Cite as: 518 U. S. 187 (1996)
Stevens, J., dissenting
In my opinion the Courts of Appeals are undoubtedly correct.4
Our decision in Franklin v. Gwinnett County Public Schools, 503 U. S. 60 (1992), makes it equally clear that all traditional forms of relief, including damages, are available in a private action to enforce § 504. In Franklin we held that a plaintiff could seek monetary damages against a school system accused of violating her rights under Title IX. We canvassed the long history of the principle that "where legal rights have been invaded, and a federal statute provides for a general right to sue for such invasion, federal courts may use any available remedy to make good the wrong done." Bell v. Hood, 327 U. S. 678, 684 (1946). See Franklin, 503 U. S., at 65-71. Applying this rule to the implied cause of action in Title IX, we rejected the government's contention that "whatever the traditional presumption may have been when the Court decided Bell v. Hood, it has disappeared in succeeding decades." Id., at 68. From Franklin it follows ineluctably that the original version of § 504—enacted, it bears repeating, one year after Title IX—authorized a damages remedy for persons aggrieved by violations of the provision's discrimination ban.
II
Against this background, Congress passed legislation in 1978 to extend § 504's prohibition against discrimination on
grounds, 451 U. S. 390 (1981); Jennings v. Alexander, 715 F. 2d 1036, 1040- 1041 (CA6 1983), rev'd on other grounds sub nom. Alexander v. Choate, 469 U. S. 287 (1985); Lloyd v. Regional Transp. Auth., 548 F. 2d 1277, 1284-1287 (CA7 1977); Miener v. Missouri, 673 F. 2d 969, 973-974 (CA8), cert. denied, 459 U. S. 909 (1982); Kling v. County of Los Angeles, 633 F. 2d 876, 878 (CA9 1980), rev'd on other grounds, 474 U. S. 936 (1985); Pushkin v. Regents of the Univ. of Colo., 658 F. 2d 1372, 1376-1380 (CA10 1981); Jones v. Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Auth., 681 F. 2d 1376, 1377, n. 1 (CA11 1982), cert. denied, 465 U. S. 1099 (1984).
4 See Conference Report on the Rehabilitation Act Amendments of 1974, S. Rep. No. 93-1270, p. 27 (1974) (hereinafter Conference Report on 1974 Amendments) (noting that § 504 was intended to "permit a judicial remedy through a private action").
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