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SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
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No. 93-1823
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MISSOURI, et al., PETITIONERS v. KALIMA
JENKINS et al.
on writ of certiorari to the united states court
of appeals for the eighth circuit
[June 12, 1995]

  Justice Thomas, concurring.
  It never ceases to amaze me that the courts are so
willing to assume that anything that is predominantly
black must be inferior.  Instead of focusing on remedy-
ing the harm done to those black schoolchildren injured
by segregation, the District Court here sought to convert
the Kansas City, Missouri, School District (KCMSD) into
a -magnet district- that would reverse the -white flight-
caused by desegregation.  In this respect, I join the
Court's decision concerning the two remedial issues
presented for review.  I write separately, however, to
add a few thoughts with respect to the overall course of
this litigation.  In order to evaluate the scope of the
remedy, we must understand the scope of the constitu-
tional violation and the nature of the remedial powers
of the federal courts.
  Two threads in our jurisprudence have produced this
unfortunate situation, in which a District Court has
taken it upon itself to experiment with the education of
the KCMSD's black youth.  First, the court has read our
cases to support the theory that black students suffer an
unspecified psychological harm from segregation that
retards their mental and educational development.  This
approach not only relies upon questionable social science
research rather than constitutional principle, but it also
rests on an assumption of black inferiority.  Second, we
have permitted the federal courts to exercise virtually
unlimited equitable powers to remedy this alleged
constitutional violation.  The exercise of this authority
has trampled upon principles of federalism and the
separation of powers and has freed courts to pursue
other agendas unrelated to the narrow purpose of
precisely remedying a constitutional harm.

                            I

                            A
  The mere fact that a school is black does not mean
that it is the product of a constitutional violation.  A
-racial imbalance does not itself establish a violation of
the Constitution.-  United States v. Fordice, 505 U. S.
___, ___ (1992) (Thomas, J., concurring) (slip op., at 2).
Instead, in order to find unconstitutional segregation, we
require that plaintiffs -prove all of the essential ele-
ments of de jure segregation-that is, stated simply, a
current condition of segregation resulting from inten-
tional state action directed specifically to the [allegedly
segregated] schools.-  Keyes v. School Dist. No. 1,
Denver, 413 U. S. 189, 205-206 (1973) (emphasis added).
-[T]he differentiating factor between de jure segregation
and so-called de facto segregation . . . is purpose or
intent to segregate.-  Id., at 208 (emphasis in original).
  In the present case, the District Court inferred a
continuing constitutional violation from two primary
facts: the existence of de jure segregation in the KCMSD
prior to 1954, and the existence of de facto segregation
today.  The District Court found that in 1954, the
KCMSD operated 16 segregated schools for black
students, and that in 1974 39 schools in the district
were more than 90% black.  Desegregation efforts
reduced this figure somewhat, but the District Court
stressed that 24 schools remained -racially isolated,-
that is, more than 90% black, in 1983-1984.  Jenkins v.
Missouri, 593 F. Supp. 1485, 1492-1493 (WD Mo. 1984).
For the District Court, it followed that the KCMSD had
not dismantled the dual system entirely.  Id., at 1493.
The District Court also concluded that because of the
KCMSD's failure to -become integrated on a system-wide
basis,- the dual system still exerted -lingering effects-
upon KCMSD black students, whose -general attitude of
inferiority- produced -low achievement . . . which
ultimately limits employment opportunities and causes
poverty.-  Id., at 1492.
  Without more, the District Court's findings could not
have supported a finding of liability against the state.
It should by now be clear that the existence of one-race
schools is not by itself an indication that the State is
practicing segregation.  See, e.g., Swann v. Charlotte-
Mecklenburg Bd. of Ed., 402 U. S. 1, 26 (1971); Pasa-
dena City Bd. of Ed. v. Spangler, 427 U. S. 424,
435-437 (1976); Freeman v. Pitts, 503 U. S. 467,
493-494 (1992).  The continuing -racial isolation- of
schools after de jure segregation has ended may well
reflect voluntary housing choices or other private
decisions.  Here, for instance, the demography of the
entire KCMSD has changed considerably since 1954.
Though blacks accounted for only 18.9% of KCMSD's
enrollment in 1954, by 1983-1984 the school district was
67.7% black.  593 F. Supp., at 1492, 1495.  That certain
schools are overwhelmingly black in a district that is
now more than two-thirds black is hardly a sure sign of
intentional state action.
  In search of intentional state action, the District Court
linked the State and the dual school system of 1984 in
two ways.  First, the Court found that -[i]n the past-
the State had placed its -imprimatur on racial discrimi-
nation.-  As the Court explained, laws from the Jim
Crow era created -an atmosphere in which . . . private
white individuals could justify their bias and prejudice
against blacks,- with the possible result that private
realtors, bankers, and insurers engaged in more discrim-
inatory activities than would otherwise have occurred.
593 F. Supp., at 1503.  But the District Court itself ac-
knowledged that the State's alleged encouragement of
private discrimination was a fairly tenuous basis for
finding liability.  Ibid.  The District Court therefore
rested the State's liability on the simple fact that the
State had intentionally created the dual school system
before 1954, and had failed to fulfill -its affirmative duty
of disestablishing a dual school system subsequent to
1954.-  Id., at 1504.  According to the District Court,
the schools whose student bodies were more than 90%
black constituted -vestiges- of the prior de jure segrega-
tion, which the State and the KCMSD had an obligation
to eliminate.  Id., at 1504, 1506.  Later, in the course of
issuing its first -remedial- order, the District Court
added that a -system wide reduction in student achieve-
ment in the schools of . . . KCMSD- was also a vestige
of the prior de jure segregation.  Jenkins v. Missouri,
639 F. Supp. 19, 24 (WD Mo. 1985) (emphasis deleted).
In a subsequent order, the District Court indicated that
post-1954 -white flight- was another vestige of the pre-
1954 segregated system.  1 App. 126.
  In order for a -vestige- to supply the ground for an
exercise of remedial authority, it must be clearly
traceable to the dual school system.  The -vestiges of
segregation that are the concern of the law in a school
case may be subtle and intangible but nonetheless they
must be so real that they have a causal link to the de
jure violation being remedied.-  Freeman v. Pitts, 503
U. S., at 406.  District Courts must not confuse the
consequences of de jure segregation with the results of
larger social forces or of private decisions.  -It is simply
not always the case that demographic forces causing
population change bear any real and substantial relation
to a de jure violation.-  Ibid.; accord, id., at 501 (Scalia,
J., concurring);  Columbus Bd. of Ed. v. Penick, 443
U. S. 449, 512 (1979) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting);
Pasadena City Bd. of Ed. v. Spangler, supra, at 435-436.
As state-enforced segregation recedes farther into the
past, it is more likely that -these kinds of continuous
and massive demographic shifts,- Freeman, 503 U. S., at
495, will be the real source of racial imbalance or of
poor educational performance in a school district.  And
as we have emphasized,  -[i]t is beyond the authority
and beyond the practical ability of the federal courts to
try to counteract- these social changes.  Ibid.
  When a district court holds the State liable for
discrimination almost 30 years after the last official
state action, it must do more than show that there are
schools with high black populations or low test scores.
Here, the district judge did not make clear how the high
black enrollments in certain schools were fairly traceable
to the State of Missouri's actions.  I do not doubt that
Missouri maintained the despicable system of segrega-
tion until 1954.  But I question the District Court's
conclusion that because the State had enforced segrega-
tion until 1954, its actions, or lack thereof, proximately
caused the -racial isolation- of the predominantly black
schools in 1984.  In fact, where, as here, the finding of
liability comes so late in the day, I would think it
incumbent upon the District Court to explain how more
recent social or demographic phenomena did not cause
the -vestiges.-  This the District Court did not do.

                            B
  Without a basis in any real finding of intentional
government action, the District Court's imposition of
liability upon the State of Missouri improperly rests
upon a theory that racial imbalances are unconstitu-
tional.  That is, the court has -indulged the presump-
tion, often irrebuttable in practice, that a presently
observed [racial] imbalance has been proximately caused
by intentional state action during the prior de jure era.-
United States v. Fordice, 505 U. S., at ___ (Thomas, J.,
concurring) (slip op., at 2) (citing Dayton Bd. of Ed. v.
Brinkman, 443 U. S. 526, 537 (1979), and Keyes v.
School Dist. No. 1, 413 U. S., at 211).  In effect, the
court found that racial imbalances constituted an
ongoing constitutional violation that continued to inflict
harm on black students.  This position appears to rest
upon the idea that any school that is black is inferior,
and that blacks cannot succeed without the benefit of
the company of whites.
  The District Court's willingness to adopt such stereo-
types stemmed from a misreading of our earliest school
desegregation case.  In Brown v. Board of Education,
347 U. S. 483 (1954) (Brown I), the Court noted several
psychological and sociological studies purporting to show
that de jure segregation harmed black students by
generating -a feeling of inferiority- in them.  Seizing
upon this passage in Brown I, the District Court
asserted that -forced segregation ruins attitudes and is
inherently unequal.-  593 F. Supp., at 1492.  The
District Court suggested that this inequality continues
in full force even after the end of de jure segregation:
-The general attitude of inferiority among blacks
produces low achievement which ultimately limits
employment opportunities and causes poverty.
While it may be true that poverty results in low
achievement regardless of race, it is undeniable that
most poverty-level families are black.  The District
stipulated that as of 1977 they had not eliminated
all the vestiges of the prior dual system.  The Court
finds the inferior education indigenous of the state-
compelled dual school system has lingering effects in
the [KCMSD].-  Ibid. (citations omitted).
Thus, the District Court seemed to believe that black
students in the KCMSD would continue to receive an
-inferior education- despite the end of de jure segrega-
tion, as long as de facto segregation persisted.  As the
District Court later concluded, compensatory educational
programs were necessary -as a means of remedying
many of the educational problems which go hand in
hand with racially isolated minority student popula-
tions.-  639 F. Supp., at 25.  Such assumptions and any
social science research upon which they rely certainly
cannot form the basis upon which we decide matters of
constitutional principle.
  It is clear that the District Court misunderstood the
meaning of Brown I.  Brown I did not say that -racially
isolated- schools were inherently inferior; the harm that
it identified was tied purely to de jure segregation, not
de facto segregation.  Indeed, Brown I itself did not need
to rely upon any psychological or social-science research
in order to announce the simple, yet fundamental truth
that the Government cannot discriminate among its
citizens on the basis of race.  See McConnell,
Originalism and the Desegregation Decisions, 81 Va. L.
Rev. 947 (1995).  As the Court's unanimous opinion
indicated: -[I]n the field of public education the doctrine
of `separate but equal' has no place.  Separate educa-
tional facilities are inherently unequal.-  Brown I, 347
U. S., at 495.  At the heart of this interpretation of the
Equal Protection Clause lies the principle that the
Government must treat citizens as individuals, and not
as members of racial, ethnic or religious groups.  It is
for this reason that we must subject all racial classifica-
tions to the strictest of scrutiny, which (aside from two
decisions rendered in the midst of wartime, see
Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U. S. 81 (1943);
Korematsu v. United States, 323 U. S. 214 (1944)) has
proven automatically fatal.
  Segregation was not unconstitutional because it might
have caused psychological feelings of inferiority.  Public
school systems that separated blacks and provided them
with superior educational resources-making blacks
-feel- superior to whites sent to lesser schools-would
violate the Fourteenth Amendment, whether or not the
white students felt stigmatized, just as do school
systems in which the positions of the races are reversed.
Psychological injury or benefit is irrelevant to the ques-
tion whether state actors have engaged in intentional
discrimination-the critical inquiry for ascertaining
violations of the Equal Protection Clause.  The judiciary
is fully competent to make independent determinations
concerning the existence of state action without the
unnecessary and misleading assistance of the social
sciences.
  Regardless of the relative quality of the schools,
segregation violated the Constitution because the State
classified students based on their race.  Of course,
segregation additionally harmed black students by
relegating them to schools with substandard facilities
and resources.  But neutral policies, such as local school
assignments, do not offend the Constitution when
individual private choices concerning work or residence
produce schools with high black populations.  See Keyes
v. School Dist. No. 1, 413 U. S., at 211.  The Constitu-
tion does not prevent individuals from choosing to live
together, to work together, or to send their children to
school together, so long as the State does not interfere
with their choices on the basis of race.
  Given that desegregation has not produced the
predicted leaps forward in black educational achieve-
ment, there is no reason to think that black students
cannot learn as well when surrounded by members of
their own race as when they are in an integrated
environment.  Indeed, it may very well be that what has
been true for historically black colleges is true for black
middle and high schools.  Despite their origins in -the
shameful history of state-enforced segregation,- these
institutions can be -`both a source of pride to blacks who
have attended them and a source of hope to black
families who want the benefits of . . . learning for their
children.'-  Fordice, 505 U. S., at ___ (Thomas, J.,
concurring) (slip op., at 4).  Because of their -distinctive
histories and traditions,- id., at ___ (slip op., at 5), black
schools can function as the center and symbol of black
communities, and provide examples of independent black
leadership, success, and achievement.
  Thus, even if the District Court had been on firmer
ground in identifying a link between the KCMSD's pre-
1954 de jure segregation and the present -racial isola-
tion- of some of the district's schools, mere de facto
segregation (unaccompanied by discriminatory inequali-
ties in educational resources) does not constitute a
continuing harm after the end of de jure segregation.
-Racial isolation- itself is not a harm; only state-enforced
segregation is.  After all, if separation itself is a harm,
and if integration therefore is the only way that blacks
can receive a proper education, then there must be
something inferior about blacks.  Under this theory,
segregation injures blacks because blacks, when left on
their own, cannot achieve.  To my way of thinking, that
conclusion is the result of a jurisprudence based upon a
theory of black inferiority.
  This misconception has drawn the courts away from
the important goal in desegregation.  The point of the
Equal Protection Clause is not to enforce strict race-
mixing, but to ensure that blacks and whites are treated
equally by the State without regard to their skin color.
The lower courts should not be swayed by the easy
answers of social science, nor should they accept the
findings, and the assumptions, of sociology and psycho-
logy at the price of constitutional principle.

                           II
  We have authorized the district courts to remedy past
de jure segregation by reassigning students in order to
eliminate or decrease observed racial imbalances, even
if present methods of pupil assignment are facially
neutral.  See Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. of
Ed., 402 U. S. 1 (1971); Green v. School Bd. of New
Kent County, 391 U. S. 430 (1968).  The District Court
here merely took this approach to its logical next step.
If racial proportions are the goal, then schools must
improve their facilities to attract white students until
the district's racial balance is restored to the -right-
proportions.  Thus, fault for the problem we correct
today lies not only with a twisted theory of racial
injuries, but also with our approach to the remedies
necessary to correct racial imbalances.
  The District Court's unwarranted focus on the psycho-
logical harm to blacks and on racial imbalances has
been only half of the tale.  Not only did the court
subscribe to a theory of injury that was predicated on
black inferiority, it also married this concept of liability
to our expansive approach to remedial powers.  We have
given the federal courts the freedom to use any measure
necessary to reverse problems-such as racial isolation
or low educational achievement-that have proven stub-
bornly resistant to government policies.  We have not
permitted constitutional principles such as federalism or
the separation of powers to stand in the way of our
drive to reform the schools.  Thus, the District Court
here ordered massive expenditures by local and state
authorities, without congressional or executive authoriza-
tion and without any indication that such measures
would attract whites back to KCMSD or raise KCMSD
test scores.  The time has come for us to put the genie
back in the bottle.

                            A
  The Constitution extends -[t]he judicial Power of the
United States- to -all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising
under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States,
and Treaties made . . . under their Authority.-  Art. III,
1, 2.  I assume for purposes of this case that the
remedial authority of the federal courts is inherent in
the -judicial Power,- as there is no general equitable
remedial power expressly granted by the Constitution or
by statute.  As with any inherent judicial power,
however, we ought to be reluctant to approve its
aggressive or extravagant use, and instead we should
exercise it in a manner consistent with our history and
traditions.  See Chambers v. NASCO, Inc., 501 U. S. 32,
63-76 (1991) (Kennedy, J., dissenting); Young v. United
States ex rel. Vuitton et Fils S.A., 481 U. S. 787,
815-825 (1987) (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment).
  Motivated by our worthy desire to eradicate segrega-
tion, however, we have disregarded this principle and
given the courts unprecedented authority to shape a
remedy in equity.  Although at times we have invali-
dated a decree as beyond the bounds of an equitable
remedy, see Milliken v. Bradley, 418 U. S. 717 (1974)
(Milliken I), these instances have been far outnumbered
by the expansions in the equity power.  In United States
v. Montgomery Cty. Bd. of Ed., 395 U. S. 225 (1969), for
example, we allowed federal courts to desegregate faculty
and staff according to specific mathematical ratios, with
the ultimate goal that each school in the system would
have roughly the same proportions of white and black
faculty.  In Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. of Ed.,
402 U. S. 1 (1971), we permitted federal courts to order
busing, to set racial targets for school populations, and
to alter attendance zones.  And in Milliken v. Bradley,
433 U. S. 267 (1977) (Milliken II), we approved the use
of remedial or compensatory education programs paid for
by the State.
  In upholding these court-ordered measures, we
indicated that trial judges had virtually boundless
discretion in crafting remedies once they had identified
a constitutional violation.  As Swann put it, -[o]nce a
right and a violation have been shown, the scope of a
district court's equitable powers to remedy past wrongs
is broad, for breadth and flexibility are inherent in
equitable remedies.-  402 U. S., at 15.  We did say that
-the nature of the violation determines the scope of the
remedy,- id., at 16, but our very next sentence signaled
how weak that limitation was: -[i]n default by the school
authorities of their obligation to proffer acceptable
remedies, a district court has broad power to fashion a
remedy that will assure a unitary school system.-  Ibid.
  It is perhaps understandable that we permitted the
lower courts to exercise such sweeping powers.  Al-
though we had authorized the federal courts to work
toward -a system of determining admission to the public
schools on a nonracial basis- in Brown v. Board of
Education, 349 U. S. 294, 300-301 (1955) (Brown II),
resistance to Brown I produced little desegregation by
the time we decided Green v. School Board of New Kent
County, supra.  Our impatience with the pace of deseg-
regation and with the lack of a good-faith effort on the
part of school boards led us to approve such extraordi-
nary remedial measures.  But such powers should have
been temporary and used only to overcome the wide-
spread resistance to the dictates of the Constitution.
The judicial overreaching we see before us today perhaps
is the price we now pay for our approval of such
extraordinary remedies in the past.
  Our prior decision in this litigation suggested that we
would approve the continued use of these expansive
powers even when the need for their exercise had
disappeared.  In Missouri v. Jenkins, 495 U. S. 33
(1990) (Jenkins I), the District Court in this case had
ordered an increase in local property taxes in order to
fund its capital improvements plan.  KCMSD, which had
been ordered by the Court to finance 25% of the plan,
could not pay its share due to state constitutional and
statutory provisions placing a cap on property taxes.
Id., at 38, 41.  Although we held that principles of
comity barred the District Court from imposing the tax
increase itself (except as a last resort), we also con-
cluded that the Court could order KCMSD to raise
taxes, and could enjoin the state laws preventing
KCMSD from doing so.  With little analysis, we held
that -a court order directing a local government body to
levy its own taxes is plainly a judicial act within the
power of a federal court.-  Id., at 55.
  Our willingness to unleash the federal equitable power
has reached areas beyond school desegregation.  Federal
courts have used -structural injunctions,- as they are
known, not only to supervise our Nation's schools, but
also to manage prisons, see Hutto v. Finney, 437 U. S.
678 (1978), mental hospitals, Thomas S. v. Flaherty, 902
F. 2d 250 (CA4), cert. denied, 498 U. S. 951 (1990), and
public housing, Hills v. Gautreaux, 425 U. S. 284 (1976).
See generally D. Horowitz, The Courts and Social Policy
4-9 (1977).  Judges have directed or managed the recon-
struction of entire institutions and bureaucracies, with
little regard for the inherent limitations on their
authority.

                            B
  Such extravagant uses of judicial power are at odds
with the history and tradition of the equity power and
the Framers' design.  The available historical records
suggest that the Framers did not intend federal equita-
ble remedies to reach as broadly as we have permitted.
Anticipating the growth of our modern doctrine, the
Anti-Federalists criticized the Constitution because it
might be read to grant broad equitable powers to the
federal courts.  In response, the defenders of the
Constitution -sold- the new framework of government to
the public by espousing a narrower interpretation of the
equity power.  When an attack on the Constitution is
followed by an open Federalist effort to narrow the
provision, the appropriate conclusion is that the drafters
and ratifiers of the Constitution approved the more
limited construction offered in response.  See McIntyre
v. Ohio Elections Commission, 514 U. S. ___, ___ (1995)
(Thomas, J., concurring in judgment) (slip op., at 10).
  The rise of the English equity courts as an alternative
to the rigors of the common law, and the battle between
the courts of equity and the courts of common law, is by
now a familiar tale.  See T. Plucknett, A Concise
History of the Common Law 191-198, 673-694 (5th ed.
1956).  By the middle of the 18th century, equity had
developed into a precise legal system encompassing
certain recognized categories of cases, such as those
involving special property forms (trusts) or those in
which the common law did not provide relief (fraud,
forgery, or mistake).  See 5 W. Holdsworth, History of
English Law 300-338 (1927); S. Milsom, Historical
Foundations of the Common Law 85-87 (1969); J. Baker,
An Introduction to English Legal History 93-95 (2d ed.
1979).  In this fixed system, each of these specific
actions then called for a specific equitable remedy.
  Blackstone described the principal differences between
courts of law and courts of equity as lying only in the
-modes of administering justice,---in the mode of proof,
the mode of trial, and the mode of relief.-  3 W.
Blackstone, Commentaries 436 (1768).  As to the last,
the English jurist noted that courts of equity held a
concurrent jurisdiction when there is a -want of a more
specific remedy, than can be obtained in the courts of
law.-  Id., at 438.  Throughout his discussion, Black-
stone emphasized that courts of equity must be governed
by rules and precedents no less than the courts of law.
-[I]f a court of equity were still at sea, and floated upon
the occasional opinion which the judge who happened to
preside might entertain of conscience in every particular
case, the inconvenience that would arise from this
uncertainty, would be a worse evil than any hardship
that could follow from rules too strict and inflexible.-
Id., at 440.  If their remedial discretion had not been
cabined, Blackstone warned, equity courts would have
undermined the rule of law and produced arbitrary
government.  -[The judiciary's] powers would have
become too arbitrary to have been endured in a country
like this, which boasts of being governed in all respects
by law and not by will.-  Ibid. (footnote omitted); see
also 1 id., at 61-62.
  So cautioned, the Framers approached equity with
suspicion.  As Thomas Jefferson put it, -Relieve the
judges from the rigour of text law, and permit them,
with pretorian discretion, to wander into it's equity, and
the whole legal system becomes incertain.-  9 Papers of
Thomas Jefferson 71 (J. Boyd ed. 1954).  Suspicion of
judicial discretion led to criticism of Article III during
the ratification of the Constitution.  Anti-Federalists
attacked the Constitution's extension of the federal
judicial power to -Cases, in Law and Equity,- arising
under the Constitution and federal statutes.  According
to the Anti-Federalists, the reference to equity granted
federal judges excessive discretion to deviate from the
requirements of the law.  Said the -Federal Farmer,- -by
thus joining the word equity with the word law, if we
mean any thing, we seem to mean to give the judge a
discretionary power.-  Federal Farmer No. 15, January
18, 1788, in 2 The Complete Anti-Federalist 322 (H.
Storing ed. 1981) (hereinafter Storing).  He hoped that
the Constitution's mention of equity jurisdiction was not
-intended to lodge an arbitrary power or discretion in
the judges, to decide as their conscience, their opinions,
their caprice, or their politics might dictate.-  Id., at
322-323.  Another Anti-Federalist, Brutus, argued that
the equity power would allow federal courts to -explain
the constitution according to the reasoning spirit of it,
without being confined to the words or letter.-  Brutus
No. 11, January 31, 1788, id., at 419.  This, predicted
Brutus, would result in the growth of federal power and
the -entire subversion of the legislative, executive and
judicial powers of the individual states.-  Id., at 420.
See G. McDowell, Equity and the Constitution 43-44
(1982).
  These criticisms provoked a Federalist response that
explained the meaning of Article III's words. Answering
the Anti-Federalist challenge in The Federalist Papers,
Alexander Hamilton described the narrow role that the
federal judicial power would play.  Initially, Hamilton
conceded that the federal courts would have some
freedom in interpreting the laws and that federal judges
would have lifetime tenure.  The Federalist No. 78,
p. 528 (J. Cooke ed. 1961).  Nonetheless, Hamilton
argued (as Blackstone had in describing the English
equity courts) that rules and established practices would
limit and control the judicial power: -To avoid an
arbitrary discretion in the courts, it is indispensable that
they should be bound down by strict rules and prece-
dents, which serve to define and point out their duty in
every particular case that comes before them.-  Id., at
529.  Cf. 1 J. Story, Commentaries on Equity Jurispru-
dence 18-20, pp. 15-17 (I. Redfield 9th ed. 1866).
Hamilton emphasized that -[t]he great and primary use
of a court of equity is to give relief in extraordinary
cases,- and that -the principles by which that relief is
governed are now reduced to a regular system.-  The
Federalist No. 83, at 569, and n.
  In response to Anti-Federalist concerns that equity
would permit federal judges an unchecked discretion,
Hamilton explicitly relied upon the precise nature of the
equity system that prevailed in England and had been
transplanted in America.  Equity jurisdiction was
necessary, Hamilton argued, because litigation -between
individuals- often would contain claims of -fraud, acci-
dent, trust or hardship, which would render the matter
an object of equitable, rather than of legal jurisdiction.-
Id., No. 80, at 539.  -In such cases,- Hamilton con-
cluded, -where foreigners were concerned on either side,
it would be impossible for the federal judicatories to do
justice without an equitable, as well as a legal jurisdic-
tion.-  Id., at 540.  Thus, Hamilton sought to narrow the
expansive Anti-Federalist reading of inherent judicial
equity power by demonstrating that the defined nature
of the English and colonial equity system-with its
specified claims and remedies-would continue to exist
under the federal judiciary.  In line with the prevailing
understanding of equity at the time, Hamilton described
Article III -equity- as a jurisdiction over certain types of
cases rather than as a broad remedial power.  Hamilton
merely repeated the well-known principle that equity
would be controlled no less by rules and practices than
was the common law.
  In light of this historical evidence, it should come as
no surprise that there is no early record of the exercise
of broad remedial powers.  Certainly there were no
-structural injunctions- issued by the federal courts, nor
were there any examples of continuing judicial supervi-
sion and management of governmental institutions.
Such exercises of judicial power would have appeared to
violate principles of state sovereignty and of the separa-
tion of powers as late in the day as the turn of the
century.  -Born out of the desegregation litigation in the
1950's and 1960's, suits for affirmative injunctions were
virtually unknown when the Court decided Ex parte
Young, [209 U. S. 123, 158 (1908).]-  Dwyer, Pendent
Jurisdiction and the Eleventh Amendment, 75 Cal. L.
Rev. 129, 162 (1987) (footnotes omitted).  Indeed, it
appears that the framers continued to follow English
equity practice well after the Ratification.  See, e.g.,
Robinson v. Campbell, 3 Wheat. 212, 221-223 (1818).
At the very least, given the Federalists' public explana-
tion during the ratification of the federal equity power,
we should exercise the power to impose equitable
remedies only sparingly, subject to clear rules guiding
its use.

                            C
  Two clear restraints on the use of the equity power-
federalism and the separation of powers-derive from
the very form of our Government.  Federal courts should
pause before using their inherent equitable powers to
intrude into the proper sphere of the States.  We have
long recognized that education is primarily a concern of
local authorities.  -[L]ocal autonomy of school districts is
a vital national tradition.-  Dayton Bd. of Ed. v. Brink-
man, 433 U. S. 406, 410 (1977); see also United States
v. Lopez, 514 U. S. ___, ___ (1995) (slip op., at 14)
(Kennedy, J., concurring); Milliken I, 418 U. S., at
741-742; San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodri-
guez, 411 U. S. 1, 50 (1973); ante, at 11 (O'Connor, J.,
concurring).  A structural reform decree eviscerates a
State's discretionary authority over its own program and
budgets and forces state officials to reallocate state
resources and funds to the desegregation plan at the
expense of other citizens, other government programs,
and other institutions not represented in court.  See
Dwyer, supra, at 163.  When District Courts seize
complete control over the schools, they strip state and
local governments of one of their most important
governmental responsibilities, and thus deny their
existence as independent governmental entities.
  Federal courts do not possess the capabilities of state
and local governments in addressing difficult educational
problems.  State and local school officials not only bear
the responsibility for educational decisions, they also are
better equipped than a single federal judge to make the
day-to-day policy, curricular, and funding choices
necessary to bring a school district into compliance with
the Constitution.  See Wright v. Council of City of
Emporia, 407 U. S. 451, 477-478 (1972) (Burger, C. J.,
dissenting).  Federal courts simply cannot gather
sufficient information to render an effective decree, have
limited resources to induce compliance, and cannot seek
political and public support for their remedies.  See
generally P. Schuck, Suing Government 150-181 (1983).
When we presume to have the institutional ability to set
effective educational, budgetary, or administrative policy,
we transform the least dangerous branch into the most
dangerous one.
  The separation of powers imposes additional restraints
on the judiciary's exercise of its remedial powers.  To be
sure, this is not a case of one branch of Government
encroaching on the prerogatives of another, but rather
of the power of the Federal Government over the States.
Nonetheless, what the federal courts cannot do at the
federal level they cannot do against the States; in either
case, Article III courts are constrained by the inherent
constitutional limitations on their powers.  There simply
are certain things that courts, in order to remain courts,
cannot and should not do.  There is no difference
between courts running school systems or prisons and
courts running executive branch agencies.
  In this case, not only did the district court exercise
the legislative power to tax, it also engaged in budget-
ing, staffing, and educational decisions, in judgments
about the location and aesthetic quality of the schools,
and in administrative oversight and monitoring.  These
functions involve a legislative or executive, rather than
a judicial, power.  See generally Jenkins I, 495 U. S., at
65-81 (Kennedy, J., concurring in part and concurring
in judgment); Nagel, Separation of Powers and the Scope
of Federal Equitable Remedies, 30 Stan. L. Rev. 661
(1978).  As Alexander Hamilton explained the limited
authority of the federal courts: -The courts must declare
the sense of the law; and if they should be disposed to
exercise WILL instead of JUDGMENT, the consequence
would equally be the substitution of their pleasure to
that of the legislative body.-  The Federalist No. 78, at
526.  Federal judges cannot make the fundamentally
political decisions as to which priorities are to receive
funds and staff, which educational goals are to be
sought, and which values are to be taught.  When
federal judges undertake such local, day-to-day tasks,
they detract from the independence and dignity of the
federal courts and intrude into areas in which they have
little expertise.  Cf. Mishkin, Federal Courts as State
Reformers, 35 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 949 (1978).
  It is perhaps not surprising that broad equitable
powers have crept into our jurisprudence, for they vest
judges with the discretion to escape the constraints and
dictates of the law and legal rules.  But I believe that
we must impose more precise standards and guidelines
on the federal equitable power, not only to restore
predictability to the law and reduce judicial discretion,
but also to ensure that constitutional remedies are
actually targeted toward those who have been injured.

                            D
  The dissent's approval of the District Court's treat-
ment of salary increases is typical of this Court's failure
to place limits on the equitable remedial power.  The
dissent frames the inquiry thus: -[t]he only issue, then,
is whether the salary increases ordered by the District
Court have been reasonably related towards achieving-
the goal of remedying a systemwide reduction in student
achievement, -keeping in mind the broad discretion
enjoyed by the District Court in exercising its equitable
powers.-  Post, at 18.  In response to its question, the
dissent concludes that -it is difficult to see how the
District Court abused its discretion- in either the 1992
or 1993 orders, post, at 19, and characterizes the lower
court's orders as -beyond reproach,- post, at 21.  When
the standard of review is as vague as whether -federal-
court decrees . . . directly address and relate to the
constitutional violation,- Milliken II, 433 U. S., at
281-282, it is difficult to ever find a remedial order
-unreasonable.-  Such criteria provide District Courts
with little guidance, and provide appellate courts few
principles with which to review trial court decisions.  If
the standard reduces to what one believes is a -fair-
remedy, or what vaguely appears to be a good -fit-
between violation and remedy, then there is little hope
of imposing the constraints on the equity power that the
framers envisioned and that our constitutional system
requires.
  Contrary to the dissent's conclusion, the District
Court's remedial orders are in tension with two common-
sense principles.  First, the District Court retained
jurisdiction over the implementation and modification of
the remedial decree, instead of terminating its involve-
ment after issuing its remedy.  Although briefly men-
tioned in Brown II as a temporary measure to overcome
local resistance to desegregation, 349 U. S., at 301
(-[d]uring this period of transition, the courts will retain
jurisdiction-), this concept of continuing judicial involve-
ment has permitted the District Courts to revise their
remedies constantly in order to reach some broad,
abstract, and often elusive goal.  Not only does this
approach deprive the parties of finality and a clear
understanding of their responsibilities, but it also tends
to inject the judiciary into the day-to-day management
of institutions and local policies-a function that lies
outside of our Article III competence.  Cf. Fuller, The
Forms and Limits of Adjudication, 92 Harv. L. Rev. 353
(1978).
  Much of the District Court's overreaching in this case
occurred because it employed this hit-or-miss method to
shape, and reshape, its remedial decree. Using its
authority of continuing jurisdiction, the Court pursued
its goal of decreasing -racial isolation- regardless of the
cost or of the difficulties of engineering demographic
changes.  Wherever possible, district courts should focus
their remedial discretion on devising and implementing
a unified remedy in a single decree.  This method would
still provide the lower courts with substantial flexibility
to tailor a remedy to fit a violation, and courts could
employ their contempt power to ensure compliance.  To
ensure that they do not overstep the boundaries of their
Article III powers, however, district courts should refrain
from exercising their authority in a manner that
supplants the proper sphere reserved to the political
branches, who have a coordinate duty to enforce the
Constitution's dictates, and to the States, whose author-
ity over schools we have long sought to preserve.  Only
by remaining aware of the limited nature of its remedial
powers, and by giving the respect due to other govern-
mental authorities, can the Judiciary ensure that its
desire to do good will not tempt it into abandoning its
limited role in our constitutional Government.
  Second, the District Court failed to target its equitable
remedies in this case specifically to cure the harm
suffered by the victims of segregation.  Of course, the
initial and most important aspect of any remedy will be
to eliminate any invidious racial distinctions in matters
such as student assignments, transportation, staff,
resource allocation, and activities.  This element of most
desegregation decrees is fairly straightforward and has
not produced many examples of overreaching by the
district courts.  It is the -compensatory- ingredient in
many desegregation plans that has produced many of
the difficulties in the case before us.
  Having found that segregation -has caused a system
wide reduction in student achievement in the schools of
the KCMSD,- 639 F. Supp., at 24, the District Court
ordered the series of magnet school plans, educational
programs, and capital improvements that the Court
criticizes today because of their interdistrict nature.  In
ordering these programs, the District Court exceeded its
authority by benefitting those who were not victims of
discriminatory conduct.  KCMSD as a whole may have
experienced reduced achievement levels, but raising the
test scores of the entire district is a goal that is not
sufficiently tailored to restoring the victims of segrega-
tion to the position they would have occupied absent
discrimination.  A school district cannot be discriminated
against on the basis of its race, because a school district
has no race.  It goes without saying that only individu-
als can suffer from discrimination, and only individuals
can receive the remedy.
  Of course, a district court may see fit to order neces-
sary remedies that have the side effect of benefitting
those who were not victims of segregation.  But the
court cannot order broad remedies that indiscriminately
benefit a school district as a whole, rather than the
individual students who suffered from discrimination.
Not only do such remedies tend to indicate -efforts to
achieve broader purposes lying beyond- the scope of the
violation, Swann, 402 U. S., at 22, but they also force
state and local governments to work toward the benefit
of those who have suffered no harm from their actions.
  To ensure that district courts do not embark on such
broad initiatives in the future, we should demand that
remedial decrees be more precisely designed to benefit
only those who have been victims of segregation.  Race-
conscious remedies for discrimination not only must
serve a compelling governmental interest (which is met
in desegregation cases), but also must be narrowly
tailored to further that interest.  See Richmond v. J. A.
Croson Co., 488 U. S. 469, 509-510 (1989) (plurality
opinion).  In the absence of special circumstances, the
remedy for de jure segregation ordinarily should not
include educational programs for students who were not
in school (or were even alive) during the period of
segregation.  Although I do not doubt that all KCMSD
students benefit from many of the initiatives ordered by
the court below, it is for the democratically accountable
state and local officials to decide whether they are to be
made available even to those who were never harmed by
segregation.

                           III
  This Court should never approve a State's efforts to
deny students, because of their race, an equal opportuni-
ty for an education.  But the federal courts also should
avoid using racial equality as a pretext for solving social
problems that do not violate the Constitution.  It seems
apparent to me that the District Court undertook the
worthy task of providing a quality education to the
children of KCMSD.  As far as I can tell, however, the
District Court sought to bring new funds and facilities
into the KCMSD by finding a constitutional violation on
the part of the State where there was none.  Federal
courts should not lightly assume that States have caused
-racial isolation- in 1984 by maintaining a segregated
school system in 1954.  We must forever put aside the
notion that simply because a school district today is
black, it must be educationally inferior.
  Even if segregation were present, we must remember
that a deserving end does not justify all possible means.
The desire to reform a school district, or any other
institution, cannot so captivate the Judiciary that it
forgets its constitutionally mandated role.  Usurpation of
the traditionally local control over education not only
takes the judiciary beyond its proper sphere, it also
deprives the States and their elected officials of their
constitutional powers.  At some point, we must recognize
that the judiciary is not omniscient, and that all
problems do not require a remedy of constitutional
proportions.