650
Thomas, J., dissenting
relief," ibid. (emphasis added). The District Court, however, did not hold respondent's Ford claim in abeyance when it denied his March 1993 habeas petition, so that claim was no longer before the District Court in May 1997. At best, then, respondent's May 1997 filing was an effort to reopen his Ford claim. But that filing (which is most definitely an "application") is subject to the statutory requirements for second or successive habeas applications. As we have recently stated in a closely related context:
"[A] prisoner's motion to recall the mandate on the basis of the merits of the underlying decision can be regarded as a second or successive application for purposes of § 2244(b). Otherwise, petitioners could evade the bar against relitigation of claims presented in a prior application, § 2244(b)(1), or the bar against litigation of claims not presented in a prior application, § 2244(b)(2)." Calderon v. Thompson, ante, at 553.
In just the same way, habeas petitioners cannot be permitted to evade § 2244(b)'s prohibitions simply by moving to reopen claims already presented in a prior habeas application.
The Court also reasons that respondent's "Ford claim here—previously dismissed as premature—should be treated in the same manner as the claim of a petitioner who returns to a federal habeas court after exhausting state remedies," for "in both situations, the habeas petitioner does not receive an adjudication of his claim." Ante, at 644, 645. Implicit in the Court's reasoning is its assumption that a prisoner whose habeas petition has been dismissed for failure to exhaust state remedies, and who then exhausts those remedies and returns to federal court, has not then filed a "second or successive habeas corpus application." § 2244(b)(1). To be sure, "none of our cases . . . ha[s] ever suggested" that a prisoner in such a situation was filing a successive petition. See ante, at 644. But that is because, before enactment of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996
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