Cite as: 528 U. S. 62 (2000)
Opinion of the Court
527 U. S. 627, 636 (1999); Alden v. Maine, 527 U. S. 706, 712 (1999). Indeed, in College Savings Bank, we rested our decision to overrule the constructive waiver rule of Parden v. Terminal R. Co. of Ala. Docks Dept., 377 U. S. 184 (1964), in part, on our Seminole Tribe holding. See College Savings Bank, supra, at 683 ("Recognizing a congressional power to exact constructive waivers of sovereign immunity through the exercise of Article I powers would also, as a practical matter, permit Congress to circumvent the antiabrogation holding of Seminole Tribe"). Under our firmly established precedent then, if the ADEA rests solely on Congress' Article I commerce power, the private petitioners in today's cases cannot maintain their suits against their state employers.
Justice Stevens disputes that well-established precedent again. Compare post, p. 92 (opinion dissenting in part and concurring in part), with Alden, supra, p. 760 (Souter, J., dissenting); College Savings Bank, 527 U. S., at 692, n. 2 (Stevens, J., dissenting); id., at 699-705 (Breyer, J., dissenting); Florida Prepaid, supra, at 664-665 (Stevens, J., dissenting); Seminole Tribe, 517 U. S., at 76-100 (Stevens, J., dissenting); id., at 100-185 (Souter, J., dissenting). In Alden, we explained that, "[a]lthough the sovereign immunity of the States derives at least in part from the common-law tradition, the structure and history of the Constitution make clear that the immunity exists today by constitutional design." 527 U. S., at 733. For purposes of today's decision, it is sufficient to note that we have on more than one occasion explained the substantial reasons for adhering to that constitutional design. See id., at 712-754; College Savings Bank, supra, at 669-670, 687-691; Seminole Tribe, supra, at 54-55, 59-73; Pennsylvania v. Union Gas Co., 491 U. S. 1, 30-42 (1989) (Scalia, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). Indeed, the present dissenters' refusal to accept the validity and natural import of decisions like Hans, rendered over a full century ago by this Court, makes it dif-
79
Page: Index Previous 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007