412
Opinion of the Court
activity rule is simply incorrect. See ante, at 387-388, n. 14. As even a cursory review of Justice Thomas' opinion and my own opinion reveals, both the broader debate and the specific statements to which we refer, see supra, at 410-411, concerned precisely the issue of the standard of review to be employed by federal habeas courts. The Wright opinions confirm what § 2254(d)(1)'s language already makes clear— that an unreasonable application of federal law is different from an incorrect or erroneous application of federal law.
Throughout this discussion the meaning of the phrase "clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States" has been put to the side. That statutory phrase refers to the holdings, as opposed to the dicta, of this Court's decisions as of the time of the relevant state-court decision. In this respect, the "clearly established Federal law" phrase bears only a slight connection to our Teague jurisprudence. With one caveat, whatever would qualify as an old rule under our Teague jurisprudence will constitute "clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States" under § 2254(d)(1). See, e. g., Stringer v. Black, 503 U. S. 222, 228 (1992) (using term "old rule"). The one caveat, as the statutory language makes clear, is that § 2254(d)(1) restricts the source of clearly established law to this Court's jurisprudence.
In sum, § 2254(d)(1) places a new constraint on the power of a federal habeas court to grant a state prisoner's application for a writ of habeas corpus with respect to claims adjudicated on the merits in state court. Under § 2254(d)(1), the writ may issue only if one of the following two conditions is satisfied—the state-court adjudication resulted in a decision that (1) "was contrary to . . . clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States," or (2) "involved an unreasonable application of . . . clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States." Under the "contrary to"
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