Task: sc_lcdispositiondirection

What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine whether the decision of the court whose decision the Supreme Court reviewed was itself liberal or conservative. In the context of issues pertaining to criminal procedure, civil rights, First Amendment, due process, privacy, and attorneys, consider liberal to be pro-person accused or convicted of crime, or denied a jury trial, pro-civil liberties or civil rights claimant, especially those exercising less protected civil rights (e.g., homosexuality), pro-child or juvenile, pro-indigent pro-Indian, pro-affirmative action, pro-neutrality in establishment clause cases, pro-female in abortion, pro-underdog, anti-slavery, incorporation of foreign territories anti-government in the context of due process, except for takings clause cases where a pro-government, anti-owner vote is considered liberal except in criminal forfeiture cases or those where the taking is pro-business violation of due process by exercising jurisdiction over nonresident, pro-attorney or governmental official in non-liability cases, pro-accountability and/or anti-corruption in campaign spending pro-privacy vis-a-vis the 1st Amendment where the privacy invaded is that of mental incompetents, pro-disclosure in Freedom of Information Act issues except for employment and student records. In the context of issues pertaining to unions and economic activity, consider liberal to be pro-union except in union antitrust where liberal = pro-competition, pro-government, anti-business anti-employer, pro-competition, pro-injured person, pro-indigent, pro-small business vis-a-vis large business pro-state/anti-business in state tax cases, pro-debtor, pro-bankrupt, pro-Indian, pro-environmental protection, pro-economic underdog pro-consumer, pro-accountability in governmental corruption, pro-original grantee, purchaser, or occupant in state and territorial land claims anti-union member or employee vis-a-vis union, anti-union in union antitrust, anti-union in union or closed shop, pro-trial in arbitration. In the context of issues pertaining to judicial power, consider liberal to be pro-exercise of judicial power, pro-judicial "activism", pro-judicial review of administrative action. In the context of issues pertaining to federalism, consider liberal to be pro-federal power, pro-executive power in executive/congressional disputes, anti-state. In the context of issues pertaining to federal taxation, consider liberal to be pro-United States and conservative pro-taxpayer. In miscellaneous, consider conservative the incorporation of foreign territories and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states or judcial authority vis-a-vis state or federal legislative authority, and consider liberal legislative veto. The lower court's decision direction is unspecifiable if the manner in which the Supreme Court took jurisdiction is original or certification; or if the direction of the Supreme Court's decision is unspecifiable and the main issue pertains to private law or interstate relations

Justice Ginsburg
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This ease concerns the legitimacy under Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure of a class-action certification sought to achieve global settlement of current and future asbestos-related claims. The class proposed for certification potentially encompasses hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of individuals tied together by this commonality: Each was, or some day may be, adversely affected by past exposure to asbestos products manufactured by one or more of 20 companies. Those companies, defendants in the lower courts, are petitioners here.
The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania certified the class for settlement only, finding that the proposed settlement was fair and that representation and notice had been adequate. That court enjoined class members from separately pursuing asbestos-related personal-injury suits in any court, federal or state, pending the issuance of a final order. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit vacated the District Court’s orders, holding that the class certification failed to satisfy Rule 23’s requirements in several critical respects. We affirm the Court of Appeals’ judgment.
I
A
The settlement-class certification we confront evolved in response to an asbestos-litigation crisis. See Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc., 83 F. 3d 610, 618, and n. 2 (CA3 1996) (citing commentary). A United States Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Committee on Asbestos Litigation, appointed by The Chief Justice in September 1990, described facets of the problem in a 1991 report:
“[This] is a tale of danger known in the 1930s, exposure inflicted upon millions of Americans in the 1940s and 1950s, injuries that began to take their toll in the 1960s, and a flood of lawsuits beginning in the 1970s. On the basis of past and current filing data, and because of a latency period that may last as long as 40 years for some asbestos related diseases, a continuing stream of claims can be expected. The final toll of asbestos related injuries is unknown. Predictions have been made of 200,000 asbestos disease deaths before the year 2000 and as many as 265,000 by the year 2015.
. “The most objectionable aspects of asbestos litigation can be briefly summarized: dockets in both federal and state courts continue to grow; long delays are routine; trials are too long; the same issues are litigated over and over; transaction costs exceed the victims’ recovery by nearly two to one; exhaustion of assets threatens and distorts the process; and future claimants may lose altogether.” Report of The Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Committee on Asbestos Litigation 2-3 (Mar. 1991).
Real reform, the report concluded, required federal legislation creating a national asbestos dispute-resolution scheme. See id., at 3, 27-35; see also id., at 42 (dissenting statement of Hogan, J.) (agreeing that “a national solution is the only answer” and suggesting “passage by Congress of an administrative claims procedure similar to the Black Lung legislation”). As recommended by the Ad Hoc Committee, the Judicial Conference of the United States urged Congress to act. See Report of the Proceedings of the Judicial Conference of the United States 33 (Mar. 12, 1991). To this date, no congressional response has emerged.
In the face of legislative inaction, the federal courts — lacking authority to replace state tort systems with a national toxic tort compensation regime — endeavored to work with the procedural tools available to improve management of federal asbestos litigation. Eight federal judges, experienced in the superintendence of asbestos cases, urged the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (MDL Panel), to consolidate in a single district all asbestos complaints then pending in federal courts. Accepting the recommendation, the MDL Panel transferred all asbestos cases then filed, but not yet on trial in federal courts to a single district, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania; pursuant to the transfer order, the collected cases were consolidated for pretrial proceedings before Judge Weiner. See In re Asbestos Products Liability Litigation (No. VI), 771 F. Supp. 415, 422-424 (JPML 1991). The order aggregated pending cases only; no authority resides in the MDL Panel to license for consolidated proceedings claims not yet filed.
B
After the consolidation, attorneys for plaintiffs and defendants formed separate steering committees and began settlement negotiations. Ronald L. Motley and Gene Locks — later appointed, along with Motley’s law partner Joseph F. Rice, to represent the plaintiff class in this action— cochaired the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee. Counsel for the.Center for Claims Resolution (CCR), the consortium of 20 former asbestos manufacturers now before us as petitioners, participated in the Defendants’ Steering Committee. Although the MDL Panel order collected, transferred, and consolidated only cases already commenced in federal courts, settlement negotiations included efforts to find a “means of resolving... future cases.” Record, Doc. 3, p. 2 (Memorandum in Support of Joint Motion for Conditional Class Certification); see also Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc., 157 F. R. D. 246, 266 (ED Pa. 1994) (“primary purpose of the settlement talks in the consolidated MDL litigatidn was to craft a national settlement that would provide an alternative resolution mechanism for asbestos claims,” including claims that might be filed in the future).
In November 1991, the Defendants’ Steering Committee made an offer designed to settle all pending and future asbestos cases by providing a fund for distribution by plaintiffs’ counsel among asbestos-exposed individuals. The Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee rejected this offer, and negotiations fell apart. CCR, however, continued to pursue “a workable administrative system for the handling of future claims.” Id., at 270.,
To that end, CCR counsel approached the lawyers who had headed the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in the unsuccessful negotiations, and a new round of negotiations began; that round yielded the mass settlement agreement now in controversy. At the time, the former heads of the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee represented thousands of plaintiffs with then-pending asbestos-related claims — claimants the parties to this suit call “inventory” plaintiffs. CCR indicated in these discussions that it would resist settlement of inventory cases absent “some kind of protection for the future.” Id., at 294; see also id., at 295 (CCR communicated to the inventory plaintiffs’ attorneys that once the CCR defendants saw a rational way to deal with claims expected to be filed in the future, those defendants would be prepared to address the settlement of pending cases).
Settlement talks thus concentrated on devising an administrative scheme for disposition of asbestos claims not yet in litigation. In these negotiations, counsel for masses of inventory plaintiffs endeavored to represent the interests of the anticipated future claimants, although those lawyers then had no attorney-client relationship with such claimants.
Once negotiations seemed likely to produce an agreement purporting to bind potential plaintiffs, CCR agreed to settle, through separate agreements, the claims of plaintiffs who had already filed asbestos-related lawsuits. In one such agreement, CCR defendants promised to pay more than $200 million to gain release of the claims of numerous inventory plaintiffs. After settling the inventory claims, CCR, together with the plaintiffs’ lawyers CCR had approached, launched this case, exclusively involving persons outside the MDL Panel’s province — plaintiffs without already pending lawsuits.
C
The class action thus instituted was not intended to be litigated. Rather, within the space of a single day, January 15, 1993, the settling parties — CCR defendants and the representatives of the plaintiff class described below — presented to the District Court a complaint, an answer, a proposed settlement agreement, and a joint motion for conditional class certification.
The complaint identified nine lead plaintiffs, designating them and members of their families as representatives of a class comprising all persons who had not filed an asbestos-related lawsuit against a CCR defendant as of the date the class action commenced, but who (1) had been exposed— occupationally or through the occupational exposure of a spouse or household member — to asbestos or products containing asbestos attributable to a CCR defendant, or (2) whose spouse or family member had been so exposed. Untold numbers of individuals may fall within this description. All named plaintiffs alleged that they or a member of their family had been exposed to asbestos-containing products of CCR defendants. More than half of the named plaintiffs alleged that they or their family members had already suffered various physical injuries as a result of the exposure. The others alleged that they had not yet manifested any asbestos-related condition. The complaint delineated no subclasses; all named plaintiffs were designated as representatives of the class as a whole.
The complaint invoked the District Court’s diversity jurisdiction and asserted various state-law claims for relief, including (1) negligent failure to warn, (2) strict liability, (3) breach of express and implied warranty, (4) negligent infliction of emotional distress, (5) enhanced risk of disease, (6) medical monitoring, and (7) civil conspiracy. Each plaintiff requested unspecified damages in excess of $100,000. CCR defendants’ answer denied the principal allegations of the complaint and asserted 11 affirmative defenses.
A stipulation of settlement accompanied the pleadings; it proposed to settle, and to preclude nearly all class members from litigating against CCR companies, all claims not filed before January 15, 1993, involving compensation for present and future asbestos-related personal injury or death. An exhaustive document exceeding 100 pages, the stipulation presents in detail an administrative mechanism and a schedule of payments to compensate class members who meet defined asbestos-exposure and medical requirements. The stipulation describes four categories of compensable disease: mesothelioma; lung cancer; certain “other cancers” (colon-rectal, laryngeal, esophageal, and stomach cancer); and “non-malignant conditions” (asbestosis and bilateral pleural thickening). Persons with “exceptional” medical claims— claims that do not fall within the four described diagnostic categories — may in some instances qualify for compensation, but the settlement caps the number of “exceptional” claims CCR must cover.
For each qualifying disease category, the stipulation specifies the range of damages CCR will pay to qualifying claimants. Payments under the settlement are not adjustable for inflation. Mesothelioma claimants — the most highly compensated category — are scheduled to receive between $20,000 and $200,000. The stipulation provides that CCR is to propose the level of compensation within the prescribed ranges; it also establishes procedures to resolve disputes over medical diagnoses and levels of compensation.
Compensation above the fixed ranges may be obtained for “extraordinary” claims. But the settlement places both numerical caps and dollar limits on such claims. The settlement also imposes “case flow máximums,” which cap the number of claims payable for each disease in a given year.
Class members are to receive no compensation for certain kinds of claims, even if otherwise applicable state law recognizes such claims. Claims that garner no compensation under the settlement include claims by family members of asbestos-exposed individuals for loss of consortium, and claims by so-called “exposure-only” plaintiffs for increased risk of cancer, fear of future asbestos-related injury, and medical monitoring. “Pleural” claims, which might be asserted by persons with asbestos-related plaques on their lungs but no accompanying physical impairment, are also excluded. Although not entitled to present compensation, exposure-only claimants and pleural claimants may qualify for benefits when and if they develop a compensable disease and meet the relevant exposure and medical criteria. Defendants forgo defenses to liability, including statute of limitations pleas.
Class members, in the main, are bound by the settlement in perpetuity, while CCR defendants may choose to withdraw from the settlement after ten years. A small number of class members — only a few per year — may reject the settlement and pursue their claims in court. Those permitted to exercise this option, however, may not assert any punitive damages claim or any claim for increased risk of cancer. Aspects of the administration of the settlement are to be monitored by the AFL-CIO and class counsel. Class counsel are to receive attorneys’ fees in an amount to be approved by the District Court.
D
On January 29,1993, as requested by the settling parties, the District Court conditionally certified, under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(3), an encompassing opt-out class. The certified class included persons occupationally exposed to defendants’ asbestos products, and members of their families, who had not filed suit as of January 15. Judge Weiner appointed Locks, Motley, and Rice as class counsel, noting that “[t]he Court may in the future appoint additional counsel if it is deemed necessary and advisable.” Record, Doc. 11, p. 3 (Class Certification Order). At no stage of the proceedings, however, were additional counsel in fact appointed. Nor was the class ever divided into subclasses. In a separate order, Judge Weiner assigned to Judge Reed, also of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, “the task of conducting fairness proceedings and of determining whether the proposed settlement is fair to the class.” See 157 F. R. D., at 258. Various class members raised objections to the settlement stipulation, and Judge Weiner granted the objectors full rights to participate in the subsequent proceedings. Ibid.
In preliminary rulings, Judge Reed held that the District Court had subject-matter jurisdiction, see Carlough v. Amchem Products, Inc., 834 F. Supp. 1437, 1467-1468 (ED Pa. 1993), and he approved the settling parties’ elaborate plan for giving notice to the class, see Carlough v. Amchem Products, Inc., 158 F. R. D. 314, 336 (ED Pa. 1993). The court-approved notice informed recipients that they could exclude themselves from the class, if they so chose, within a three-month opt-out period.
Objectors raised numerous challenges to the settlement. They urged that the settlement unfairly disadvantaged those without currently compensable conditions in that it failed to adjust for inflation or to account for changes, over time, in medical understanding. They maintained that compensation levels were intolerably low in comparison to awards available in tort litigation or payments received by the inventory plaintiffs. And they objected to the absence of any compensation for certain claims, for example, medical monitoring, compensable under the tort law of several States. Rejecting these and all other objections, Judge Reed concluded that the settlement terms were fair and had been negotiated without collusion. See 157 F. R. D., at 325, 331-332. He also found that adequate notice had been given to class members, see id., at 332-334, and that final class certification under Rule 23(b)(3) was appropriate, see id., at 315.
As to the specific prerequisites to certification, the District Court observed that the class satisfied Rule 23(a)(1)’s numer-osity requirement, see ibid., a matter no one debates. The Rule 23(a)(2) and (b)(3) requirements of commonality and preponderance were also satisfied, the District Court held, in that
“[t]he members of the class have all been exposed to asbestos products supplied by the defendants and all share an interest in receiving prompt and fair compensation for their claims, while minimizing the risks and transaction costs inherent in the asbestos litigation process as it occurs presently in the tort system. Whether the proposed settlement satisfies this interest and is otherwise a fair, reasonable and adequate compromise of the claims of the class is a predominant issue for purposes of Rule 23(b)(3).” Id., at 316.
The District Court held next that the claims of the class representatives were “typical” of the class as a whole, a requirement of Rule 23(a)(3), and that, as Rule 23(b)(3) demands, the class settlement was “superior” to other methods of adjudication. See ibid.
Strenuous objections had been asserted regarding the adequacy of representation, a Rule 23(a)(4) requirement. Objectors maintained that class counsel and class representatives had disqualifying conflicts of interests. In particular, objectors urged, claimants whose injuries had become manifest and claimants without manifest injuries should not have common counsel and should not be aggregated in a single class. Furthermore, objectors argued, lawyers representing inventory plaintiffs should not represent the newly formed class.
Satisfied that class counsel had ably negotiated the settlement in the best interests of all concerned, and that the named parties served as adequate representatives, the District Court rejected these objections. See id., at 317-319, 326-332. Subclasses were unnecessary, the District Court held, bearing in mind the added cost and confusion they would entail and the ability of class members to exclude themselves from the class during the three-month opt-out period. See id., at 318-319. Reasoning that the representative plaintiffs “have a strong interest that recovery for. all of the medical categories be maximized because they may have claims in any, or several categories,” the District Court found “no antagonism of interest between class members with various medical conditions, or between persons with and without currently manifest asbestos impairment.” Id., at 318. Declaring class certification appropriate and the settlement fair, the District Court preliminarily enjoined all class members from commencing any asbestos-related suit against the CCR defendants in any state or federal court. See Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc., 878 F. Supp. 716, 726-727 (ED Pa. 1994).
The objectors appealed. The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit vacated the certification, holding that the requirements of Rule 23 had not been satisfied. See 83 F. 3d 610 (1996).
E
The Court of Appeals, in a long, heavily detailed opinion by Judge Becker, first noted several challenges by objectors to justiciability, subject-matter jurisdiction, and adequacy of notice. These challenges, the court said, raised “serious concerns.” Id., at 623. However, the court observed, “the jurisdictional issues in this case would not exist but for the [class-action] certification.” Ibid. Turning to the class-certification issues and finding them dispositive, the Third Circuit declined to decide other questions.
On class-action prerequisites, the Court of Appeals referred to an earlier Third Circuit decision, In re General Motors Corp. Pick-Up Truck Fuel Tank Products Liability Litigation, 55 F. 3d 768, cert. denied, 516 U. S. 824 (1995) (hereinafter GM Trucks), which held that although a class action may be certified for settlement purposes only, Rule 23(a)’s requirements must be satisfied as if the case were going to be litigated. 55 F. 3d, at 799-800. The same rule should apply, the Third Circuit said, to class certification under Rule 23(b)(3). See 83 F. 3d, at 625. But cf. In re Asbestos Litigation, 90 F. 3d 963, 975-976, and n. 8 (CA5 1996), cert. pending, Nos. 96-1379, 96-1394. While stating that the requirements of Rule 23(a) and (b)(3) must be met “without taking into account the settlement,” 83 F. 3d, at 626, the Court of Appeals in fact closely considered the terms of the settlement as it examined aspects of the case under Rule 23 criteria. See id., at 630-634.
The Third Circuit recognized that Rule 23(a)(2)’s “commonality” requirement is subsumed under, or superseded by, the more stringent Rule 23(b)(3) requirement that questions common to the class “predominate over” other questions. The court therefore trained its attention on the “predominance” inquiry. See id., at 627. The harmfulness of asbestos exposure was indeed a prime factor common to the class, the Third Circuit observed. See id., at 626, 630. But uncommon questions abounded.
In contrast to mass torts involving a single accident, class members in this case were exposed to different asbestos-containing products, in different ways, over different periods, and for different amounts of time; some suffered no physical injury, others suffered disabling or deadly diseases. See id., at 626, 628. “These factual differences,” the Third Circuit explained, “translated] into significant legal differences.” Id., at 627. State law governed and varied widely on such critical issues as “viability of [exposure-only] claims [and] availability of causes of action for medical monitoring, increased risk of cancer, and fear of future injury.” Ibid. “[T]he number of uncommon issues in this humongous class action,” the Third Circuit concluded, ibid., barred a determination, under existing tort law, that common questions predominated, see id., at 630.
The Court of Appeals next found that “serious intra-class conflicts preclude[d] th[e] class from meeting the adequacy of representation requirement” of Rule 23(a)(4). Ibid. Adverting to, but not resolving charges of attorney conflict of interests, the Third Circuit addressed the question whether the named plaintiffs could adequately advance the interests of all class members. The Court of Appeals acknowledged that the District Court was certainly correct to this extent: “ ‘[T]he members of the class are united in seeking the maximum possible recovery for their asbestos-related claims.’” Ibid, (quoting 157 F. R. D., at 317). “But the settlement does more than simply provide a general recovery fund,” the Court of Appeals immediately added; “[rjather, it makes important judgments on how recovery is to be allocated among different kinds of plaintiffs, decisions that necessarily favor some claimants over others.” 83 F. 3d, at 630.
In the Third Circuit’s view, the "most salient” divergence of interests separated plaintiffs already afflicted with an asbestos-related disease from plaintiffs without manifest injury (exposure-only plaintiffs). The latter would rationally want protection against inflation for distant recoveries. See ibid. They would also seek sturdy back-end opt-out rights and “causation provisions that can keep pace with changing science and medicine, rather than freezing in place the science of 1993.” Id., at 630-631. Already injured parties, in contrast, would care little about such provisions and would rationally trade them for higher current payouts. See id., at 631. These and other adverse interests, the Court of Appeals carefully explained, strongly suggested that an undivided set of representatives could not adequately protect the discrete interests of both currently afflicted and exposure-only claimants.
The Third Circuit next rejected the District Court’s determination that the named plaintiffs were “typical” of the class, noting that this Rule 23(a)(3) inquiry overlaps the adequacy of representation question: “both look to the potential for conflicts in the class.” Id., at 632. Evident conflict problems, the court said, led it to hold that “no set of representatives can be ‘typical’ of this class.” Ibid.
The Court of Appeals similarly rejected the District Court’s assessment of the superiority of the class action. The Third Circuit initially noted that a class action so large and complex “could not be tried.” Ibid. The court elaborated most particularly, however, on the unfairness of binding exposure-only plaintiffs who might be unaware of the class action or lack sufficient information about their exposure to make a reasoned decision whether to stay in or opt out. See id., at 633. “A series of statewide or more narrowly defined adjudications, either through consolidation under Rule 42(a) or as class actions under Rule 23, would seem preferable,” the Court of Appeals said. Id., at 634.
The Third Circuit, after intensive review, ultimately ordered decertification of the class and vacation of the District Court’s antisuit injunction. Id., at 635. Judge Wellford concurred, “fully subscribing] to the decision of Judge Becker that the plaintiffs in this case ha[d] not met the requirements of Rule 23.” Ibid. He added that in his view, named exposure-only plaintiffs had no standing to pursue the suit in federal court, for their depositions showed that “[t]hey claimed no damages and no present injury.” Id., at 638.
We granted certiorari, 519 U. S. 957 (1996), and now affirm.
II
Objectors assert in this Court, as they did in the District Court and Court of Appeals, an array of jurisdictional barriers. Most fundamentally, they maintain that the settlement proceeding instituted by class counsel and CCR is not a justi-ciable case or controversy within the confines of Article III of the Federal Constitution. In the main, they say, the proceeding is a nonadversarial endeavor to impose on countless individuals without currently ripe claims an administrative compensation regime binding on those individuals if and when they manifest injuries.
Furthermore, objectors urge that exposure-only claimants lack standing to sue: Either they have not yet sustained any cognizable injury or, to the extent the complaint states claims and demands relief for emotional distress, enhanced risk of disease, and medical monitoring, the settlement provides no redress. Objectors also argue that exposure-only claimants did not meet the then-current amount-in-controversy requirement (in excess of $50,000) specified for federal-court jurisdiction based upon diversity of citizenship. See 28 U. S. C. § 1332(a).
As earlier recounted, see supra, at 608, the Third Circuit declined to reach these issues because they “would not exist but for the [class-action] certification.” 83 F. 3d, at 623. We agree that “[t]he class certification issues are dispositive,” ibid.; because their resolution here is logically antecedent to the existence of any Article III issues, it is appropriate to reach them first, cf. Arizonans for Official English v. Arizona, 520 U. S. 43, 66-67 (1997) (declining to resolve definitively question whether petitioners had standing because mootness issue was dispositive of the case). We therefore follow the path taken by the Court of Appeals, mindful that Rule 23’s requirements must be interpreted in keeping with Article III constraints, and with the Rules Enabling Act, which instructs that rules of procedure “shall not abridge, enlarge or modify any substantive right,” 28 U. S. C. § 2072(b). See also Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 82 (“rules shall not be construed to extend... the [subject-matter] jurisdiction of the United States district courts”).
III
To place this controversy in context, we briefly describe the characteristics of class actions for which the Federal Rules provide. Rule 23, governing federal-court class actions, stems from equity practice and gained its current shape in an innovative 1966 revision. See generally Kaplan, Continuing Work of the Civil Committee: 1966 Amendments of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (I), 81 Harv. L. Rev. 356, 375-400 (1967) (hereinafter Kaplan, Continuing Work). Rule 23(a) states four threshold requirements applicable to all class actions: (1) numerosity (a “class [so large] that join-der of all members is impracticable”); (2) commonality (“questions of law or fact common to the class”); (3) typicality (named parties’ claims or defenses “are typical... of the class”); and (4) adequacy of representation (representatives “will fairly and adequately protect the interests of the class”).
In addition to satisfying Rule 23(a)’s prerequisites, parties seeking class certification must show that the action is maintainable under Rule 23(b)(1), (2), or (3). Rule 23(b)(1) covers cases in which separate actions by or against individual class members would risk establishing “incompatible standards of conduct for the party opposing the class,” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23(b)(1)(A), or would “as a practical matter be disposi-tive of the interests” of nonparty class members “or substantially impair or impede their ability to protect their interests,” Rule 23(b)(1)(B). Rule 23(b)(1)(A) “takes in cases where the party is obliged by law to treat the members of the class alike (a utility acting toward customers; a government imposing a tax), or where the party must treat all alike as a matter of practical necessity (a riparian owner using water as against downriver owners).” Kaplan, Continuing Work 388 (footnotes omitted). Rule 23(b)(1)(B) includes, for example, “limited fund” cases, instances in which numerous persons make claims against a fund insufficient to satisfy all claims. See Advisory Committee’s Notes on Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23, 28 U. S. C. App., pp. 696-697 (hereinafter Adv. Comm. Notes).
Rule 23(b)(2) permits class actions for declaratory or in-junctive relief where “the party opposing the class has acted or refused to act on grounds generally applicable to the class.” Civil rights cases against parties charged with unlawful, class-based discrimination are prime examples. Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 697; see Kaplan, Continuing Work 389 (subdivision (b)(2) “build[s] on experience mainly, but not exclusively, in the civil rights field”).
In the 1966 class-action amendments, Rule 23(b)(3), the category at issue here, was “the most adventuresome” innovation. See Kaplan, A Prefatory Note, 10 B. C. Ind. & Com. L. Rev. 497, 497 (1969) (hereinafter Kaplan, Prefatory Note). Rule 23(b)(3) added to the complex-litigation arsenal class actions for damages designed to secure judgments binding all class members save those who affirmatively elected to be excluded. See 7A C. Wright, A. Miller, & M. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1777, p. 517 (2d ed. 1986) (hereinafter Wright, Miller, & Kane); see generally Kaplan, Continuing Work 379-400. Rule 23(b)(3) “opt-out” class actions superseded the former “spurious” class action, so characterized because it generally functioned as a permissive joinder (“opt-in”) device. See 7A Wright, Miller, & Kane § 1753, at 28-31, 42-44; see also Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 695.
Framed for situations in which “class-action treatment is not as clearly called for” as it is in Rule 23(b)(1) and (b)(2) situations, Rule 23(b)(3) permits certification where class suit “may nevertheless be convenient and desirable.” Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 697. To qualify for certification under Rule 23(b)(3), a class must meet two requirements beyond the Rule 23(a) prerequisites: Common questions must “predominate over any questions affecting only individual members”; and class resolution must be “superior to other available methods for the fair and efficient adjudication of the controversy.” In adding “predominance” and “superiority” to the qualification-for-certification list, the Advisory Committee sought to cover cases “in which a class action would achieve economies of time, effort, and expense, and promote... uniformity of decision as to persons similarly situated, without sacrificing procedural fairness or bringing about other undesirable results.” Ibid. Sensitive to the competing tugs of individual autonomy for those who might prefer to go it alone or in a smaller unit, on the one hand, and systemic efficiency on the other, the Reporter for the 1966 amendments cautioned: “The new provision invites a close look at the case before it is accepted as a class action....” Kaplan, Continuing Work 390.
Rule 23(b)(3) includes a nonexhaustive list of factors pertinent to a court’s “close look” at the predominance and superiority criteria:
“(A) the interest of members of the class in individually controlling the prosecution or defense of separate actions; (B) the extent and nature of any litigation concerning the controversy already commenced by or against members of the class; (C) the desirability or undesirability of concentrating the litigation of the claims in the particular forum; (D) the difficulties likely to be encountered in the management of a class action.”
In setting out these factors, the Advisory Committee for the 1966 reform anticipated that in each case, courts would “consider the interests of individual members of the class in controlling their own litigations and carrying them on as they see fit.” Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 698. They elaborated:
“The interests of individuals in conducting separate lawsuits may be so strong as to call for denial of a class action. On the other hand, these interests may be theoretic rather than practical; the class may have a high degree of cohesion and prosecution of the action through representatives would be quite únobjectionable, or the amounts at stake for individuals may be so small that separate suits would be impracticable.” Ibid.
See also Kaplan, Continuing Work 391 (“Th[e] interest [in individual control] can be high where the stake of each member bulks large and his will and ability to take care of himself are strong; the interest may be no more than theoretic where the individual stake is so small as to make a separate action impracticable.” (footnote omitted)). As the Third Circuit observed in the instant case: “Each plaintiff [in an action involving claims for personal injury and death] has a significant interest in individually controlling the prosecution of [his case]”; each “ha[s] a substantial stake in making individual decisions on whether and when to settle.” 83 F. 3d, at 633.
While the text of Rule 23(b)(3) does not exclude from certification cases in which individual damages run high, the Advisory Committee had dominantly in mind vindication of “the rights of groups of people who individually would be without effective strength to bring their opponents into court at all.” Kaplan, Prefatory Note 497. As concisely recalled in a recent Seventh Circuit opinion:
“The policy at the very core of the class action mechanism is to overcome the problem that small recoveries do not provide the incentive for any individual to bring a solo action prosecuting his or her rights. A class action solves this problem by aggregating the relatively paltry potential recoveries into something worth someone’s (usually an attorney’s) labor.” Mace v. Van Ru Credit Corp., 109 F. 3d 338, 344 (1997).
To alert class members to their right to “opt out” of a (b)(3) class, Rule 23 instructs the court to “direct to the members of the class the best notice practicable under the circumstances, including individual notice to all members who can be identified through reasonable effort.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23(c)(2); see Eisen v. Carlisle & Jacquelin, 417 U. S. 156, 173-177 (1974) (individual notice to class members identifiable through reasonable effort is mandatory in (b)(3) actions; requirement may not be relaxed based on high cost).
No class action may be “dismissed or compromised without [court] approval,” preceded by notice to class members. Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23(e). The Advisory Committee’s sole comment on

Question: What is the ideological direction of the decision reviewed by the Supreme Court?
A. Conservative
B. Liberal
C. Unspeciﬁable
Answer:

Answer: A