Cite as: 518 U. S. 137 (1996)
Stevens, J., dissenting
The majority counters with a pair of cases that supposedly show the absence of a settled practice regarding review of state-law questions. One of those—Wichita Royalty Co. v. City Nat. Bank of Wichita Falls, 306 U. S. 103 (1939)—was a diversity case decided in the wake of Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U. S. 64 (1938). Just four weeks before we handed down Erie, the Court of Appeals had disclaimed its obligation to follow a controlling decision by the Texas Supreme Court (indeed, one rendered in an earlier stage of the same proceedings) on a matter of Texas commercial law. 306 U. S., at 106. The Court of Appeals then denied rehearing on the theory that the Texas court had changed its mind and now agreed with the former's view of the law. Ibid. Our decision to hear that case, which resulted in our rejection of the lower court's conclusion, was plainly motivated by a concern to give effect to Erie's new mandate.
That leaves the single example of Steele v. General Mills, Inc., 329 U. S. 433 (1947), in which this Court granted certiorari because the lower court's judgment "undermine[d] the transportation policy of Texas." Id., at 438. Decided nearly 50 years ago and without successor, Steele is the exception that proves the rule.
However irregular such grants were in the past, they are now virtually unheard of. Indeed, in 1980 we codified our already longstanding practice by eliminating as a consideration for deciding whether to review a case the fact that "a court of appeals has . . . decided an important state or territorial question in a way in conflict with applicable state or territorial law." Compare this Court's Rule 19(1)(b) (1970) with this Court's Rule 17.1 (1980). That deletion—the only deletion of an entire category of cases—was intended to communicate our view that errors in the application of state law are not a sound reason for granting certiorari, except in the most extraordinary cases. Tellingly, the majority does not cite a single example during the past 16 years in which we
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