286
Scalia, J., concurring in judgments
ation, however, is not sufficient to rebut the presumption against retroactivity. Statutes are seldom crafted to pursue a single goal, and compromises necessary to their enactment may require adopting means other than those that would most effectively pursue the main goal. A legislator who supported a prospective statute might reasonably oppose retroactive application of the same statute. Indeed, there is reason to believe that the omission of the 1990 version's express retroactivity provisions was a factor in the passage of the 1991 bill. Section 102 is plainly not the sort of provision that must be understood to operate retroactively because a contrary reading would render it ineffective.
The presumption against statutory retroactivity is founded upon sound considerations of general policy and practice, and accords with long held and widely shared expectations about the usual operation of legislation. We are satisfied that it applies to § 102. Because we have found no clear evidence of congressional intent that § 102 of the Civil Rights Act of 1991 should apply to cases arising before its enactment, we conclude that the judgment of the Court of Appeals must be affirmed.
It is so ordered.
Justice Scalia, with whom Justice Kennedy and Justice Thomas join, concurring in the judgments.*
I
I of course agree with the Court that there exists a judicial presumption, of great antiquity, that a legislative enactment affecting substantive rights does not apply retroactively absent clear statement to the contrary. See generally Kaiser
ages. We are not free to fashion remedies that Congress has specifically chosen not to extend. See Northwest Airlines, Inc. v. Transport Workers, 451 U. S. 77, 97 (1981).
*[This opinion applies also to Rivers v. Roadway Express, Inc., No. 92- 938, post, p. 298.]
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