Cite as: 505 U. S. 247 (1992)
Scalia, J., dissenting
Rico v. Russell & Co., 288 U. S. 476, 485 (1933); Verlinden, 461 U. S., at 492. We would be loath to repudiate such a longstanding and settled rule, on which Congress has surely been entitled to rely, cf. Pennsylvania v. Union Gas Co., 491 U. S. 1, 34-35 (1989) (Scalia, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part), and this case gives us no reason to contemplate overruling it.
VI
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice Scalia, with whom The Chief Justice, Justice O'Connor, and Justice Kennedy join, dissenting.
The Court today concludes that whenever a statute granting a federally chartered corporation the "power to sue and be sued" specifically mentions the federal courts (as opposed to merely embracing them within general language), the law will be deemed not only to confer on the corporation the capacity to bring and suffer suit (which is all that the words say), but also to confer on federal district courts jurisdiction over any and all controversies to which that corporation is a party. This wonderland of linguistic confusion—in which words are sometimes read to mean only what they say and other times read also to mean what they do not say—is based on the erroneous premise that our cases in this area establish a "magic words" jurisprudence that departs from ordinary rules of English usage. In fact, our cases simply reflect the fact that the natural reading of some "sue and be sued" clauses is that they confer both capacity and jurisdiction. Since the natural reading of the Red Cross Charter is that it confers only capacity, I respectfully dissent.
I
Section 2 of the Red Cross Charter, 36 U. S. C. § 2, sets forth the various powers of the corporation, such as the
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