Cite as: 523 U. S. 420 (1998)
Ginsburg, J., dissenting
zen mothers to transmit their citizenship to their foreign-born children, Congress simultaneously and for the first time required that such children (unless both parents were citizens) fulfill a residence requirement: "[T]he right of citizenship shall not descend unless the child comes to the United States and resides therein for at least five years continuously immediately previous to his eighteenth birthday." Act of May 24, 1934, § 1, 48 Stat. 797. Commentary underscores what the text conveys. Congress largely relied on a residence requirement, not the sex of the child's citizen parent, to assure an abiding affiliation with the United States. See Proposed Code 10-11, 14.
Even if one accepts at face value the Government's current rationale, it is surely based on generalizations (stereotypes) about the way women (or men) are. These generalizations pervade the opinion of Justice Stevens, which constantly relates and relies on what "typically," or "normally," or "probably" happens "often." E. g., ante, at 436, 437, 442.
We have repeatedly cautioned, however, that when the Government controls "gates to opportunity," it "may not exclude qualified individuals based on 'fixed notions concerning the roles and abilities of males and females.' " United States v. Virginia, 518 U. S. 515, 541 (1996) (quoting Mississippi Univ. for Women v. Hogan, 458 U. S., at 725); see also Orr v. Orr, 440 U. S. 268, 283 (1979) ("Where, as here, the State's . . . purposes are as well served by a gender-neutral classification as one that gender classifies and therefore carries with it the baggage of sexual stereotypes, the State cannot be permitted to classify on the basis of sex."). Only an " 'exceedingly persuasive justification,' " Kirchberg v. Feenstra, 450 U. S. 455, 461 (1981) (quoting Personnel Administrator of Mass. v. Feeney, 442 U. S. 256, 273 (1979)), one that does "not rely on overbroad generalizations about the different talents, capacities, or preferences of males and females," United States v. Virginia, 518 U. S., at 533, will support dif-
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