294
Blackmun, J., dissenting
I do not maintain that it will always be easy to determine, from the statute's purpose, the relevant event for assessing its retroactivity. As I have suggested, for example, a statutory provision for attorney's fees presents a difficult case. Ordinarily, however, the answer is clear—as it is in both Landgraf and Rivers v. Roadway Express, Inc., post, p. 298. Unlike the Court, I do not think that any of the provisions at issue is "not easily classified," ante, at 281. They are all directed at the regulation of primary conduct, and the occurrence of the primary conduct is the relevant event.
Justice Blackmun, dissenting.
Perhaps from an eagerness to resolve the "apparent tension," see Kaiser Aluminum & Chemical Corp. v. Bonjorno, 494 U. S. 827, 837 (1990), between Bradley v. School Bd. of Richmond, 416 U. S. 696 (1974), and Bowen v. Georgetown Univ. Hospital, 488 U. S. 204 (1988), the Court rejects the "most logical reading," Kaiser, 494 U. S., at 838, of the Civil Rights Act of 1991, 105 Stat. 1071 (Act), and resorts to a presumption against retroactivity. This approach seems to me to pay insufficient fidelity to the settled principle that the "starting point for interpretation of a statute 'is the language of the statute itself,' " Kaiser, 494 U. S., at 835, quoting Consumer Product Safety Comm'n v. GTE Sylvania, Inc., 447 U. S. 102, 108 (1980), and extends the presumption against retroactive legislation beyond its historical reach and purpose.
A straightforward textual analysis of the Act indicates that § 102's provision of compensatory damages and its attendant right to a jury trial apply to cases pending on appeal on the date of enactment. This analysis begins with § 402(a) of the Act, 105 Stat. 1099: "Except as otherwise specifically provided, this Act and the amendments made by this Act
relevant retroactivity event is the primary activity of gambling, not the primary activity of constructing casinos.
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