Cite as: 516 U. S. 489 (1996)
Thomas, J., dissenting
favor of potential plaintiffs." 508 U. S., at 262. Given the "evident care" with which ERISA was crafted, we have traditionally been "reluctant to tamper with [the] enforcement scheme" embodied in the statute. Russell, supra, at 147. Accordingly, we have repeatedly declined invitations by plan participants and beneficiaries to extend benefits and remedies not specifically authorized by the statutory text. See, e. g., Mertens, supra, at 262 (rejecting claim that ERISA affords a cause of action against a nonfiduciary who knowingly participates in a fiduciary breach); Russell, supra, at 145-148 (declining invitation to create an implied private cause of action for extracontractual damages); Pilot Life Ins. Co. v. Dedeaux, 481 U. S. 41, 56 (1987) (holding that civil enforcement scheme codified at § 502(a) is not to be supplemented by state-law remedies).
Nowhere is the care with which ERISA was crafted more evident than in the Act's mechanism for the enforcement of fiduciary duties. Part 4 of the Act's regulatory provisions, entitled "Fiduciary Responsibility," see §§ 401-414, 29 U. S. C. §§ 1101-1114, assigns fiduciaries "a number of detailed duties and responsibilities." Mertens, supra, at 251. Part 4 also includes its own liability provision, § 409, which we considered in Russell. Entitled "Liability for Breach of Fiduciary Duty," § 409 provides:
"Any person who is a fiduciary with respect to a plan who breaches any of the responsibilities, obligations, or duties imposed upon fiduciaries by this subchapter shall be personally liable to make good to such plan any losses to the plan resulting from each such breach, and to restore to such plan any profits of such fiduciary which have been made through use of assets of the plan by the fiduciary, and shall be subject to such other equitable or remedial relief as the court may deem appropriate, including removal of such fiduciary." § 409(a), as codified in 29 U. S. C. § 1109(a) (1988 ed.).
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