Cite as: 505 U. S. 333 (1992)
Blackmun, J., concurring in judgment
sive, successive, or procedurally defaulted claim unless the defendant can show "by clear and convincing evidence that, but for a constitutional error, no reasonable juror would have found the petitioner eligible for the death penalty under the applicable state law." Ante, at 336. For the reasons stated by Justice Stevens in his separate opinion, post, p. 360, which I join, I believe that the Court today adopts an unduly cramped view of "actual innocence." I write separately not to discuss the specifics of the Court's standard, but instead to reemphasize my opposition to an implicit premise underlying the Court's decision: that the only "fundamental miscarriage of justice" in a capital proceeding that warrants redress is one where the petitioner can make out a claim of "actual innocence." I also write separately to express my ever-growing skepticism that, with each new decision from this Court constricting the ability of the federal courts to remedy constitutional errors, the death penalty really can be imposed fairly and in accordance with the requirements of the Eighth Amendment.
I
The Court repeatedly has recognized that principles of fundamental fairness underlie the writ of habeas corpus. See Engle v. Isaac, 456 U. S. 107, 126 (1982); Sanders v. United States, 373 U. S. 1, 17-18 (1963). Even as the Court has erected unprecedented and unwarranted barriers to the federal judiciary's review of the merits of claims that state prisoners failed properly to present to the state courts, or failed to raise in their first federal habeas petitions, or previously presented to the federal courts for resolution, it consistently has acknowledged that exceptions to these rules of unreviewability must exist to prevent violations of fundamental fairness. See Engle, 456 U. S., at 135 (principles of finality and comity "must yield to the imperative of correcting a fundamentally unjust incarceration"). Thus, the Court has held, federal courts may review procedurally defaulted, abusive, or successive claims absent a showing of cause and
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