Cite as: 522 U. S. 75 (1997)
Stevens, J., dissenting
this case.1 Either the fact that further litigation of a federal issue in the state system would be futile provides a legitimate basis for treating the judgment of the State's highest court as final—as the Court held in Ritchie—or it is sufficient to defeat jurisdiction, as the Court concludes today. I do not believe the Court can have it both ways.
Since Ritchie is still the law, I believe it requires us to take jurisdiction and to reach the merits. The federal issue is not difficult to resolve. Under 42 U. S. C. § 1988, the Alabama Wrongful Death Act permits the survival of petitioners' § 1983 claims. Our decisions in cases such as Smith v. Wade, 461 U. S. 30 (1983), Newport v. Fact Concerts, Inc., 453 U. S. 247 (1981), and Carey v. Piphus, 435 U. S. 247 (1978), make it perfectly clear that the measure of damages in an action brought under 42 U. S. C. § 1983 is governed by federal law. Cf. Sullivan v. Little Hunting Park, Inc., 396 U. S. 229, 239-240 (1969) (holding that, in a case arising
1 Indeed, the Court's response to my dissent in Ritchie applies directly to the facts of this case: "But as Justice Stevens' dissent recognizes, the Pennsylvania courts already have considered and resolved this issue in their earlier proceedings; if the Commonwealth were to raise it again in a new set of appeals, the courts below would simply reject the claim under the law-of-the-case doctrine. Law-of-the-case principles are not a bar to this Court's jurisdiction, of course, and thus Justice Stevens' dissent apparently would require the Commonwealth to raise a fruitless Sixth Amendment claim in the trial court, the Superior Court, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court still another time before we regrant certiorari on the question that is now before us.
"The goals of finality would be frustrated, rather than furthered, by these wasteful and time-consuming procedures. Based on the unusual facts of this case, the justifications for the finality doctrine—efficiency, judicial restraint, and federalism, see Radio Station WOW, Inc. v. Johnson, 326 U. S. 120, 124 (1945); post, at 72—would be ill served by another round of litigation on an issue that has been authoritatively decided by the highest state court." Pennsylvania v. Ritchie, 480 U. S. 39, 49, n. 7 (1987).
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