10
Opinion of the Court
believe Pollard was), see Pino v. Landon, 349 U. S. 901 (1955). In Sibron v. New York, we relied upon this opinion to support the conclusion that our jurisprudence had "abandoned all inquiry into the actual existence of collateral consequences and in effect presumed that they existed." 392 U. S., at 55 (citing Pollard, supra).3 Thereafter, and in summary fashion, we proceeded to accept the most generalized and hypothetical of consequences as sufficient to avoid mootness in challenges to conviction. For example, in Evitts v. Lucey, 469 U. S. 387 (1985), we held that respondent's habeas challenge had not become moot despite the expiration of his sentence and despite the fact that "his civil rights, including suffrage and the right to hold public office, [had been] restored," id., at 391, n. 4. Since he had not been pardoned, we said, "some collateral consequences of his conviction remain, including the possibility that the conviction would be used to impeach testimony he might give in a future proceeding and the possibility that it would be used to subject him to persistent felony offender prosecution if he should go to trial on any other felony charges in the future." Ibid. See also Benton v. Maryland, 395 U. S. 784, 790-791 (1969); Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U. S. 106, 108, n. 3 (1977) (per curiam); Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U. S. 366 (1993).
There are several relevant observations to be made regarding these developments: First, it must be acknowledged that the practice of presuming collateral consequences (or of accepting the remote possibility of collateral consequences as adequate to satisfy Article III) sits uncomfortably beside the "long-settled principle that standing cannot be 'inferred argumentatively from averments in the pleadings,' but rather
3 Sibron also purported to rely on United States v. Morgan, 346 U. S. 502 (1954), and Fiswick v. United States, 329 U. S. 211 (1946), as establishing that a "mere possibility" of collateral consequences suffices, see 392 U. S., at 54-55, but as we have described, those cases involved much more than that.
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