Missouri v. Jenkins, 515 U.S. 70, 104 (1995)

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96

MISSOURI v. JENKINS

Opinion of the Court

effect, there is no "careful delineation of the extent of the effect." ' . . . The district court thus dealt not only with the issue whether the SSDs were constitutional violators but also whether there were significant inter-district segregative effects. . . . When it did so, it made specific findings that negate current significant interdistrict effects, and concluded that the requirements of Milliken had not been met." Jenkins v. Missouri, 807 F. 2d 657, 672 (CA8 1986) (affirming, by an equally divided court, the District Court's findings and conclusion that there was no interdistrict violation or interdistrict effect) (en banc).9

In Freeman, we stated that "[t]he 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." 503 U. S., at 496. The record here does not support the District Court's reliance on "white flight" as a justification for a permissible expansion of its intradistrict remedial authority through its pursuit of desegregative attractiveness. See Milliken I, 418 U. S., at 746; see also Dayton Bd. of Ed. v. Brinkman, 433 U. S. 406, 417 (1977) (Dayton I).

Justice Souter claims that our holding effectively overrules Hills v. Gautreaux, 425 U. S. 284 (1976). See also Brief for American Civil Liberties Union et al. as Amici Curiae 18-20. In Gautreaux, the Federal Department of

9 Justice Souter construes the Court of Appeals' determination to mean that the violations by the State and the KCMSD did not cause segregation within the limits of each of the SSD's. Post, at 163-164. But the Court of Appeals would not have decided this question at the behest of these plaintiffs—present and future KCMSD students—who have no standing to challenge segregation within the confines of the SSD's. Cf. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U. S. 555, 560-561 (1992). Ergo, the Court of Appeals meant exactly what it said: the requirements of Milliken I had not been met because the District Court's specific findings "negate current significant interdistrict effects." Jenkins, 807 F. 2d, at 672.

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