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Page Number: 62

30 

JONES v. HENDRIX 

JACKSON, J., dissenting 

442 U. S. 178, 186–187 (1979); Davis, 417 U. S., at 346–347 
(citing Hill v. United States, 368 U. S. 424, 428–429 (1962)).
In any event, the majority does not cite a single case that
suggests that an Act of Congress that threatens to cut off 
access  to  habeas  (or  its  statutory  equivalent)  should  be
treated  any  differently  for  purposes  of  application  of  the
clear-statement rule if a petitioner’s claim has a statutory 
basis. 

The majority’s most full-throated defense of its jettison-
ing of clear-statement principles lies in its attempt to cast
statutory innocence claims as not “historically or constitu-
tionally grounded.”  Ante, at 24–25.  The first and most ob-
vious problem with this effort is that the historical pedigree 
of a claim is irrelevant for clear-statement purposes.  The 
clear-statement rule is applicable here because the statute
being interpreted involves access to the writ of habeas cor-
pus—a  significant  constitutional  value  that  we  would  not
assume Congress would discard without careful considera-
tion.  See Manning 121–122; see also Holland, 560 U. S., at 
646–649.  And, so triggered, our clear-statement canon of
construction is not rendered inapplicable just because the 
particular type of claim that a prisoner seeks to advance in
the context of a habeas or postconviction proceeding (if he
is  afforded  one)  might  not  date  back  to  the  founding  era.
This  must  be  why  the  majority  cites  no  precedent  that
splices the clear-statement rule in this fashion.

Looking  back  to  the  time  of  the  founding  to  determine 
whether the clear-statement rule applies to our interpreta-
tion of a statute passed in 1996 also makes no sense.  The 
clear-statement question relates to what Congress intended
with respect to the meaning of the statute at the time it was 
enacted.  When Congress introduced §2255(h), it codified or 
changed  the  law  that  existed  at  that  time  (i.e.,  in  1996). 
See, e.g., Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U. S. 473, 483 (2000) (not-
ing  that  AEDPA’s  certificate-of-appealability  provisions
codified the prevailing judicial standard).  Thus, when this