Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/524bv.pdf
Page Number: 308.0

524US1

Unit: $U85

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Cite as: 524 U. S. 236 (1998)

263

Scalia, J., dissenting

the vitality” of the holdings. Ante, at 252. The confusion
that will be introduced by this new approach is obvious.

At bottom, the only justiﬁcation for the Court’s holding—
and the only one that prompts the concurrence to overrule
House—is convenience: it “permits us to carry out our nor-
mal function” of appellate review. Ante, at 251. Our “nor-
mal” function of appellate review, however, is no more and
no less than what Congress says it is. U. S. Const., Art. III,
§ 2. The Court’s deﬁance of the scheme created by Congress
in evident reliance on our precedent is a display not of “com-
mon sense,” ante, at 250, but of judicial willfulness. And a
doctrine of stare decisis that is suspended when ﬁve Justices
ﬁnd it inconvenient (or indeed, as the concurrence suggests,
even four Justices in search of a ﬁfth) is no doctrine at all,
but simply an excuse for adhering to cases we like and aban-
doning those we do not.

II

Since I ﬁnd no jurisdiction under § 1254(1), I must address
the Government’s further argument that we can issue a
common-law writ of certiorari under the All Writs Act, 28
U. S. C. § 1651. The All Writs Act provides that “[t]he
Supreme Court . . . may issue all writs necessary or appro-
priate in aid of [its] jurisdictio[n] and agreeable to the usages
and principles of law.” As expressly noted in this Court’s
Rule 20.1, issuance of a writ under § 1651 “is not a matter of
right, but of discretion sparingly exercised,” and “[t]o justify
the granting of any such writ, the petition must show that
the writ will be in aid of the Court’s appellate jurisdiction,
that exceptional circumstances warrant the exercise of the
Court’s discretionary powers, and that adequate relief cannot
be obtained in any other form or from any other court.”

Petitioner (who ﬁled a petition for a writ of certiorari
under § 1254(1), not under the All Writs Act, Pet. for Cert.
1) has failed to establish that he meets these requirements.
To begin with, he has not shown that adequate relief is unob-
tainable in any form or from any other court. AEDPA dif-