Cite as: 521 U. S. 320 (1997)
Opinion of the Court
applications in capital cases when a State has met certain conditions. In general terms, applications will be expedited (for a State's benefit) when a State has made adequate provision for counsel to represent indigent habeas applicants at the State's expense. Thus, § 2261(b) provides that "[t]his chapter is applicable if a State establishes . . . a mechanism for the appointment, compensation, and payment of reasonable litigation expenses of competent counsel in State post-conviction proceedings brought by indigent prisoners . . . ." 110 Stat. 1221-1222. There is an ambiguity in the provision just quoted, the argument runs, for it applies chapter 154 to capital cases only where "a State establishes . . . a mechanism," leaving a question whether the chapter would apply if a State had already established such a mechanism before chapter 154 was passed. The idea is that the present tense of the word "establishes" might be read to rule out a State that already had "established" a mechanism, suggesting that when § 107(c) was added to provide that the chapter would apply to "cases pending" it was meant to eliminate the ambiguity by showing that all pending cases would be treated alike.
This explanation of the significance of § 107(c) is not, however, very plausible. First, one has to strain to find the ambiguity on which the alternative explanation is supposed to rest. Why would a Congress intent on expediting capital habeas cases have wanted to disfavor a State that already had done its part to promote sound resolution of prisoners' petitions in just the way Congress sought to encourage? It would make no sense to leave such States on the slower track, and it seems unlikely that federal courts would so have interpreted § 2261(b). Second, anyone who had seen such ambiguity lurking could have dispatched it in a far simpler and straightforward fashion than enacting § 107(c); all the drafter would have needed to do was to insert three words into § 2261(b), to make it refer to a State that "establishes or has established . . . a mechanism." It simply is not plausible
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