98
Opinion of Stevens, J.
fundamentally inconsistent with the Framers' conception of the constitutional order that it has forsaken any claim to the usual deference or respect owed to decisions of this Court. Stare decisis, furthermore, has less force in the area of constitutional law. See, e. g., Burnet v. Coronado Oil & Gas Co., 285 U. S. 393, 406-410 (1932) (Brandeis, J., dissenting). And in this instance, it is but a hollow pretense for any State to seek refuge in stare decisis' protection of reliance interests. It cannot be credibly maintained that a State's ordering of its affairs with respect to potential liability under federal law requires adherence to Seminole Tribe, as that decision leaves open a State's liability upon enforcement of federal law by federal agencies. Nor can a State find solace in the stare decisis interest of promoting "the evenhanded . . . and consistent development of legal principles." Payne v. Tennessee, 501 U. S. 808, 827 (1991). That principle is perverted when invoked to rely on sovereign immunity as a defense to deliberate violations of settled federal law. Further, Seminole Tribe is a case that will unquestionably have serious ramifications in future cases; indeed, it has already had such an effect, as in the Court's decision today and in the equally misguided opinion of Alden v. Maine, 527 U. S. 706 (1999). Further still, the Seminole Tribe decision unnecessarily forces the Court to resolve vexing questions of constitutional law respecting Congress' § 5 authority. Finally, by its own repeated overruling of earlier precedent, the majority has itself discounted the importance of stare decisis in this area of the law.7 The kind of judicial activism manifested in cases like Seminole Tribe,
7 See, e. g., College Savings Bank v. Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Ed. Expense Bd., 527 U. S., at 675-683 (overruling Parden v. Terminal R. Co. of Ala. Docks Dept., 377 U. S. 184 (1964)); Seminole Tribe, 517 U. S., at 63-73 (overruling Pennsylvania v. Union Gas Co., 491 U. S. 1 (1989)); Pennhurst State School and Hospital v. Halderman, 465 U. S. 89, 127, 132-137 (1984) (Stevens, J., dissenting) ("[T]he Court repudiates at least 28 cases, spanning well over a century of this Court's jurisprudence").
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