Cite as: 518 U. S. 839 (1996)
Opinion of Souter, J.
which . . . should be borne by the public as a whole"). Hence, while the Government might legitimately conclude that a given contractual commitment was no longer in the public interest, a government seeking relief from such commitments through legislation would obviously not be in a position comparable to that of the private contractor who willy-nilly was barred by law from performance. There would be, then, good reason in such circumstance to find the regulatory and contractual characters of the Government fused together, in Horowitz's terms, so that the Government should not have the benefit of the defense.41
Horowitz's criterion of "public and general act" thus reflects the traditional "rule of law" assumption that generality in the terms by which the use of power is authorized will tend to guard against its misuse to burden or benefit the few unjustifiably.42 See, e. g., Hurtado v. California, 110 U. S. 516, 535-536 (1884) ("Law . . . must be not a special rule for a particular person or a particular case, but . . . '[t]he general law . . .' so 'that every citizen shall hold his life, liberty, property and immunities under the protection of the general
41 Our Contract Clause cases have demonstrated a similar concern with governmental self-interest by recognizing that "complete deference to a legislative assessment of reasonableness and necessity is not appropriate because the State's self-interest is at stake." United States Trust Co. of N. Y. v. New Jersey, 431 U. S. 1, 26 (1977); see also Energy Reserves Group, Inc. v. Kansas Power & Light Co., 459 U. S. 400, 412-413, and n. 14 (1983) (noting that a stricter level of scrutiny applies under the Contract Clause when a State alters its own contractual obligations); cf. Perry, supra, at 350-351 (drawing a "clear distinction" between Congress's power over private contracts and "the power of the Congress to alter or repudiate the substance of its own engagements").
42 The generality requirement will almost always be met where, as in Deming, the governmental action "bears upon [the Government's contract] as it bears upon all similar contracts between citizens." Deming v. United States, 1 Ct. Cl. 190, 191 (1865). Deming is less helpful, however, in cases where, as here, the public contracts at issue have no obvious private analogs.
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