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Page Number: 54

22 

JONES v. HENDRIX 

JACKSON, J., dissenting 

inference  that  Congress  silently  repealed  the  traditional 
[postconviction]  remedy  for  federal  prisoners  who  have 
been  imprisoned  for  conduct  that  Congress  did  not  crimi-
nalize.”  Brief for Respondent 28.  I proceed here to add that 
nothing outside of AEDPA—not the background legal prin-
ciples that existed at the time Congress enacted the statute, 
nor the practical consequences of reading §2255(h) in this
manner—supports that inference either. 

Take  equity,  for  instance.    When  Congress  crafted
§2255(h), it legislated against an important background eq-
uitable principle pertaining to postconviction relief: Courts
should not interpret statutory provisions governing habeas
review to even “ ‘run the risk’ ” of causing prisoners to “ ‘for-
ever los[e] their opportunity for any federal review of their 
. . .  claims.’ ”    Panetti  v.  Quarterman,  551  U. S.  930,  945– 
946  (2007)  (quoting  Rhines  v.  Weber,  544  U. S.  269,  275 
(2005));  see  also  Stewart  v.  Martinez-Villareal,  523  U. S. 
637, 645 (1998).  This means that Congress was well aware 
that  courts  consistently  “rel[y]  on  equitable  doctrines  to 
carve out . . . ways petitioners can bypass [otherwise appli-
cable] procedural obstacles” when a prisoner has “not had a 
full and fair opportunity to litigate their federal claims.”  E. 
Primus,  Equitable  Gateways:  Toward  Expanded  Federal
Habeas  Corpus  Review  of  State-Court  Criminal  Convic-
tions,  61  Ariz.  L. Rev.  291,  305  (2019).11    Knowing  that  
courts are equitable tribunals that tend to operate in this
fashion  should  have  prompted  Congress  to  express  its  in-

—————— 

11 Many of the Courts of Appeals that had read §2255(e) as saving legal
innocence claims invoked this equitable principle.  See, e.g., In re Daven-
port, 147 F. 3d, at 609; Triestman, 124 F. 3d, at 378; In re Dorsainvil, 119 
F. 3d, at 251.  As lower courts also recognized, the impetus to provide a
meaningful  opportunity  for  review  of  a  postconviction  claim  was  espe-
cially strong when failure to hear the claim might result in a “miscar-
riage of justice.”  See Reyes-Requena, 243 F. 3d, at 904; In re Dorsainvil, 
119 F. 3d, at 251.