110
Opinion of Kennedy, J.
by our flexible rule of stare decisis; and because no friend of stare decisis would want it to be.
Justice Kennedy, with whom Justice White joins, concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
I remain of the view that it is sometimes appropriate in the civil context to give only prospective application to a judicial decision. "[P]rospective overruling allows courts to respect the principle of stare decisis even when they are impelled to change the law in light of new understanding." American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Smith, 496 U. S. 167, 197 (1990) (plurality opinion). When a court promulgates a new rule of law, prospective application functions "to avoid injustice or hardship to civil litigants who have justifiably relied on prior law." Id., at 199 (internal quotation marks omitted). See Phoenix v. Kolodziejski, 399 U. S. 204, 213-215 (1970); Cipriano v. City of Houma, 395 U. S. 701, 706 (1969) (per curiam); England v. Louisiana Bd. of Medical Examiners, 375 U. S. 411, 422 (1964). And in my view retroactivity in civil cases continues to be governed by the standard announced in Chevron Oil Co. v. Huson, 404 U. S. 97, 106-107 (1971). Thus, for the reasons explained by Justice O'Connor, post, at 113-117, I cannot agree with the Court's broad dicta, ante, at 95-97, that appears to embrace in the civil context the retroactivity principles adopted for criminal cases in Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U. S. 314 (1987). As Justice O'Connor has demonstrated elsewhere, the differences between the civil and criminal contexts counsel strongly against adoption of Griffith for civil cases. See American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Smith, supra, at 197-199. I also cannot accept the Court's conclusion, ante, at 96-99, which is based on Justice Souter's opinion in James B. Beam Distilling Co. v. Georgia, 501 U. S. 529, 540-543 (1991), that a decision of this Court must be applied in a retroactive manner simply because the rule of law there announced happened to be applied to the parties then before the Court.
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