344
Stevens, J., dissenting
Court's holding must rest on its understanding of the legislative history. The history on which the Court relies includes no relevant comments in the Committee Reports or the debates. It consists only of the fact that prior to 1987 the statute directed the Attorney General to make the credit determination. See ante, at 331-332. It seems to me, however, that that smidgen of history merely raises the issue without answering it. The fact that Congress carefully re-wrote the relevant section in a way that makes the defendant's right significantly more valuable tends to support the conclusion that the changes in language were deliberate and should not be ignored. See Union Bank v. Wolas, 502 U. S. 151 (1991); United States Railroad Retirement Bd. v. Fritz, 449 U. S. 166, 179 (1980). Recognizing the district court's authority to enter an appropriate order at the conclusion of the sentencing hearing is entirely consistent with a congressional purpose to enhance the value of this right.
III
No statutory policy would be adversely affected by recognizing the district court's authority to make the initial credit determination in appropriate cases, and in fact, two important policies would be served. First, as the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has observed, see n. 10, supra, allowing the district court, in its discretion, to compute the credit when the sentence is imposed furthers the interest in providing prisoners with prompt, accurate, and precise information about the time they must spend in prison. This policy is expressly identified in the Senate Report describing
tute custody for purposes of credit; in Ramsey v. Brennan, 878 F. 2d 995, 996 (1989), the Seventh Circuit would not credit the time that Ramsey spent in a halfway house while awaiting trial, and in United States v. Woods, 888 F. 2d, at 656, the Tenth Circuit held that Woods was not entitled to credit for the time he spent at a residential treatment center when he was out on bond. In each of these cases, the issue was ripe for decision at the sentencing hearing.
Page: Index Previous 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007