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Souter, J., dissenting
make. Since there will have been no advocate's help in analyzing the record on the direct state appeal, and since counsel may well have been absent formally as well as constructively in any state postconviction proceedings, the federal judge would be looking for (among other things) previously unidentified state-law issues not previously waived. One could not ask for a more certain guarantee of inefficient and time consuming judicial effort.7
What remains is only to say a word about the State's argument that relief in this case is barred under Teague v. Lane, 489 U. S. 288 (1989), as requiring application of a new rule of law not clearly entailed by our prior holdings. The argument seems to be that California has relied on Wende for so long that any disapproval from a federal court at this juncture is some sort of novelty (resulting from the failure of other state defendants to reach the federal courts earlier with Wende objections). The obvious answer is that the application of Douglas and Griffin standards to meritless appeals has been subject to repeated explanation starting with Anders and echoed in McCoy and Penson. Once general rules are announced they do not become "new" again with every particular violation that may subsequently occur. See Saffle v. Parks, 494 U. S. 484, 491-492 (1990) (discussing application of the rule of Jurek v. Texas, 428 U. S. 262 (1976),
7 Since a Wende case is like a denial of counsel, it would make no more sense to give the State an option to demonstrate no prejudice under Chapman v. California, 386 U. S. 18 (1967), or Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U. S. 619 (1993), than it would to require a defendant to show it under Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S. 668 (1984). The presumption of prejudice does not, however, promise relief to every California defendant whose appeal was dismissed as frivolous and against whom the statute of limitations has not run, see 28 U. S. C. § 2244(d)(1) (1994 ed., Supp. III). One submission before us claims that the Wende scheme has not supplanted Anders v. California, 386 U. S. 738 (1967), throughout California. See Brief for Jesus Garcia Delgado as Amicus Curiae 9-10. Briefs that measure up according to the standards adumbrated in Anders would of course receive standard Strickland analysis.
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