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Opinion of the Court
istrative procedures squarely distinguish this case from Wright and Wilder, where an aggrieved individual lacked any federal review mechanism, see supra, at 280-281, and further counsel against our finding a congressional intent to create individually enforceable private rights.8
Congress finally provided that "[e]xcept for the conduct of hearings, none of the functions of the Secretary under this section shall be carried out in any of the regional offices" of the Department of Education. 20 U. S. C. § 1232g(g). This centralized review provision was added just four months after FERPA's enactment due to "concern that regionalizing the enforcement of [FERPA] may lead to multiple interpretations of it, and possibly work a hardship on parents, students, and institutions." 120 Cong. Rec. 39863 (1974) ( joint statement). Cf. Wright, 479 U. S., at 426 ("Congress' aim was to provide a decentralized . . . administrative process" (emphasis added; internal quotation marks omitted)). It is implausible to presume that the same Congress nonetheless intended private suits to be brought before thousands of federal- and state-court judges, which could only result in the sort of "multiple interpretations" the Act explicitly sought to avoid.
In sum, if Congress wishes to create new rights enforceable under § 1983, it must do so in clear and unambiguous terms—no less and no more than what is required for Congress to create new rights enforceable under an implied private right of action. FERPA's nondisclosure provisions contain no rights-creating language, they have an aggregate, not individual, focus, and they serve primarily to direct the Secretary of Education's distribution of public funds to educational institutions. They therefore create no rights enforceable under § 1983. Accordingly, the judgment of the
8 We need not determine whether FERPA's procedures are "sufficiently comprehensive" to offer an independent basis for precluding private enforcement, Middlesex County Sewerage Authority, 453 U. S., at 20, due to our finding that FERPA creates no private right to enforce.
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