author: Justice Kennedy Justice Scalia,

text:
    BOWEN, SECRETARY OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES v. GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL et al.
    No. 87-1097.
    Argued October 11, 1988
    Decided December 12, 1988

      Richard J. Lazarus argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs were Acting Solicitor General Ayer, Assistant Attorney General Bolton, Deputy Solicitor General Merrill, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Spears, John F. Cordes, Mark W. Pennak, Ronald E. Robertson, Terry Coleman, and Henry R. Goldberg.

      Ronald N. Sutter argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief were Mary Susan Philp and Thomas K. Hyatt.

      Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for Sisters of Mercy Health Corp. et al. by James K. Robinson and Anthony A. Derezinski; and for the American Hospital Association by Linda A. Tomaselli and Robert A. Klein.

   Justice Kennedy

delivered the opinion of the Court.

Under the Medicare program, health care providers are reimbursed by the Government for expenses incurred in providing medical services to Medicare beneficiaries. See Title XVIII of the Social Security Act, 79 Stat. 291, as amended, 42 U. S. C. § 1395 et seq. (the Medicare Act). Congress has authorized the Secretary of Health and Human Services to promulgate regulations setting limits on the levels of Medicare costs that will be reimbursed. The question presented here is whether the Secretary may exercise this rulemaking authority to promulgate cost limits that are retroactive.

I

The Secretary’s authority to adopt cost-limit rules is established by § 223(b) of the Social Security Amendments of 1972, 86 Stat. 1393, amending 42 U. S. C. § 1395x(v)(l)(A). This authority was first implemented in 1974 by promulgation of a cost-limit schedule for hospital services; new cost-limit schedules were issued on an annual basis thereafter.

On June 30, 1981, the Secretary issued a cost-limit schedule that included technical changes in the methods for calculating cost limits. One of these changes affected the method for calculating the “wage index,” a factor used to reflect the salary levels for hospital employees in different parts of the country. Under the prior rule, the wage index for a given geographic area was calculated by using the average salary levels for all hospitals in the area; the 1981 rule provided that wages paid by Federal Government hospitals would be excluded from that computation. 46 Fed. Reg. 33637, 33638-33639 (1981).

Various hospitals in the District of Columbia area brought suit in United States District Court seeking to have the 1981 schedule invalidated. On April 29, 1983, the District Court struck down the 1981 wage-index rule, concluding that the Secretary had violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U. S. C. §551 et seq., by failing to provide notice and an opportunity for public comment before issuing the rule. See District of Columbia Hospital Assn. v. Heckler, No. 82-2520, App. to Pet. for Cert. 49a (hereinafter DCHA). The court did not enjoin enforcement of the rule, however, finding it lacked jurisdiction to do so because the hospitals had not yet exhausted their administrative reimbursement remedies. The court’s order stated:

“If the Secretary wishes to put in place a valid prospective wage index, she should begin proper notice and comment proceedings; any wage index currently in place that has been promulgated without notice and comment is invalid as was the 1981 schedule.” DOHA, App. to Pet. for Cert. 64a.

The Secretary did not pursue an appeal. Instead, after recognizing the invalidity of the rule, see 48 Fed. Reg. 39998 (1983), the Secretary settled the hospitals’ cost reimbursement reports by applying the pre-1981 wage-index method.

In February 1984, the Secretary published a notice seeking public comment on a proposal to reissue the 1981 wage-index rule, retroactive to July 1, 1981. 49 Fed. Reg. 6175 (1984). Because Congress had subsequently amended the Medicare Act to require significantly different cost reimbursement procedures, the readoption of the modified wage-index method was to apply exclusively to a 15-month period commencing July 1, 1981. After considering the comments received, the Secretary reissued the 1981 schedule in final form on November 26, 1984, and proceeded to recoup sums previously paid as a result of the District Court’s ruling in DCHA. 49 Fed. Reg. 46495 (1984). In effect, the Secretary had promulgated a rule retroactively, and the net result was as if the original rule had never been set aside.

Respondents, a group of seven hospitals who had benefited from the invalidation of the 1981 schedule, were required to return over $2 million in reimbursement payments. After exhausting administrative remedies, they sought judicial review under the applicable provisions of the APA, claiming that the retroactive schedule was invalid under both the APA and the Medicare Act.

The United States District Court for the District of Columbia granted summary judgment for respondents. Applying the balancing test enunciated in Retail, Wholesale and De partment Store Union, AFL-CIO v. NLRB, 151 U. S. App. D. C. 209, 466 F. 2d 380 (1972), the court held that retroactive application was not justified under the circumstances of the case.

The Secretary appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which affirmed. 261 U. S. App. D. C. 262, 821 F. 2d 750 (1987). The court based its holding on the alternative grounds that the APA, as a general matter, forbids retroactive rulemaking, and that the Medicare Act, by specific terms, bars retroactive cost-limit rules. We granted certiorari, 485 U. S. 903 (1988), and we now affirm.

II

It is axiomatic that an administrative agency’s power to promulgate legislative regulations is limited to the authority delegated by Congress. In determining the validity of the Secretary’s retroactive cost-limit rule, the threshold question is whether the Medicare Act authorizes retroactive rulemaking.

Retroactivity is not favored in the law. Thus, congressional enactments and administrative rules will not be construed to have retroactive effect unless their language requires this result. E. g., Greene v. United States, 376 U. S. 149, 160 (1964); Claridge Apartments Co. v. Commissioner, 323 U. S. 141, 164 (1944); Miller v. United States, 294 U. S. 435, 439 (1935); United States v. Magnolia Petroleum Co., 276 U. S. 160, 162-163 (1928). By the same principle, a statutory grant of legislative rulemaking authority will not, as a general matter, be understood to encompass the power to promulgate retroactive rules unless that power is conveyed by Congress in express terms. See Brimstone R. Co. v. United States, 276 U. S. 104, 122 (1928) (“The power to require readjustments for the past is drastic. It. . . ought not to be extended so as to permit unreasonably harsh action without very plain words”). Even where some substantial justification for retroactive rulemaking is presented, courts should be reluctant to find such authority absent an express statutory grant.

The Secretary contends that the Medicare Act provides the necessary authority to promulgate retroactive cost-limit rules in the unusual circumstances of this case. He rests on alternative grounds: first, the specific grant of authority to promulgate regulations to “provide for the making of suitable retroactive corrective adjustments,” 42 U. S. C. § 1395x(v)(l)(A)(ii); and second, the general grant of authority to promulgate cost limit rules, §§ 1395x(v)(l)(A), 1395hh, 1395Ü. We consider these alternatives in turn.

A

The authority to promulgate cost-reimbursement regulations is set forth in § 1395x(v)(l)(A). That subparagraph also provides that:

“Such regulations shall. . . (ii) provide for the making of suitable retroactive corrective adjustments where, for a provider of services for any fiscal period, the aggregate reimbursement produced by the methods of determining costs proves to be either inadequate or excessive. ” Ibid.

This provision on its face permits some form of retroactive action. We cannot accept the Secretary’s argument, however, that it provides authority for the retroactive promulgation of cost-limit rules. To the contrary, we agree with the Court of Appeals that clause (ii) directs the Secretary to establish a procedure for making case-by-case adjustments to reimbursement payments where the regulations prescribing computation methods do not reach the correct result in individual cases. The structure and language of the statute require the conclusion that the retroactivity provision applies only to case-by-case adjudication, not to rulemaking.

Section 1395x(v)(l)(A), of which clause (ii) is a part, directs the Secretary to promulgate regulations (including cost-limit rules) establishing the methods to be used in determining reasonable costs for “institutions” and “providers” that participate in the Medicare program. Clause (i) of § 1395x(v)(l)(A) requires these cost-method regulations to take into account both direct and indirect costs incurred by “providers.” Clause (ii) mandates that the cost-method regulations include a mechanism for making retroactive corrective adjustments. These adjustments are required when, for “a provider,” the “aggregate reimbursement produced by the methods of determining costs” is too low or too high. By its terms, then, clause (ii) contemplates a mechanism for adjusting the reimbursement received by a provider, while the remainder of § 1395x(v)(l)(A) speaks exclusively in the plural. The distinction suggests that clause (ii), rather than permitting modifications to the cost-method rules in their general formulation, is intended to authorize case-by-case inquiry into the accuracy of reimbursement determinations for individual providers. Indeed, it is difficult to see how a corrective adjustment could be made to the aggregate reimbursement paid “a provider” without performing an individual examination of the provider’s expenditures in retrospect.

Our conclusion is buttressed by the statute’s use of the term “adjustments.” Clause (ii) states that the cost-method regulations shall “provide for the making of . . . adjustments.” In order to derive from this language the authority to promulgate cost-limit rules, the “adjustments” that the cost-method regulations must “provide for the making of” would themselves be additional cost-method regulations. Had Congress intended the Secretary to promulgate regulations providing for the issuance of further amendatory regulations, we think this intent would have been made explicit.

It is also significant that clause (ii) speaks in terms of adjusting the aggregate reimbursement amount computed by one of the methods of determining costs. As the Secretary concedes, the cost-limit rules are one of the methods of determining costs, and the retroactive 1984 rule was therefore an attempt to change one of those methods. Yet nothing in clause (ii) suggests that it permits changes in the methods used to compute costs; rather, it expressly contemplates corrective adjustments to the aggregate amounts of reimbursement produced pursuant to those methods. We cannot find in the language of clause (ii) an independent grant of authority to promulgate regulations establishing the methods of determining costs.

Our interpretation of clause (ii) is consistent with the Secretary’s past implementation of that provision. The regulations promulgated immediately after enactment of the Medicare Act established a mechanism for making retroactive corrective adjustments that remained essentially unchanged throughout the periods relevant to this case. Compare 20 CFR §§405.451(b)(1), 405.454(a), (f) (1967), with 42 CFR §§405.451(b)(1), 405.454(a), (f) (1983). These regulations provide for adjusting the amount of interim payments received by a provider, to bring the aggregate reimbursement into line with the provider’s actual reasonable costs.

These are the only regulations that expressly contemplate the making of retroactive corrective adjustments. The 1984 reissuance of the 1981 wage-index rule did not purport to be such a provision; indeed, it is only in the context of this litigation that the Secretary has expressed any intent to characterize the rule as a retroactive corrective adjustment under clause (ii).

Despite the novelty of this interpretation, the Secretary contends that it is entitled to deference under Young v. Community Nutrition Institute, 476 U. S. 974, 980-981 (1986), Chemical Mfrs. Assn. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 470 U. S. 116, 125 (1985), and Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837, 842-844 (1984). We have never applied the principle of those cases to agency litigating positions that are wholly unsupported by regulations, rulings, or administrative practice. To the contrary, we have declined to give deference to an agency counsel’s interpretation of a statute where the agency itself has articulated no position on the question, on the ground that “Congress has delegated to the administrative official and not to appellate counsel the responsibility for elaborating and enforcing statutory commands.” Investment Company Institute v. Camp, 401 U. S. 617, 628 (1971); cf. Burlington Truck Lines, Inc. v. United States, 371 U. S. 156, 168 (1962) (“The courts may not accept appellate counsel’s post hoc rationalizations for agency [orders]”). Even if we were to sanction departure from this principle in some cases, we would not do so here. Far from being a reasoned and consistent view of the scope of clause (ii), the Secretary’s current interpretation of clause (ii) is contrary to the narrow view of that provision advocated in past cases, where the Secretary has argued that clause (ii) “merely contemplates a year-end balancing of the monthly installments received by a provider with the aggregate due it for the year.” Regents of the University of California v. Heckler, 771 F. 2d 1182, 1189 (CA9 1985); see also Whitecliff Inc. v. United States, 210 Ct. Cl. 53, 60, n. 11, 536 F. 2d 347, 352, n. 11 (1976), cert. denied, 430 U. S. 969 (1977). Deference to what appears to be nothing more than an agency’s convenient litigating position would be entirely inappropriate. Accordingly, the retroactive rule cannot be upheld as an exercise of the Secretary’s authority to make retroactive corrective adjustments.

B

The statutory provisions establishing the Secretary’s general rulemaking power contain no express authorization of retroactive rulemaking. Any light that might be shed on this matter by suggestions of legislative intent also indicates that no such authority was contemplated. In the first place, where Congress intended to grant the Secretary the authority to act retroactively, it made that intent explicit. As discussed above, § 1395x(v)(l)(A)(ii) directs the Secretary to establish procedures for making retroactive corrective adjustments; in view of this indication that Congress considered the need for retroactive agency action, the absence of any express authorization for retroactive cost-limit rules weighs heavily against the Secretary’s position.

The legislative history of the cost-limit provision directly addresses the issue of retroactivity. In discussing the authority granted by § 223(b) of the 1972 amendments, the House and Senate Committee Reports expressed a desire to forbid retroactive cost-limit rules: “The proposed new authority to set limits on costs . . . would be exercised on a prospective, rather than retrospective, basis so that the provider would know in advance the limits to Government recognition of incurred costs and have the opportunity to act to avoid having costs that are not reimbursable.” H. R. Rep. No. 92-231, p. 83 (1971); see S. Rep. No. 92-1230, p. 188 (1972).

The Secretary’s past administrative practice is consistent with this interpretation of the statute. The first regulations promulgated under § 223(b) provided that “[t]hese limits will be imposed prospectively. . . .” 20 CFR § 405.460(a) (1975). Although the language was dropped from subsection (a) of the regulation when it was revised in 1979, the revised regulation continued to refer to “the prospective periods to which limits are being applied,” and it required that notice of future cost limits be published in the Federal Register “[p]rior to the beginning of a cost period to which limits will be applied ____” 42 CFR §§405.460(b)(2), (3) (1980). Finally, when the regulations were amended again in 1982, the Secretary reinserted the requirement that the limits be applied with prospective effect, noting that the language had been “inadvertently omitted” in the previous amendment but that the reinsertion would “have no effect on the way we develop or apply the limits.” 47 Fed. Reg. 43282, 43286 (1982); see 42 CFR § 405.460(a)(2) (1983).

Other examples of similar statements by the agency abound. Every cost-limit schedule promulgated by the Secretary between 1974 and 1981, for example, included a statement that § 223 permits the Secretary to establish “prospective” limits on the costs that are reimbursed under Medicare. The Secretary’s administrative rulings have also expressed this understanding of § 223(b). See Beth Israel Hospital v. Blue Cross Assn./Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Massachusetts, CCH Medicare and Medicaid Guide ¶ 31, 645 (Nov. 7, 1981).

The Secretary nonetheless suggests that, whatever the limits on his power to promulgate retroactive regulations in the normal course of events, judicial invalidation of-a prospective rule is a unique occurrence that creates a heightened need, and thus a justification, for retroactive curative rule-making. The Secretary warns that congressional intent and important administrative goals may be frustrated unless an invalidated rule can be cured of its defect and made applicable to past time periods. The argument is further advanced that the countervailing reliance interests are less compelling than in the usual case of retroactive rulemaking, because the original, invalidated rule provided at least some notice to the individuals and entities subject to its provisions.

Whatever weight the Secretary’s contentions might have in other contexts, they need not be addressed here. The case before us is resolved by the particular statutory scheme in question. Our interpretation of the Medicare Act compels the conclusion that the Secretary has no authority to promulgate retroactive cost-limit rules.

The 1984 reinstatement of the 1981 cost-limit rule is invalid. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is

Affirmed.

Justice Scalia,

concurring.

I agree with the Court that general principles of administrative law suggest that § 223(b) of the Medicare Act, 42 U. S. C. § 1395x(v)(l)(A), does not permit retroactive application of the Secretary of Health and Human Service’s 1984 cost-limit rule. I write separately because I find it incomplete to discuss general principles of administrative law without reference to the basic structural legislation which is the embodiment of those principles, the Administative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U. S. C. §§551-552, 553-559, 701-706, 1305, 3105, 3344, 5372, 7521. I agree with the District of Columbia Circuit that the APA independently confirms the judgment we have reached.

The first part of the APA’s definition of “rule” states that a rule

“means the whole or a part of an agency statement of general or particular applicability and future effect designed to implement, interpret, or prescribe law or policy or describing the organization, procedure, or practice requirements of an agency . . . .” 5 U. S. C. §551(4) (emphasis added).

The only plausible reading of the italicized phrase is that rules have legal consequences only for the future. It could not possibly mean that merely some of their legal consequences must be for the future, though they may also have legal consequences for the past, since that description would not enable rules to be distinguished from “orders,” see 5 U. S. C. §551(6), and would thus destroy the entire dichotomy upon which the most significant portions of the APA are based. (Adjudication — the process for formulating orders, see §551(7) — has future as well as past legal consequences, since the principles announced in an adjudication cannot be departed from in future adjudications without reason. See, e. g., Local 32, American Federation of Government Employees v. FLRA, 248 U. S. App. D. C. 198, 202, 774 F. 2d 498, 502 (1985) (McGowan, J.); Greater Boston Television Corp. v. FCC, 143 U. S. App. D. C. 383, 393, 444 F. 2d 841, 852 (1970) (Leventhal, J.), cert. denied, 403 U. S. 923 (1971)).

Nor could “future effect” in this definition mean merely “taking effect in the future,” that is, having a future effective date even though, once effective, altering the law applied in. the past. That reading, urged by the Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary), produces a definition of “rule” that is meaningless, since obviously all agency statements have “future effect” in the sense that they do not take effect until after they are made. (One might argue, I suppose, that “future effect” excludes agency statements that take effect immediately, as opposed to one second after promulgation. Apart from the facial silliness of making the central distinction between rulemaking and adjudication hang upon such a thread, it is incompatible with § 553(d), which makes clear that, if certain requirements are complied with, a rule can be effective immediately.) Thus this reading, like the other one, causes § 551(4) to fail in its central objective, which is to distinguish rules from orders. All orders have “future effect” in the sense that they are not effective until promulgated.

In short, there is really no alternative except the obvious meaning, that a rule is a statement that has legal consequences only for the future. If the first part of the definition left any doubt of this, however, it is surely eliminated by the second part (which the Secretary’s brief regrettably submerges in ellipsis). After the portion set forth above, the definition continues that a rule

“includes the approval or prescription for the future of rates, wages, corporate or financial structures or reorganizations thereof, prices, facilities, appliances, services or allowances therefor or of valuations, costs, or accounting, or practices bearing on any of the foregoing.” 5 U. S. C. § 551(4) (emphasis added).

It seems to me clear that the phrase “for the future” — which even more obviously refers to future operation rather than a future effective date — is not meant to add a requirement to those contained in the earlier part of the definition, but rather to repeat, in a more particularized context, the prior requirement “of future effect.” And even if one thought otherwise it would not matter for purposes of the present case, since the HHS “cost-limit” rules governing reimbursement are a “prescription” of “practices bearing on” “allowances” for “services.”

The position the Secretary takes in this litigation is out of accord with the Government’s own most authoritative interpretation of the APA, the 1947 Attorney General’s Manual on the Administrative Procedure Act (AG’s Manual), which we have repeatedly given great weight. See, e. g., Steadman v. SEC, 450 U. S. 91, 103, n. 22 (1981); Chrysler Corp. v. Brown, 441 U. S. 281, 302, n. 31 (1979); Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 435 U. S. 519, 546 (1978). That document was prepared by the same Office of the Assistant Solicitor General that had advised Congress in the latter stages of enacting the APA, and was originally issued “as a guide to the agencies in adjusting their procedures to the requirements of the Act.” AG’s Manual 6. Its analysis is plainly out of accord with the Secretary’s position here:

“Of particular importance is the fact that ‘rule’ includes agency statements not only of general applicability but also those of particular applicability applying either to a class or to a single person. In either case, they must be of future effect, implementing or prescribing future law.
“[T]he entire Act is based upon a dichotomy between rule making and adjudication. . . . Rule making is agency action which regulates the future conduct of either groups of persons or a single person; it is essentially legislative in nature, not only because it operates in the future but also because it is primarily concerned with policy considerations. . . . Conversely, adjudication is concerned with the determination of past and present rights and liabilities.” Id., at 13-14.

These statements cannot conceivably be reconciled with the Secretary’s position here that a rule has future effect merely because it is made effective in the future. Moreover, the clarity of these statements cannot be disregarded on the basis of the single sentence, elsewhere in the Manual, that “[njothing in the Act precludes the issuance of retroactive rules when otherwise legal and accompanied by the finding required by section 4(c).” Id., at 37. What that statement means (apart from the inexplicable reference to §4(c), 5 U. S. C. § 553(d), which would appear to have no application, no matter which interpretation is adopted), is clarified by the immediately following citation to the portion of the legislative history supporting it, namely, H. R. Rep. No. 1980, 79th Cong., 2d Sess., 49, n. 1 (1946). That Report states that “[t]he phrase ‘future effect’ does not preclude agencies from considering and, so far as legally authorized, dealing with past transactions in prescribing rules for the future.” Ibid. The Treasury Department might prescribe, for example, that for purposes of assessing future income tax liability, income from certain trusts that has previously been considered nontaxable will be taxable — whether those trusts were established before or after the effective date of the regulation. That is not retroactivity in the sense at issue here, i. e., in the sense of altering the past legal consequences of past actions. Rather, it is what has been characterized as “secondary” retroactivity, see McNulty, Corporations and the Intertemporal Conflict of Laws, 55 Cal. L. Rev. 12, 58-60 (1967). A rule with exclusively future effect (taxation of future trust income) can unquestionably affect past transactions (rendering the previously established trusts less desirable in the future), but it does not for that reason cease to be a rule under the APA. Thus, with respect to the present matter, there is no question that the Secretary could have applied her new wage-index formulas to respondents in the future, even though respondents may have been operating under long-term labor and supply contracts negotiated in reliance upon the pre-existing rule. But when the Secretary prescribed such a formula for costs reimbursable while the prior rule was in effect, she changed the law retroactively, a function not performable by rule under the APA.

A rule that has unreasonable secondary retroactivity — for example, altering future regulation in a manner that makes worthless substantial past investment incurred in reliance upon the prior rule — may for that reason be “arbitrary” or “capricious,” see 5 U. S. C. § 706, and thus invalid. In reference to such situations, there are to be found in many cases statements to the effect that “[w]here a rule has retroactive effects, it may nonetheless be sustained in spite of such retro-activity if it is reasonable.” General Telephone Co. of Southwest v. United States, 449 F. 2d 846, 863 (CA5 1971). See also National Assn. of Independent Television Producers and Distributors v. FCC, 502 F. 2d 249, 255 (CA2 1974) (“Any implication by the FCC that this court may not consider the reasonableness of the retroactive effect of a rule is clearly wrong”). It is erroneous, however, to extend this “reasonableness” inquiry to purported rules that not merely affect past transactions but change what was the law in the past. Quite simply, a rule is an agency statement “of future effect,” not “of future effect and/or reasonable past effect.”

The profound confusion characterizing the Secretary’s approach to this case is exemplified by its reliance upon our opinion in SEC v. Chenery Corp., 332 U. S. 194 (1947). Even apart from the fact that that case was not decided under the APA, it has nothing to do with the issue before us here, since it involved adjudication rather than rulemaking. Thus, though it is true that our opinion permitted the Secretary, after his correction of the procedural error that caused an initial reversal, see SEC v. Chenery Corp., 318 U. S. 80 (1943), to reach the same substantive result with retroactive effect, the utterly crucial distinction is that Chenery involved that form of administrative action where retroactivity is not only permissible but standard. Adjudication deals with what the law was; rulemaking deals with what the law will be. That is why we said in Chenery:

“Since the Commission, unlike a court, does have the ability to make new law prospectively through the exercise of its rule-making powers, it has less reason to rely upon ad hoc adjudication to formulate new standards of conduct.... The function of filling in the interstices of the Act should be performed, as much as possible, through this quasi-legislative promulgation of rules to be applied in the future.” 332 U. S., at 202 (emphasis added).

And just as Chenery suggested that rulemaking was prospective, the opinions in NLRB v. Wyman-Gordon Co., 394 U. S. 759 (1969), suggested the obverse: that adjudication could not be purely prospective, since otherwise it would constitute rulemaking. Both the plurality opinion, joined by four of the Justices, and the dissenting opinions of Justices Douglas and Harlan expressed the view that a rule of law announced in an adjudication, but with exclusively prospective effect, could not be accepted as binding (without new analysis) in subsequent adjudications, since it would constitute rulemaking and as such could only be achieved by following the prescribed rulemaking procedures. See id., at 764-766 (plurality opinion); id., at 777 (Douglas, J., dissenting); id., at 780-781 (Harlan, J., dissenting). Side by side these two cases, Chenery and Wyman-Gordon, set forth quite nicely the “dichotomy between rulemaking and adjudication” upon which “the entire [APA] is based.” AG’s Manual 14.

Although the APA was enacted over 40 years ago, this Court has never directly confronted whether the statute authorizes retroactive rules. This in itself casts doubt on the Secretary’s position. If so obviously useful an instrument was available to the agencies, one would expect that we would previously have had occasion to review its exercise. The only Supreme Court case the Government cites, however, is the pre-APA case of Addison v. Holly Hill Fruit Products, Inc., 322 U. S. 607 (1944). That case does not stand for a general authority to issue retroactive rules before the APA was enacted, much less for authority to do so in the face of § 551(4). Addison involved the promulgation of a definition of “area of production” by the Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division, for purposes of an exemption to the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, 52 Stat. 1060, as amended, 29 U. S. C. §201 et seq. We found his definition unlawful — but instead of directing the entry of judgment for the employees who were claiming higher wages, we remanded the case to the District Court “with instructions to hold it until the Administrator, by making a valid determination of the area with all deliberate speed, acts within the authority given him by Congress.” 322 U. S., at 619. It is not entirely clear that we required this determination to be made by regulation rather than by a declaratory order applicable to the case at hand. Where an interpretive rule is held invalid, and there is no pre-existing rule which it superseded, it is obviously available to the agency to “make” law retroactively through adjudication, just .as courts routinely do (and just as we indicated the Secretary of Agriculture could have done in United States v. Morgan, 307 U. S. 183, 193 (1939)). Perhaps that is all Addison stands for. Arguably, however, the Administrator was obliged to act by regulation rather than by adjudication, since the statutory exemption in question referred to “area of production (as defined by the Administrator).” See 322 U. S., at 608. If the parenthetical had the effect of requiring specification by rule (rather than through adjudication), then the Court would have been authorizing a retroactive regulation. But it would have been doing so in a sitúation where one of two legal commands had to be superseded. In these circumstances, either the Administrator had to contravene normal law by promulgating a retroactive regulation, or else the Administrator would, by his inaction, have totally eliminated the congressionally prescribed “area of production” exemption. Something had to yield. If this case involves retroactive rulemaking at all, it does not stand for the Government’s asserted principle of the general permissibility of retroactive rules so long as they are reasonable, but rather for the much narrower (and unexceptional) proposition that a particular statute may in some circumstances implicitly authorize retroactive rulemaking.

This case cannot be disposed of, as the Secretary suggests, by simply noting that retroactive rulemaking is similar to retroactive legislation, and that the latter has long been upheld against constitutional attack where reasonable. See, e. g., Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. v. R. A. Gray & Co., 467 U. S. 717 (1984); Baltimore & Susquehanna R. Co. v. Nesbit, 10 How. 395 (1851). See generally Hochman, The Supreme Court and the Constitutionality of Retroactive Legislation, 73 Harv. L. Rev. 692 (1960). The issue here is not constitutionality, but rather whether there is any good reason to doubt that the APA means what it says. For purposes of resolving that question, it does not at all follow that, since Congress itself possesses the power retroactively to change its laws, it must have meant agencies to possess the power retroactively to change their regulations. Retroactive legislation has always been looked upon with disfavor, see Smead, The Rule Against Retroactive Legislation: A Basic Principle of Jurisprudence, 20 Minn. L. Rev. 775 (1936); 2 J. Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States § 1398, p. 272 (5th ed. 1891), and even its constitutionality has been conditioned upon a rationality requirement beyond that applied to other legislation, see Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., supra, at 730; Usery v. Turner Elkhorn Mining Co., 428 U. S. 1, 16-17 (1976). It is entirely unsurprising, therefore, that even though Congress wields such a power itself, it has been unwilling to confer it upon the agencies. Given the traditional attitude towards retroactive legislation, the regime established by the APA is an entirely reasonable one: Where quasi-legislative action is required, an agency cannot act with retroactive effect without some special congressional authorization. That is what the APA says, and there is no reason to think Congress did not mean it.

The dire consequences that the Secretary predicts will ensue from reading the APA as it is written (and as the Justice Department originally interpreted it) are not credible. From the more than 40 years of jurisprudence since the APA has been in effect, the Secretary cites only one holding and one alternative holding (set forth in a footnote) sustaining retroactive regulations. See Citizens to Save Spencer County v. EPA, 195 U. S. App. D. C. 30, 600 F. 2d 844 (1979); National Helium Corp. v. FEA, 569 F. 2d 1137, 1145, n. 18 (Temp. Emerg. Ct. App. 1977). They are evidently not a device indispensable to efficient government. It is important to note that the retroactivity limitation applies only to rulemaking. Thus, where legal consequences hinge upon the interpretation of statutory requirements, and where no preexisting interpretive rule construing those requirements is in effect, nothing prevents the agency from acting retroactively through adjudication. See NLRB v. Bell Aerospace Co., 416 U. S. 267, 293-294 (1974); SEC v. Chenery Corp., 332 U. S., at 202-203. Moreover, if and when an agency believes that the extraordinary step of retroactive rulemaking is crucial, all it need do is persuade Congress of that fact to obtain the necessary ad hoc authorization. It may even be that implicit authorization of particular retroactive rulemaking can be found in existing legislation. If, for example, a statute prescribes a deadline by which particular rules must be in effect, and if the agency misses that deadline, the statute may be interpreted to authorize a reasonable retroactive rule despite the limitation of the APA. (Such a situation would bear some similarity to that in Addison.)

I need not discuss what other exceptions, with basis in the law, may permit an agency to issue a retroactive rule. The only exception suggested by the Secretary to cover the present case has no basis in the law. The Secretary contends that the evils generally associated with retroactivity do not apply to reasonable “curative” rulemaking — that is, the correction of a mistake in an earlier rulemaking proceeding. Because the invalidated 1981 wage-index rule furnished respondents with “ample notice” of the standard that would be applied, the Secretary asserts that it is not unfair to apply the identical 1984 rule retroactively. I shall assume that the invalidated rule provided ample notice, though that is not at all clear. It makes no difference. The issue is not whether retroactive rulemaking is fair; it undoubtedly may be, just as may prospective adjudication. The issue is whether it is a permissible form of agency action under the particular structure established by the APA. The Secretary provides nothing that can bring it -within that structure. I might add that even if I felt free to construct my own model of desirable administrative procedure, I would assüredly not sanction “curative” retroactivity. I fully agree with the District of Columbia Circuit that acceptance of the Secretary’s position would “make a mockery ... of the APA,” since “agencies would be free to violate the rulemaking requirements of the APA with impunity if, upon invalidation of a rule, they were free to ‘reissue’ that rule on a retroactive basis.” 261 U. S. App. D. C. 262, 270, 821 F. 2d 750, 758 (1987).

For these reasons in addition to those stated by the Court, I agree that the judgment of the District of Columbia Circuit must be affirmed.

       The Courts of Appeals have not spoken in one voice in construing this provision. Some courts have held that clause (ii) permits the Secretary to promulgate retroactive regulations. E. g., Tallahassee Memorial Regional Medical Center v. Bowen, 815 F. 2d 1435, 1453-1454 (CA11 1987), cert. denied, 485 U. S. 1020 (1988); Fairfax Nursing Center, Inc. v. Califano, 590 F. 2d 1297, 1300 (CA4 1979); Springdale Convalescent Center v. Mathews, 545 F. 2d 943, 954-955 (CA5 1977). The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has reached the opposite conclusion, construing clause (ii) to provide for nothing more than a year-end balancing of individual providers’ cost-reimbursement accounts. Daughters of Miriam Center for the Aged v. Mathews, 590 F. 2d 1250, 1258, n. 23 (1978). Other courts, without deciding whether clause (ii) permits rulemaking, have held that it requires the Secretary to make case-by-case adjustments to reimbursement determinations. E. g., St. Paul-Ramsey Medical Center v. Bowen, 816 F. 2d 417, 419-420 (CA8 1987); Regents of the University of California v. Heckler, 771 F. 2d 1182, 1188-1189 (CA9 1985).

      ` It is clear from the language of these provisions that they are intended to implement the Secretary’s authority under clause (ii):
      “These regulations also provide for the making of suitable retroactive adjustments after the provider has submitted fiscal and statistical reports. The retroactive adjustment will represent the difference between the amount received by the provider during the year for covered services from both [the Medicare program] and the beneficiaries and the amount determined in accordance with an accepted method of cost apportionment to be the actual cost of services rendered to beneficiaries during the year.” 20 CFR § 405.451(b)(1) (1967); 42 CFR § 405.451(b)(1) (1983).

       Section 223(b) of the 1972 amendments amended the Medicare Act to state that the Secretary’s regulations for computing reasonable costs may “provide for the establishment of limits on the direct or indirect overall incurred costs or incurred costs of specific items or services or groups of items or services to be recognized as reasonable based on estimates of the costs necessary in the efficient delivery of needed health services to individuals covered by the insurance programs established under this sub-chapter . . . .” 42 U. S. C. § 1395x(v)(l)(A).
      Section 1395hh provides that “[t]he Secretary shall prescribe such regulations as may be necessary to carry out the administration of the insurance programs under this subchapter.” Finally, § 1395Ü incorporates 42 U. S. C. § 405(a), which provides that “[t]he Secretary shall have full power and authority to make rules and regulations . . . , not inconsistent with the provisions of this subchapter, which are necessary or appropriate to carry out such provisions . . . .”

      See 46 Fed. Reg. 48010 (1981); id., at 33637; 45 Fed. Reg. 41868 (1980); 44 Fed. Reg. 31806 (1979); 43 Fed. Reg. 43558 (1978); 42 Fed. Reg. 53675 (1977); 41 Fed. Reg. 26992 (1976); 40 Fed. Reg. 23622 (1975); 39 Fed. Reg. 20168 (1974); see also 48 Fed. Reg. 39998 (1983) (notice of invalidation of 1981 cost-limit schedule). Even the notice of proposed rulemaking concerning reissuance of the 1981 schedule contained the statement that § 223 “authorizes the Secretary to set prospective limits on the costs that are reimbursed under Medicare.” 49 Fed. Reg. 6175, 6176 (1984). Interestingly, this statement does not appear in the final notice announcing the reissuance of the 1981 schedule. Id., at 46495.


source: Caselaw Access Project

author: Per Curiam.

license: Public Domain

text:
    HARBISON-WALKER REFRACTORIES, A DIVISION OF DRESSER INDUSTRIES, INC. v. BRIECK
    No. 87-271.
    Argued October 31, 1988
    Decided December 12, 1988
    822 F. 2d 52,

      Andrew M. Kramer argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs were Envin N. Griswold, David A. Copus, Patricia A. Dunn, and James P. Hollihan.

      Brian J. Martin argued the cause for the United States et al. as amici curiae urging affirmance. On the brief were Solicitor General Fried, Assistant Attorney General Reynolds, Deputy Solicitor General Merrill, Charles A. Rothfeld, and Charles A. Shanor.

      James H. Logan argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief were Julius L. Chambers, Charles Stephen Ralston, Ronald L. Ellis, and Eric Schnapper.

      Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed for the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America by John C. Unkovic and Stephen A. Bokat; and for the Equal Employment Advisory Council by Robert E. Williams, Douglas S. McDowell, and Ann Elizabeth Reesman.

      Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the American Association of Retired Persons by Alfred Miller, Steven S. Honigman, Christopher G. Mackaronis, and Cathy Ventrell-Monsees; and for the Plaintiff Employment Lawyers Association by Paul H. Tobias.

   Per Curiam.

The writ of certiorari is dismissed as improvidently granted.

Justice White dissents.


author: Per Curiam. Justice Marshall,

text:
    OLDEN v. KENTUCKY
    No. 88-5223.
    Decided December 12, 1988
   Per Curiam.

Petitioner James Olden and his friend Charlie Ray Harris, both of whom are black, were indicted for kidnaping, rape, and forcible sodomy. The victim of the alleged crimes, Starla Matthews, a young white woman, gave the following account at trial: She and a friend, Regina Patton, had driven to Princeton, Kentucky, to exchange Christmas gifts with Bill Russell, petitioner’s half brother. After meeting Russell at a local car wash and exchanging presents with him, Matthews and Patton stopped in J.R.’s, a “boot-legging joint” serving a predominantly black clientele, to use the restroom. Matthews consumed several glasses of beer. As the bar became more crowded, she became increasingly nervous because she and Patton were the only white people there. When Patton refused to leave, Matthews sat at a separate table, hoping to demonstrate to her friend that she was upset. As time passed, however, Matthews lost track of Patton and became somewhat intoxicated. When petitioner told her that Patton had departed and had been in a car accident, she left the bar with petitioner and Harris to find out what had happened. She was driven in Harris’ car to another location, where, threatening her with a knife, petitioner raped and sodomized her. Harris assisted by holding her arms. Later, she was driven to a dump, where two other men joined the group. There, petitioner raped her once again. At her request, the men then dropped her off in the vicinity of Bill Russell’s house.

On cross-examination, petitioner’s counsel focused on a number of inconsistencies in Matthews’ various accounts of the alleged crime. Matthews originally told the police that she had been raped by four men. Later, she claimed that she had been raped by only petitioner and Harris. At trial, she contended that petitioner was the sole rapist. Further, while Matthews testified at trial that petitioner had threatened her with a knife, she had not previously alleged that petitioner had been armed.

Russell, who also appeared as a State’s witness, testified that on the evening in question he heard a noise outside his home and, when he went out to investigate, saw Matthews get out of Harris’ car. Matthews immediately told Russell that she had just been raped by petitioner and Harris.

Petitioner and Harris asserted a defense of consent. According to their testimony, Matthews propositioned petitioner as he was about to leave the bar, and the two engaged in sexual acts behind the tavern. Afterwards, on Matthews’ suggestion, Matthews, petitioner, and Harris left in Harris’ car in search of cocaine. When they discovered that the seller was not at home, Matthews asked Harris to drive to a local dump so that she and petitioner could have sex once again. Harris complied. Later that evening, they picked up two other men, Richard Hickey and Chris Taylor, and drove to an establishment called The Alley. Harris, Taylor, and Hickey went in, leaving petitioner and Matthews in the ear. When Hickey and Harris returned, the men gave Hickey a ride to a store and then dropped Matthews off, at her request, in the vicinity of Bill Russell’s home.

Taylor and Hickey testified for the defense and corroborated the defendants’ account of the evening. While both acknowledged that they joined the group later than the time when the alleged rape occurred, both testified that Matthews did not appear upset. Hickey further testified that Matthews had approached him earlier in the evening at J.R.’s and told him that she was looking for a black man with whom to have sex. An independent witness also appeared for the defense and testified that he had seen Matthews, Harris, and petitioner at a store called Big O’s on the evening in question, that a policeman was in the store at the time, and that Matthews, who appeared alert, made no attempt to signal for assistance.

Although Matthews and Russell were both married to and living with other people at the time of the incident, they were apparently involved in an extramarital relationship. By the time of trial the two were living together, having separated from their respective spouses. Petitioner’s theory of the case was that Matthews concocted the rape story to protect her relationship with Russell, who would have grown suspicious upon seeing her disembark from Harris’ car. In order to demonstrate Matthews’ motive to lie, it was crucial, petitioner contended, that he be allowed to introduce evidence of Matthews’ and Russell’s current cohabitation. Over petitioner’s vehement objections, the trial court nonetheless granted the prosecutor’s motion in limine to keep all evidence of Matthews’ and Russell’s living arrangement from the jury. Moreover, when the defense attempted to cross-examine Matthews about her living arrangements, after she had claimed during direct examination that she was living with her mother, the trial court sustained the prosecutor’s objection.

Based on the evidence admitted at trial, the jury acquitted Harris of being either a principal or an accomplice to any of the charged offenses. Petitioner was likewise acquitted of kidnaping and rape. However, in a somewhat puzzling turn of events, the jury convicted petitioner alone of forcible sodomy. He was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment.

Petitioner appealed, asserting, inter alia, that the trial court’s refusal to allow him to impeach Matthews’ testimony by introducing evidence supporting a motive to lie deprived him of his Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses against him. The Kentucky Court of Appeals upheld the conviction. No. 86-CR-006 (May 11, 1988). The court specifically held that evidence that Matthews and Russell were living together at the time of trial was not barred by the State’s rape shield law. Ky. Rev. Stat. Ann. §510.145 (Michie 1985). Moreover, it acknowledged that the evidence in question was relevant to petitioner’s theory of the case. But it held, nonetheless, that the evidence was properly excluded as “its probative value [was] outweighed by its possibility for prejudice.” App. to Pet. for Cert. A6. By way of explanation, the court stated: “[T]here were the undisputed facts of race; Matthews was white and Russell was black. For the trial court to have admitted into evidence testimony that Matthews and Russell were living together at the time of the trial may have created extreme prejudice against Matthews.” Judge Clayton, who dissented but did not address the evidentiary issue, would have reversed petitioner’s conviction both because he believed the jury’s verdicts were “manifestly inconsistent,” and because he found Matthews’ testimony too incredible to provide evidence sufficient to uphold the verdict. Id., at A7.

The Kentucky Court of Appeals failed to accord proper weight to petitioner’s Sixth Amendment right “to be confronted with the witnesses against him. ” That right, incorporated in the Fourteenth Amendment and therefore available in state proceedings, Pointer v. Texas, 380 U. S. 400 (1965), includes the right to conduct reasonable cross-examination. Davis v. Alaska, 415 U. S. 308, 315-316 (1974).

In Davis v. Alaska, we observed that, subject to “the broad discretion of a trial judge to preclude repetitive and unduly harassing interrogation . . . , the cross-examiner has traditionally been allowed to impeach, i. e., discredit, the witness.” Id., at 316. We emphasized that “the exposure of a witness’ motivation in testifying is a proper and important function of the constitutionally protected right of cross-examination.” Id., at 316-317, citing Greene v. McElroy, 360 U. S. 474, 496 (1959). Recently, in Delaware v. Van Arsdall, 475 U. S. 673 (1986), we reaffirmed Davis, and held that “a criminal defendant states a violation of the Confrontation Clause by showing that he was prohibited from engaging in otherwise appropriate cross-examination designed to show a prototypical form of bias on the part of the witness, and thereby ‘to expose to the jury the facts from which jurors . . . could appropriately draw inferences relating to the reliability of the witness.’” 475 U. S., at 680, quoting Davis, supra, at 318.

In the instant case, petitioner has consistently asserted that he and Matthews engaged in consensual sexual acts and that Matthews — out of fear of jeopardizing her relationship with Russell — lied when she told Russell she had been raped and has continued to lie since. It is plain to us that “[a] reasonable jury might have received a significantly different impression of [the witness’] credibility had [defense counsel] been permitted to pursue his proposed line of cross-examination.” Delaware v. Van Arsdall, supra, at 680.

The Kentucky Court of Appeals did not dispute, and indeed acknowledged, the relevance of the impeachment evidence. Nonetheless, without acknowledging the significance of, or even adverting to, petitioner’s constitutional right to confrontation, the court held that petitioner’s right to effective cross-examination was outweighed by the danger that revealing Matthews’ interracial relationship would prejudice the jury against her. While a trial court may, of course, impose reasonable limits on defense counsel’s inquiry into the potential bias of a prosecution witness, to take account of such factors as “harassment, prejudice, confusion of the issues, the witness’ safety, or interrogation that [would be] repetitive or only marginally relevant,” Delaware v. Van Arsdall, supra, at 679, the limitation here was beyond reason. Speculation as to the effect of jurors’ racial biases cannot justify exclusion of cross-examination with such strong potential to demonstrate the falsity of Matthews’ testimony.

In Delaware v. Van Arsdall, supra, we held that “the constitutionally improper denial of a defendant’s opportunity to impeach a witness for bias, like other Confrontation Clause errors, is subject to Chapman [v. California, 386 U. S. 18 (1967)] harmless-error analysis.” Id., at 684. Thus we stated:

“The correct inquiry is whether, assuming that the damaging potential of the cross-examination were fully realized, a reviewing court might nonetheless say that the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Whether such an error is harmless in a particular case depends upon a host of factors, all readily accessible to reviewing courts. These factors include the importance of the witness’ testimony in the prosecution’s case, whether the testimony was cumulative, the presence or absence of evidence corroborating or contradicting the testimony of the witness on material points, the extent of cross-examination otherwise permitted, and, of course, the overall strength of the prosecution’s case.” Ibid.

Here, Matthews’ testimony was central, indeed crucial, to the prosecution’s case. Her story, which was directly contradicted by that of petitioner and Harris, was corroborated only by the largely derivative testimony of Russell, whose impartiality would also have been somewhat impugned by revelation of his relationship with Matthews. Finally, as demonstrated graphically by the jury’s verdicts, which cannot be squared with the State’s theory of the alleged crime, and by Judge Clayton’s dissenting opinion below, the State’s case against petitioner was far from overwhelming. In sum, considering the relevant Van Arsdall factors within the context of this case, we find it impossible to conclude “beyond a reasonable doubt” that the restriction on petitioner’s right to confrontation was harmless.

The motion for leave to proceed informa pauperis and the petition for certiorari are granted, the judgment of the Kentucky Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

It is so ordered.

Justice Marshall,

dissenting.

I continue to believe that summary dispositions deprive litigants of a fair opportunity to be heard on the merits and create a significant risk that the Court is rendering an erroneous or ill-advised decision that may confuse the lower courts. See Pennsylvania v. Bruder, ante, p. 11 (Marshall, J., dissenting); Rhodes v. Stewart, ante, p. 4 (Marshall, J., dissenting); Buchanan v. Stanships, Inc., 485 U. S. 265, 269 (1988) (Marshall, J., dissenting); Commissioner v. McCoy, 484 U. S. 3, 7 (1987) (Marshall, J., dissenting). I therefore dissent from the Court’s decision today to reverse summarily the decision below.


author: Justice Marshall

text:
    OWENS et al. v. OKURE
    No. 87-56.
    Argued November 1, 1988
    Decided January 10, 1989

      Peter H. Schiff, Deputy Solicitor General of New York, argued the cause for petitioners. With him on the briefs were Robert Abrams, Attorney General, O. Peter Sherwood, Solicitor General, and Charles R. Fraser, Assistant Attorney General.

      Kenneth Kimerling argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief were Arthur N. Eisenberg, John A. Powell, Steven Shapiro, Helen Hershkoff, and Joseph M. Brennan.

      Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed for the State of Nebraska et al. by Robert M. Spire, Attorney General of Nebraska, and Mark D. Starr, Assistant Attorney General, Joseph B. Meyer, Attorney General of Wyoming, John Steven Clark, Attorney General of Arkansas, Robert H. Henry, Attorney General of Oklahoma, and David Lee, Assistant Attorney General, Roger A. Tellinghuisen, Attorney General of South Dakota, Donald J. Hanaway, Attorney General of Wisconsin, T. Travis Medlock, Attorney General of South Carolina, Robert T. Stephan, Attorney General of Kansas, and William L. Webster, Attorney General of Missouri; and for the city of New York by Peter L. Zimroth, Leonard J. Koemer, Edward F. X. Hart, and John P. Woods.

   Justice Marshall

delivered the opinion of the Court.

In Wilson v. Garcia, 471 U. S. 261 (1985), we held that courts entertaining claims brought under 42 U. S. C. § 1983 should borrow the state statute of limitations for personal injury actions. This case raises the question of what limitations period should apply to a § 1983 action where a State has one or more statutes of limitations for certain enumerated intentional torts, and a residual statute for all other personal injury actions. We hold that the residual or general personal injury statute of limitations applies.

I

On November 13, 1985, respondent Tom U. U. Okure brought suit in the District Court for the Northern District of New York, seeking damages under §1983 from petitioners Javan Owens and Daniel G. Lessard, two State University of New York (SUNY) police officers. Okure alleged that, on January 27, 1984, the officers unlawfully arrested him on the SUNY campus in Albany and charged him with disorderly conduct. The complaint stated that Okure was “forcibly transported” to a police detention center, “battered and beaten by [the police officers] and forced to endure great emotional distress, physical harm, and embarrassment.” App. 5-6. As a result of the arrest and beating, Okure claimed, he “sustained personal injuries, including broken teeth and a sprained finger, mental anguish, shame, humiliation, legal expenses and the deprivation of his constitutional rights.” Id., at 6.

The officers moved to dismiss the complaint, which had been filed 22 months after the alleged incident, as time barred. They contended that § 1983 actions were governed by New York’s 1-year statute of limitations covering eight intentional torts: “assault, battery, false imprisonment, malicious prosecution, libel, slander, false words causing special damages, [and] a violation of the right of privacy.” N. Y. Civ. Prac. Law § 215(3) (McKinney 1972).

The District Court denied the motion to dismiss. 625 F. Supp. 1568 (1986). Borrowing “a narrowly drawn statute which is applicable only to certain intentional torts,” id., at 1570, the court stated, was inconsistent with this Court’s endorsement of “a simple, broad characterization of all §1983 claims.” Ibid, (citing Wilson, supra, at 272). Moreover, a 1-year statute of limitations on § 1983 claims “would improperly restrict the scope of § 1983 and controvert federal policy.” 625 F. Supp., at 1571. The court concluded that New York’s 3-year residual statute of limitations for claims of personal injury not embraced by specific statutes of limitations, N. Y. Civ. Prac. Law §214(5) (McKinney Supp. 1988), was applicable to § 1983 actions, and that Okure’s complaint was therefore timely. The court then certified an interlocutory appeal on this question pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1292(b) (1982 ed., Supp. IV) and Rule 5(a) of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure.

The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit granted permission for the appeal and affirmed. 816 F. 2d 45 (1987). It stated that Wilson’s description of § 1983 claims as general personal injury actions required a statute of limitations “expansive enough to accommodate the diverse personal injury torts that section 1983 has come to embrace.” Id., at 48. As between the two New York statutes of limitations, the court observed: “By nature, section 214(5) is general; section 215(3) is more specific and exceptional. This dichotomy survives no matter how many similar intentional torts are judicially added to those enumerated in section 215(3).” Ibid. The Court of Appeals favored § 214(5) for another reason: its 3-year period of limitations “more faithfully represents the federal interest in providing an effective remedy for violations of civil rights than does the restrictive one year limit.” Id., at 49. Injuries to personal rights are not “necessarily apparent to the victim at the' time they are inflicted,” the court explained, and “[e]ven where the injury itself is obvious, the constitutional dimensions of the tort may not be.” Id., at 48.

The dissent argued that § 1983 actions are best analogized to intentional torts, id., at 51, and that, because §215(3) governs “almost every intentional injury to the person,” id., at 50, it is more appropriate for §1983 claims than §214(5), which it contended had been confined primarily to negligence claims. Ibid. The dissent added that using § 215(3)’s 1-year limitations period is not “inherently inconsistent with the policies underlying the Civil Rights Act.” Id., at 54. We granted certiorari, 485 U. S. 958 (1988), and now affirm.

II

A

In this case, we again confront the consequences of Congress’ failure to provide a specific statute of limitations to govern § 1983 actions. Title 42 U. S. C. § 1988 endorses the borrowing of state-law limitations provisions where doing so is consistent with federal law; § 1988 does not, however, offer any guidance as to which state provision to borrow. To fill this void, for years we urged courts to select the state statute of limitations “most analogous,” Board of Regents, Univ. of New York v. Tomanio, 446 U. S. 478, 488 (1980), and “most appropriate,” Johnson v. Railway Express Agency, Inc., 421 U. S. 454, 462 (1975), to the particular § 1983 action, so long as the chosen limitations period was consistent with federal law and policy. Occidental Life Ins. Co. of California v. EEOC, 432 U. S. 355, 367 (1977); Johnson, supra, at 465.

The practice of seeking state-law analogies for particular § 1983 claims bred confusion and inconsistency in the lower courts and generated time-consuming litigation. Some courts found analogies in common-law tort, others in contract law, and still others in statutory law. Often the result had less to do with the general nature of § 1983 relief than with counsel’s artful pleading and ability to persuade the court that the facts and legal theories of a particular § 1983 claim resembled a particular common-law or statutory cause of action. Consequently, plaintiffs and defendants often had no idea whether a federal civil rights claim was barred until a court ruled on their case. Predictability, a primary goal of statutes of limitations, was thereby frustrated.

In Wilson, we sought to end this “conflict, confusion and uncertainty.” 471 U. S., at 266. Recognizing the problems inherent in the case-by-case approach, we determined that 42 U. S. C. §1988 requires courts to borrow and apply to all § 1983 claims the one most analogous state statute of limitations. Ibid. See id., at 275 (“[F]ederal interests in uniformity, certainty, and the minimization of unnecessary litigation all support the conclusion that Congress favored this simple approach”); see also id., at 272 (“[A] simple, broad characterization of all § 1983 claims best fits the statute’s remedial purpose”). We Concluded, based upon the legislative history of § 1983 and the wide array of claims now embraced by that provision, that § 1983 “conferfs] a general remedy for injuries to personal rights.” Id., at 278. Because “§ 1983 claims are best characterized as personal injury actions,” we held that a State’s personal injury statute of limitations should be applied to all § 1983 claims. Id., at 280.

As the instant case indicates, Wilson has not completely eliminated the confusion over the appropriate limitations period for § 1983 claims. In States where one statute of limitations applies to all personal injury claims, Wilson supplies a clear answer. Courts considering § 1983 claims in States with multiple statutes of limitations for personal injury actions, however, have differed over how to determine which statute applies. Several Courts of Appeals have held that the appropriate period is that which the State assigns to certain enumerated intentional torts. These courts have reasoned that intentional torts are most closely analogous to the claims Congress envisioned being brought under the Civil Rights Act, and to the paradigmatic claims brought today under § 1983. Other Courts of Appeals, by contrast, have endorsed the use of the state residuary statute of limitations for § 1983 actions. These courts have observed that § 1983 embraces a broad array of actions for injury to personal rights, and that the intentional tort is therefore too narrow an analogy to a § 1983 claim. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit followed this second approach when it concluded that New York’s statute of limitations for certain enumerated intentional torts did not reflect the diversity of § 1983 claims.

B

In choosing between the two alternatives endorsed by the Courts of Appeals — the intentional torts approach and the general or residual personal injury approach — we are mindful that ours is essentially a practical inquiry. Wilson, 471 U. S., at 272. Our decision in Wilson that one “simple broad characterization” of all § 1983 actions was appropriate under § 1988 was, after all, grounded in the realization that the potential applicability of different state statutes of limitations had bred chaos and uncertainty. Id., at 275; see also Burnett v. Grattan, 468 U. S. 42, 50 (1984) (courts selecting a state statute of limitations for § 1983 actions must “tak[e] into account practicalities that are involved in litigating federal civil rights claims”); accord, Felder v. Casey, 487 U. S. 131 (1988). Thus, our task today is to provide courts with a rule for determining the appropriate personal injury limitations statute that can be applied with ease and predictability in all 50 States.

A rule endorsing the choice of the state statute of limitations for intentional torts would be manifestly inappropriate. Every State has multiple intentional tort limitations provisions, carving up the universe of intentional torts into different configurations. In New York, for example, §215(3), the intentional tort statute endorsed by petitioners, covers eight enumerated torts. See supra, at 237. But different provisions cover other specified intentional torts. Malpractice actions are governed by one provision; certain veterans’ claims, by another. In Michigan, separate statutes of limitations govern “assault, battery, or false imprisonment,” Mich. Comp. Laws §600.5805(2) (1979), “malicious prosecution,” §600.5805(3), “libel or slander,” §600.5805(7), and “all other actions to recover damages for the death of a person or for injury to a person §600.5805(8). In Ohio, separate provisions govern “bodily injury,” Ohio Rev. Code Ann. §2305.10 (Supp. 1987), “libel, slander, malicious prosecution, or false imprisonment,” §2305.11, and “assault or battery,” §2305.111. Similarly, in Pennsylvania, separate provisions govern “libel, slander or invasion of privacy,” 42 Pa. Cons. Stat. § 5523(1) (1988), “assault, battery, false imprisonment, false arrest, malicious prosecution or malicious abuse of process,” §5524(1), “injuries to the person or for the death of an individual caused by the wrongful act or neglect or unlawful violence or negligence of another,” § 5524(2), and “[a]ny other action or proceeding to recover damages for injury to person or property which is founded on negligent, intentional, or otherwise tortious conduct.” §5524(7). Were we to call upon courts to apply the state statute of limitations governing intentional torts, we would succeed only in transferring the present confusion over the choice among multiple personal injury provisions to a choice among multiple intentional tort provisions.

In marked contrast to the multiplicity of state intentional tort statutes of limitations, every State has one general or residual statute of limitations governing personal injury actions. Some States have a general provision which applies to all personal injury actions with certain specific exceptions. Others have a residual provision which applies to all actions not specifically provided for, including personal injury actions. Whichever form they take, these provisions are easily identifiable by language or application. Indeed, the very idea of a general or residual statute suggests that each State would have no more than one. Potential § 1983 plaintiffs and defendants therefore can readily ascertain, with little risk of confusion or unpredictability, the applicable limitations period in advance of filing a § 1983 action.

Petitioners’ argument that courts should borrow the intentional tort limitations periods because intentional torts are most analogous to § 1983 claims fails to recognize the enormous practical disadvantages of such a selection. Moreover, this analogy is too imprecise to justify such a result. In Wilson, we expressly rejected the practice of drawing narrow analogies between § 1983 claims and state causes of action. 471 U. S., at 272. We explained that the Civil Rights Acts provided

“[a] unique remedy mak[ing] it appropriate to accord the statute ‘a sweep as broad as its language.’ Because the § 1983 remedy is one that can ‘override certain kinds of state laws,’ Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S. 167, 173 (1961), and is, in all events, ‘supplementary to any remedy any State might have,’ McNeese v. Board of Education, 373 U. S. 668, 672 (1963), it can have no precise counterpart in state law. Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S., at 196, n. 5 (Harlan, J., concurring). Therefore, it is ‘the purest coincidence,’ ibid., when state statutes or the common law provide for equivalent remedies; any analogies to those causes of action are bound to be imperfect.” Ibid, (footnotes omitted).

The intentional tort analogy is particularly inapposite in light of the wide spectrum of claims which § 1983 has come to span. In Wilson, we noted that claims brought under § 1983 include

“discrimination in public employment on the basis of race or the exercise of First Amendment rights, discharge or demotion without procedural due process, mistreatment of schoolchildren, deliberate indifference to the medical needs of prison inmates, the seizure of chattels without advance notice or sufficient opportunity to be heard.” Id., at 273 (footnotes omitted).

See also id., at 273, n. 31; Blackmun, Section 1983 and Federal Protection of Individual Rights — Will the Statute Remain Alive or Fade Away?, 60 N. Y. U. L. Rev. 1, 19-20 (1985). Many of these claims bear little if any resemblance to the common-law intentional tort. See Felder v. Casey, 487 U. S., at 146, n. 3. Even where intent is an element of a constitutional claim or defense, the necessary intent is often different from the intent requirement of a related common-law tort. E. g., Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, 485 U. S. 46, 53 (1988) (distinguishing constitutional “malice” in the First Amendment context from common-law “malice”). Given that so many claims brought under § 1983 have no precise state-law analog, applying the statute of limitations for the limited category of intentional torts would be inconsistent with § 1983’s broad scope. We accordingly hold that where state law provides multiple statutes of limitations for personal injury actions, courts considering § 1983 claims should borrow the general or residual statute for personal injury actions.

III

The Court of Appeals therefore correctly applied New York’s 3-year statute of limitations governing general personal injury actions to respondent Okure’s claim. Our decision in Wilson promised an end to the confusion over what statute of limitations to apply to § 1983 actions; with today’s decision, we hope to fulfill Wilson’s promise. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is

Affirmed.

      New York Civ. Prac. Law §214 provides in relevant part:
      “The following actions must be commenced within three years:
      “5. an action to recover damages for a personal injury except as provided in sections 214-b, 214-c and 215 . . . .”

       In relevant part, § 1988 provides:
      “The jurisdiction in civil and criminal matters conferred on the district courts by the provisions of this Title, and of Title ‘CIVIL RIGHTS,’ and of Title ‘CRIMES,’ for the protection of all persons in the United States in their civil rights, and for their vindication, shall be exercised and enforced in conformity with the laws of the United States, so far as such laws are suitable to carry the same into effect; but in all cases where they are not adapted to the object, or are deficient in the provisions necessary to furnish suitable remedies and punish offenses against law, the common law, as modified and changed by the constitution and statutes of the State wherein the court having jurisdiction of such civil or criminal cause is held, so far as the same is not inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States, shall be extended to and govern the said courts in the trial and disposition of the cause . . . .” 42 U. S. C. § 1988.

       See Shapiro, Choosing the Appropriate State Statute of Limitations for Section 1983 Claims After Wilson v. Garcia: A Theory Applied to Maryland Law, 16 Balt. L. Rev. 242, 251-256 (1987) (describing different approaches to determining the appropriate statute of limitations for § 1983 actions); Note, Retroactive Application of Wilson v. Garcia: Continued Confusion to a Troubled Topic, 44 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 135, 135, n. 4 (1987) (same); Comment, Statutes of Limitations in Federal Civil Rights Litigation, 1976 Ariz. S. L. J. 97, 116-126 (same).

      See Preuit & Mauldin v. Jones, 474 U. S. 1105, 1108 (1986) (White, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari) (“[CJonflicting principles . . . have determined the statutes of limitations chosen for § 1983 actions in the Tenth Circuit on the one hand and the Fifth and Eleventh Circuits on the other”); Wilson, 471 U. S., at 286-287 (O’Connor, J., dissenting) (anticipating dilemma facing courts in States with more than one statute of limitations for personal injury claims).

      See, e. g., Mulligan v. Hazard, 777 F. 2d 340 (CA6 1985) (selecting Ohio statute of limitations for libel, slander, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, false imprisonment, and malpractice, and rejecting statute of limitations for bodily injury or for injury to the rights of the plaintiff not enumerated elsewhere), cert. denied, 476 U. S. 1174 (1986); Gates v. Spinks, 771 F. 2d 916 (CA5 1985) (selecting Mississippi statute of limitations for most intentional torts, and rejecting statute for causes of action not otherwise provided for), cert. denied, 475 U. S. 1065 (1986); Jones v. Preuit & Mauldin, 763 F. 2d 1250, 1254 (CA11 1985) (selecting Alabama statute of limitations for actions for “ ‘any trespass to person or liberty, such as false imprisonment or assault and battery,’ ” and rejecting statute for “ ‘any injury to the person or rights of another not arising from contract and not specifically enumerated in this section’ ”), cert. denied, 474 U. S. 1105 (1986). The Fifth and Sixth Circuits, however, on several occasions have departed from this approach. See, e. g., Kline v. North Texas State Univ., 782 F. 2d 1229 (CA5 1986) (selecting Texas statute of limitations for injury done to the person of another); Carroll v. Wilkerson, 782 F. 2d 44, 45 (CA6) (per curiam) (selecting Michigan general personal injury statute of limitations), cert, denied sub nom. County of Wayne v. Wilkerson, 479 U. S. 923 (1986).

      See, e.g., Meade v. Grubbs, 841 F. 2d 1512, 1523-1524, and 1524, n. 11 (CA10 1988) (selecting Oklahoma statute of limitations for “‘injury to the rights of another, not arising on contract and not hereinafter enumerated,’ ” and rejecting statute for assault or battery); Banks v. Chesapeake & Potomac Tel. Co., 256 U. S. App. D. C. 22, 33, 802 F. 2d 1416, 1427 (1986) (stating in dicta that it “might well” apply District of Columbia statute of limitations for claims not otherwise provided for and rejecting statute for libel, slander, assault, battery, mayhem, wounding, malicious prosecution, false arrest, or false imprisonment); Small v. Inhabitants of Belfast, 796 F. 2d 544, 546-547 (CA1 1986) (selecting Maine’s statute of limitations for “ ‘[a]ll civil actions . . . except as otherwise specifically provided,”’ and rejecting statute for assault and battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel, and medical malpractice); McKay v. Hammock, 730 F. 2d 1367, 1370 (CA10 1984) (en banc) (selecting Colorado statute of limitations for “ ‘[a]ll other actions of every kind for which no other period of limitation is provided by law,’ ” and rejecting statutes for trespass and trespass on the case).

       See N. Y. Civ. Prac. Law § 214(6) (McKinney Supp. 1988) (3-year statute of limitations covers all malpractice claims not provided for in § 214-a); § 214-a (272-year statute of limitations for all medical, dental, and podiatric malpractice torts); § 214-b (2-year statute of limitations for Vietnam veterans’ claims of exposure to phenoxy herbicides, commonly known as Agent Orange). Thus, it is irrelevant that courts have construed § 215(3) to provide the appropriate limitations period for a few intentional torts that are not enumerated in that statute, see, e. g., Koster v. Chase Manhattan Bank, 609 F. Supp. 1191, 1198 (SDNY 1985) (construing § 215(3) to cover intentional infliction of emotional distress); Rio v. Presbyterian Hospital in City of New York, 561 F. Supp. 325, 328 (SDNY 1983) (construing §215(3) to cover intentional interference with contractual relations); Hansen v. Petrone, 124 App. Div. 2d 782, 508 N. Y. S. 2d 500 (1986) (mem.) (construing § 215(3) to cover abuse of process and intentional infliction of emotional distress); accord, 2 Carmody-Wait 2d § 13.74 (1965); 35 N. Y. Jur., Limitations and Laches § 35, pp. 527-528 (1964).

       The following nonexhaustive list illustrates the frequency with which States have enacted multiple statutes of limitations governing intentional torts. See, e. g., Ala. Code §§ 6-2-34 (1) (1977) (six years “for any trespass to person or liberty, such as false imprisonment or assault and battery”); Ala. Code §§ 6-2-38 (h), (i), (k), (1) (Supp. 1987) (two years for malicious prosecution, libel or slander, seduction, or any injury to the person, or rights of another not arising from contract and not specifically enumerated); Alaska Stat. Ann. § 09.10.070 (1983) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, seduction, false imprisonment); § 09.10.055 (six years for injuries resulting from construction-related torts); Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 12-541 (1982) (one year for malicious prosecution, false imprisonment, or injuries done to character or reputation of another by libel or slander, seduction); Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 12-542(2) (Supp. 1988) (two years for “injuries done to the person of another”); Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 12-551 (1982) (two years for injuries resulting from product liability); Ark. Code Ann. § 16-56-104 (1987) (one year for special actions on the case, criminal conversation, alienation of affection, assault and battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel with special damages); § 16-56-105 (three years for libel); § 16-56-106 (18 months for medical malpractice); § 16-56-112(b)(2) (five years for injuries resulting from construction-related torts); Cal. Civ. Proc. Code Ann. § 340 (West Supp. 1988) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, seduction, injury, or death from wrongful act or neglect); § 340.1 (three years for actions based on incestuous relationship with a minor); Cal. Civ. Proc. Code Ann. § 340.2 (West 1982) (one year for asbestos-related torts); §340.5 (three years for medical malpractice); §340.6 (one year for attorney malpractice); Cal. Civ. Code Ann. §29 (West 1982) (six years for injuries to “[a] child conceived, but not yet bom”); Colo. Rev. Stat. § 13-80-102(a) (1987) (two years for “[t]ort actions, including but not limited to actions for negligence, trespass, malicious abuse of process, malicious prosecution, outrageous conduct, interference with relationships”); Colo. Rev. Stat. § 13-80-102.5 (Supp. 1988) (two years for medical malpractice); Colo. Rev. Stat. § 13-80-103(a) (1987) (one year for assault, battery, false imprisonment, false arrest, libel, slander); D. C. Code § 12-301(4) (1981) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, mayhem, wounding, malicious prosecution, false arrest); § 12-301(8) (three years for actions not otherwise prescribed); Fla. Stat. § 95.11(3)(o) (1987) (four years for assault, battery, false arrest, malicious prosecution, malicious interference, false imprisonment, or any other intentional tort, except as provided elsewhere); § 95.11(3)(p) (four years for actions not specifically provided for); §95.U(4)(b) (two years for medical and professional malpractice and wrongful death); Ga. Code Ann. § 9-3-33 (1982) (one year for injury to reputation; two years for injury to the person; four years for injury to the person involving a loss of consortium); Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-4 (1985) (two years for libel or slander); Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-7.3 (Supp. 1987) (two to six years for medical torts depending on time of discovery of the injury); 111. Rev. Stat., eh. 110,113-201 (1984) (one year for libel, slander, or publication of matter violating right of privacy); *113-202 (two years for false imprisonment, malicious prosecution, abduction, or seduction, criminal conversation); Kan. Stat. Ann. § 60-513(a)(4) (Supp. 1987) (two years for “injury to the rights of another, not arising on contract, and not herein enumerated”); Kan. Stat. Ann. § 60-514 (1983) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, or false imprisonment); Ky. Rev. Stat. Ann. §413.120(6) (Baldwin 1988) (five years for “injury to the rights of the plaintiff, not arising on contract and not otherwise enumerated”); §413.135 (five years for injury resulting from construction of improvements to real estate); §§ 413.140(l)(d)-(e) (one year for libel, slander, and malpractice); Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit. 14, §752 (1980) (six years for civil actions except as otherwise specifically provided); § 752(A) (four years for malpractice by design professionals); § 752(B) (two years for injuries suffered during “participation in skiing or hang-gliding or the use of a tramway associated with skiing or hang-gliding”); Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit. 14, §752-C (Supp. 1988) (six years for actions based on sexual act with a minor); § 753 (two years for assault and battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel); Md. Cts. & Jud. Proc. Code Ann. § 5-101 (1984) (three years for all civil actions); § 5-105 (one year for assault, battery, libel, slander); § 5-108 (20 years for injury to person occurring after improvement to realty); Md. Cts. & Jud. Proc. Code Ann. § 5-109 (Supp. 1988) (five years for medical torts); Mass. Gen. Laws § 260:2A (1986) (three years for tort actions except as otherwise provided for); §260:4 (three years for assault, battery, false imprisonment, slander, libel, and malpractice); Mo. Rev. Stat. § 516.120(1) (1986) (five years for all liabilities “except where a different time is herein limited”); §516.140 (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, criminal conversation, and malicious prosecution); Neb. Rev. Stat. § 25-207(3) (1985) (four years for “injury to the rights of the plaintiff, not arising on contract, and not hereinafter enumerated”); § 25-208 (one year for libel, slander, assault and battery, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution); Nev. Rev. Stat. § 11.190(4)(c) (1987) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, and seduction); § ll.,190(4)(e) (two years for injuries to or death of a person caused by the wrongful act or neglect of another); N. J. Stat. Ann. §2A:14-1 (West 1987) (six years for any tortious injury to the rights of another not stated elsewhere); § 2A:14-2 (two years for injury to the person caused by the wrongful act, neglect, or default of any person); § 2A:14-3 (one year for libel or slander); N. C. Gen. Stat. § 1-52(5) (1988) (three years for “any other injury to the person or rights of another, not arising on contract and not hereafter enumerated”); § 1-54 (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); N. D. Cent. Code § 28-01-16(5) (Supp. 1987) (six years for injury to the person or rights of another not arising under contract, when not otherwise expressly provided); N. D. Cent. Code § 28-01-18(1) (1974) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); N. D. Cent. Code § 28-01-18(4) (Supp. 1987) (two years for injuries done to the person of another, when death ensues); Okla. Stat., Tit. 12, §95 (Third) (1981) (two years “for injury to the rights of another, not arising on contract, and not hereinafter enumerated”); § 95 (Fourth) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, or false imprisonment); R. I. Gen. Laws § 9-l-14(a) (1985) (one year for slander); § 9-l-14(b) (three years for injuries to the person); R. I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-14.1 (Supp. 1988) (three years for malpractice); R. I. Gen. Laws § 9-1-14.2 (1985) (three years for Agent Orange-related torts); S. C. Code § 15-3-530(5) (Supp. 1987) (six years for criminal conversation or “for any other injury to the person or rights of another, not arising on contract, not hereinafter enumerated”); S. C. Code § 15-3-550(1) (1977) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); S. D. Codified Laws § 15-2-13(5) (1984) (six years for “criminal conversation or for any other injury to the rights of another not arising on contract and not otherwise specifically enumerated”); § 15-2-14.1 (two years for medical malpractice); § 15-2-15(1) (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, or false imprisonment); Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. § 16.002 (1980) (one year for malicious prosecution, libel, slander, or breach of promise of marriage); § 16.003 (two years for “personal injury”); Utah Code Ann. § 78-12-25(3) (Supp. 1988) (four years for “action for relief not otherwise provided for by law”); Utah Code Ann. § 78-12-28(2) (1987) (two years for death caused by wrongful act or neglect); Utah Code Ann. § 78-12-29(4) (Supp. 1988) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, or seduction); Va. Code § 8.01-243A (Supp. 1988) (two years for personal injuries unless otherwise provided for); Va. Code §8.01-244 (1984) (two years for wrongful death); §8.01-248 (one year for “personal action, for which no limitation is otherwise prescribed”); Wash. Rev. Code §4.16.080(2) (1987) (three years “for injury to the person or rights of another not hereinafter enumerated”); § 4.16.100(1) (two years for libel, slander, assault, assault and battery, or false imprisonment); Wash. Rev. Code §4.16.340 (Supp. 1988) (three years for intentional conduct brought by any person for recovery of damages for injury suffered as a result of childhood sexual abuse); §4.16.350 (three years for torts involving medical malpractice); Wis. Stat. §893.54 (1985-1986) (three years for injuries to the person); § 893.55 (three years for medical malpractice); § 893.57 (two years for libel, slander, assault, battery, false imprisonment, or “other intentional tort”); § 893.585 (three years for sexual exploitation by a therapist); Wis. Stat. §893.587 (Supp. 1988) (three years for incest-related torts); Wyo. Stat. § l-3-105(a)(iv)(C) (1988) (four years for “injury to the rights of the plaintiff, not arising on contract and not herein enumerated”); § l-3-105(a)(v) (one year for libel, slander, assault, battery, malicious prosecution, and false imprisonment).

       See, e. g., Ala. Code § 6-2-38(1) (Supp. 1988) (“[A]ny injury to the person or rights of another not arising from contract and not specifically enumerated”); N. C. Gen. Stat. § 1-52(5) (1988) (“[A]ny other injury to the person or rights of another, not arising on contract and not hereafter enumerated”).

      See, e. g., D. C. Code § 12-301(8) (1981) (actions not otherwise prescribed); Colo. Rev. Stat. § 13-80-102(i) (1987) (“All other actions of every kind for which no other period of limitation is provided”).

      The analogy to intentional torts also reflects a profound misunderstanding of § 1983’s history. Section 1983 was the product of congressional concern about the Ku Klux Klan-sponsored campaign of violence and deception in the South, which was “denying decent citizens their civil and political rights.” Wilson, 471 U. S., at 276; see also Briscoe v. LaHue, 460 U. S. 325, 336-340 (1983). Although these violent acts often resembled the torts of assault, battery, false imprisonment, and misrepresentation, § 1983 was not directed at the perpetrators of these deeds as much as at the state officials who tolerated and condoned them.
      “While one main scourge of the evil — perhaps the leading one — was the Ku Klux Klan, the remedy created [§ 1983] was not a remedy against it or its members but against those who representing a State in some capacity were unable or unwilling to enforce a state law.” Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S. 167, 175-176 (1961) (emphasis in original; footnote omitted).
      See also Wilson, supra, at 276; Parratt v. Taylor, 451 U. S. 527, 534 (1981) (“Nothing in the language of § 1983 or its legislative history limits the statute solely to intentional deprivations of constitutional rights”).
      The intentional tort analogy also inadequately reflects the state of tort law at the time the Civil Rights Act was enacted. Almost all States had two types of personal injury claims: trespass and trespass or action on the case. J. K. Angelí, Limitations of Actions at Law 13-14, 311-319 (1869); H. F. Buswell, Statute of Limitations and Adverse Possession 307-308 (1889). Trespass claims covered direct injury and action on the case indirect injury. W. Keeton, D. Dobbs, R. Keeton, & D. Owen, Prosser and Keeton, Law of Torts 29-30 (5th ed. 1984). The paradigmatic § 1983 claim in 1871 involved a victim of violence or harassment who sued state officials for failing to prevent the harm; involving indirect injury, it would have been covered by the action on the case doctrine, including the relevant statute of limitations. Because most States have replaced action on the case with the general personal injury or residual provisions, and trespass with specialized intentional tort provisions, history supports the application of the former to § 1983 claims.

       Our decision today is fully consistent with Wilson’s rejection of a state residual, or “catchall,” limitations provision as the appropriate one for §1983 actions. 471 U. S., at 278. In Wilson, we rejected recourse to such provisions in the first instance, a position we continue to embrace. Courts should resort to residual statutes of limitations only where state law provides multiple statutes of limitations for personal injury actions and the residual one embraces, either explicitly or by judicial construction, unspecified personal injury actions. See, e. g., Small v. Inhabitants of Belfast, 796 F. 2d 544 (CA1 1986) (construing Maine’s catchall statute as the general personal injury provision); Alley v. Dodge Hotel, 163 U. S. App. D. C. 320, 501 F. 2d 880 (1974) (per curiam) (construing District of Columbia’s catchall statute as the general personal injury provision).

       Because we hold that the Court of Appeals correctly borrowed New York’s 3-year general personal injury statute of limitations, we need not address Okure’s argument that applying a 1-year limitations period to § 1983 actions would be inconsistent with federal interests. See Burnett v. Grattan, 468 U. S. 42, 61 (1984) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting) (before borrowing a state statute of limitations and applying it to § 1983 claims, a court must ensure that it “afford[s] a reasonable time to the federal claimant”).