Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
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529US2

Unit: $U47

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432

WILLIAMS v. TAYLOR

Opinion of the Court

lack,” and an “[o]mission to perform”); Webster’s New Inter-
national Dictionary 814 (3d ed. 1993) (“to leave some possible
or expected action unperformed or some condition un-
achieved”). See also Black’s Law Dictionary 594 (6th ed.
1990) (deﬁning “fail” as “[f]ault, negligence, or refusal”). To
say a person has failed in a duty implies he did not take the
necessary steps to fulﬁll it. He is, as a consequence, at fault
and bears responsibility for the failure.
In this sense, a per-
son is not at fault when his diligent efforts to perform an act
are thwarted, for example, by the conduct of another or by
happenstance. Fault lies,
in those circumstances, either
with the person who interfered with the accomplishment of
the act or with no one at all. We conclude Congress used
the word “failed” in the sense just described. Had Congress
intended a no-fault standard, it would have had no difﬁculty
in making its intent plain.
It would have had to do no more
than use, in lieu of the phrase “has failed to,” the phrase
“did not.”

Under the opening clause of § 2254(e)(2), a failure to de-
velop the factual basis of a claim is not established unless
there is lack of diligence, or some greater fault, attributable
to the prisoner or the prisoner’s counsel.
In this we agree
with the Court of Appeals and with all other courts of
appeals which have addressed the issue. See, e. g., Baja v.
Ducharme, 187 F. 3d 1075, 1078–1079 (CA9 1999); Miller v.
Champion, 161 F. 3d 1249, 1253 (CA10 1998); Cardwell, 152
F. 3d, at 337; McDonald v. Johnson, 139 F. 3d 1056, 1059
(CA5 1998); Burris v. Parke, 116 F. 3d 256, 258 (CA7 1997);
Love v. Morton, 112 F. 3d 131, 136 (CA3 1997).

Our interpretation of § 2254(e)(2)’s opening clause has sup-
port in Keeney v. Tamayo-Reyes, 504 U. S. 1 (1992), a case
In Keeney,
decided four years before AEDPA’s enactment.
a prisoner with little knowledge of English sought an eviden-
tiary hearing in federal court, alleging his nolo contendere
plea to a manslaughter charge was not knowing and volun-
tary because of inaccuracies in the translation of the plea