ALLEN v. WRIGHT ET AL.
No. 81-757
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued February 29, 1984—Decided July 3, 1984
468 U.S. 737
*Together with No. 81-970, Regan, Secretary of the Treasury, et al. v. Wright et al., also on certiorari to the same court.
Solicitor General Lee argued the cause for petitioners in No. 81-970. With him on the briefs were Assistant Attorney General Archer, Deputy Solicitor General Wallace, Ernest J. Brown, and Robert S. Pomerance. William J. Landers II argued the cause for petitioner in No. 81-757. With him on the brief was S. Shepherd Tate.
Robert H. Kapp argued the cause for respondents. With him on the brief were Joseph M. Hassett, David S. Tatel, William L. Robinson, Norman J. Chachkin, and Frank R. Parker.†
JUSTICE O‘CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
Parents of black public school children allege in this nationwide class action that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has not adopted sufficient standards and procedures to fulfill its obligation to deny tax-exempt status to racially discriminatory private schools. They assert that the IRS thereby harms them directly and interferes with the ability of their
I
The IRS denies tax-exempt status under
The IRS rules require a school applying for tax-exempt status to give a breakdown along racial lines of its student body and its faculty and administrative staff, id., § 5.01-1, as well as of scholarships and loans awarded, id., § 5.01-2. They also require the applicant school to state the year of its organization, id., § 5.01-5, and to list “incorporators, founders, board members, and donors of land or buildings,” id., § 5.01-3, and state whether any of the organizations among these have an objective of maintaining segregated public or private school education, id., § 5.01-4. The rules further provide that, once given an exemption, a school must keep specified records to document the extent of compliance with the IRS guidelines. Id., § 7, p. 590.7 Finally, the
In 1976 respondents challenged these guidelines and procedures in a suit filed in Federal District Court against the Secretary of the Treasury and the Commissioner of Internal Revenue.9 The plaintiffs named in the complaint are parents of black children who, at the time the complaint was filed, were attending public schools in seven States in school districts undergoing desegregation. They brought this nationwide class action “on behalf of themselves and their children, and . . . on behalf of all other parents of black children attending public school systems undergoing, or which may in the future undergo, desegregation pursuant to court order [or] HEW regulations and guidelines, under state law, or voluntarily.” App. 22-23. They estimatеd that the class they seek to represent includes several million persons. Id., at 23.
Respondents allege in their complaint that many racially segregated private schools were created or expanded in their
Respondents allege that the challenged Government conduct harms them in two ways. The challenged conduct
“(a) constitutes tangible federal financial aid and other support for racially segregated educational institutions, and
“(b) fosters and encourages the organization, operation and expansion of institutions providing racially segregated educational opportunities for white children avoiding attendance in desegregating public school districts and thereby interferes with the efforts of federal courts, HEW and local school authorities to desegregate public school districts which have been operating racially dual school systems.” Id., at 38-39.
Respondents request only prospective relief. Id., at 40-41. They ask for a declaratory judgment that the challenged IRS tax-exemption practices are unlawful. They also
“which have insubstantial or nonexistent minority enrollments, which are located in or serve desegregating public school districts, and which either—
“(1) were established or expanded at or about the time the public school districts in which they are located or which they serve were desegregating;
“(2) have been determined in adversary judicial or administrative proceedings to be racially segregated; or
“(3) cannot demonstrate that they do not provide racially segregated educational opportunities for white children avoiding attendance in desegregating public school systems. . . .” Id., at 40.
Finally, respondents ask for an order directing the IRS to replace its 1975 guidelines with standards consistent with the requested injunction.
In May 1977 the District Court permitted intervention as a defendant by petitioner Allen, the head of one of the private school systems identified in the complaint. Id., at 54-55. Thereafter, progress in the lawsuit was stalled for sevеral years. During this period, the IRS reviewed its challenged policies and proposed new Revenue Procedures to tighten requirements for eligibility for tax-exempt status for private schools. See 43 Fed. Reg. 37296 (1978); 44 Fed. Reg. 9451 (1979).15 In 1979, however, Congress blocked any strength-
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed, concluding that respondents have standing to maintain this lawsuit. The court acknowledged that Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U. S. 26 (1976), “suggests that litigation concerning tax liability is a matter between taxpayer and IRS, with the door
II
A
Article III of the Constitution confines the federal courts to adjudicating actual “cases” and “controversies.” As the Court explained in Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U. S. 464, 471-476 (1982), the “case or controversy” requirement defines with respect to the Judicial Branch the idea of separation of powers on which the Federal Government is founded. The several doctrines that have grown up to elaborate that requirement are “founded in concern about the proper—and properly limited—role of the courts in a democratic society.” Warth v. Seldin, 422 U. S. 490, 498 (1975).
“All of the doctrines that cluster about Article III—not only standing but mootness, ripeness, political question, and the like—relate in part, and in different though overlapping ways, to an idea, which is more than an intuition but less than a rigorous and explicit theory, about the constitutional and prudential limits to the powers of an unelected, unrepresentative judiciary in our kind of government.” Vander Jagt v. O‘Neill, 226 U. S. App. D. C. 14, 26-27, 699 F. 2d 1166, 1178–1179 (1983) (Bork, J., concurring).
The case-or-controversy doctrines state fundamental limits on federal judicial power in our system of government.
The Art. III doctrine that requires a litigant to have “standing” to invoke the power of a federal court is perhaps the most important of these doctrines. “In essence the question of standing is whether the litigant is entitled to have the
Like the prudential component, the constitutional component of standing doctrine incorporates concepts concededly not susceptible of precise definition. The injury alleged must be, for example, “‘distinct and palpable,‘” Gladstone, Realtors v. Village of Bellwood, 441 U. S. 91, 100 (1979) (quoting Warth v. Seldin, supra, at 501), and not “abstract” or “conjectural” or “hypothetical,” Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U. S. 95, 101-102 (1983); O‘Shea v. Littleton, 414 U. S. 488, 494 (1974). The injury must be “fairly” traceable to the challenged action, and relief from the injury must be “likely” to follow from a favorable decision. See Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U. S., at 38, 41. These terms cannot be defined so as to make application of the constitutional standing requirement a mechanical exercise.
The absence of precise definitions, however, as this Court‘s extensive body of case law on standing illustrates, see generally Valley Forge, supra, at 471-476, hardly leaves courts at sea in applying the law of standing. Like most legal notions, the standing concepts have gained considerable definition from developing case law. In many cases the standing question can be answered chiefly by comparing the allegations of the particular complaint to those made in prior standing
Determining standing in a particular case may be facilitated by clarifying principles or even clear rules developed in prior cases. Typically, however, the standing inquiry requires careful judicial examination of a complaint‘s allegations to ascertain whether the particular plaintiff is entitled to an adjudication of the particular claims asserted. Is the injury too abstract, or otherwise not appropriate, to be considered judicially cognizable? Is the line of causation between the illegal conduct and injury too attenuated? Is the prospect of obtaining relief from the injury as a result of a favorable ruling too speculative? These questions and any others relevant to the standing inquiry must be answered by reference to the Art. III notion that federal courts may exercise power only “in the last resort, and as a necessity,” Chicago & Grand Trunk R. Co. v. Wellman, 143 U. S. 339, 345 (1892), and only when adjudication is “consistent with a system of separated powers and [the dispute is one] traditionally thought to be capable of resolution through the judicial process,” Flast v. Cohen, 392 U. S. 83, 97 (1968). See Valley Forge, 454 U. S., at 472-473.
B
Respondents allege two injuries in their complaint to support their standing to bring this lawsuit. First, they say that they are harmed directly by the mere fact of Gоvernment financial aid to discriminatory private schools. Second, they say that the federal tax exemptions to racially discriminatory private schools in their communities impair
In the Court of Appeals, respondents apparently relied on the first injury. Thus, the court below asserted that “[t]he sole injury [respondents] claim is the denigration they suffer” as a result of the tax exemptions. 211 U. S. App. D. C., at 238, 656 F. 2d, at 827. In this Court, respondents have not focused on this claim of injury. Here they stress the effect of the tax exemptions on their “equal educational opportunities,” see, e. g., Brief for Respondents 12, 14, renewing reliance on the second injury described in their complaint.
Because respondents have not clearly disclaimed reliance on either of the injuries described in their complaint, we address both allegations of injury. We conclude that neither suffices to support respondents’ standing. The first fails under clear precedents of this Court because it does not constitute judicially cognizable injury. The second fails because the alleged injury is not fairly traceable to the assertedly unlawful conduct of the IRS.19
1
Respondents’ first claim of injury can be interpreted in two ways. It might be a claim simply to have the Government
This Court has repeatedly held that an asserted right to have the Government act in accordance with law is not sufficient, standing alone, to confer jurisdiction on a federal court. In Schlesinger v. Reservists Committee to Stop the War, 418 U. S. 208 (1974), for example, the Court rejected a claim of citizen standing to challenge Armed Forces Reserve commissions held by Members of Congress as violating the Incompatibility Clause of Art. I, § 6, of the Constitution. As citizens, the Court held, plaintiffs alleged nothing but “the abstract injury in nonobservance of the Constitution....” Id., at 223, n. 13. More recently, in Valley Forge, supra, we rejected a claim of standing to challenge a Government conveyance of property to a religious institution. Insofar as the plaintiffs relied simply on “‘their shared individuated right‘” to a Government that made no law rеspecting an establishment of religion, id., at 482 (quoting Americans United v. U. S. Dept. of HEW, 619 F. 2d 252, 261 (CA3 1980)), we held that plaintiffs had not alleged a judicially cognizable injury. “[A]ssertion of a right to a particular kind of Government conduct, which the Government has violated by acting differently, cannot alone satisfy the requirements of Art. III without draining those requirements of meaning.” 454 U. S., at 483. See also United States v. Richardson, 418 U. S. 166 (1974); Laird v. Tatum, 408 U. S. 1 (1972);
Neither do they have standing to litigate their claims based on the stigmatizing injury often caused by racial discrimination. There can be no doubt that this sort of noneconomic injury is one of the most serious consequences of discriminatory government action and is sufficient in some circumstances to support standing. See Heckler v. Mathews, 465 U. S. 728, 739-740 (1984). Our cases make clear, however, that such injury accords a basis for standing only to “those persons who are personally denied equal treatment” by the challenged discriminatory conduct, ibid.
In Moose Lodge No. 107 v. Irvis, 407 U. S. 163 (1972), the Court held that the plaintiff had no standing to challenge a club‘s racially discriminatory membership policies because he had never applied for membership. Id., at 166-167. In O‘Shea v. Littleton, 414 U. S. 488 (1974), the Court held that the plaintiffs had no standing to challenge racial discrimination in the administration of their city‘s criminal justice system because they had not alleged that they had been or would likely be subject to the challenged practices. The Court denied standing on similar facts in Rizzo v. Goode, 423 U. S. 362 (1976). In each of those cases, the plaintiffs alleged official racial discrimination comparable to that alleged by respondents here. Yet standing was denied in each case because the plaintiffs were not personally subject to the challenged discrimination. Insofar as their first claim of injury is concerned, respondents are in exactly the same position: unlike the appellee in Heckler v. Mathews, supra, at 740-741, n. 9, they do not allege a stigmatic injury suffered as a direct result of having personally been denied equal treatment.
The consequences of recognizing respondents’ standing on the basis of their first claim of injury illustrate why our cases plainly hold that such injury is not judicially cognizable. If the abstract stigmatic injury were cognizable, standing
2
It is in their complaint‘s second claim of injury that respondents allege harm to a concrete, personal interest that can support standing in some circumstances. The injury they identify—their children‘s diminished ability to receive an education in a racially integrated school—is, beyond any doubt, not only judicially cognizable but, as shown by cases from Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483 (1954), to Bob Jones University v. United States, 461 U. S. 574 (1983), one of the most serious injuries recognized in our legal system. Despite the constitutional importance of curing the
The illegal conduct challenged by respondents is the IRS‘s grant of tax exemptions to some racially discriminatory schools. The line of causation between that conduct and desegregation of respondents’ schools is attenuated at best. From the perspective of the IRS, the injury to respondents is highly indirect and “results from the independent action of some third party not before the court,” Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U.S., at 42. As the Court pointed out in Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S., at 505, “the
The diminished ability of respondents’ children to receive a desegregated education would be fairly traceable to unlawful IRS grants of tax exemptions only if there were enough racially discriminatory private schools receiving tax exemptions in respondents’ communities for withdrawal of those exemptions to make an appreciable difference in public school integration. Respondents have made no such allegation. It is, first, uncertain how many racially discriminatory private schools are in fact receiving tax exemptions.23 Moreover, it is entirely speculative, as respondents themselves conceded in the Court of Appeals, see n. 17, supra, whether withdrawal of a tax exemption from any particular school would lead the school to change its policies. See 480 F. Supp., at 796. It is just as speculative whether any given parent of a child attending such a private school would decide to transfer the child to public school as a result of any changes in educational or financial policy made by the private school once it was threatened with loss of tax-exempt status. It is also pure speculation whether, in a particular community, a large enough number of the numerous relevant school officials and parents would reach decisions that collectively would have a significant impact on the racial composition of the public schools.
The idea of separation of powers that underlies standing doctrine explains why our cases preclude the conclusion that respondents’ alleged injury “fairly can be traced to the challenged action” of the IRS. Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., supra, at 41. That conclusion would pave the way generally for suits challenging, not specifically identifiable Government violations of law, but the particular programs agencies establish to carry out their legal obligations. Such suits, even when premised on allegations of
“Carried to its logical end, [respondents‘] approach would have the federal courts as virtually continuing monitors of the wisdom and soundness of Executive action; such a role is appropriate for the Congress acting through its committees and the ‘power of the purse‘; it is not the role of the judiciary, absent actual present or immediately threatened injury resulting from unlawful governmental action.” Laird v. Tatum, 408 U. S., at 15.
See also Gilligan v. Morgan, 413 U. S. 1, 14 (1973) (BLACKMUN, J., concurring).
The same concern for the proper role of the federal courts is reflected in cases like O‘Shea v. Littleton, 414 U. S. 488 (1974), Rizzo v. Goode, 423 U. S. 362 (1976), and Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U. S. 95 (1983). In all three cases plaintiffs sought injunctive relief directed at certain systemwide law enforcement practices.25 The Court held in each case that, absent an allegation of a specific threat of being subject to the challenged practices, plaintiffs had no standing to ask for an injunction. Animating this Court‘s holdings was the principle that “[a] federal court . . . is not the proper forum to press” general complaints about the way in which government goes about its business. Id., at 112.
. . .
Case-or-controversy considerations, the Court observed in O‘Shea v. Littleton, supra, at 499, “obviously shade into those determining whether the complaint states a sound basis for equitable relief.” The latter set of considerations should therefore inform our judgment about whether respondents
“When a plaintiff seeks to enjoin the activity of a government agency, even within a unitary court system, his case must contend with ‘the well-established rule that the Government has traditionally been granted the widest latitude in the “dispatch of its own internal affairs,” Cafeteria Workers v. McElroy, 367 U. S. 886, 896 (1961),’ quoted in Sampson v. Murray, 415 U. S. 61, 83 (1974).”
When transported into the
C
The Court of Appeals relied for its contrary conclusion on Gilmore v. City of Montgomery, 417 U. S. 556 (1974), on Norwood v. Harrison, 413 U. S. 455 (1973), and on Coit v. Green, 404 U. S. 997 (1971), summarily aff‘g Green v. Con-nally, 330 F. Supp. 1150 (DC). Respondents in this Court, though stressing a different injury from the one emphasized by the Court of Appeals, see supra, at 752-753, place principal reliance on those cases as well. None of the cases, however, requires that we find standing in this lawsuit.
In Gilmore v. City of Montgomery, supra, the plaintiffs asserted a constitutional right, recognized in an outstanding injunction, to use the city‘s public parks on a nondiscriminatory basis. They alleged that the city was violating that equal protection right by permitting racially discriminatory private schools and other groups to use the public parks. The Court recognized plaintiffs’ standing to challenge this city policy insofar as the policy permitted the exclusive use of the parks by racially discriminatory private schools: the plaintiffs had alleged direct cognizable injury to their right to nondiscriminatory access to the public parks. Id., at 570-571, n. 10.27
Standing in Gilmore thus rested on an allegation of direct deprivation of a right to equal use of the parks. Like the plaintiff in Heckler v. Mathews—indeed, like the plaintiffs having standing in virtually any equal protection case—the plaintiffs in Gilmore alleged that they were personally being denied equal treatment. 465 U. S., at 740-741, n. 9. The Gilmore Court did not rest its finding of standing on an abstract denigration injury, and no problem of attenuated causation attended the plaintiffs’ claim of injury.28
In Norwood v. Harrison, supra, parents of public school children in Tunica County, Miss., filed a statewide class action challenging the State‘s provision of textbooks to students attending racially discriminatory private schools in the State. The Court held the State‘s practice unconstitutional because it breached “the State‘s acknowledged duty to establish a unitary school system,” id., at 460-461. See id., at 463-468. The Court did not expressly address the basis for the plaintiffs’ standing.
In Gilmore, however, the Court identified the basis for standing in Norwood: “The plaintiffs in Norwood were parties to a school desegregation order and the relief they sought was directly related to the concrete injury they suffered.” 417 U. S., at 571, n. 10. Through the school-desegregation decree, the plaintiffs had acquired a right to have the State “steer clear” of any рerpetuation of the racially dual school system that it had once sponsored. 413 U. S., at 467. The interest acquired was judicially cognizable because it was a personal interest, created by law, in having the State refrain from taking specific actions. Cf. Warth v. Seldin, 422 U. S., at 500 (standing may exist by virtue of legal rights created by statute). The plaintiffs’ complaint alleged that the State directly injured that interest by aiding racially discriminatory private schools. Respondents in this lawsuit, of course, have no injunctive rights against the IRS that are allegedly being harmed by the challenged IRS action.
Unlike Gilmore and Norwood, Coit v. Green, supra, cannot easily be seen to have based standing on an injury different in kind from any asserted by respondents here. The plaintiffs
First, the decision has little weight as a precedent on the law of standing. This Court‘s decision in Coit was merely a summary affirmance; for that reason alone it could hardly establish principles contrary to those set out in opinions issued after full briefing and argument. See Fusari v. Steinberg, 419 U. S. 379, 392 (1975) (BURGER, C. J., concurring); see also Tully v. Griffin, Inc., 429 U. S. 68, 74 (1976). Moreover, when the case reached this Court, the plaintiffs and the IRS were no longer adverse parties; and the ruling that was summarily affirmed, Green v. Connally, 330 F. Supp. 1150 (DC 1971), did not include a ruling on the issue of standing, which had been briefly considered in a prior ruling of the District Court, Green v. Kennedy, 309 F. Supp. 1127, 1132 (DC), appeal dism‘d sub nom. Cannon v. Green, 398 U. S. 956 (1970). Thus, “the Court‘s affirmance in Green lacks the precedential weight of a case involving a truly adversary controversy.” Bob Jones University v. Simon, 416 U. S. 725, 740, n. 11 (1974).
In any event, the facts in the Coit case are sufficiently different from those presented in this lawsuit that the absence of standing here is unaffected by the possible propriety of standing there. In particular, the suit in Coit was limited to the public schools of one State. Moreover, the District Court found, based on extensive evidence before it as well as on the findings in Coffey v. State Educational Finance Comm‘n, 296 F. Supp. 1389 (SD Miss. 1969), that large numbers of segregated private schools had been established in the State for the purpose of avoiding a unitary public school system, 309 F. Supp., at 1133-1134; that the tax exemptions were critically important to the ability of such schools to succeed, id., at 1134-1136; and that the connection between
The limited setting, the history of school desegregation in Mississippi at the time of the Coit litigation, the nature of the IRS conduct challenged at the outset of the litigation, and the District Court‘s particular findings, which were never challenged as clearly erroneous, see Motion to Dismiss or Affirm in Coit v. Green, O. T. 1971, No. 71-425, p. 13, amply distinguish the Coit case from respondents’ lawsuit. Thus, we
III
“The necessity that the plaintiff who seeks to invoke judicial power stand to profit in some personal interest remains an
It is so ordered.
JUSTICE MARSHALL took no part in the decision of these cases.
JUSTICE BRENNAN, dissenting.
Once again, the Court “uses ‘standing to slam the courthouse door against plaintiffs who are entitled to full consideration of their claims on the merits.‘” Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U. S. 464, 490 (1982) (BRENNAN, J., dissenting) (quoting Barlow v. Collins, 397 U. S. 159, 178 (1970) (BRENNAN, J., concurring in result and dissenting)). And once again, the Court does so by “wax[ing] eloquent” on considerations that provide little justification for the decision at hand. See 454 U. S., at 491. This time, however, the Court focuses on “the idea of separation of powers,” ante, at 750, 752, 759, 761, as if the mere incantation of that phrase provides an obvious solution to the difficult questiоns presented by these cases.
The Court‘s attempt to obscure the standing question must be seen, therefore, as no more than a cover for its failure to recognize the nature of the specific claims raised by the respondents in these cases. By relying on generalities concerning our tripartite system of government, the Court is able to conclude that the respondents lack standing to maintain this action without acknowledging the precise nature of the injuries they have alleged. In so doing, the Court displays a startling insensitivity to the historical role played by the federal courts in eradicating race discrimination from our Nation‘s schools—a role that has played a prominent part in this Court‘s decisions from Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483 (1954), through Bob Jones University v. United States, 461 U. S. 574 (1983). Because I cannot join in such misguided decisionmaking, I dissent.
I
The respondents, suing individually and on behalf of their minor children, are parents of black children attending public schools in various school districts across the Nation. Each of these school districts, the respondents allege,1 was once seg-
To eliminate this federal financial assistance for discriminating schools, the respondents seek a declaratory judgment that сurrent IRS practices are inadequate both in identifying racially discriminatory schools and in denying requested tax exemptions or revoking existing exemptions for any schools so identified. In particular, they allege that existing IRS guidelines permit schools to receive tax exemptions simply by adopting and certifying—but not implementing—a policy of nondiscrimination. Pursuant to these ineffective guidelines,2 many private schools that discriminate on the basis of
“which have insubstantial or non-existent minority enrollments, which are located in or serve desegregating school districts, and which either—
“(a) were established or expanded at or about the time the public school districts in which they are located or which they serve were desegregating;
“(b) have been determined in adversary judicial or administrative proceedings to be racially segregated; or
“(c) cannot demonstrate that they do not provide racially segregated educational opportunities for white children avoiding attendance in desegregating public school systems.” Complaint ¶ 4, App. 19.
This requested relief is substantially similar to the enforcement guidelines promulgated by the IRS itself in 1978 and 1979, before congressional action temporarily stayed, and the agency withdrew, the amended procedures. See 44 Fed. Reg. 9451 (1979); 43 Fed. Reg. 37296 (1978). Cf. ante, at 747, and nn. 15-16.
Persons seeking judicial relief from an
A
In these cases, the respondents have alleged at least one type of injury that satisfies the constitutionаl requirement of “distinct and palpable injury.”3 In particular, they claim
“fosters and encourages the organization, operation and expansion of institutions providing racially segregated educational opportunities for white children avoiding attendance in desegregating public school districts and thereby interferes with the efforts of federal courts, HEW and local school authorities to desegregate public school districts which have been operating racially dual school systems.” Complaint ¶ 50(b), App. 39.
The Court acknowledges that this alleged injury is sufficient to satisfy constitutional standards. See ante, at 756. It does so only grudgingly, however, without emphasizing the significance of the harm alleged. Nonetheless, we have consistently recognized throughout the last 30 years that the deprivation of a child‘s right to receive an education in a desegregated school is a harm of special significance; surely, it satisfies any constitutional requirement of injury in fact. Just last Term in Bob Jones University v. United States, for example, we acknowledged that “[a]n unbroken line of cases following Brown v. Board of Education establishes beyond doubt this Court‘s view that racial discrimination in education violates a most fundamental national public policy, as well as rights of individuals.” 461 U. S., at 593 (1983) (emphasis added). See Gilmore v. City of Montgomery, 417 U. S. 556, 568 (1974) (“[T]he constitutional rights of children not to be discriminated against . . . can neither be nullified openly and
In the analogous context of housing discrimination, the Court has similarly recognized that the denial of an opportunity to live in an integrated community is injury sufficient to satisfy the constitutional requirements of standing. In particular, we have recognized that injury is properly alleged when plaintiffs claim a deprivation “of the social and professional benefits of living in an integrated society.” Gladstone, Realtors v. Village of Bellwood, 441 U. S. 91, 111-112 (1979). See also Havens Realty Corp. v. Coleman, supra, at 376, and n. 17; Trafficante v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., 409 U. S. 205 (1972). Noting “the importance of the ‘benefits [obtained] from interracial associations,‘” as well as the oft-stated principle “that noneconomic injuries may suffice to provide standing,” we have consistently concluded that such an injury is “sufficient to satisfy the constitutional standing requirement of actual or threatened harm.” Gladstone, Realtors, supra, at 112 (quoting Trafficante, supra, at 210, and citing Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U. S. 727, 734-735 (1972)).
There is, of course, no rational basis on which to treat children who seek to be educated in desegregated school districts any differently for purposes of standing than residents who seek to live in integrated housing communities. Indeed, if anything, discriminatory practices by private schools, which “exer[t] a pervasive influence on the entire educational process,” Norwood, supra, at 469 (citing Brown v. Board of Education, supra, and quoted in Bob Jones University, supra, at
B
Fully explicating the injury alleged helps to explain why it is fairly traceable to the governmental conduct challenged by the respondents. As the respondents specifically allege in their complaint:
“Defendants have fostered and encouraged the development, operation and expansion of many of these racially segregated private schools by recognizing them as ‘charitable’ organizations described in Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, and exempt from federal income taxation under Section 501(a) of the Code. Once the schools are classified as tax-exempt . . . , contributions made to them are deductible from gross income on individual and corporate income tax returns. . . . Moreover, [the] organizations . . . are also exempt from federal social security taxes . . . and from federal unemployment taxes. . . . The resulting exemptions and deductions provide tangible financial aid and other benefits which support the operation of racially segregated private schools. In particular, the resulting deductions facilitate the raising of funds to organize new schools and expand existing schools in order to accommodate white students avoiding attendance in desеgregating public school districts. Additionally, the existence of a federal tax exemption amounts to a federal stamp of approval which facilitates fund raising on behalf of racially segregated private schools. Finally, by supporting the development, operation and expansion of institutions providing racially segregated educational opportunities
for white children avoiding attendance in desegregating public schools, defendants are thereby interfering with the efforts of courts, HEW and local school authorities to desegregate public school districts which have been operating racially dual school systems.” Complaint ¶ 21, App. 24.4
Viewed in light of the injuries they claim, the respondents have alleged a direct causal relationship between the Government action they challenge and the injury they suffer: their inability to receive an education in a racially integrated school is directly and adversely affected by the tax-exempt status granted by the IRS to racially discriminatory schools in their respective school districts. Common sense alone would recognize that the elimination of tax-exempt status for racially discriminatory private schools would serve to lessen the impact that those institutions have in defeating efforts to desegregate the public schools.
The Court admits that “[t]he diminished ability of respondents’ children to receive a desegregated education would be
For example, the respondents specifically refer by name to at least 32 private schools that discriminate on the basis of race and yet continue to benefit illegally from tax-exempt status. Eighteen of those schools—including at least 14 elementary schools, 2 junior high schools, and 1 high school—are located in the city of Memphis, Tenn., which has been the subject of several court orders to desegregate. See Complaint ¶¶ 24-27, 45, App. 26-27, 35-36. Similarly, the respondents cite two private schools in Orangeburg, S. C. that continue to benefit from federal tax exemptions even though they practice race discrimination in school districts that are desegregating pursuant to judicial and administrative orders. See Complaint ¶¶ 29, 46, App. 28, 36. At least with respect to these school districts, as well as the others specifically mentioned in the complaint, there can be little doubt that the respondents have identified communities containing “enough racially discriminatory private schools receiving tax exemptions . . . to make an appreciable difference in public school integration,” ante, at 758.6
Moreover, the Court has previously recognized the existence, and constitutional significance, of such direct relationships between unlawfully segregated school districts and government support for racially discriminatory private schools in those districts. In Norwood v. Harrison, 413 U. S. 455 (1973), for example, we considered a Mississippi program that provided textbooks to students attending both public and private schools, without regard to whether any participating school had racially discriminatory policies. In declaring that program constitutionally invalid, we noted that “‘a state may not induce, encourage or promote private persons to accomplish what it is constitutionally forbidden to accomplish.‘” Id., at 465. We then spoke directly to the causal relationship between the financial aid provided by the state textbook program and the constitutional rights asserted by the students and their parents:
“The District Court laid great stress on the absence of a showing by appellants that ‘any child enrolled in private school, if deprived of free textbooks, would withdraw from private school and subsequently enroll in the public schools.’ . . . We do not agree with the District Court in its analysis of the legal consequences of this uncertainty, for the Constitution does not permit the State to aid discrimination even when there is no precise causal relationship between state financial aid to a private school and the continued well-being of that school. A State may not grant the type of tangible financial aid here involved if that aid has a significant tendency to facilitate, reinforce, and support private discrimination.” Id., at 465-466 (citations omitted) (emphasis added).
Thus, Norwood explicitly stands for the proposition that governmental aid to racially discriminatory schools is a direct impediment to school desegregation.
The Court purports to distinguish Norwood from the present litigation because “[t]he plaintiffs in Norwood were parties to a school desegregation order” and therefore “had acquired a right to have the State ‘steer clear’ of any perpetuation of the racially dual school system that it had once sponsored,” ante, at 763 (quoting Gilmore v. City of Montgomery, 417 U.S. 556, 571, n. 10 (1974), and Norwood, supra, at 467), whereas the “[r]espondents in this lawsuit . . . have no injunctive rights against the IRS that are allegedly being harmed,” ante, at 763. There is nothing to suggest, however, that the relevant injunction in Norwood was anything more than an order to desegregate the schools in Tunica County, Miss. Given that many of the school districts identified in the respondents’ complaint have also been the subject of court-ordered integration, the standing inquiry in these cases should not differ. And, although the respondents do not specifically allege that they are named parties to
Even accepting the relevance of the Court‘s distinction, moreover, that distinction goes to the injury suffered by the respective plaintiffs, and not to the causal connection between the harm alleged and the governmental action challenged. Cf. ante, at 756 (conceding that the respondents have alleged constitutionally sufficient harm in these cases). The causal relationship existing in Norwood between the alleged harm (i. e., interference with the plaintiffs’ injunctive rights to a desegregated school system) and the challenged governmental action (i. e., free textbooks provided to racially discriminatory schools) is indistinguishable from the causal relationship existing in the present cases, unless the Court intends to distinguish the lending of textbooks from the granting of tax-exempt status. The Court‘s express statement on causation in Norwood therefore bears repeating: “the Constitution does not permit the State to aid discrimination even when there is no precise causal relationship between state financial aid to a private school and the continued well-being of that school.” 413 U. S., at 465-466. See Note, The Judicial Role in Attacking Racial Discrimination in Tax-Exempt Private Schools, 93 Harv. L. Rev. 378, 385-386 (1979).8
The three-judge District Court expressly concluded that the plaintiffs had standing to maintain their action:
“This case is properly maintained as a class action, pursuant to Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, by Negro school children in Mississippi and the parents of those children on behalf of themselves and all persons similarly situated. They have standing to attack the constitutionality of statutory provisions which they claim provid[e] an unconstitutional system of benefits and
matching grants that fosters and supports a system of segregated private schools as an alternative available to white students seeking to avoid desegregated public schools. We follow the precedent on this point of the three-judge District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi in Coffey v. State Educational Finance Commission, 296 F. Supp. 1389 (1969).” Green v. Kennedy, 309 F. Supp. 1127, 1132 (DC), appeal dism‘d sub nom. Cannon v. Green, 398 U.S. 956 (1970).
When the case was properly appealed to this Court, the standing issue was expressly raised in the jurisdictional statement filed by intervenor Coit, on behalf of a class of parents and children who supported or attended all-white private schools. Juris. Statement, O. T. 1971, No. 71-425, p. 11. See Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U.S. 26, 63, and n. 11 (BRENNAN, J., concurring in judgment). Nonetheless, the Court summarily affirmed, Coit v. Green, supra, thereby indicating our agreement with the District Court‘s conclusion.9 See also Griffin v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, 377 U.S. 218, 224 (1964).
Even accepting the correctness of the causation analysis included in that decision, however, it is plainly distinguishable from the cases at hand. The respondents in these cases do not challenge the denial of any service by a tax-exempt
III
More than one commentator has noted that the causation component of the Court‘s standing inquiry is no more than a poor disguise for the Court‘s view of the merits of the underlying claims.10 The Court today does nothing to avoid that criticism. What is most disturbing about today‘s decision, therefore, is not the standing analysis applied, but the in
JUSTICE STEVENS, with whom JUSTICE BLACKMUN joins, dissenting.
Three propositions are clear to me: (1) respondents have adequately alleged “injury in fact“; (2) their injury is fairly traceable to the conduct that they claim to be unlawful; and (3) the “separation of powers” principle does not create a jurisdictional obstacle to the consideration of the merits of their claim.
I
Respondents, the parents of black schoolchildren, have alleged that their children are unable to attend fully desegregated schools because large numbers of white children in the areas in which respondents reside attend private schools which do not admit minority children. The Court, JUSTICE BRENNAN, and I all agree that this is an adequate allegation of “injury in fact.” The Court is quite correct when it writes:
“The injury they identify—their children‘s diminished ability to receive an education in a racially integrated school—is, beyond any doubt, not only judicially cognizable but, as shown by cases from Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954), to Bob Jones University v. United States, 461 U.S. 574 (1983), one of the most serious injuries recognized in our legal system.” Ante, at 756.
This kind of injury may be actionable whether it is caused by the exclusion of black children from public schools or by an official policy of encouraging white children to attend nonpub
II
In final analysis, the wrong respondents allege that the Government has committed is to subsidize the exodus of white children from schools that would otherwise be racially integrated. The critical question in these cases, therefore, is whether respondents have alleged that the Government has created that kind of subsidy.
In answering that question, we must of course assume that respondents can prove what they have alleged. Furthermore, at this stage of the litigation we must put to one side all questions about the appropriateness of a nationwide class action.1 The controlling issue is whether the causal connection between the injury and the wrong has been adequately alleged.
An organization that qualifies for preferential treatment under
“Both tax exemptions and tax deductibility are a form of subsidy that is administered through the tax system. A tax exemption has much the same effect as a cash grant to the organization of the amount of tax it would have to pay on its income. Deductible contributions are similar to cash grants of the amount of a portion of the individual‘s contributions.” Regan v. Taxation With Representation of Washington, 461 U.S. 540, 544 (1983) (footnote omitted).
The purpose of this scheme, like the purpose of any subsidy, is to promote the activity subsidized; the statutes “seek to achieve the same basic goal of encouraging the development of certain organizations through the grant of tax benefits.” Bob Jones University v. United States, 461 U.S. 574, 587, n. 10 (1983). If the granting of preferential tax treatment would “encourage” private segregated schools to conduct their “charitable” activities, it must follow that the withdrawal of the treatment would “discourage” them, and hence promote the process of desegregation.2
We have held that when a subsidy makes a given activity more or less expensive, injury can be fairly traced to the subsidy for purposes of standing analysis because of the resulting increase or decrease in the ability to engage in the activity.3 Indeed, we have employed exactly this causation analysis in the same context at issue here—subsidies given private schools that practice racial discrimination. Thus, in Gilmore v. City of Montgomery, 417 U.S. 556 (1974), we easily recognized the causal connection between official policies that enhanced the attractiveness of segregated schools and the failure to bring about or maintain a desegregated public school system.4 Similarly, in Norwood v. Harrison,
The Court itself appears to embrace this reading of Gilmore and Norwood. It describes Gilmore as holding that a city‘s policy of permitting segregated private schools to use public parks “would impede the integration of the public schools. Exclusive availability of the public parks ‘significantly enhanced the attractiveness of segregated private schools . . . by enabling them to offer complete athletic programs.‘” Ante, at 762, n. 27 (quoting 417 U.S., at 569). It characterizes Norwood as having concluded that the provision of textbooks to such schools would impede court-ordered desegregation. Ante, at 763. Although the form of the subsidy for segregated private schools involved in Gilmore and Norwood was different from the “cash grant” that flows from a tax exemption, the economic effect and causal connection between the subsidy and the impact on the complaining litigants was precisely the same in those cases as it is here.
III
Considerations of tax policy, economics, and pure logic all confirm the conclusion that respondents’ injury in fact is fairly traceable to the Government‘s allegedly wrongful conduct. The Court therefore is forced to introduce the concept of “separation of powers” into its analysis. The Court writes that the separation of powers “explains why our cases preclude the conclusion” that respondents’ injury is fairly traceable to the conduct they challenge. Ante, at 759.
The Court could mean one of three things by its invocation of the separation of powers. First, it could simply be expressing the idea that if the plaintiff lacks Art. III standing to bring a lawsuit, then there is no “case or controversy”
Second, the Court could be saying that it will require a more direct causal connection when it is troubled by the separation of powers implications of the case before it. That approach confuses the standing doctrine with the justiciability of the issues that respondents seek to raise. The purpose of the standing inquiry is to measure the plaintiff‘s stake in the outcome, not whether a court has the authority to provide it with the outcome it seeks:
“[T]he standing question is whether the plaintiff has ‘alleged such a personal stake in the outcome of the controversy’ as to warrant his invocation of federal-court jurisdiction and to justify the exercise of the court‘s remedial powers on his behalf.” Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 498–499 (1975) (emphasis in original) (quoting Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 204 (1962)).8
Third, the Court could be saying that it will not treat as legally cognizable injuries that stem from an administrative decision concerning how enforcement resources will be allocated. This surely is an important point. Respondents do seek to restructure the IRS‘s mechanisms for enforcing the legal requirement that discriminatory institutions not receive tax-exempt status. Such restructuring would dramatically
However, as the Court also recognizes, this principle does not apply when suit is brought “to enforce specific legal obligations whose violation works a direct harm,” ante, at 761. For example, despite the fact that they were challenging the methods used by the Executive to enforce the law, citizens were accorded standing to challenge a pattern of police misconduct that violated the constitutional constraints on law enforcement activities in Allee v. Medrano, 416 U.S. 802 (1974).11 Here, respondents contend that the IRS is violating a specific constitutional limitation on its enforcement discretion. There is a solid basis for that contention. In Norwood, we wrote:
“A State‘s constitutional obligation requires it to steer clear, not only of operating the old dual system of racially segregаted schools, but also of giving significant aid to institutions that practice racial or other invidious discrimination.” 413 U. S., at 467.
Gilmore echoed this theme:
“‘[A]ny tangible State assistance, outside the generalized services government might provide to private segregated schools in common with other schools, and with all citizens, is constitutionally prohibited if it has ‘a significant tendency to facilitate, reinforce, and support private discrimination.’ Norwood v. Harrison, 413 U.S. 455, 466 (1973). The constitutional obligation of the State ‘requires it to steer clear, not only of operating the old dual system of racially segregated schools, but also of giving significant aid to institutions that practice racial
or other invidious discrimination.’ Id., at 467.” 417 U. S., at 568-569.
Respondents contend that these cases limit the enforcement discretion enjoyed by the IRS. They establish, respondents argue, that the IRS cannot provide “cash grants” to discriminatory schools through preferential tax treatment without running afoul of a constitutional duty to refrain from “giving significant aid” to these institutions. Similarly, respondents claim that the Internal Revenue Code itself, as construed in Bob Jones, constrains enforcement discretion.12 It has been clear since Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137 (1803), that “[i]t is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is.” Id., at 177. Deciding whether the Treasury has violated a specific legal
In short, I would deal with the question of the legal limitations on the IRS‘s enforcement discretion on its merits, rather than by making the untenable assumption that the granting of preferential tax treatment to segregated schools does not make those schools more attractive to white students and hence does not inhibit the process of desegregation. I respectfully dissent.
Notes
The question whether respondents have adequately alleged their standing must be separated from the question whether they can prove what has been alleged. It may be that questions concerning the racial policies of given schools, and the impact of their tax treatment on enrollment, vary widely from school to school, making inappropriate the nationwide class described in respondents’ complaint. A case in which it was proved that a segregated private school opened just as a nearby public school system began desegregating pursuant to court order, that the IRS knew the school did not admit blacks, and that the school prospered only as a result of favorable tax treatment, might be very different from one in which the plaintiff attempted to prove a nationwide policy and its effect. However, as JUSTICE BRENNAN observes, ante, at 770-771, n. 3, 780-781, n. 9, that goes to whether respondents can prove the nationwide policy they have alleged, and whether the factual issues they raise are sufficiently national in scope to justify the certification of a nationwide class. I rather doubt that a nationwide class would be appropriate, but at this stage respondents’ allegations of injury must be taken as true, see Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 501 (1975), and hence we must assume that respondents can prove the existence of a nationwide policy and its alleged effects.
“This litigation prompted the Service once again to review its procedures in this area. It focused our attention on the adequacy of existing policies and procedures as we moved to formulate a litigation position. We concluded that the Service‘s procedures were ineffective in identifying schools which in actual operation discriminate against minority students, even though the schools may profess an open enrollment policy and comply with the yearly publication requirements of Revenue Procedure 75-50.“A clear indication that our rules require strengthening is the fact that a number of private schools continue to hold tax exemption even though they have been held by Federal courts to be racially discriminatory. This position is indefensible. Just last year the U. S. Commission on Civil Rights criticized the Service‘s enforcement in this area as inadequate, emphasizing the continuing tax exemption of such adjudicated schools.” Tax-Exempt Status of Private Schools: Hearings before the Subcommittee on Oversight of the House Committee on Ways and Means, 96th Cong., 1st Sess., 5 (1979) (statement of Jerome Kurtz, Commissioner of Internal Revenue) (emphasis added).
See also id., at 236-251 (letter and memorandum from U. S. Commission on Civil Rights criticizing IRS enforcеment policies); id., at 1181-1182, 1187-1191 (statement and letter from Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice criticizing IRS guidelines).
Respondents’ complaint is premised on precisely this theory. The complaint, in ¶¶ 39-48, describes a number of private schools which receive preferential tax treatment and which allegedly discriminate on the basis of race, providing white children with “a racially segregated alternative to attendance” in the public schools which respondents’ children attend. The complaint then states:
“There are thousands of other racially segregated private schools which operate or serve desegregating public school districts and which function under the umbrella of organizations which have received, applied for, or will apply for, federal tax exemptions. Moreover, many additional public school districts will in the future begin desegregating pursuant to court order or [government] regulations and guidelines, under state law or vol
untarily. Additional racially segregated private schools may be organized or expanded, many of which will be operated by organizations which have received, applied for, or will apply for federal tax exemptions. As in the case of those representative organizations and private schools described in paragraphs 39-48, supra, such organizations and schools provide, or will provide, white children with a racially segregated alternative to desegregating public schools. By recognizing these organizations as exempt from federal taxation, defendants facilitate their development, operation and expansion and the provision of racially segregated educational opportunities for white children avoiding attendance in desegregating public school systems. Defendants thereby also interfere with the efforts of federal courts, [the Federal Government] and local school authorities to eliminate racially dual school systems.” App. 38 (emphasis supplied).
Thus, like JUSTICE BRENNAN, ante, at 774-775, I do not understand why the Court states that the complaint contains no allegation that the tax benefits received by private segregated schools “make an appreciable difference in public school integration,” ante, at 758, unless the Court requires “intricacies of pleading that would have gladdened the heart of Baron Parke.” Chayes, The Role of the Judge in Public Law Litigation, 89 Harv. L. Rev. 1281, 1305 (1976).
See Duke Power Co. v. Carolina Environmental Study Group, Inc., 438 U.S. 59, 74-78 (1978); United States v. SCRAP, 412 U.S. 669, 687-689 (1973); see also Barlow v. Collins, 397 U.S. 159 (1970).
“Contrary to law and their public responsibility, defendants have fostered and encouraged the development, operation and expansion of these racially segregated private schools by granting them, or the organizations that operate them, exemptions from federal income taxation . . . . Defendants have thereby ensured that these private schools will be exempt from federal income taxation, and that contributions to them will be deductible by corporate and individual donors for federal tax purposes. These federal tax benefits are important to the financial well-being of private segregated schools and significantly support their development, operation and expansion. Moreovеr, by facilitating the development, operation and expansion of racially segregated schools which provide alternative educational opportunities for white children avoiding attendance in desegregating public school systems, defendants are thereby interfering with the efforts of federal courts, HEW and local school authorities to desegregate public school districts which have operated racially dual school systems.” App. 17-18.
We agreed with the District Court‘s following reasoning:
“Montgomery officials were under an affirmative duty to bring about and to maintain a desegregated public school system. Providing recreational facilities to de facto or de jure segregated private schools was inconsistent with that duty because such aid enhanced the attractiveness of those schools, generated capital savings that could be used to improve their private educational offerings, and provided means to raise other revenue to support the institutions, all to the detriment of establishing the constitutionally mandated unitary public school system.” 417 U. S., at 563.
We went on to write:
“Any arrangement, implemented by state officials at any level, which significantly tends to perpetuate a dual school system, in whatever manner, is constitutionally impermissible. [T]he constitutional rights of children not to be discriminated against . . . can neither be nullified openly and directly by state legislators or state executive or judicial officers, nor nullified indirectly by them through evasive schemes for segregation whether attempted ‘ingeniously or ingenuously.’ This means that any tangible state assistance, outside the generalized services government might provide to private segregated schools in common with other schools, and with all citizens, is constitutionally prohibited if it has ‘a significant tendency to facilitate, reinforce, and support private discrimination.‘” Id., at 568 (quoting Cooper v. Aaron, 358 U.S. 1, 17 (1958), and Norwood v. Harrison, 413 U. S. 455, 466 (1973)).
It is this “racially segregated alternative” to public schools—the availability of schools that “receive tax exemptions merely on the basis of adopting and certifying—but not implementing—a policy of nondiscrimination,” App. 17-18, which respondents allege white parents have found attractive, see id., at 23-24, and which would either lose their cost advantage or their character as a segregated alternative if denied tax-exempt status because of their discriminatory admissions policies.
This causation analysis explains the holding in the case on which the Court chiefly relies, Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U. S. 26 (1976). There, the plaintiffs—indigent persons in need of free medical care—alleged that they were harmed by the Secretary of the Treasury‘s decision to permit hospitals to retain charitable status while offering a reduced level of free care. However, while here the source of the causal nexus is the price that white parents must pay to obtain a segregated education, which is inextricably intertwined with the school‘s tax status, in Simon the plaintiffs were seeking free care, which hospitals could decide not to provide for any number of reasons unrelated to their tax status. See id., at 42-43, and n. 23. Moreover, in Simon, the hospitals had to spend money in order to obtain charitable status. Therefore, they had an economic incentive to forgo preferential treatment. As the Court observed:
“It is equally speculative whether the desired exercise of the Court‘s remedial powers in this suit would result in the availability to respondents of such services. So far as the complaint sheds light, it is just as plausible that the hospitals to which respondents may apply for service would elect to forgo favorable tax treatment to avoid the undetermined financial drain of an increase in the level of uncompensated services. [C]onflicting evidence supports the commonsense proposition that the dependence upon special tax benefits may vary from hospital to hospital.” Id., at 43.
In contrast, the tax benefits private schools receive here involve no “financial drain” since the schools need not provide “uncompensated services” in order to obtain preferential tax treatment. Thus, the economic effect of the challenged tax treatment in these cases is not “speculative,” as the Court concluded it was in Simon. Here the financial incentives run in only one direction.
In particular, the plaintiffs in Norwood, suing on behalf of a statewide class of black students, characterized the basis for their standing as follows:
“The named plaintiffs . . . are black citizens of the United States residing in Tunica County, Mississippi. They are students in attendance at the public schools of the Tunica County School District. Their right to a racially integrated and otherwise nondiscriminatory public school system, vindicated by order of [the District Court] dated January 23, 1970 [United States and Driver v. Tunica County School District, Civil Action Nos. DC 6718 and 7013], and their right to the elimination of state support for racially segregated schools, has been frustrated and/or abridged by the creation of the racially segregated Tunica County Institute of Learning and the policies and practices of defendants as set forth below.” App. 20 and Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae in Norwood v. Harrison, O. T. 1972, No. 72-77, p. 5.
For the reasons explained in the text, I find these allegations legally indistinguishable from the allegations in the present litigation.
See also Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 498 (1975); Schlesinger v. Reservists Committee to Stop the War, 418 U.S. 208, 222 (1974).
Our subsequent decision in Gilmore v. City of Montgomery, 417 U.S. 556 (1974), heavily relied on our decision in Norwood. In Gilmore, we considered a challenge to a city policy that permitted racially segrеgated schools and other segregated private groups and clubs to use city parks and recreational facilities. In affirming an injunction against exclusive access to such facilities, we noted:
“Any arrangement, implemented by state officials at any level, which significantly tends to perpetuate a dual school system, in whatever manner, is constitutionally impermissible. [T]he constitutional rights of children not to be discriminated against . . . can neither be nullified openly and directly by state legislators or state executive or judicial officers, nor nullified indirectly by them through evasive schemes for segregation whether attempted ‘ingeniously or ingenuously.‘” 417 U.S., at 568. This means that any tangible state assistance, outside the generalized services government might provide to private segregated schools in common with other schools, and with all citizens, is constitutionally prohibited if it has ‘a significant tendency to facilitate, reinforce, and support private discrimination.’ The constitutional obligation of the State ‘requires it to steer clear, not only of operating the old dual system of racially segregated schools, but also of giving significant aid to institutions that practice racial or other invidious discrimination.‘” 417 U. S., at 568-569 (citations omitted).
The Court notes that the case in Gilmore was remanded to the District Court for development of a more particularized record to ensure that the nonexclusive use of the city‘s parks “would result in cognizable injury to these plaintiffs.” Ante, at 763, n. 28 (quoting Gilmore, supra, at 570-571, n. 10). At most, however, this simply suggests that a remand for more particularized pleadings is the proper disposition in the present litigation. Cf. n. 6, supra. The Court is therefore no more faithful to the procedures followed in Gilmore than it is to the substance of that decision.
See also Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 101-102 (1983); Duke Power Co. v. Carolina Environmental Study Group, Inc., 438 U. S., at 72; Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U. S., at 38; Schlesinger v. Reservists Committee to Stop the War, 418 U. S., at 220-221; United States v. Richardson, 418 U. S. 166, 179 (1974); O‘Shea v. Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 493-494 (1974); Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 123 (1973); Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U. S. 727, 731-732 (1972); Flast v. Cohen, 392 U. S. 83, 99 (1968).
The Court‘s discussion of our summary affirmance in Coit v. Green simply stretches the imagination beyond its breaking point. The Court concludes that “[t]he limited setting, the history of school desegregation in Mississippi at the time of the Coit litigation, the nature of the IRS conduct challenged at the outset of the litigation, and the District Court‘s particular findings . . . amply distinguish the Coit case from respondents’ lawsuit.” Ante, at 765. With all due respect, none of these criteria should be relevant to the determination of standing in these cases.
First, although the Coit litigation was limited to the State of Mississippi, that relates solely to the scope of a properly certified class, and not to the standing of class members to maintain their action. Cf. n. 3, supra. Second, although the District Court made extensive findings concerning the importance оf tax exemptions to the discriminatory schools involved in the Coit litigation, that only helps to prove the truth of the allegations made by the respondents in these cases. It also demonstrates why the respondents should be given either an opportunity to prove their case on the merits or an opportunity to amend their pleadings with more particularized allegations. Cf. nn. 6, 8, supra. Because the respondents in this litigation have never had their day in court, the Court‘s use of the specific findings made in the Coit litigation to deny the respondents standing in this litigation makes a mockery of the standing inquiry. Third, although it is correct that, before the Coit litigation, the IRS initially followed a policy of granting tax exemptions to racially discriminatory schools, that should have no bearing on the respondents’ standing in these cases; indeed, the respondents have alleged that the current IRS enforcement policy is so ineffective as to be the functional equivalent of the Government‘s policy prior to the Coit litigation. See supra, at 768, and n. 2. Finally, if the “history of school desegregation in Mississippi at the time of the Coit litigation” is at all relevant to the standing inquiry, it weighs in favor of allowing the respondents to maintain their present lawsuit. From the perspective of black children attending desegregating public schools, and according to the allegations included in their complaint, current IRS policies toward racially discriminatory private schools represent a substantial continuation of the onerous history of school desegregation in the affected school districts. With all respect, therefore, the Court has simply failed to distinguish these cases from our summary affirmance in Coit v. Green.
The Flast Court made precisely this point:
“When the emphasis in the standing problem is placed on whether the person invoking a federal court‘s jurisdiction is a proper party to maintain the action, the weakness of the Government‘s argument in this case becomes apparent. The question whether a particular person is a proper party to maintain the action does not, by its own force, raise separation of powers problems related to improper judicial interference in areas committed to other branches of the Federal Government. Such problems arise, if at all, only from the substantive issues the individual seeks to have adjudicated. Thus, in terms of Article III limitations on federal court jurisdiction, the question of standing is related only to whether the dispute sought to be adjudicated will be presented in an adversary context and in a form historically viewed as capable of judicial resolution. It is for that reason that the emphasis in standing problems is on whether the party invoking federal court jurisdiction has ‘a personal stake in the outcome of the controversy,’ and whether the dispute touches upon ‘the legal relations of parties having adverse legal interests.‘” Id., at 100-101 (emphasis supplied) (citations omitted) (quoting Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 204 (1962), and Aetna Life Insurance Co. v. Haworth, 300 U.S. 227, 240-241 (1937)).
See, e. g., L. Tribe, American Constitutional Law § 3-21 (1978); Chayes, Foreword: Public Law Litigation and the Burger Court, 96 Harv. L. Rev. 1, 14-22 (1982); Nichol, Causation as a Standing Requirement: The Unprincipled Use of Judicial Restraint, 69 Ky. L. J. 185 (1980–1981); Tushnet, The New Law of Standing: A Plea for Abandonment, 62 Cornell L. Rev. 663 (1977).
The danger of the Court‘s approach is illustrated by its failure to provide any standards to guide courts in determining when it is appropriate to require a more rigorous redressability showing because of separation of powers concerns, or how redressability can be demonstrated in a case raising separation of power concerns. The only guidance the Court offers is that the separation of powers counsels against recognizing standing when the plaintiff “seek[s] a restructuring of the apparatus established by the Executive Branch to fulfill its legal duties.” Ante, at 761. That cannot be an appropriate test; the separation of powers tolerates quite a bit of “restructuring” in order to eliminate the effects of racial segregation. For example, in Bolling v. Sharpe, 347 U.S. 497 (1954), we held that the Fifth Amendment prohibits the Executive from maintaining a dual school system. We have subsequently made it clear that the courts have authority to restructure both schoоl attendance patterns and curriculum when necessary to eliminate the effects of a dual school system. See, e. g., Columbus Board of Education v. Penick, 443 U.S. 449 (1979); Milliken v. Bradley, 433 U.S. 267 (1977); Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, 402 U.S. 1 (1971). At the same time, standing doctrine has never stood as a barrier to such “restructuring.” In the seminal case of Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186 (1962), the Court accorded voters standing to challenge population variations between electoral districts despite the fact that the legislative reapportionment sought would and eventually did have dramatic “restructuring” effects. Only two Terms ago, in Watt v. Energy Action Educational Foundation, 454 U.S. 151, 160-162 (1981), the Court accorded California standing to challenge the Secretary of the Interior‘s methods for accepting bids on oil and gas rights, despite the fact that this would affect the manner in which the Executive Branch discharged “[its] duty to ‘take Care that the Laws are faithfully executed,‘” ante, at 761.
In Bob Jones we clearly indicated that the Internal Revenue Code not only permits but in fact requires the denial of tax-exempt status to racially discriminatory private schools:
“Few social or political issues in our history have been more vigorously debated and more extensively ventilated than the issue of racial discrimination, particularly in education. Given the stress and anguish of the history of efforts to escape from the shackles of the ‘separate but equal’ doctrine of Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896), it cannot be said that educational institutions that, for whatever reasons, practice racial discrimination, are institutions exercising ‘beneficial and stabilizing influences in community life,’ Walz v. Tax Comm‘n, 397 U.S. 664, 673 (1970), or should be encouraged by having all taxpayers share in their support by way of special tax status.
“There can thus be no question that the interpretation of
§ 170 and§ 501(c)(3) announced by the IRS in 1970 was correct. That it may be seen as belated does not undermine its soundness. It would be wholly incompatible with the concepts underlying tax exemption to grant the benefit of tax-exempt status to racially discriminatory educational entities, which ‘exer[t] a pervasive influence on the entire educational process.’ Norwood v. Harrison, [413 U. S.], at 469. Whatever may be the rationale for such private schools’ policies, and however sincere the rationale may be, racial discrimination in education is contrary to public policy. Racially discriminatory educational institutions cannot be viewed as conferring a public benefit within the ‘charitable’ concept discussed earlier, or within the congressional intent underlying§ 170 and§ 501(c)(3) .” 461 U. S., at 595-596.
It has long been the rule that unless a claim is wholly insubstantial, it may not be dismissed for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. See Bell v. Hood, 327 U.S. 678 (1946).
In Heckler v. Mathews, for example, the named plaintiff (appellee) was being denied monetary benefits allegedly on a discriminatory basis. We specifically pointed out that the causation component of standing doctrine was satisfied with respect to the claimed benefits. In distinguishing the case from Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U.S. 26 (1976), we said: “there can be no doubt about the direct causal relationship between the Government‘s alleged deprivation of appellee‘s right to equal protection and the personal injury appellee has suffered—denial of Social Security benefits solely on the basis of his gender.” 465 U.S., at 741, n. 9.
In this litigation, respondents identify only one interest that they allege is being discriminatorily impaired—their interest in desegregated public school education. Respondents’ asserted stigmatic injury, therefore, is sufficient to support their standing in this litigation only if their school-desegregation injury independently meets the causation requirement of standing doctrine.
The Court said nothing about the plaintiffs’ standing to challenge the use of the parks, exclusive or nonexclusive, by racially discriminatory groups other than schools. It was unnecessary to do so because the Court declined to consider the merits of that challenge on the record before it. Id., at 570-574.