Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-857_4357.pdf
Page Number: 4.0

4 

JONES v. HENDRIX 

Syllabus 

(2) The Government asks the Court to adopt a novel interpreta-
tion of §2255(e)’s saving clause based on an elaborate argument.  Start-
ing from the premise that the words “inadequate or ineffective” imply
reference to a “benchmark” of adequacy and effectiveness, the Govern-
ment equates that benchmark with the types of claims cognizable in 
federal habeas petitions by state prisoners under the general habeas 
statutes.  The Government ultimately concludes that §2255(h) renders
§2255 “inadequate or ineffective to test” a federal prisoner’s statutory
claim in cases where the prisoner has already filed one §2255 motion
and the claim otherwise satisfies pre-AEDPA habeas principles, which 
generally  will  require  “a  ‘colorable  showing  of  factual  innocence.’ ” 
McCleskey v. Zant, 499 U. S. 467, 495 (quoting Kuhlmann v. Wilson, 
477 U. S. 436, 454 (plurality opinion)). 

The Court sees no indication that the saving clause adopts the Gov-
ernment’s  state-prisoner-habeas  benchmark.    In  any  event,  that
benchmark has uncertain relevance to the question presented here be-
cause  federal  habeas  relief  does  not  lie  for  errors  of  state  law.    The 
Government’s  theory  ultimately  rests  instead  on  its  assertion  that 
§2255(h) is simply not clear enough to support the inference that Con-
gress entirely closed the door on pure statutory claims not brought in
a federal prisoner’s initial §2255 motion.  That assertion is unpersua-
sive. 

The Government asserts that the Court must require “the clearest 
command” before construing AEDPA to “close [the] courthouse doors”
on “a strong equitable claim” for relief.  Holland v. Florida, 560 U. S. 
631,  646,  649  (internal  quotation  marks  omitted).    But  AEDPA’s  re-
strictions embody Congress’s policy judgment regarding the appropri-
ate balance between finality and error correction.  The Court declines 
to adopt a presumption against finality.  Further, the Court typically
has found clear-statement rules appropriate when a statute implicates 
historically or constitutionally grounded norms that the Court would
not  expect  Congress  to  unsettle  lightly.    See,  e.g.,  Alabama  Assn.  of 
Realtors v. Department of Health and Human Servs., 594 U. S. ___, ___ 
(per curiam).  As  far  as  history  and  the  Constitution  are  concerned, 
“there is nothing incongruous about a system in which this kind of er-
ror—the application of a since-rejected statutory interpretation—can-
not be remedied after final judgment,” George v. McDonough, 596 U. S. 
___, ___, and thus nothing fundamentally surprising about Congress 
declining to make such errors remediable in a second or successive col-
lateral attack.  Pp. 20–25. 

8 F. 4th 683, affirmed. 

THOMAS, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C. J., 
and ALITO, GORSUCH, KAVANAUGH, and BARRETT, JJ., joined.  SOTOMAYOR