396
Opinion of Souter, J.
rather on meeting the prerequisites of Rule 23 governing class actions." 1 H. Newberg & A. Conte, Newberg on Class Actions § 2.07, pp. 2-40 to 2-41 (3d ed. 1992).
See also 7B Wright & Miller § 1785.1, at 141 ("As long as the representative parties have a direct and substantial interest, they have standing; the question whether they may be allowed to present claims on behalf of others . . . depends not on standing, but on an assessment of typicality and adequacy of representation"). This analysis is confirmed by our treatment of standing when the case of a named class-action plaintiff protesting a durational residence requirement becomes moot during litigation because the requirement becomes satisfied; even then the question is not whether suit can proceed on the standing of some unnamed members of the class, but whether "the named representative [can continue] to 'fairly and adequately protect the interests of the class.' " Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U. S. 393, 403 (1975) (quoting Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23(a)).
Justice Scalia says that he is not applying a standing rule when he concludes (as I also do) that systemic relief is inappropriate here. Ante, at 360-361, n. 7. I accept his assurance. But he also makes it clear, by the same footnote, that he does not rest his conclusion (as I rest mine) solely on the failure to prove that in every Arizona prison, or even in many of them, the State denied court access to illiterate prisoners, a point on which I take it every Member of the Court agrees. Instead, he explains that a failure to prove that more than two illiterate prisoners suffered prejudice to nonfrivolous claims is (at least in part) the reason for reversal. Since he does not intend to be applying his standing rule in so saying, I assume he is applying a class-action rule (requiring a denial of classwide relief when trial evidence does not show the existence of a class of injured claimants). But that route is just as unnecessary and complicating as the route through standing. (Indeed, the distinction between standing and class-action rules might be practically irrele-
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