Cite as: 508 U. S. 656 (1993)
O'Connor, J., dissenting
These precedents establish that, where a challenged statute is replaced with more narrowly drawn legislation pending our review, and the plaintiff seeks only prospective relief, we generally should decline to decide the case. The controversy with respect to the old statute is moot, because a declaration of its invalidity or an injunction against the law's future enforcement would not benefit the plaintiff. Where we cannot be sure how the statutory changes will affect the plaintiff's claims, dismissal avoids the possibility that our decision will prove advisory.
B
Like Diffenderfer, this case concerns a law that was repealed and replaced after this Court granted review. Petitioner's complaint requests only declaratory and injunctive relief from a set-aside ordinance that no longer exists. The Court acknowledges that Jacksonville's new ordinance is more narrowly drawn than the last. See ante, at 662 ("The new ordinance may disadvantage [petitioner's members] to a lesser degree than the old one"). But the majority believes that Diffenderfer and similar cases are inapposite because, in the majority's view, Jacksonville's new ordinance does not differ substantially from the one challenged in petitioner's complaint. See ante, at 662-663, n. 3. I cannot agree.
"The gravamen of petitioner's complaint," ante, at 662, as I read it, was that the original set-aside law violated the Equal Protection Clause for two reasons: The law "[lacked] an adequate factual basis," in that the city had not undertaken studies to determine whether past discrimination or its continuing effects made a preference program necessary, App. 15-17; and the ordinance "[was] not narrowly tailored to remedy any prior racial discrimination," because the program was not limited in time, the 10% set-aside figure was not rationally related to any relevant statistic, and preferences were awarded to groups against whom no discrimination ever had occurred in the city, id., at 17-18. The District Court invalidated the ordinance on the authority of Rich-
673
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