Cite as: 518 U. S. 839 (1996)
Rehnquist, C. J., dissenting
ity by an appellate court, and remanded for computation of damages, it is no canon of construction at all.
The principal opinion's search for some unifying theme for somewhat similar cases from Fletcher v. Peck, 6 Cranch 87, in 1810, to the present day is an interesting intellectual exercise, but its practical fruit is inedible.
II
The principal opinion also makes major changes in the existing sovereign acts doctrine which render the doctrine a shell. The opinion formally acknowledges the classic statement of the doctrine in Horowitz v. United States, 267 U. S. 458 (1925), quoting: " '[i]t has long been held by the Court of Claims that the United States when sued as a contractor cannot be held liable for an obstruction of the performance of the particular contract resulting from its public and general acts as a sovereign.' " Ante, at 892 (quoting 267 U. S., at 461). The principal opinion says that this statement cannot be taken at face value, however, because it reads "the essential point" of Horowitz to be "to put the Government in the same position that it would have enjoyed as a private contractor." Ante, at 892; see also ante, at 893 (Horowitz emphasized "the need to treat the Government-as-contractor the same as a private party"). But neither Horowitz, nor the Court of Claims cases upon which it relies, confine themselves to so narrow a rule. As the quotations from them in the principal opinion show, the early cases emphasized the dual roles of Government, as contractor and as sovereign. See, e. g., Deming v. United States, 1 Ct. Cl. 190, 191 (1865) ("The United States as a contractor are not responsible for the United States as a lawgiver"). By minimizing the role of lawgiver and expanding the role as private contractor, the principal opinion has thus casually, but improperly, reworked the sovereign acts doctrine.
The principal opinion further cuts into the sovereign acts doctrine by defining the "public and general" nature of an
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