700
Opinion of O'Connor, J.
(successive petitions); id., at 490 (procedurally defaulted claims); Fay, supra, at 438 (procedurally defaulted claims). Most telling of all, this Court continuously has recognized that the ultimate equity on the prisoner's side—a sufficient showing of actual innocence—is normally sufficient, standing alone, to outweigh other concerns and justify adjudication of the prisoner's constitutional claim. See Sawyer v. Whitley, 505 U. S. 333, 340-347 (1992) (actual innocence of penalty); Murray v. Carrier, 477 U. S. 478, 496 (1986) (federal courts may reach procedurally defaulted claims on a showing that a constitutional violation probably resulted in the conviction of an actually innocent person); Kuhlmann v. Wilson, 477 U. S. 436, 454 (1986) (colorable showing of actual innocence suffices to excuse successive claim); see also Teague v. Lane, supra, at 313 (where absence of procedure seriously diminishes the likelihood of an accurate conviction, a new rule requiring the procedure may be applied retroactively on habeas).
Nonetheless, decisions concerning the availability of habeas relief warrant restraint. Nowhere is the Court's restraint more evident than when it is asked to exclude a substantive category of issues from relitigation on habeas. Although we recognized the possibility of excluding certain types of claims long ago, see Mackey, supra, at 683 (Harlan, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part), only once has this Court found that the concerns of finality, federalism, and fairness supported such a result; that was in Stone v. Powell, 428 U. S. 465 (1976). Ante, at 686. Since then, the Court has refused to bar additional categories of claims on three different occasions. Ante, at 687-688.
Today we face the question whether Stone v. Powell should extend to bar claims on habeas that the prophylactic rule of Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 (1966), had been violated. Continuing the tradition of caution in this area, the Court answers that question in the negative. This time I must disagree. In my view, the "prudential concerns,"
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