said that “there was no union[,] that people were not supporting it[, and] that there were other striking employees who wanted to return to work.” 287N. L. R. B.,at351. Price also stated that striker Clint Waller told her that he was not walking the picket line because he felt that the Union was not representing the employees, and that he wanted the strike to end. Waller later resigned from the Union. Striker Raymond Brunner reportedly told Price that he had thought about retiring because he no longer wanted to work with the Union. Price stated that striker replacement David Schneider told her that he did not think that the Union supported the employees and did not see any need for a union as long as the employer treated him well. Ibid. The “ Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

G

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Reed announced the judgment of the Court in an opinion in which The Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Jackson join. This writ of certiorari brings before this Court a unique situation. The petitioner, Willie Francis, is a colored citizen of Louisiana. He was duly convicted of murder and in September, 1945, sentenced to be electrocuted for the crime. Upon a proper death warrant, Francis was prepared for execution and on May 3, 1946, pursuant to the warrant, was placed in the official electric chair of the State of Louisiana in the presence of the authorized witnesses. The executioner threw the switch but, presumably because of some mechanical difficulty, death did not result. He was thereupon removed from the chair and returned to prison where he now is. A new death warrant was issued by the Governor of Louisiana, fixing the execution for May 9,1946. Applications to the Supreme Court of the state were filed for writs of certiorari, mandamus, prohibition and habeas corpus, directed to the appropriate officials in the state. Execution of the sentence was stayed. By the applications petitioner claimed the protection of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment on the ground that an execution under the circumstances detailed would deny due process to him because of the double jeopardy provision of the Fifth Amendment and the cruel and unusual punishment provision of the Eighth Amendment. These federal constitutional protections, petitioner claimed, would be denied because he had once gone through the difficult preparation for execution and had once received through his body a current of electricity intended to cause death. The Supreme Court of Louisiana denied the applications on the ground of a lack of any basis for judicial relief. That is, the state court concluded there was no violation of state or national law alleged in the various applications. It spoke of the fact that no “current of sufficient intensity to cause death” passed through petitioner’s body. It referred specifically to the fact that the applications of petitioner invoked the provisions of the Louisiana Constitution against cruel and inhuman punishments and putting one in jeopardy of life or liberty twice for the same offense. We granted certio-rari on a petition setting forth the aforementioned contentions, to consider the alleged violations of rights under the Federal Constitution in the unusual circumstances of this case. 328 U. S. 833. For matters of state law, the opinion and order of the Supreme Court of Louisiana are binding on this Court, Hebert v. Louisiana, 272 U. S. 312, 317. So far as we are aware, this case is without precedent in any court. To determine whether or not the execution of the petitioner may fairly take place after the experience through which he passed, we shall examine the circumstances under the assumption, but without so deciding, that violation of the principles of the Fifth and Eighth Amendments, as to double jeopardy and cruel and unusual punishment, would be violative of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. As nothing has been brought to our attention to suggest the contrary, we must and do assume that the state officials carried out their duties under the death warrant in a careful and humane manner. Accidents happen for which no man is to blame. We turn to the question as to whether the proposed enforcement of the criminal law of the state is offensive to any constitutional requirements to which reference has been made. First. Our minds rebel against permitting the same sovereignty to punish an accused twice for the same offense. Ex parte Lange, 18 Wall. 163, 168, 175; In re Bradley, 318 U. S. 50. Compare United States v. Lanza, 260 U. S. 377, 382. But where the accused successfully seeks review of a conviction, there is no double jeopardy upon a new trial. United States v. Ball, 163 U. S. 662, 672. See People v. Trezza, 128 N. Y. 529, 535, 28 N. E. 533. Even where a state obtains a new trial after conviction because of errors, while an accused may be placed on trial a second time, it is not the sort of hardship to the accused that is forbidden by the Fourteenth Amendment. Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U. S. 319, 328. As this is a prosecution under state law, so far as double jeopardy is concerned, the Palko case is decisive. For we see no difference from a constitutional point of view between a new trial for error of law at the instance of the state that results in a death sentence instead of imprisonment for life and an execution that follows a failure of equipment. When an accident, with no suggestion of malevolence, prevents the consummation of a sentence, the state’s subsequent course in the administration of its criminal law is not affected on that account by any requirement of due process under the Fourteenth Amendment. We find no double jeopardy here which can be said to amount to a denial of federal due process in the proposed execution. Second. We find nothing in what took place here which amounts to cruel and unusual punishment in the constitutional sense. The case before us does not call for an examination into any punishments except that of death. See Weems v. United States, 217 U. S. 349. The traditional humanity of modern Anglo-American law forbids the infliction of unnecessary pain in the execution of the death sentence. Prohibition against the wanton infliction of pain has come into our law from the Bill of Rights of 1688. The identical words appear in our Eighth Amendment. The Fourteenth would prohibit by its due process clause execution by a state in a cruel manner. Petitioner’s suggestion is that because he once underwent the psychological strain of preparation for electrocution, now to require him to undergo this preparation again subjects him to a lingering or cruel and unusual punishment. Even the fact that petitioner has already been subjected to a current of electricity does not make his subsequent execution any more cruel in the constitutional sense than any other execution. The cruelty against which the Constitution protects a convicted man is cruelty inherent in the method of punishment, not the necessary suffering involved in any method employed to extinguish life humanely. The fact that an unforeseeable accident prevented the prompt consummation of the sentence cannot, it seems to us, add an element of cruelty to a subsequent execution. There is no purpose to inflict unnecessary pain nor any unnecessary pain involved in the proposed execution. The situation of the unfortunate victim of this accident is just as though he had suffered the identical amount of mental anguish and physical pain in any other occurrence, such as, for example, a fire in the cell block. We cannot agree that the hardship imposed upon the petitioner rises to that level of hardship denounced as denial of due process because of cruelty. Third. The Supreme Court of Louisiana also rejected petitioner’s contention that death inflicted after his prior sufferings would deny him the equal protection of the laws, guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. This suggestion in so far as it differs from the due process argument is based on the idea that execution, after an attempt at execution has failed, would be a more severe punishment than is imposed upon others guilty of a like offense. That is, since others do not go through the strain of preparation for execution a second time or have not experienced a nonlethal current in a prior attempt at execution, as petitioner did, to compel petitioner to submit to execution after these prior experiences denies to him equal protection. Equal protection does not protect a prisoner against even illegal acts of officers in charge of him, much less against accidents during his detention for execution. See Lisenba v. California, 314 U. S. 219, 226. Laws cannot prevent accidents nor can a law equally protect all against them. So long as the law applies to all alike, the requirements of equal protection are met. We have no right to assume that Louisiana singled out Francis for a treatment other than that which has been or would generally be applied. Fourth. There is a suggestion in the brief that the original trial itself was so unfair to the petitioner as to justify a reversal of the judgment of conviction and a new trial. Petitioner’s claim in his brief is that he was inadequately represented by counsel. The record of the original trial presented to us shows the warrant for arrest, the indictment, the appointment of counsel and the minute entries of trial, selection of jury, verdict and sentence. There is nothing in any of these papers to show any violation of petitioner’s constitutional rights. See Carter v. Illinois, 329 U. S. 173. Review is sought here because of a denial of due process of law that would be brought about by execution of petitioner after failure of the first effort to electrocute him. Nothing is before us upon which a ruling can be predicated as to alleged denial of federal constitutional rights during petitioner’s trial. On this record, we see nothing upon which we could conclude that the constitutional rights of petitioner were infringed. Affirmed. Fifth Amendment: "... nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; . . Eighth Amendment: “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.” See Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U S. 78, 99; Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U. S. 319, 324; In re Kemmler, 136 U. S. 436, 445; Collins v. Johnston, 237 U. S. 502, 510. See Kepner v. United States, 195 U. S. 100, 129; cf. United States v. Ball, 163 U. S. 662, 666-70. This Court said of a similar clause embodied in the constitution of New York, In re Kemmler, 136 U. S. 436,446: “. • - but the language in question as used in the constitution of the State of New York was intended particularly to operate upon the legislature of the State, to whose control the punishment of crime was almost wholly confided. So that, if the punishment prescribed for an offence against the laws of the State were manifestly cruel and unusual, as burning at the stake, crucifixion, breaking on the wheel, or the like, it would be the duty of the courts to adjudge such penalties to be within the constitutional prohibition.” It added, p. 447: “Punishments are cruel when they involve torture or a lingering death; but the punishment of death is not cruel, within the meaning of that word as used in the Constitution. It implies there something inhuman and barbarous, something more than the mere extinguishment of life.” Louisiana has the same humane provision in its constitution. Louisiana Constitution, Art. I, § 12. The Kemmler case denied that electrocution infringed the federal constitutional rights of a convicted criminal sentenced to execution. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

A

sc_issuearea

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Mr. Justice Douglas delivered the opinion of the Court. The United Corporation is a holding company registered under the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935, 49 Stat. 803, 15 U. S. C. § 79 et seq. Section 11 (b) of that Act requires each holding company, with exceptions not material here, to limit the operations of the holding-company system of which it is a part to a single integrated public-utility system and to businesses reasonably incidental or economically necessary or appropriate to that system. Section 11 (e) allows a registered holding company to submit a plan to the Commission which will enable it to comply with § 11 (b). United controlled, directly or indirectly, various gas and electric utility companies in the East. It submitted a plan to the Commission which, it claimed, would complete its compliance with § 11 (b). The Commission rejected United’s plan. 13 S. E. C. 854, 898-899. The Commission, however, withheld issuance of a dissolution order so as to afford United an opportunity to comply with the Act by divesting itself of control over its subsidiaries and by transforming itself into an investment company. Id., p. 899. The Commission accordingly directed that United cease to be a holding company and limit its corporate structure to a single class of stock, namely, common stock. No review of that order was sought. Thereafter United retired its preference stock by exchanging it for underlying portfolio securities and for cash. Other portfolio securities were disposed of through market sales and dividend distributions. As of December 31, 1950, United had outstanding 14,529,491.5 shares of common stock, and option warrants entitling the holders to purchase 3,732,059 shares of common stock at any time at a price of $27.50 per share. As of December 31, 1950, United’s assets consisted approximately of $57,000,000 of securities and $2,000,000 in cash and government bonds, which was equivalent to $4.12 per share of common stock. The securities, which consisted of common stocks of utility operating and holding companies, included 11.9 percent of the voting stock of Niagara Mohawk Power Corp., 28.3 percent of South Jersey Gas Co., 5.8 percent of the United Gas Improvement Co., 5.5 percent of the Columbia Gas System, Inc., and voting stocks of other companies in amounts less than 5 percent of the total outstanding. United submitted a further plan which provided in essential part as follows: First. The sale by United of all of its South Jersey common stock and of sufficient amounts of its stock-holdings in the other utility companies so that within one year its resultant holdings would not exceed 4.9 percent of the voting stock of any of those companies. Second. An offer to United’s stockholders who wanted to withdraw from the company. Holders of 100 or more shares of United’s common stock were offered common stock of Niagara Mohawk that United had in its portfolio ; holders of smaller blocks of United’s common stock were offered cash. These offers were on a voluntary basis. Third. Cancellation of the option warrants without any compensation to the holders. Fourth. Amendments to the charter and bylaws of United (without a vote of stockholders) to provide for cumulative voting in the election of directors and a 50 percent quorum at stockholders meetings. The Commission approved the plan with modifications not material to the issues presented in this case. Holding Company Act Releases Nos. 10614, 10643. First. The method of transforming United from a holding company into an investment company was approved. Second. Offers to those stockholders who wanted to withdraw from the enterprise were held to be fair both to them and to those who chose to remain as investors in United. Third. The holders of the option warrants were denied any participation in the reorganization on the ground that there was no reasonable expectation that the market price of the common stock would increase to the extent needed to give the warrants a recognizable value and that continuance of the warrants would be inherently deceptive to investors and perpetuate useless and unnecessary complexities in the corporate structure. Fourth. The changes as respects cumulative voting and quorum requirements were approved. The Commission in its order of approval stated that the provisions of the plan relating to the cancellation of the warrants and the amendment of the charter and bylaws would not be operative “until an appropriate United States District Court shall, upon application thereto, enter an order enforcing said provisions.” Holding Company Act Release No. 10643, p. 3. No such provision was made as respects the other provisions of the plan. Some of the common stockholders thereupon filed a petition for review in the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia under § 24 (a) of the Act. They challenged the First and Second provisions of the plan, which we have described above. They also asked that the Third and Fourth provisions, the ones which were made subject to approval by the District Court, be approved by the Court of Appeals. The petitioner in this Court is a protective committee representing holders of the option warrants. It moved to intervene in the review proceedings in the Court of Appeals, claiming that forfeiture of the warrants was not justified. The Commission and United opposed the intervention on the ground that by reason of the Commission’s order and § 11 (e) of the Act only the District Court had jurisdiction to review the provisions of the plan respecting the elimination of the warrants and the amendments to the charter and bylaws. The Court of Appeals allowed petitioner to intervene. It held that so long as the Commission had not applied to a District Court under § 11 (e) to enforce a plan, the Court of Appeals had exclusive jurisdiction on petition of an aggrieved person under § 24 (a) to review the entire plan, including those provisions which the Commission made enforceable by the District Court. The Court of Appeals further held that if it affirmed or modified an order of the Commission approving a plan and the Commission thereafter applied to the District Court to obtain enforcement, the District Court would have no function except to enforce, since the ruling by the Court of Appeals on the fairness of the plan would be binding on the District Court. Accordingly the Court of Appeals reviewed the entire plan, found it fair and equitable in all respects, and affirmed the Commission’s order. 92 U. S. App. D. C. 172, 203 F. 2d 611. The case is here on certiorari limited to the question of jurisdiction. 346 U. S. 810. The question is not whether there is judicial review of orders of the Commission. The question is which orders are reviewable in the District Court, which in the Court of Appeals. The first reading of the Act may leave the impression that there is conflict between § 24 (a) and § 11 (e). Section 24 (a) gives review in the Court of Appeals of “an order” of the Commission and grants the Court of Appeals “exclusive jurisdiction to affirm, modify, or set aside such order, in whole or in part.” This is clearly broad enough to include an order of the Commission under § 11 respecting a plan of a holding company seeking compliance with § 11 (b). Section 11 (e), however, provides in some instances for review of such plans on application by the Commission to the District Court. Moreover, the Commission by virtue of § 18 (f) may apply to the District Court for enforcement of any of its orders where it appears that someone is about to commit a violation. We are tendered several alternatives: 1. That the Court of Appeals having first acquired jurisdiction can and should review the entire plan. 2. That the District Court can and should review all phases of the plan in an enforcement proceeding and, pending application for enforcement, no review of any phase of the plan should be entertained by the Court of Appeals. 3. That a so-called split review is permissible where as here the Commission has reserved for enforcement proceedings in the District Court only certain provisions of the plan, the Court of Appeals being restricted under § 24 (a) to those not so reserved. We have concluded that the so-called split review is permissible under the circumstances here present and that the Court of Appeals had jurisdiction under § 24 (a) to review all questions tendered it, except those pertaining to the elimination of the option warrants and the amendments to the charter and bylaws. In result we affirm in part and reverse in part the Court of Appeals on the jurisdictional question to which we restricted the grant of the petition for certiorari. It should be noted to begin with that the Act marks out two paths to compliance by a registered holding company with the requirements of the Act. One is the procedure under § 11 (b) whereby the Commission by order may require that designated steps be taken by the holding company. Failing that, the Commission may apply to a District Court for enforcement of its orders under § 11 (d). See Commonwealth & Southern Corp. v. Securities & Exchange Commission, 134 F. 2d 747. We are not concerned here with that method of bringing holding companies into compliance with the Act. We deal here with the second method of compliance — the voluntary reorganization which the company itself submits under the broad discretion Congress left to management to determine how to bring their systems into compliance with the Act. Our problem starts under § 11 (e) with the provision that a holding company “may . . . submit a plan to the Commission for the divestment of control, securities, or other assets, or for other action . . . enabling such company ... to comply with the provisions of subsection (b).” We turn then to problems involved in the efforts of registered holding companies voluntarily to meet the requirements of the Act. The Congress contemplated that under this Act some holding companies might satisfy the requirements of § 11 by divesting themselves of control and converting themselves into investment companies. See S. Rep. No. 621, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 13. If in anticipation of that step a holding company desired to give its security holders an opportunity to withdraw from the enterprise and with the approval of the Commission made them an offer to exchange their securities for securities in its portfolio, there would be no doubt that the fairness of that offer would be reviewable by the Court of Appeals under § 24 (a) on petition of. a security holder. Two cases drawn from United’s program of compliance with the Act are illustrative. After the Commission ordered United to simplify its capital structure and cease to be a holding company, United proposed a plan for eliminating its preference stock by making an offer to exchange on a voluntary basis securities of subsidiaries and cash for the preference stock. The Commission approved; and review of that plan was had in the Court of Appeals under the procedure of § 24 (a) of the Act. Phillips v. Securities & Exchange Commission, 153 F. 2d 27. Later United proposed the pro rata distribution of shares of a subsidiary to holders of its common stock. The Commission approved; and review of that plan was had under § 24 (a) in the Court of Appeals. Phillips v. Securities & Exchange Commission, 87 U. S. App. D. C. 380, 185 F. 2d 746. If, therefore, United had offered its common stockholders cash or portfolio securities for their common stock and had put the offer in a separate plan, not making it physically a part of a more comprehensive plan, and the Commission had approved the exchange, there can be no doubt that that plan could have been reviewed by the Court of Appeals under § 24 (a). We are unable to see why the mere fact that the offer is not in isolation but one of several proposals joined together for presentation to the Commission and approved by the Commission at the time it approves the other proposals should make a difference for purposes of judicial review. Mr. Justice Rutledge writing for the Court in Securities & Exchange Commission v. Central-Illinois Corp., 338 U. S. 96, pointed out that the difference between § 11 (e) and § 24 (a) is not essentially in the scope of judicial review. Rather, it is in the function which the two systems of review perform. As he said, § 11 (e) serves “to mobilize the judicial authority in carrying out the policies of the Act.” Id., p. 125. The full import of that statement can be understood only if § 11 (e) and the functions it performs are appreciated. Section 11 (e) applies to a plan which a holding company submits to the Commission for purposes of complying with the Act. In other words, it applies to what traditionally has been known in the field of business and finance as voluntary reorganizations, that is to say, reorganizations designed by the management, not those imposed on a company from without. The holding company proposes the voluntary reorganization; the Commission, after hearing, approves, if it finds the plan “necessary to effectuate the provisions of subsection (b) and fair and equitable to the persons affected by such plan.” If § 11 (e) ended there, it would be plain that judicial review would be had either under § 24 (a) on a petition by an “aggrieved” person or under § 18 (f) if and when the Commission brought an action to enforce compliance with its order approving a plan. Section 11 (e), however, has its own enforcement procedure, somewhat peculiarly worded. It gives a registered holding company the standing to ask that the enforcement machinery of the Act be placed behind its voluntary plan of reorganization. Section 11 (e) provides, “The Commission, at the request of the company, may apply to a court, in accordance with the provisions of subsection (f) of section 18, to enforce and carry out the terms and provisions of such plan.” (Italics added.) The Commission may or may not accede to the company’s suggestion. Section 11 (e) does not make it mandatory for the Commission to do so. It only says that the Commission “may” do so. That implies the exercise of discretion. The company might request, as here, that only some of the terms and provisions of a plan be submitted to the enforcement proceedings of the Act; or it might ask that each and every proposal be so treated. The Commission might refuse the request or it might grant it in whole or in part. The considerations governing the exercise of the Commission’s discretion would embrace a variety of factors. It may be necessary to eliminate one class of stock; an exchange on a voluntary basis may not be possible because some security holders object. Therefore a compulsory retirement of the stock may be necessary. One step in United’s program of compliance involved that procedure, as is shown by In re United Corp., 82 F. Supp. 196. United proposed a plan for the compulsory retirement of preference stock; the Commission approved and applied to the District Court for enforcement. An enforcement decree on one phase of a voluntary plan of reorganization may be an appropriate and convenient means (if not a necessary one) to modify a certificate of incorporation. Thus in Delaware the corporation statute directs the Secretary of State to accept a decree of a federal court enforcing a provision of a plan which modifies, alters, or repeals the bylaws of a Delaware corporation or amends its certificate of incorporation. 8 Del. Code Ann., 1953, § 245. Illustrations could be multiplied. But those we have given indicate that a holding company may not be able to carry through without some degree of compulsion all phases of the voluntary plan it submits, that it may need the force of a judicial decree behind the Commission’s order in order to put through its reorganization. On the other hand, the holding company might conclude that market conditions were so favorable, its own financial situation so strong, the terms of the voluntary reorganization so attractive that it would need no help from any source to effectuate the plan, once the Commission approved. That is the reason Congress left the choice — the right to ask for enforcement help — to the holding company. Conceivably the Commission might refuse to give the help requested unless other phases of the plan were also put through enforcement proceedings. That conclusion might be reached where the several aspects of the plan were so closely and intimately related one to the other that the fairness of one turned on the fairness of the other. No such issue arises here, for the question whether the common stockholders who want to withdraw from United have been offered enough Niagara Mohawk stock or enough cash has nothing to do either with the elimination of the option warrants or the changes in the charter and bylaws to govern stockholders who do not withdraw from the enterprise. We have said enough to indicate some of the considerations confronting the Commission when it decides, in connection with a voluntary reorganization plan under § 11 (e), whether it will “mobilize the judicial authority in carrying out the policies of the Act,” to use the words of Mr. Justice Rutledge in the Central-Illinois Corp. case, supra. The Commission may send only one provision of a plan of voluntary reorganization into enforcement proceedings and let all others go the route of § 24 (a) should an aggrieved person desire to take them there. Here as in other fields (Phelps Dodge Corp. v. Labor Board, 313 U. S. 177, 194) the relation of remedy to policy is peculiarly for the administrative agency. See American Power Co. v. Securities & Exchange Commission, 329 U. S. 90, 112. We cannot say that the Commission abused its discretion in the present case, for, as we have already observed, the amendments of the charter and bylaws and the fairness of the elimination of the option warrants have no apparent relevancy to the manner in which the common stockholders, who sought review in the Circuit Court under § 24 (a), say they have been treated. It may be, as some argue, that it would be a better scheme to have all or none of a plan go into enforcement proceedings under § 11 (e). If the entire plan were presented in the enforcement proceedings, all parties would be notified and heard at one time. But Congress in its wisdom has provided differently. The problem relates, as we have said, only to voluntary reorganizations, that is to plans submitted by the companies themselves to bring their operations into compliance with the Act. The history of voluntary recapitalizations, readjustments, and reorganizations may well have suggested that the litigious issues would not be numerous, that overall judicial review of the total plan need not be made mandatory, that only select phases and aspects of voluntary reorganization need be put through enforcement proceedings. Certainly one who has an isolated point of objection, whose protest relates only to a single phase of a plan has an advantage in the review accorded him by § 24 (a). He can bring suit in the Court of Appeals in the circuit where he resides or has his principal place of business, or in the District of Columbia. He can sue at once in his own bailiwick and not have to await institution of an enforcement proceeding perhaps in some faraway place. He can have a hearing on his own personal grievance without running the risk that his case may be lost in the large shuffle of an enforcement proceeding where many parties and many interests are involved. There is nothing strange or irrational in routing the common stockholders in this case to the Court of Appeals and the option warrant holders to the District Court. Each will have his day in court. Nothing that one court does will impinge on the other. Each court will be performing a different function. Whether a better procedure could be devised is not for us to determine. It is sufficient that the procedure indicated is permissible under the Act, and that the Commission in selecting certain phases of a plan for submission to enforcement proceedings did not, to borrow a phrase from the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, lose “sight of the law.” We accordingly affirm the Court of Appeals in taking jurisdiction over the controversy insofar as it related (1) to the sale by United of its holdings and (2) to the offers it made to its stockholders who wanted to withdraw. We reverse the Court of Appeals in taking jurisdiction over the provisions of the voluntary plan of reorganization which the Commission in its order made operative on enforcement by the District Court. So ordered. Section 11 (b) places on the Commission the duty to require registered holding companies and their subsidiaries not only to limit, with specified exceptions, their operations to a single integrated public-utility system but also to simplify their capital structures. Section 24 (a) provides: “Any person or party aggrieved by an order issued by the Commission under this title may obtain a review of such order in the circuit court of appeals of the United States within any circuit wherein such person resides or has his principal place of business, or in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, by filing in such court, within sixty days after the entry of such order, a written petition praying that the order of the Commission be modified or set aside in whole or in part. A copy of such petition shall be forthwith served upon any member of the Commission, or upon any officer thereof designated by the Commission for that purpose, and thereupon the Commission shall certify and file in the court a transcript of the record upon which the order complained of was entered. Upon the filing of such transcript such court shall have exclusive jurisdiction to affirm, modify, or set aside such order, in whole or in part. No objection to the order of the Commission shall be considered by the court unless such objection shall have been urged before the Commission or unless there were reasonable grounds for failure so to do. The findings of the Commission as to the facts, if supported by substantial evidence, shall be conclusive. If application is made to the court for leave to adduce additional evidence, and it is shown to the satisfaction of the court that such additional evidence is material and that there were reasonable grounds for failure to adduce such evidence in the proceeding before the Commission, the court may order such additional evidence to be taken before the Commission and to be adduced upon the hearing in such manner and upon such terms and conditions as to the court may seem proper. The Commission may modify its findings as to the facts by reason of the additional evidence so taken, and it shall file with the court such modified or new findings, which, if supported by substantial evidence, shall be conclusive, and its recommendation, if any, for the modification or setting aside of the original order. The judgment and decree of the court affirming, modifying, or setting aside, in whole or in part, any such order of the Commission shall be final, subject to review by the Supreme Court of the United States upon certiorari or certification as provided in sections 239 and 240 of the Judicial Code, as amended (U. S. C., title 28, secs. 346 and 347).” Section 11 (e) provides: “In accordance with such rules and regulations or order as the Commission may deem necessary or appropriate in the public interest or for the protection of investors or consumers, any registered holding company or any subsidiary company of a registered holding company may, at any time after January 1, 1936, submit a plan to the Commission for the divestment of control, securities, or other assets, or for other action by such company or any subsidiary company thereof for the purpose of enabling such company or any subsidiary company thereof to comply with the provisions of subsection (b). If, after notice and opportunity for hearing, the Commission shall find such plan, as submitted or as modified, necessary to effectuate the provisions of subsection (b) and fair and equitable to the persons affected by such plan, the Commission shall make a,n order approving such plan; and the Commission, at the request of the company, may apply to a court, in accordance with the provisions of subsection (f) of section 18, to enforce and carry out the terms and provisions of such plan. If, upon any such application, the court, after notice and opportunity for hearing, shall approve such plan as fair and equitable and as appropriate to effectuate the provisions of section 11, the court as a court of equity may, to such extent as it deems necessary for the purpose of carrying out the terms and provisions of such plan, take exclusive jurisdiction and possession of the company or companies and the assets thereof, wherever located; and the court shall have jurisdiction to appoint a trustee, and the court may constitute and appoint the Commission as sole trustee, to hold or administer, under the direction of the court and in accordance with the plan theretofore approved by the court and the Commission, the assets so possessed.” Section 18 (f) provides: “Whenever it shall appear to the Commission that any person is engaged or about to engage in any acts or practices which constitute or will constitute a violation of the provisions of this title, or of any rule, regulation, or order thereunder, it may in its discretion bring an action in the proper district court of the United States, the [district court of the United States for] the District of Columbia, or the United States courts of any Territory or other place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, to enjoin such acts or practices and to enforce compliance with this title or any rule, regulation, or order thereunder, and upon a proper showing a permanent or temporary injunction or decree or restraining order shall be granted without bond. The Commission may transmit such evidence as may be available concerning such acts or practices to the Attorney General, who, in his discretion, may institute the appropriate criminal proceedings under this title.” In speaking of plans of voluntary reorganization under § 11 (e) the Court in Commonwealth & Southern Corp. v. Securities & Exchange Commission, 134 F. 2d 747, 751, said: “If the plan is one which can be carried out by the sole action of the parties thereto no further proceedings are needed. If not, the subsection authorizes the Commission, at the request of the company proposing the plan, to make application to a district court to enforce and carry out the plan. In this proceeding the court, if it finds the plan fair, equitable and appropriate, may direct it to be carried out, taking possession of the company and its assets if necessary to that end. . . . “It will thus be seen that the congressional purpose is to leave open to the holding companies a broad area of discretion in determining just how they are to bring their systems into compliance with the required standards. . . . “It is obvious that in many cases the desired result may be reached in more than one way. Congress evidently intended to permit the Commission to leave to the company involved the initiative in suggesting from among the available alternative methods that one which it deems most appropriate. This seems clear in the light of the fact that under section 11 (e) the company is not restricted to proposing a plan of compliance which it is in a position to carry out itself but it may also propose a plan affecting the rights of third persons which it may, through the Commission, request a court to enforce against the opposition of those third persons. It is only if the company does not propose a plan which the Commission and the court approve that the Commission under section 11 (d) itself may propose and seek enforcement of a plan against the opposition of the company.” See In re Standard Gas & Electric Co., 151 F. 2d 326, 331. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

H

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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states. Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. The Pennsylvania statute governing proceedings brought against a defendant to establish his paternity of a child born out of wedlock specifies that the “burden of proof shall be by a preponderance of the evidence.” This appeal presents the question whether a determination of paternity by that evidentiary standard complies with the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. We agree with the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania’s conclusion that applying the preponderance standard to this determination is constitutionally permissible. I On May 28, 1983, appellee Jean Marie Minnich, an unmarried woman, gave birth to Cory Michael Minnich. Three weeks later, appellee filed a complaint for child support in the Common Pleas Court of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, against appellant Gregory Rivera, alleging that he was the father of her son. In advance of trial appellant requested the court to rule that the statutory burden of proof of paternity violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and to instruct the jury that paternity must be established by clear and convincing evidence. The trial judge denied the motion. Applying the preponderance standard, the jury unanimously found that appellant is the father of the child. On appellant’s post-trial motions, the trial judge reconsidered his ruling on the burden of proof issue and granted appellant’s motion for a new trial. Appellee appealed directly to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which held that the statute is constitutional and reinstated the jury’s verdict. 509 Pa. 588, 506 A. 2d 879 (1986). The State Supreme Court noted that the standard was entitled to the presumption that legislative enactments are valid, and is the same as that approved by a majority of the jurisdictions that regard paternity suits as civil proceedings. Then, after reviewing the respective interests of the putative father, the mother, and the child, as well as “the interest of the Commonwealth in seeing that fathers support their children who are born out of wedlock so that those children do not become public charges,” the court concluded that the preponderance standard is one that “does not unduly risk the erroneous deprivation of any of them.” The Chief Justice of that court dissented. Relying on our holding in Santosky v. Kramer, 455 U. S. 745 (1982), that the Constitution requires clear and convincing evidence before the State may terminate the parental relationship, he reasoned that the same degree of proof should be required to create the relationship. We noted probable jurisdiction, 479 U. S. 960 (1986), and now affirm. II The preponderance of the evidence standard that the Pennsylvania Legislature has prescribed for paternity cases is the standard that is applied most frequently in litigation between private parties in every State. More specifically, it is the same standard that is applied in paternity litigation in the majority of American jurisdictions that regard such proceedings as civil in nature. A legislative judgment that is not only consistent with the “dominant opinion” throughout the country but is also in accord with “the traditions of our people and our law,” see Lochner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45, 76 (1905) (Holmes, J., dissenting), is entitled to a powerful presumption of validity when it is challenged under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The converse of this proposition is that a principal reason for any constitutionally mandated departure from the preponderance standard has been the adoption of a more exacting burden of proof by the majority of jurisdictions. In each of the three cases in which we have held that a standard of proof prescribed by a state legislature was unconstitutional, our judgment was consistent with the standard imposed by most jurisdictions. Thus, in explaining our conclusion that proof of a criminal charge beyond a reasonable doubt is constitutionally required, we stated: “Although virtually unanimous adherence to the reasonable-doubt standard in common-law jurisdictions may not conclusively establish it as a requirement of due process, such adherence does ‘reflect a profound judgment about the way in which law should be enforced and justice administered.’ Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 145, 155 (1968).” In re Winship, 397 U. S. 358, 361-362 (1970). Similarly, in Addington v. Texas, 441 U. S. 418 (1979), our rejection of Texas’ argument that a preponderance standard of proof was sufficient in a civil proceeding to commit an individual to a state mental hospital involuntarily was supported by the fact that a majority of the States had chosen to apply either a clear and convincing standard, id., at 431-432, nn. 6, 7, and 8, or the even more demanding criminal law standard, id., at 430-431, and n. 5. And in Santosky v. Kramer, which presented the question whether New York could extinguish a pre-existing parent-child relationship without requiring greater factual certainty than a fair preponderance of the evidence, we began our analysis by noting that 38 jurisdictions required a higher standard of proof in proceedings to terminate parental rights. 455 U. S., at 749-750. Appellant’s principal argument is that the standard of proof required by our holding in Santosky to terminate the parent-child relationship is also constitutionally required to create it. This view of Santosky rests on the tacit assumption of an equivalence between the State’s imposition of the legal obligations accompanying a biological relationship between parent and child and the State’s termination of a fully existing parent-child relationship. We are unable to accept this assumption. The collective judgment of the many state legislatures which adhere to a preponderance standard for paternity proceedings rests on legitimate and significant distinctions between termination and paternity proceedings. First, there is an important difference between the ultimate results of a judgment in the two proceedings. Resolving the question whether there is a causal connection between an alleged physical act of a putative father and the subsequent birth of the plaintiff’s child sufficient to impose financial liability on the father will not trammel any preexisting rights; the putative father has no legitimate right and certainly no liberty interest in avoiding financial obligations to his natural child that are validly imposed by state law. In the typical contested paternity proceeding, the defendant’s nonadmission of paternity represents a disavowal of any interest in providing the training, nurture, and loving protection that are at the heart of the parental relationship protected by the Constitution. See Lehr v. Robertson, 463 U. S. 248, 261 (1983). Rather, the primary interest of the defendant is in avoiding the serious economic consequences that flow from a court order that establishes paternity and its correlative obligation to provide support for the child. In contrast, in a termination proceeding the State is seeking to destroy permanently all legal recognition of the parental relationship. In Santosky, we described the parent’s desire for, and right to, the companionship, care, and custody of his or her children as “an interest far more precious than any property right.” 455 U. S., at 758-759. The State’s determination that the relationship between a parent and his or her child ought to be stripped of legal recognition abrogates many aspects of this precious interest. The difference between the two types of proceedings is thus a difference that is directly related to the degree of proof that is appropriately required. For, as we have said in explanation of the need for clear and convincing evidence in certain proceedings, “rights once confirmed should not be lightly revoked.” Schneiderman v. United States, 320 U. S. 118, 125 (1943). Second, there is an important distinction between the parties’ relationship to each other in the two proceedings. As is true of the other types of proceedings in which the Court has concluded that the Constitution demands a higher standard of proof than a mere preponderance of the evidence, the contestants in a termination proceeding are the State and an individual. Because the State has superior resources, see Santosky, 455 U. S., at 763, and because an adverse ruling in a criminal, civil commitment, or termination proceeding has especially severe consequences for the individuals affected, it is appropriate for society to impose upon itself a disproportionate share of the risk of error in such proceedings. See In re Winship, 397 U. S., at 370-372 (Harlan, J., concurring); Addington, 441 U. S., at 427; Santosky, 455 U. S., at 766. Unlike those proceedings, in a paternity suit the principal adversaries are the mother and the putative father, each of whom has an extremely important, but nevertheless relatively equal, interest in the outcome. Each would suffer in a similar way the consequences of an adverse ruling; thus, it is appropriate that each share roughly equally the risk of an inaccurate factual determination. Nor does the child’s interest in the proceeding favor placing a disproportionate share of the risk of error on either party. Surely, from the child’s point of view, a lower standard of proof increases the possibility of an erroneous determination that the defendant is his or her father, while a higher standard of proof increases the risk of a mistaken finding that the defendant is not his or her true father and thus may not be required to assume responsibility for his or her support. The equipoise of the private interests that are at stake in a paternity proceeding supports the conclusion that the standard of proof normally applied in private litigation is also appropriate for these cases. Finally, there is an important difference in the finality of judgment in favor of the defendant in a termination proceeding and in a paternity proceeding. As we pointed out in Santosky, “natural parents have no ‘double jeopardy’ defense” against the State’s repeated efforts to terminate parental rights. 455 U. S., at 764. If the State initially fails to win termination, as New York did in that case, see id., at 751, n. 4, it always can try once again as family circumstances change or as it gathers more or better evidence. “[E]ven when the parents have attained the level of fitness required by the State, they have no similar means by which they can forestall future termination efforts.” Id., at 764. The imposition of a higher standard of proof protects the parents, and to some degree the child, from renewed efforts to sever their familial ties. In contrast, a paternity suit terminates with the entry of a final judgment that bars repeated litigation of the same issue under normal principles of civil litigation. There is no “striking asymmetry in [the parties’] litigation options.” Ibid. The judgment of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is therefore Affirmed. Pennsylvania Stat. Ann., Tit. 42, § 6704(g) (Purdon 1982): “Trial of Paternity — Where the paternity of a child born out of wedlock is disputed, the determination of paternity shall be made by the court without a jury unless either party demands trial by jury. The trial, whether or not a trial by jury is demanded, shall be a civil trial and there shall be no right to a criminal trial on the issue of paternity. The burden of proof shall be by a preponderance of the evidence.’’ (Emphasis supplied.) The statute was repealed on October 30, 1985; its successor also provides that the burden of proof in a paternity action “shall be by a preponderance of the evidence.” 23 Pa. Cons. Stat. § 4343(a) (1985). “The person alleged to be father has a legitimate interest in not being declared the father of a child he had no hand in bringing into the world. It is important to him that he not be required to provide support and direct financial assistance to one not his child. There is a legitimate concern on his part with not having a stranger declared his legal heir thereby giving that stranger potential interests, inter alia, in his estate, and Social Security Benefits. He has an interest in not being responsible for the health, welfare and education of a child not his own. “The child born out of wedlock, on the other hand, has an interest in knowing his father and in having two parents to provide and care for him. The child’s concerns include a known belonging to a certain line of descent with knowledge of any benefits or detriments inheritable from that line. Further, the child is entitled to financial assistance from each parent able to provide such support. “The mother has an interest in receiving from the child’s natural father help, financial and otherwise, in raising and earing for the child born out of wedlock. She has an interest in seeing that her child has two responsible parents.” 509 Pa., at 593-594, 506 A. 2d, at 882. Id., at 596-597, 506 A. 2d, at 883. Earlier the court had described the public interest more fully: “The Commonwealth has an interest in its infant citizens having two parents to provide and care for them. There is a legitimate interest in not furnishing financial assistance for children who have a father capable of support. The Commonwealth is concerned in having a father responsible for a child born out of wedlock. This not only tends to reduce the welfare burden by keeping minor children, who have a financially able parent, off the rolls, but it also provides an identifiable father from whom potential recovery may be had of welfare payments which are paid to support the child born out of wedlock.” Id., at 594, 506 A. 2d, at 882. See id., at 600, 506 A. 2d, at 885. “[T]he typical civil ease involves] a monetary dispute between private parties. Since society has a minimal concern with the outcome of such private suits, plaintiff’s burden of proof is a mere preponderance of the evidence. The litigants thus share the risk of error in roughly equal fashion.” Addington v. Texas, 441 U. S. 418, 423 (1979). See also E. Cleary, McCormick on Evidence 956 (3d ed. 1984) (preponderance standard applies to “the general run of issues in civil cases”). See 10 Am. Jur. 2d, Bastards 837, 922 (1983); National Conference of State Legislatures, In the Best Interest of the Child: A Guide to State Child Support and Paternity Laws 102-103 (1982). A few States apply a more stringent standard of proof to a civil paternity action. See, e. g., In re Wayne County Dept. of Social Services v. Williams, 63 N. Y. 2d 658, 660, 468 N. E. 2d 705 (1984); E. E. v. F. F., 106 App. Div. 2d 694, 483 N. Y. S. 2d 748 (1984) (clear and convincing evidence); Va. Code § 20-61.1 (Supp. 1986); Jones v. Robinson, 229 Va. 276, 287, 329 S. E. 2d 794, 800 (1985) (proof beyond a reasonable doubt). “When an unwed father demonstrates a full commitment to the responsibilities of parenthood by ‘eom[ing] forward to participate in the rearing of his child,’ Caban [v. Mohammed, 441 U. S. 380, 392 (1979)], his interest in personal contact with his child acquires substantial protection under the Due Process Clause. At that point it may be said that he ‘act[s] as a father toward his children.’ Id., at 389, n. 7. But the mere existence of a biological link does not merit equivalent constitutional protection. The actions of judges neither create nor sever genetic bonds.” 463 U. S., at 261. Unlike the State Supreme Court, we place no reliance on the State’s interest in avoiding financial responsibility for children born out of wedlock. If it were relevant, the State’s financial interest in the outcome of the ease would weigh in favor of imposing a disproportionate share of the risk of error upon it by requiring a higher standard of proof. In our view, however, the State’s legitimate interest is in the fair and impartial adjudication of all civil disputes, including paternity proceedings. This interest is served by the State’s independent judiciary, which presumably resolves these disputes unaffected by the State’s interest in minimizing its welfare expenditures. Question: What is the issue area of the decision? A. Criminal Procedure B. Civil Rights C. First Amendment D. Due Process E. Privacy F. Attorneys G. Unions H. Economic Activity I. Judicial Power J. Federalism K. Interstate Relations L. Federal Taxation M. Miscellaneous N. Private Action Answer:

D

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