408
Ginsburg, J., concurring in judgment
issue); thus it becomes yet another user-friendly judicial rule to be invoked ad libitum.
* * *
In sum, we find nothing to support the "exculpatory no" doctrine except the many Court of Appeals decisions that have embraced it. While communis error facit jus may be a sadly accurate description of reality, it is not the normative basis of this Court's jurisprudence. Courts may not create their own limitations on legislation, no matter how alluring the policy arguments for doing so, and no matter how widely the blame may be spread. Because the plain language of § 1001 admits of no exception for an "exculpatory no," we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
It is so ordered.
Justice Souter, concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
I join the opinion of the Court except for its response to petitioner's argument premised on the potential for prosecutorial abuse of 18 U. S. C. § 1001 as now written (ante, at 405-406). On that point I have joined Justice Ginsburg's opinion espousing congressional attention to the risks inherent in the statute's current breadth.
Justice Ginsburg, with whom Justice Souter joins, concurring in the judgment.
Because a false denial fits the unqualified language of 18 U. S. C. § 1001, I concur in the affirmance of Brogan's conviction. I write separately, however, to call attention to the extraordinary authority Congress, perhaps unwittingly, has conferred on prosecutors to manufacture crimes. I note, at the same time, how far removed the "exculpatory no" is from the problems Congress initially sought to address when it
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