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Opinion of the Court

The dissent describes the Government as having "expressly acknowledged [in the Court of Appeals] the responsibilities described in Page," post, at 56 (emphasis added). It did no such thing. Rather, the Government acknowledged "that it has certain responsibilities under . . . Page." Brief for United States in Response to Appellee's Brief in Nos. 882827, 88-2843 (CA10), p. 9 (emphasis added). It conceded, in other words, not that the responsibilities Page had imposed were proper, but merely that Page had imposed them-over the protests of the Government, but in a judgment that was nonetheless binding precedent for the panel below. The dissent would apparently impose, as an absolute condition to our granting certiorari upon an issue decided by a lower court, that a party demand overruling of a squarely applicable, recent circuit precedent, even though that precedent was established in a case to which the party itself was privy and over the party's vigorous objection, see Page, 808 F. 2d, at 727 (“The government counters that a prosecutor has no duty to disclose exculpatory evidence [to a grand jury]"), and even though no "intervening developments in the law," post, at 59, n. 5, had occurred. That seems to us unreasonable.

In short, having reconsidered the precise question we resolved when this petition for review was granted, we again answer it the same way. It is a permissible exercise of our discretion to undertake review of an important issue expressly decided by a federal court 5 where, although the peti

5 Where certiorari is sought to a state court, "due regard for the appropriate relationship of this Court to state courts," McGoldrick v. Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, 309 U. S. 430, 434-435 (1940), may suggest greater restraint in applying our "pressed or passed upon" rule. In that context, the absence of challenge to a seemingly settled federal rule deprives the state court of an opportunity to rest its decision on an adequate and independent state ground. See Illinois v. Gates, 462 U. S. 213, 222 (1983), cited by the dissent post, at 59; see also Bankers Life & Casualty Co. v. Crenshaw, 486 U. S. 71, 79-80 (1988). But cf. Cohen v. Cowles Media Co., 501 U. S. 663, 667 (1991) (“It is irrelevant to this Court's juris

Opinion of the Court

tioner did not contest the issue in the case immediately at hand, it did so as a party to the recent proceeding upon which the lower courts relied for their resolution of the issue, and did not concede in the current case the correctness of that precedent. Undoubtedly the United States benefits from this rule more often than other parties; but that is inevitably true of most desirable rules of procedure or jurisdiction that we announce, the United States being the most frequent litigant in our courts. Since we announce the rule to be applicable to all parties; since we have recently applied a similar rule (indeed, a rule even more broadly cast) to the disadvantage of the United States, see Stevens v. Department of Treasury, 500 U. S. 1 (1991); and since the dissenters themselves have approved the application of this rule (or a broader one) in circumstances rationally indistinguishable from those before us, see n. 2, supra; the dissent's suggestion that in deciding this case "the Court appears to favor the Government over the ordinary litigant," post, at 59, and compromises its "obligation to administer justice impartially," ibid., needs no response.

III

Respondent does not contend that the Fifth Amendment itself obliges the prosecutor to disclose substantial exculpatory evidence in his possession to the grand jury. Instead, building on our statement that the federal courts "may, within limits, formulate procedural rules not specifically required by the Constitution or the Congress," United States v. Hasting, 461 U. S. 499, 505 (1983), he argues that imposition of the Tenth Circuit's disclosure rule is supported by the courts' "supervisory power." We think not. Hasting, and the cases that rely upon the principle it expresses, deal strictly with the courts' power to control their own procedures. See, e. g., Jencks v. United States, 353 U. S. 657, 667–

diction whether a party raised below and argued a federal-law issue that the state supreme court actually considered and decided").

Opinion of the Court

668 (1957); McNabb v. United States, 318 U. S. 332 (1943). That power has been applied not only to improve the truthfinding process of the trial, see, e. g., Mesarosh v. United States, 352 U. S. 1, 9-14 (1956), but also to prevent parties from reaping benefit or incurring harm from violations of substantive or procedural rules (imposed by the Constitution or laws) governing matters apart from the trial itself, see, e. g., Weeks v. United States, 232 U. S. 383 (1914). Thus, Bank of Nova Scotia v. United States, 487 U. S. 250 (1988), makes clear that the supervisory power can be used to dismiss an indictment because of misconduct before the grand jury, at least where that misconduct amounts to a violation of one of those "few, clear rules which were carefully drafted and approved by this Court and by Congress to ensure the integrity of the grand jury's functions," United States v. Mechanik, 475 U. S. 66, 74 (1986) (O'CONNOR, J., concurring in judgment).6

We did not hold in Bank of Nova Scotia, however, that the courts' supervisory power could be used, not merely as a means of enforcing or vindicating legally compelled stand

6 Rule 6 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure contains a number of such rules, providing, for example, that "no person other than the jurors may be present while the grand jury is deliberating or voting," Rule 6(d), and placing strict controls on disclosure of "matters occurring before the grand jury," Rule 6(e); see generally United States v. Sells Engineering, Inc., 463 U. S. 418 (1983). Additional standards of behavior for prosecutors (and others) are set forth in the United States Code. See 18 U. S. C. §§ 6002, 6003 (setting forth procedures for granting a witness immunity from prosecution); §1623 (criminalizing false declarations before grand jury); § 2515 (prohibiting grand jury use of unlawfully intercepted wire or oral communications); § 1622 (criminalizing subornation of perjury). That some of the misconduct alleged in Bank of Nova Scotia v. United States, 487 U. S. 250 (1988), was not specifically proscribed by Rule, statute, or the Constitution does not make the case stand for a judicially prescribable grand jury code, as the dissent suggests, see post, at 64-65. All of the allegations of violation were dismissed by the Court-without considering their validity in law-for failure to meet Nova Scotia's dismissal standard. See Bank of Nova Scotia, supra, at 261.

Opinion of the Court

ards of prosecutorial conduct before the grand jury, but as a means of prescribing those standards of prosecutorial conduct in the first instance-just as it may be used as a means of establishing standards of prosecutorial conduct before the courts themselves. It is this latter exercise that respondent demands. Because the grand jury is an institution separate from the courts, over whose functioning the courts do not preside, we think it clear that, as a general matter at least, no such “supervisory" judicial authority exists, and that the disclosure rule applied here exceeded the Tenth Circuit's authority.

A

"[R]ooted in long centuries of Anglo-American history," Hannah v. Larche, 363 U. S. 420, 490 (1960) (Frankfurter, J., concurring in result), the grand jury is mentioned in the Bill of Rights, but not in the body of the Constitution. It has not been textually assigned, therefore, to any of the branches described in the first three Articles. It "is a constitutional fixture in its own right."" United States v. Chanen, 549 F. 2d 1306, 1312 (CA9) (quoting Nixon v. Sirica, 159 U. S. App. D. C. 58, 70, n. 54, 487 F. 2d 700, 712, n. 54 (1973)), cert. denied, 434 U. S. 825 (1977). In fact the whole theory of its function is that it belongs to no branch of the institutional Government, serving as a kind of buffer or referee between the Government and the people. See Stirone v. United States, 361 U. S. 212, 218 (1960); Hale v. Henkel, 201 U. S. 43, 61 (1906); G. Edwards, The Grand Jury 28-32 (1906). Although the grand jury normally operates, of course, in the courthouse and under judicial auspices, its institutional relationship with the Judicial Branch has traditionally been, so to speak, at arm's length. Judges' direct involvement in the functioning of the grand jury has generally been confined to the constitutive one of calling the grand jurors together and administering their oaths of office. See United States v. Calandra, 414 U. S. 338, 343 (1974); Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 6(a).

Opinion of the Court

The grand jury's functional independence from the Judicial Branch is evident both in the scope of its power to investigate criminal wrongdoing and in the manner in which that power is exercised. "Unlike [a] [c]ourt, whose jurisdiction is predicated upon a specific case or controversy, the grand jury 'can investigate merely on suspicion that the law is being violated, or even because it wants assurance that it is not."" United States v. R. Enterprises, Inc., 498 U. S. 292, 297 (1991) (quoting United States v. Morton Salt Co., 338 U. S. 632, 642-643 (1950)). It need not identify the offender it suspects, or even "the precise nature of the offense" it is investigating. Blair v. United States, 250 U. S. 273, 282 (1919). The grand jury requires no authorization from its constituting court to initiate an investigation, see Hale, supra, at 59–60, 65, nor does the prosecutor require leave of court to seek a grand jury indictment. And in its day-today functioning, the grand jury generally operates without the interference of a presiding judge. See Calandra, supra, at 343. It swears in its own witnesses, Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 6(c), and deliberates in total secrecy, see United States v. Sells Engineering, Inc., 463 U. S. 418, 424-425 (1983).

True, the grand jury cannot compel the appearance of witnesses and the production of evidence, and must appeal to the court when such compulsion is required. See, e. g., Brown v. United States, 359 U. S. 41, 49 (1959). And the court will refuse to lend its assistance when the compulsion the grand jury seeks would override rights accorded by the Constitution, see, e. g., Gravel v. United States, 408 U. S. 606 (1972) (grand jury subpoena effectively qualified by order limiting questioning so as to preserve Speech or Debate Clause immunity), or even testimonial privileges recognized by the common law, see In re Grand Jury Investigation of Hugle, 754 F. 2d 863 (CA9 1985) (opinion of Kennedy, J.) (same with respect to privilege for confidential marital communications). Even in this setting, however, we have insisted that the grand jury remain "free to pursue its investi

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