delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case presents the question whether the claim-preclusive effect of a federal judgment dismissing a diversity action on statute-of-limitations grounds is determined by the law of the State in which the federal court sits.
I
Petitioner filed a complaint against respondent in California state court, alleging inducement of breach of contract and various business torts. Respondent removed the case to the United States District Court for the Central District of California on the basis of diversity of citizenship, see 28 U. S. C. §§ 1332, 1441 (1994 ed. and Supp. IV), and successfully moved to dismiss petitioner’s claims as barred by California’s 2-year statute of limitations. In its order of dismissal, the District Court, adopting language suggested by respondent, dismissed petitioner’s claims “in [their] entirety on the merits and with prejudice.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 59a. Without contesting the District Court’s designation of its dismissal as “on the merits,” petitioner appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which affirmed the District Court’s order.
II
Petitioner contends that the outcome of this case is controlled by
Dupasseur
v.
Rochereau,
Respondent, for its part, contends that the outcome of this case is controlled by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(b), which provides as follows:
“Involuntary Dismissal: Effect Thereof. For failure of the plaintiff to prosecute or to comply with these rules or any order of court, a defendant may move for dismissal of an action or of any claim against the defendant. Unless the court in its order for dismissal otherwise specifies, a dismissal under this subdivision and any dismissal not provided for in this rule, other than a dismissal for lack of jurisdiction, for improper venue, or for failure to join a party under Rule 19, operates as an adjudication upon the merits.”
Since the dismissal here did nоt “otherwise specif[y]” (indeed, it specifically stated that it was “on the merits”), and did not pertain to the excepted subjects of jurisdiction, venue, or joinder, it follows, respondent contends, that the dismissal “is entitled to claim preclusive effect.” Brief for Respondent 3-4.
Implicit in this reasoning is the unstated minor premise that all judgments denominated “on the merits” are entitled to claim-preclusive effect. That premise is not necessarily valid. The original connotation of an “on the merits” adjudication is one that actually “pass[es] directly on the substance
*502
of [a particular] claim” before the court. Restatement § 19, Comment
a,
at 161. That connotation remains common to every jurisdiction of which we are aware. See
ibid.
(“Thе prototypical] [judgment on the merits is] one in which the merits of [a party’s] claim are in fact adjudicated [for or] against the [party] after trial of the substantive issues”). And it is, we think, the meaning intended in those many statements to the effect that a judgment “on the merits” triggers the doctrine of res judicata or claim preclusion. See,
e. g., Parklane Hosiery Co.
v.
Shore,
But оver the years the meaning of the term “judgment on the merits” “has gradually undergone change,” R. Marcus, M. Redish, & E. Sherman, Civil Procedure: A Modern Approach 1140-1141 (3d ed. 2000), and it has come to be applied to some judgments (such as the one involved here) that do
not
pass upon the substantive merits of a claim and hence do
not
(in many jurisdictions) entail claim-preclusive effect. Compare,
e. g., Western Coal & Mining Co.
v.
Jones,
In short, it is no longer true that a judgment “on the merits” is necessarily a judgment entitled to claim-preclusive effect; and there are a number of reasons for believing that the phrase “adjudication upon the merits” does not bear that meaning in Rule 41(b). To begin with, Rule 41(b) sets forth nothing more than a default rule for determining the import of a dismissal (a dismissal is “upon the merits,” with the three stated exceptions, unless the court “otherwise specifies”). This would be a highly peculiar context in which to announce a federally prescribed rule on the complex question of claim preclusion, saying in effect, “All federal dismissals (with three specified exceptions) preclude suit elsewhere, unless the court otherwise specifies.”
And even apart from the purely default character of Rule 41(b), it would be peculiar to find a rule governing the effect that must be accorded federal judgments by other courts ensconced in rules governing the internal procedures of the rendering court itself. Indeed, such a rule would arguably violate the jurisdictional limitation of the Rules Enabling Act: that the Rules “shall not abridge, enlarge or modify any substantive right,” 28 U. S. C. § 2072(b). Cf.
Ortiz
v.
Fibreboard Corp.,
Moreover, as so interpreted, the Rule would in many cases violate the federalism principle of
Erie R. Co.
v.
Tompkins,
Finally, if Rule 41(b) did mean what respondent suggests, we would surely have relied upon it in our cases recognizing the claim-preclusive effect of federаl judgments in federal-question cases. Yet for over half a century since the pro
*505
mulgation of Rule 41(b), we have not once done so. See,
e. g., Heck
v.
Humphrey,
We think the key to a more reasonable interpretation of the meaning of “operates as an adjudication upon the merits” in Rule 41(b) is to be found in Rule 41(a), which, in discussing the effect of voluntary dismissal by the plaintiff, makes clear that an “adjudication upon the merits” is the oppositе of a “dismissal without prejudice”:
“Unless otherwise stated in the notice of dismissal or stipulation, the dismissal is without prejudice, except that a notice of dismissal operates as an adjudication upon the merits when filed by a plaintiff who has once dismissed in any court of the United States or of any state an action based, on or including the same claim.”
See also 18 Wright & Miller § 4435, at 329, n. 4 (“Both рarts of Rule 41... use the phrase ‘without prejudice’ as a contrast to adjudication on the merits”); 9
id.,
§2373, at 396, n. 4 (“‘[W]ith prejudice’ is an acceptable form of shorthand for ‘an adjudication upon the merits’”). See also
Goddard,
We think, then, that the effect of the “adjudication upon the merits” default provision of Rule 41(b) — and, presumably, of the explicit order in the present case that used the language of that default provision — is simply that, unlikе a dismissal “without prejudice,” the dismissal in the present case barred refiling of the same claim in the United States District Court for the Central District of California. That is undoubtedly a necessary condition, but it is not a sufficient one, for claim-preclusive effect in other courts. 2
Ill
Having concluded that the claim-preclusive effect, in Maryland, of this California federal diversity judgment is dictated neither by Dupasseur v. Rochereau, as petitioner contends, nor by Rule 41(b), as respondent contends, we turn to consideration of what determines the issue. Neither the Full Faith and Credit Clause, U. S. Const., Art. IV, § 1, 3 nor the full faith and credit statute, 28 U. S. C. § 1788, 4 ad *507 dresses the question. By their terms they govern the effects to be given only to state-court judgments (and, in the case of the statute, to judgments by courts of territories and possessions). And no other federal textual provision, neither of the Constitution nor of any statute, addresses the claim-preclusive effect of a judgment in a federal diversity action.
It is also true, however, that no federal textual provision addresses the claim-preclusive effect of a federal-court judgment in a federal-question case, yet we have long held that States cannot give thosе judgments merely whatever effect they would give their own judgments, but must accord them the effect that this Court prescribes. See
Stoll
v.
Gottlieb,
“It is true that for some purposes and within certain limits it is only required that the judgments of the courts of the United States shall be given the same force and effect as are given the judgments of the courts of the States wherein they are rendered; but it is equally true that whether a Federal judgment has been given due force and effect in the state court is a Federal question reviewable by this court, which will determine for itself whether such judgment has been given due weight or otherwise. . . .
“When is the state court obliged to give to Federal judgments only the force and effect it gives to state court judgments within its own jurisdiction? Such cases are distinctly pointed out in the opinion of Mr. Jus *508 tice Bradley in Dupasseur v. Rochereau [which stated that the case wаs a diversity case, applying state law under state procedure].” Ibid.
In other words, in Dupasseur the State was allowed (indeed, required) to give a federal diversity judgment no more effect than it would accord one of its own judgments only because reference to state law was the federal rule that this Court deemed appropriate. In short, federal common law governs the claim-preclusive effect of a dismissal by a federal court sitting in diversity. See generally R. Fallon, D. Meltzer, & D. Shapiro, Hart and Wechsler’s The Federal Courts and the Federal System 1473 (4th ed. 1996); Degnan, Federalized Res Judicata, 85 Yale L. J. 741 (1976).
It is left to us, then, to determine the appropriate federal rule. And despite the sea change that has occurred in the background law since
Dupasseur
was decided — not only repeal of the Conformity Act but also the watershed decision of this Court in
Erie
— we think the result decreed by
Du-passeur
continues to be correct for diversity cases. Since state, rather than federal, substantive law is at issue there is no need for a uniform federal rule. And indeed, nationwide uniformity in the substance of the matter is better served by having the same claim-preclusive rule (the state rule) apply whether the dismissal has been ordered by a stаte or a federal court. This is, it seems to us, a classic case for adopting, as the federally prescribed rule of decision, the law that would be applied by state courts in the State in which the federal diversity court sits. See
Gasperini
v.
Center for Humanities, Inc.,
This federal reference to state law will not obtain, of course, in situations in which the state law is incompatible with federal interests. If, for example, state law did not accord claim-preclusive effect to dismissals for willful violation of disсovery orders, federal courts’ interest in the integrity of their own processes might justify a contrary federal rule. No such conflict with potential federal interests exists in the present case. Dismissal of this state cause of action was decreed by the California federal court .only because the California statute of limitations so required; and there is no conceivable federal interest in giving that time bar more effect in other courts than the California courts themselves would impose.
* * *
Because the claim-preclusive effect of the California federal court’s dismissal “upon the merits” of petitioner’s action on statute-of-limitations grounds is governed by a federal rule that in turn incorporates California’s law of claim preclusion (the content of which we do not pass upon today), the Maryland Court of Special Appeals erred in holding that the dismissal necessarily precluded the bringing of this action in the Maryland courts. The judgment is reversed, and the case remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Notes
Rule 41(b), interpreted as a preelusion-establishing rulе, would not have the two effects described in the preceding paragraphs — arguable violation of the Rules Enabling Act and incompatibility with
Erie R. Co.
v.
Tompkins,
We do not decide whether, in a diversity case, a federal court’s “dismissal upon the merits” (in the sense we have described), under circumstances where a state court would decree only a “dismissal without prejudice,” abridges a “substantive right” and thus exceeds the authorization of the Rules Enabling Act. We think the situation will present itself more .rarely than would the arguable violation of the Act that would ensue from interpreting Rule 41(b) as a rule of claim preclusion; and if it is a violation, can be more easily dealt with on direct appeal.
Article IV, §1, provides as follows:
“Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.”
Title 28 U. S. C. § 1738 provides in relevant part as follows:
“The records and judicial proceedings of any court of any . . . State, Territory or Possession . . . shall have the same full faith and credit in every court within the United States and its Territories and Possessions as they have by law or usage in the courts of such State, Territory or Possession from which they are taken.”