OCTOBER TERM, 1996
Syllabus
BLESSING, DIRECTOR, ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMIC SECURITY
v. FREESTONE ET AL.
CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH
CIRCUIT
No. 95-1441. Argued January 6, 1997-Decided April 21, 1997
Respondents, five Arizona mothers whose children are eligible
for state child support services under Title IV -D of the Social
Security Act, filed this 42 U. S. C. § 1983 suit against
petitioner, the director of the state child support agency,
claiming, among other things, that they properly applied for child
support services; that, despite their good faith efforts to
cooperate, the agency never took adequate steps to obtain child
support payments for them; that these omissions were largely
attributable to staff shortages and other structural defects in the
State's program; and that these systemic failures violated their
individual rights under Title IV-D to have all mandated services
delivered in substantial compliance with the title and its
implementing regulations. They requested broad relief, including a
declaratory judgment that the Arizona program's operation violates
Title IV -D provisions creating rights in them that are enforceable
through a § 1983 action, and an injunction requiring the director
to achieve substantial compliance with Title IV-D throughout all
programmatic operations. The District Court granted summary
judgment for petitioner, but the Ninth Circuit reversed. Without
distinguishing among the numerous provisions of the complex Title
IV-D program or the many rights those provisions might have
created, the latter court held that respondents had an enforceable
individual right to have the State achieve "substantial compliance"
with Title IV-D. It also disagreed with the District Court's
conclusion that Congress had foreclosed private Title IV-D
enforcement actions by authorizing the Secretary of Health and
Human Services (Secretary) to audit and cut off funds to States
whose programs do not substantially comply with Title IV-D's
requirements.
Held: Title IV-D does not give individuals a federal
right to force a state agency to substantially comply with Title
IV-D. Pp.340-349.
(a) A plaintiff seeking § 1983 redress must assert the violation
of a federal
right, not merely of federal
law. Golden
State Transit Corp. v.
Los Angeles, 493 U. S. 103, 106. Three
principal factors determine whether a statutory provision creates a
privately enforceable right: (1) whether the plaintiff is an
intended beneficiary of the statute; (2) whether the plaintiff's
asserted interests are not so vague and amor-
330
Syllabus
phous as to be beyond the competence of the judiciary to
enforce; and (3) whether the statute imposes a binding obligation
on the State. See,
e. g., Wilder v.
Virginia Hospital
Assn., 496 U. S.
498, 509. Even if a plaintiff demonstrates such a right,
however, there is only a rebuttable presumption that it is
enforceable under § 1983. Dismissal is proper if Congress
specifically foreclosed a § 1983 remedy,
Smith v.
Robinson, 468 U. S. 992, 1005, n. 9, 1003, either expressly,
by forbidding recourse to § 1983 in the statute itself, or
impliedly, by creating a comprehensive enforcement scheme that is
incompatible with individual § 1983 enforcement,
Livadas v.
Bradshaw, 512
U. S. 107, 133. pp. 340-341.
(b) Respondents have not established that Title IV-D gives them
individually enforceable federal rights. In prior cases, the Court
has been able to determine whether or not a statute created such
rights because the plaintiffs articulated, and lower courts
evaluated, welldefined claims. See,
e. g., Wright v.
Roanoke Redevelopment and Housing Authority, 479 U. S. 418, 430. Here,
respondents have not identified with particularity the rights they
claim, and the Ninth Circuit has not engaged in the requisite
methodical inquiry. That court erred in apparently holding that
individuals have an enforceable right to "substantial compliance"
with Title IV-D in all respects. The statutory "substantial
compliance" requirement, see,
e. g., 42 U. S. C. §
609(a)(8) (1994 ed., Supp. II), does not give rise to individual
rights; it was not intended to benefit individual children and
custodial parents, but is simply a yardstick for the Secretary to
measure the
systemwide performance of a State's Title IV-D
program, allowing her to increase the frequency of audits and
reduce the State's federal grant upon a finding of substantial
noncompliance. The Court of Appeals also erred in taking a blanket
approach to determining whether Title IV-D creates rights:
It is readily apparent that many of the provisions of that
multifaceted statutory scheme, including its "substantial
compliance" standard and data processing, staffing, and
organizational requirements, do not fit any of the traditional
criteria for identifying statutory rights. Although this Court does
not foreclose the possibility that some Title IV-D provisions give
rise to individual rights, the Ninth Circuit did not separate out
the particular rights it believed arise from the statutory scheme,
the complaint is less than clear in this regard, and it is not
certain whether respondents sought any relief more specific than a
declaration that their "rights" were being violated and an
injunction forcing petitioner to "substantially comply" with all of
Title IV-D's provisions. This defect is best addressed by sending
the case back for the District Court to construe the complaint in
the first instance, in order to determine exactly what rights,
considered in their most concrete, specific form, respondents are
asserting. Only by manageably breaking down the
331
complaint into specific allegations can the District Court
proceed to determine whether any specific claim asserts an
individual federal right. Pp. 341-346.
(c) Petitioner's argument that Title IV-D's remedial scheme is
sufficiently comprehensive to demonstrate congressional intent to
preclude § 1983 suits is rejected. Petitioner does not claim that
any Title IV-D provision expressly curtails § 1983 actions, and she
has failed to make the difficult showing that allowing such actions
to go forward in these circumstances would be inconsistent with
Congress' carefully tailored scheme. That scheme is far more
limited than those at issue in
Middlesex County Sewerage
Authority v.
National Sea Clammers Assn., 453 U. S. 1,
and
Smith v.
Robinson, 468 U. S. 992, the only
cases in which the Court has found preclusion; in particular, Title
IV-D contains no private remedy-either judicial or
administrative-through which aggrieved persons can seek redress.
The only way that Title IV -D assures that States live up to their
child support plans is through the Secretary's oversight, but the
Secretary's limited powers to audit and cut federal funding are not
comprehensive enough to foreclose § 1983 liability. Pp.
346-348.
68 F.3d
1141, vacated and remanded.
O'CONNOR, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.
SCALIA, J., filed a concurring opinion, in which KENNEDY, J.,
joined,
post, p. 349.
C.
Tim Delaney, Solicitor General of Arizona, argued the
cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs were
Grant
Woods, Attorney General,
Carter G.
Phillips, Richard
D. Bernstein, and
Adam D. Hirsh.
Marsha S.
Berzon argued the cause and filed a
brief for respondents.
Patricia A. Millett argued the cause for the United States as
amicus curiae urging affirmance. With her on the brief were Acting
Solicitor General Dellinger, Assistant Attorney General Hunger,
Deputy Solicitor General Kneedler, William Kanter, and Alfred
Mollin.
*
*Briefs of
amici curiae urging reversal were filed for
the State of Illinois et al. by
James E. Ryan, Attorney
General of Illinois,
Barbara A. Preiner, Solicitor General,
and
James C.
O'Connell, Barbara L. Greenspan, and
James C.
Stevens, Special Assistant Attorneys
General, and
Charles F. C.
Ruff, Corporation Counsel
of the District of Columbia, and
332
JUSTICE O'CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court. This case
concerns a lawsuit brought by five mothers in Arizona whose
children are eligible to receive child support services from the
State pursuant to Title IV -D of the Social Security Act, as added,
88 Stat. 2351, and as amended, 42 U. S. C. §§ 651-669b (1994 ed.
and Supp. II). These custodial parents sued the director of
Arizona's child support agency
by the Attorneys General for their respective jurisdictions as
follows: Jeff Sessions of Alabama, Bruce M. Botelho of Alaska,
Daniel E. Lungren of California, Gale A. Norton of Colorado,
Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, M. Jane Brady of Delaware,
Robert A. Butterworth of Florida, Michael
J. Bowers of
Georgia, Margery S. Bronster of Hawaii, Alan G. Lance of Idaho,
Pamela S. Carter of Indiana, Thomas
J. Miller of Iowa, Carla
J. Stovall of Kansas, Richard P. Ieyoub of Louisiana, Andrew
Ketterer of Maine,
J. Joseph Curran, Jr., of Maryland, Scott
Harshbarger of Massachusetts, Frank
J. Kelley of Michigan,
Mike Moore of Mississippi, Joseph P. Mazurek of Montana, Don
Stenberg of Nebraska, Frankie Sue Del Papa of Nevada, Jeffrey R.
Howard of New Hampshire, Peter Verniero of New Jersey, Dennis C.
Vacco of New York, Michael F. Easley of North Carolina, Heidi
Heitkamp of North Dakota, Betty D. Montgomery of Ohio, W A. Drew
Edmondson of Oklahoma, Theodore R. Kulongoski of Oregon, Thomas W
Corbett, Jr., of Pennsylvania, Jeffrey B. Pine of Rhode Island,
Charles Molony Condon of South Carolina, Mark Barnett of South
Dakota, Charles W Burson of Tennessee, Dan Morales of Texas, Jan
Graham of Utah, Jeffrey L. Amestoy of Vermont, James S. Gilmore III
of Virginia, Christine Q Gregoire of Washington, William U. Hill of
Wyoming, Malaetasi M. Togafau of American Samoa, Calvin E.
Holloway, Sr., of Guam, and Julio A. Brady of the Virgin Islands;
for the American Public Welfare Association et al. by Diana L.
Fogle; for the Council of State Governments et al. by Richard Ruda
and Charles Rothfeld; and for the National District Attorneys
Association et al. by John D. Krisor, Jr., John Kaye, Michael R.
Capizi, John Ladenburg, and Michael McCormick.
Briefs of
amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for
the American Civil Liberties Union et al. by
Christopher A.
Hansen, Steven R. Shapiro, and
Erwin Chemerinsky; for
the Anti-Poverty Project of the Edwin F. Mandel Legal Aid Clinic of
the University of Chicago Law School by
Gary H. Palm; for
the National Center for Youth Law et al. by
Leora Gershenzon,
Martha Matthews, and
Brian Paddock; and for the National
Women's Law Center et al. by
Regina G.
Maloney, Nancy
Duff Campbell, Elisabeth Hirschhorn Donahue, and
Martha
F.
Davis.
333
under Rev. Stat. § 1979, 42 U. S. C. § 1983, claiming that they
had an enforceable individual right to have the State's program
achieve "substantial compliance" with the requirements of Title
IV-D. Without distinguishing among the numerous provisions of this
complex program, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held
that respondents had such a right. We disagree that the statutory
scheme can be analyzed so generally, and hold that Title IV -D does
not give individuals a federal right to force a state agency to
substantially comply with Title IV-D. Accordingly, we vacate and
remand with instructions to remand to the District Court.
I
This controversy concerns an interlocking set of cooperative
federal-state welfare programs. Arizona participates in the federal
Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program, which
provides subsistence welfare benefits to needy families. Social
Security Act, Title IV-A, 42 U. S. C. §§ 601-617. To qualify for
federal AFDC funds, the State must certify that it will operate a
child support enforcement program that conforms with the numerous
requirements set forth in Title IV -D of the Social Security Act,
42 U. S. C. §§ 651-669b (1994 ed. and Supp. II),1 and will do so
pursuant to a detailed plan that has been approved by the Secretary
of Health and Human Services (Secretary). § 602(a)(2); see also §
652(a)(3). The Federal Government underwrites roughly two-thirds of
the cost of the State's child support efforts. § 655(a). But the
State must do more than simply collect overdue support payments; it
must also establish a comprehensive system to establish
paternity,
1 After the Court of Appeals rendered its decision, Congress
amended Title IV-D in the Personal Responsibility and Work
Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, Pub. L. 104-193, 110 Stat.
2105. Except where otherwise noted, we refer to the amended version
of Title IV-D throughout this opinion.
334
locate absent parents, and help families obtain support orders.
§§ 651, 654.
A State must provide these services free of charge to AFDC
recipients and, when requested, for a nominal fee to children and
custodial parents who are not receiving AFDC payments. §§ 651,
654(4). AFDC recipients must assign their child support rights to
the State and fully cooperate with the State's efforts to establish
paternity and obtain support payments. Although the State may keep
most of the support payments that it collects on behalf of AFDC
families in order to offset the costs of providing welfare
benefits, until recently it only had to distribute the first $50 of
each payment to the family. 42 U. S. C. § 657(b)(1). The amended
version of Title IV -D replaces this $50 pass-through with more
generous distributions to families once they leave welfare. 42 U.
S. C. § 657(a)(2) (1994 ed., Supp. II). NonAFDC recipients who
request the State's aid are entitled to have all collected funds
passed through. § 657(a)(3). In all cases, the State must
distribute the family's share of collected support payments within
two business days after receipt. § 654b(c)(1).
The structure of each State's Title IV-D agency, like the
services it provides, must conform to federal guidelines. For
example, States must create separate units to administer the plan,
§ 654(3), and to disburse collected funds, § 654(27), each of which
must be staffed at levels set by the Secretary, 45 CFR § 303.20
(1995). If a State delegates its disbursement function to local
governments, it must reward the most efficient local agencies with
a share of federal incentive payments. 42 U. S. C. § 654(22). To
maintain detailed records of all pending cases, as well as to
generate the various reports required by federal authorities,
States must set up computer systems that meet numerous federal
specifications. § 654a. Finally, in addition to setting up this
administrative framework, each participating
335
State must enact laws designed to streamline paternity and child
support actions. §§ 654(20), 666.
To oversee this complex federal-state enterprise, Congress
created the Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) within the
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). This agency is
charged with auditing the States' compliance with their federally
approved plans. Audits must occur at least once every three years,
or more often if a State's performance falls below certain
standards. § 652(a)(4). If a State does not "substantially comply"
with the requirements of Title IV -D, the Secretary is authorized
to penalize the State by reducing its AFDC grant by up to five
percent. § 609(a)(8). The Secretary has interpreted "substantial
compliance" as: (a) full compliance with requirements that services
be offered statewide and that certain recipients be notified
monthly of the support collected, as well as with reporting,
recordkeeping, and accounting rules; (b) 90 percent compliance with
case opening and case closure criteria; and (c) 75 percent
compliance with most remaining program requirements. 45 CFR §
305.20 (1995). The Secretary may suspend a penalty if the State
implements an adequate corrective action plan, and if the program
achieves "substantial compliance," she may rescind the penalty
entirely. 42 U. S. C. § 609(c) (1994 ed., Supp. II).
II
Arizona's record of enforcing child support obligations is less
than stellar, particularly compared with those of other States. In
a 1992 report, Arizona's Auditor General chronicled many of the
State's problems. In the 1989-1990 fiscal year, Arizona failed to
collect enough child support payments and federal incentives to
cover the administrative costs of its Title IV-D program-1 of only
10 States to fall below that target. Arizona Auditor General, A
Performance Audit of the Arizona Department of Economic Security 2
(1992). The Auditor General also pointed out that the cost
effectiveness
336
of Arizona's support enforcement efforts had been "minimal." For
every dollar spent on enforcement, the State collected barely two
dollars-almost half the nationwide average.
Ibid. In 1992,
nearly three-quarters of Arizona's 275,000 child support cases were
still in the earliest stages of the enforcement process. In 42
percent of all cases, paternity had yet to be established. In a
further 29 percent, the absent parent had been identified but his
or her whereabouts were unknown.
Id., at 12. Overall, the
Auditor General found that Arizona "obtains regular child support
payments for fewer than five percent of the parents it serves."
Id., at 9.
Federal audits by OCSE have also identified shortcomings in
Arizona's child support system. In several reviews of the State's
performance from 1984 to 1989, the Secretary found that Arizona had
not substantially complied with significant program requirements,
and she repeatedly penalized the State one percent of its AFDC
grant. The State developed a corrective action plan after each
failed audit, which prompted the Secretary to suspend and-in every
instance but one-waive the one-percent reduction in Arizona's AFDC
funding.2
2 For the deficiencies in Arizona's child support enforcement
system, see principally OCSE, Audit Division Report No. AZ-85-PR,
Program Results Audit of the State of Arizona Child Support
Enforcement Program, October 1, 1984-September 30, 1985 (June 25,
1987); OCSE, Audit Division Report No. AZ-86-PR/PM, Program
Results/Performance Measurements Audit, State of Arizona, Child
Support Enforcement Program, October 1, 1985-September 30, 1986
(June 9, 1989); OCSE, Audit Division Report No. AZ-90-AA,
Comprehensive Annual Audit, State of Arizona (Sept. 30, 1991)
(covering calendar year 1989). Arizona eventually achieved
substantial compliance in each category found deficient in these
audits, although not always in a timely manner. See,
e.
g., Letter from Jo Anne B. Barnhart, Assistant Secretary for
Children and Families, Dept. of HHS, to Linda Moore-Cannon,
Director, Arizona Dept. of Economic Security (Mar. 2, 1992)
(reducing Arizona's AFDC funding by one percent for the period
between July 1, 1988, and December 31, 1988, due to the State's
failure to implement its Parent Locator Service in conformity with
its corrective action plan).
337
Respondents are five Arizona mothers (some of whom receive AFDC
benefits) whose children are eligible for Title IV -D child support
services. They filed this lawsuit in the United States District
Court for the District of Arizona against the Director of the
Arizona Department of Economic Security, the state agency charged
with providing child support services under Title IV-D. In a
lengthy complaint, respondents claimed that they had properly
applied for child support services but that, despite their good
faith efforts to cooperate, the agency never took adequate steps to
obtain child support payments from the fathers of their children.
These omissions, respondents contended, were largely attributable
to structural defects in the State's child support efforts: staff
shortages, high caseloads, unmanageable backlogs, and deficiencies
in the State's accounting methods and recordkeeping. App. 11,
14-16. Respondents sought to represent a class of all children and
custodial parents residing in Arizona who are or will be entitled
to Title IV-D services.
Respondents claimed that the State's systemic failures violated
their federal rights under Title IV-D. Invoking 42 U. S. C. § 1983,
they asked the District Court to grant them the following broad
relief:
"Enter a declaratory judgment determining that operation of the
Arizona Title IV -D program violates controlling, substantive
provisions of federal law creating rights in plaintiffs and the
class enforceable through an action permitted by 42 U. S. C. §
1983.
"Grant permanent (and as necessary and appropriate,
interlocutory) injunctions prohibiting continued adherence to the
aforesaid pattern and practices and requiring affirmative measures
sufficient to achieve as well as sustain substantial compliance
with federal law, throughout all programmatic operations at issue."
App. 42.
The Director immediately moved to dismiss the complaint on
several grounds, arguing primarily that Title IV-D cre-
338
ates no individual rights enforceable under § 1983. The District
Court treated this motion as one for summary judgment and ruled in
favor of the Director. Relying primarily on a decision of the Court
of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit,
Carelli v.
Howser,
923 F.2d
1208 (1991), the District Court held that Congress had
foreclosed private actions to enforce Title IV -D by authorizing
the Secretary to audit and cut off funds to States with programs
that do not substantially comply with Title IV-D's
requirements.
A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
reversed.
68 F.3d
1141 (1995). The majority identified the three principal
factors this Court has used to determine whether a statute creates
a privately enforceable right: whether the plaintiff is one of the
"intended beneficiaries of the statute," whether the plaintiffs'
asserted interests are not so "'vague and amorphous' as to be
'beyond the competence of the judiciary to enforce,'" and whether
the statute imposes a binding obligation on the State.
Id.,
at 1147 (quoting
Wilder v.
Virginia Hospital Assn.,
496 U. S. 498,
509 (1990)). Title IV-D, the Court of Appeals held, satisfied each
of these criteria. First, "needy families with children" were the
intended beneficiaries of Title IV-D. 68 F. 3d, at 1150. Second,
the majority held that the "plaintiffs' asserted interest is not
vague or amorphous, and it is sufficiently concrete to be
judicially enforceable" because whether a State delivers the
services required by Title IV-D "to the degree required by law is
judicially ascertainable."
Id., at 1149-1150. Finally, the
Court of Appeals stated that the statute imposes binding
obligations because a State must satisfy each of the requirements
spelled out in Title IV-D in order to receive AFDC funding.
Although the majority acknowledged that the requirement that a
State remain in "substantial compliance" with its plan might seem
ambiguous when divorced from context, the majority believed that
the "highly detailed requirements" of the statute and its
imple-
339
menting regulations adequately notified the State of the extent
of its duties.
Id., at 1148. Moreover, the Court of Appeals
noted that "the statute ... sets forth detailed criteria for
measuring compliance with the statute," for example, generally
requiring States to establish paternity in a given percentage of
all cases.
Id., at 1149 (citing 42 U. S. C. § 652(g)).
Accordingly, the Court of Appeals concluded that respondents could
sue petitioner under § 1983 to bring Arizona's child support
enforcement program into substantial compliance with federal law.
68 F. 3d, at 1150.
The Court of Appeals also disagreed with the District Court's
conclusion that Congress had implicitly foreclosed an individual
remedy under § 1983 for violations of Title IV-D. The majority
noted that Title IV -D includes no provisions for judicial
enforcement that might supplant the § 1983 remedy.
Id., at
1153. Instead, the law simply gave the Secretary administrative
oversight powers that were virtually indiscernible from those we
had found insufficient to displace § 1983 liability in
Wright v.
Roanoke Redevelopment and Housing
Authority, 479 U.
S. 418 (1987). The majority expressed no opinion as to the
appropriateness of either injunctive or declaratory relief, and
left that question for the District Court to answer in the first
instance. 68 F. 3d, at 1156.
Judge Kleinfeld dissented, arguing that Congress placed the
power to enforce Title IV -D exclusively in the hands of the
Secretary. He contended that the "'substantial compliance' standard
does not 'unambiguously confer' enforceable rights on any
individual."
Id., at 1157. At most, Title IV -D called upon
States "to try pretty hard, and do a pretty good job, of enforcing
child support, and come up with a plan to try harder if the
Secretary thinks they have not been trying hard enough."
Ibid.
We granted certiorari to resolve disagreement among the Courts
of Appeals as to whether individuals may sue state
340
officials under § 1983 for violations of Title IV _D.3 517 U. S.
1186 (1996).
III
Section 1983 imposes liability on anyone who, under color of
state law, deprives a person "of any rights, privileges, or
immunities secured by the Constitution and laws." We have held that
this provision safeguards certain rights conferred by federal
statutes.
Maine v.
Thiboutot, 448 U. S. 1 (1980). In
order to seek redress through § 1983, however, a plaintiff must
assert the violation of a federal
right, not merely a
violation of federal
law. Golden State Transit Corp. v.
Los Angeles, 493 U. S. 103, 106
(1989). We have traditionally looked at three factors when
determining whether a particular statutory provision gives rise to
a federal right. First, Congress must have intended that the
provision in question benefit the plaintiff.
Wright, 479 U.
S., at 430. Second, the plaintiff must demonstrate that the right
assertedly protected by the statute is not so "vague and amorphous"
that
3 Compare
Wehunt v.
Ledbetter, 875 F.2d
1558 (CA111989) (holding that Title IV -D was not
enacted for the especial benefit of AFDC families, and so it does
not create enforceable rights under § 1983), cert. denied, 494 U.
S. 1027 (1990), with
Carelli v.
Howser, 923 F.2d
1208 (CA6 1991) (holding that Title IV-D creates rights
that are enforceable under § 1983, but that the Secretary's
oversight power forecloses a § 1983 remedy), with
Albiston v.
Maine Comm'r of Human Servs.,
7 F.3d
258 (CA11993) (holding that AFDC recipients have an
enforceable right to prompt disbursement of their child support
payments under Title IV-D), and with
Howe v.
Ellenbecker, 8 F.3d
1258 (CA8 1993) (holding that Title IV-D creates rights
that are enforceable under § 1983), cert. denied, 511 U. S. 1005
(1994).
Petitioner makes two further arguments in her briefs on the
merits.
She first contends that the Eleventh Amendment strips federal
courts of jurisdiction over a § 1983 cause of action against state
officials to enforce Title IV-D. Next, she asks us to overrule
Maine v.
Thiboutot, 448 U. S. 1 (1980), where
we held that § 1983 provides a remedy for violations of federal
statutes. We decline to address these questions which were neither
raised nor decided below, and were not presented in the petition
for certiorari. This Court's Rule 14.1(a).
341
its enforcement would strain judicial competence.
Id., at
431-432. Third, the statute must unambiguously impose a binding
obligation on the States. In other words, the provision giving rise
to the asserted right must be couched in mandatory, rather than
precatory, terms.
Wilder, supra, at 510-511; see also
Pennhurst State School and Hospital v.
Halderman,
451 U. S. 1, 17
(1981) (discussing whether Congress created obligations giving rise
to an implied cause of action).
Even if a plaintiff demonstrates that a federal statute creates
an individual right, there is only a rebuttable presumption that
the right is enforceable under § 1983. Because our inquiry focuses
on congressional intent, dismissal is proper if Congress
"specifically foreclosed a remedy under § 1983."
Smith v.
Robinson, 468
U. S. 992, 1005, n. 9 (1984). Congress may do so expressly, by
forbidding recourse to § 1983 in the statute itself, or impliedly,
by creating a comprehensive enforcement scheme that is incompatible
with individual enforcement under § 1983.
Livadas v.
Bradshaw, 512
U. S. 107, 133 (1994).
A
With these principles in mind, we turn first to the question
whether respondents have established that Title IV -D gives them
federal rights.
In their complaint, respondents argued that federal law granted
them "individual rights to all mandated services delivered in
substantial compliance with Title IV -D and its implementing
regulations." App. 41. They sought a broad injunction requiring the
Director of Arizona's child support agency to achieve "substantial
compliance ... throughout all programmatic operations."
Id.,
at 42. Attributing the deficiencies in the State's program
primarily to staff shortages and other structural defects,
respondents essentially invited the District Court to oversee every
aspect of Arizona's Title IV-D program.
342
Without distinguishing among the numerous rights that might have
been created by this federally funded welfare program, the Court of
Appeals agreed in sweeping terms that "Title IV -D creates
enforceable rights in families in need of Title IV -D services." 68
F. 3d, at 1150. The Court of Appeals did not specify exactly which
"rights" it was purporting to recognize, but it apparently believed
that federal law gave respondents the right to have the State
substantially comply with Title IV-D in all respects. We
disagree.
As an initial matter, the lower court's holding that Title IV -D
"creates enforceable rights" paints with too broad a brush. It was
incumbent upon respondents to identify with particularity the
rights they claimed, since it is impossible to determine whether
Title IV -D, as an undifferentiated whole, gives rise to undefined
"rights." Only when the complaint is broken down into manageable
analytic bites can a court ascertain whether each separate claim
satisfies the various criteria we have set forth for determining
whether a federal statute creates rights. See,
e. g., Golden
State, supra, at 106 (asking whether the "provision in
question" was designed to benefit the plaintiff).
In prior cases, we have been able to determine whether or not a
statute created a given right because the plaintiffs articulated,
and lower courts evaluated, well-defined claims. In
Wright,
for example, we held that tenants of public housing projects had a
right to have their utility costs included within a rental payment
that did not exceed 30 percent of their income. We did not ask
whether the federal housing legislation generally gave rise to
rights; rather, we focused our analysis on a specific statutory
provision limiting "rent" to 30 percent of a tenant's income. 479
U. S., at 430. Similarly, in
Wilder, we held that health
care providers had an enforceable right to reimbursement at
"reasonable and adequate rates" as required by a particular
provision in the Medicaid statute. 496 U. S., at 511-512. And in
Suter v.
Artist M., 503 U. S. 347 (1992),
where we held that Title
343
IV-E of the Social Security Act did not give the plaintiffs the
right that they asserted, we again analyzed the claim in very
specific terms: whether children had a right to have state
authorities undertake "reasonable efforts to prevent removal of
children from their homes and to facilitate reunification of
families where removal had occurred."
Id., at 352 (footnote
omitted). Finally, in
Livadas, supra, at 134, we discerned
in the structure of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) the
very specific right of employees "to complete the
collective-bargaining process and agree to an arbitration clause."
See 512 U. S., at 133, n. 27 (explaining that whether a claim
founded on the NLRA is cognizable under § 1983 may depend on
whether the claim stems from abridgment of a "protected individual
interest"). We did not simply ask whether the NLRA created
unspecified "rights."
The Court of Appeals did not engage in such a methodical
inquiry. As best we can tell, the Court of Appeals seemed to think
that respondents had a right to require the Director of Arizona's
child support agency to bring the State's program into substantial
compliance with Title IV-D. But the requirement that a State
operate its child support program in "substantial compliance" with
Title IV -D was not intended to benefit individual children and
custodial parents, and therefore it does not constitute a federal
right. Far from creating an
individual entitlement to
services, the standard is simply a yardstick for the Secretary to
measure the
systemwide performance of a State's Title IV -D
program. Thus, the Secretary must look to the aggregate services
provided by the State, not to whether the needs of any particular
person have been satisfied. A State substantially complies with
Title IV -D when it provides most mandated services (such as
enforcement of support obligations) in only 75 percent of the cases
reviewed during the federal audit period. 45 CFR §
305.20(a)(3)(iii) (1995). States must aim to establish paternity in
90 percent of all eligible cases, but may satisfy considerably
lower targets so long as their
344
efforts are steadily improving. 42 U. S. C. § 652(g). It is
clear, then, that even when a State is in "substantial compliance"
with Title IV -D, any individual plaintiff might still be among the
10 or 25 percent of persons whose needs ultimately go unmet.
Moreover, even upon a finding of substantial noncompliance, the
Secretary can merely reduce the State's AFDC grant by up to five
percent; she cannot, by force of her own authority, command the
State to take any particular action or to provide any services to
certain individuals. In short, the substantial compliance standard
is designed simply to trigger penalty provisions that increase the
frequency of audits and reduce the State's AFDC grant by a maximum
of five percent. As such, it does not give rise to individual
rights.
The Court of Appeals erred not only in finding that individuals
have an enforceable right to substantial compliance, but also in
taking a blanket approach to determining whether Title IV -D
creates rights. It is readily apparent that many other provisions
of that multifaceted statutory scheme do not fit our traditional
three criteria for identifying statutory rights. To begin with,
many provisions, like the "substantial compliance" standard, are
designed only to guide the State in structuring its systemwide
efforts at enforcing support obligations. These provisions may
ultimately benefit individuals who are eligible for Title IV-D
services, but only indirectly. For example, Title IV-D lays out
detailed requirements for the State's data processing system. Among
other things, this system must sort information into standardized
data elements specified by the Secretary; transmit information
electronically to the State's AFDC system to monitor family
eligibility for financial assistance; maintain the data necessary
to meet federal reporting requirements; and provide for the
electronic transfer of funds for purposes of income withholding and
interstate collections. 42 U. S. C. § 654a (1994 ed., Supp. II); 45
CFR § 307.10 (1995). Obviously, these complex standards do not
345
give rise to individualized rights to computer services. They
are simply intended to improve the overall efficiency of the
States' child support enforcement scheme.
The same reasoning applies to the staffing levels of the state
agency, which respondents seem to claim are inadequate. App. 11
(Complaint' 39) (alleging that delays in case processing are
attributable to "extraordinary staff shortages, inordinately high
caseloads and unmanageable backlogs"). Title IV -D generally
requires each participating State to establish a separate child
support enforcement unit "which meets such staffing and
organizational requirements as the Secretary may by regulation
prescribe." 42 U. S. C. § 654(3). The regulations, in turn, simply
provide that each level of the State's organization must have
"sufficient staff" to fulfill specified functions. These mandates
do not, however, give rise to federal rights. For one thing, the
link between increased staffing and the services provided to any
particular individual is far too tenuous to support the notion that
Congress meant to give each and every Arizonan who is eligible for
Title IV -D the right to have the State Department of Economic
Security staffed at a "sufficient" level. Furthermore, neither the
statute nor the regulation gives any guidance as to how large a
staff would be "sufficient." Cf.
Suter, 503 U. S., at 360
(finding requirement of "reasonable efforts" unenforceable where
there was "[n]o further statutory guidance ... as to how
'reasonable efforts' are to be measured"). Enforcement of such an
undefined standard would certainly "strain judicial competence."
Livadas, 512 U. S., at 132.
We do not foreclose the possibility that some provisions of
Title IV -D give rise to individual rights. The lower court did not
separate out the particular rights it believed arise from the
statutory scheme, and we think the complaint is less than clear in
this regard. For example, respondent Madrid alleged that the state
agency managed to collect some support payments from her ex-husband
but failed to pass
346
through the first $50 of each payment, to which she was
purportedly entitled under the pre-1996 version of § 657(b)(1).
App. 13 (Complaint , 48). Although § 657 may give her a federal
right to receive a specified portion of the money collected on her
behalf by Arizona, she did not explicitly request such relief in
the complaint.
In any event, it is not at all apparent that respondents sought
any relief more specific than a declaration that their "rights"
were being violated and an injunction forcing Arizona's child
support agency to "substantially comply" with all of the provisions
of Title IV-D. We think that this defect is best addressed by
sending the case back for the District Court to construe the
complaint in the first instance, in order to determine exactly what
rights, considered in their most concrete, specific form,
respondents are asserting. Only by manageably breaking down the
complaint into specific allegations can the District Court proceed
to determine whether any specific claim asserts an individual
federal right.
B
Because we leave open the possibility that Title IV -D may give
rise to some individually enforceable rights, we pause to consider
petitioner's final argument that no remand is warranted because the
statute contains "a remedial scheme that is 'sufficiently
comprehensive ... to demonstrate congressional intent to preclude
the remedy of suits under § 1983.'"
Wilder, 496 U. S., at
521 (quoting
Middlesex County Sewerage Authority v.
National Sea Clammers Assn., 453 U. S. 1, 20 (1981)).
Because petitioner does not claim that any provision of Title IV -D
expressly curtails § 1983 actions, she must make the difficult
showing that allowing § 1983 actions to go forward in these
circumstances "would be inconsistent with Congress' carefully
tailored scheme."
Golden State, 493 U. S., at 107 (citation
and internal quotation marks omitted).
347
Only twice have we found a remedial scheme sufficiently
comprehensive to supplant § 1983: in
Sea Clammers, supra,
and
Smith v.
Robinson, 468 U. S. 992 (1984). In
Sea Clammers, we focused on the "unusually elaborate
enforcement provisions" of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act,
which placed at the disposal of the Environmental Protection Agency
a panoply of enforcement options, including noncompliance orders,
civil suits, and criminal penalties. 453 U. S., at 13. We
emphasized that several provisions of the Act authorized private
persons to initiate enforcement actions.
Id., at 14, 20. We
found it "hard to believe that Congress intended to preserve the §
1983 right of action when it created so many specific statutory
remedies, including the two citizen-suit provisions."
Id.,
at 20. Likewise, in
Smith, the review scheme in the
Education of the Handicapped Act permitted aggrieved individuals to
invoke "carefully tailored" local administrative procedures
followed by federal judicial review. 468 U. S., at 1009. We
reasoned that Congress could not possibly have wanted parents to
skip these procedures and go straight to court by way of § 1983,
since that would have "render[ed] superfluous most of the detailed
procedural protections outlined in the statute."
Id., at
lOll.
We have also stressed that a plaintiff's ability to invoke §
1983 cannot be defeated simply by "[t]he availability of
administrative mechanisms to protect the plaintiff's interests."
Golden State, supra, at 106. Thus, in
Wright, we
rejected the argument that the Secretary of Housing and Urban
Development's "generalized powers" to audit local public housing
authorities, to enforce annual contributions contracts, and to cut
off federal funding demonstrated a congressional intention to
prevent public housing tenants from using § 1983 to enforce their
rights under the federal Housing Act. 479 U. S., at 428. We reached
much the same conclusion in
Wilder, where the Secretary of
Health and Human Services
348
had power to reject state Medicaid plans or to withhold federal
funding to States whose plans did not comply with federallaw. 496
U. S., at 521. Even though in both cases these oversight powers
were accompanied by limited state grievance procedures for
individuals, we found that § 1983 was still available.
Wright,
supra, at 427-428;
Wilder, supra, at 523.
The enforcement scheme that Congress created in Title IV -D is
far more limited than those in
Sea Clammers and
Smith. Unlike the federal programs at issue in those cases,
Title IV -D contains no private remedy-either judicial or
administrative-through which aggrieved persons can seek redress.
The only way that Title IV -D assures that States live up to their
child support plans is through the Secretary's oversight. The
Secretary can audit only for "substantial compliance" on a
programmatic basis. Furthermore, up to 25 percent of eligible
children and custodial parents can go without most of the services
enumerated in Title IV -D before the Secretary can trim a State's
AFDC grant. These limited powers to audit and cut federal funding
closely resemble those powers at issue in
Wilder and
Wright. Although counsel for the Secretary suggested at oral
argument that the Secretary "has the same right under a contract as
any other party to seek specific performance," Tr. of Oral Arg. 49,
this possibility was not developed in the briefs. Even assuming the
Secretary's authority to sue for specific performance, Title IV-D's
administrative enforcement arsenal would not compare to those in
Sea Clammers and
Smith, especially if, as the
Government further contended, see Tr. of Oral Arg. 49-50, no
private actor would have standing to force the Secretary to bring
suit for specific performance. To the extent that Title IV -D may
give rise to individual rights, therefore, we agree with the Court
of Appeals that the Secretary's oversight powers are not
comprehensive enough to close the door on § 1983 liability. 68 F.
3d, at 1151-1156.
349
IV
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is vacated, and the case is
remanded with instructions to remand to the District Court for
further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
JUSTICE SCALIA, with whom JUSTICE KENNEDY joins, concurring.
I agree with the Court that under the test set forth in
Wright v.
Roanoke Redevelopment and Housing
Authority, 479 U.
S. 418, 423 (1987), and
Wilder v.
Virginia Hospital
Assn., 496 U. S.
498, 509 (1990), 42 U. S. C. § 1983 does not permit individual
beneficiaries of Title IV -D of the Social Security Act, as added,
88 Stat. 2351, and as amended, 42 U. S. C. §§ 651-669b (1994 ed.,
Supp. II), to bring suit challenging a State's failure to achieve
"substantial compliance" with the requirements of Title IV-D. That
conclusion makes it unnecessary to reach the question whether §
1983
ever authorizes the beneficiaries of a federal-state
funding and spending agreement-such as Title IV -D-to bring
suit.
As we explained in
Pennhurst State School and Hospital v.
Halderman, 451
U. S. 1 (1981), such an agreement is "in the nature of a
contract,"
id., at 17: The State promises to provide certain
services to private individuals, in exchange for which the Federal
Government promises to give the State funds. In contract law, when
such an arrangement is made (A promises to pay B money, in exchange
for which B promises to provide services to C), the person who
receives the benefit of the exchange of promises between the two
others (C) is called a third-party beneficiary. Until relatively
recent times, the third-party beneficiary was generally regarded as
a stranger to the contract, and could not sue upon it; that is to
say, if, in the example given above, B broke his promise and did
not provide services to C, the only person who could enforce the
promise in court was the other party
350
to the contract, A. See 1 W. Story, A Treatise on the Law of
Contracts 549-550 (4th ed. 1856). This appears to have been the law
at the time § 1983 was enacted. See Brief for Council of State
Governments et al. as
Amici Curiae 10-11, and n. 6 (citing
sources). If so, the ability of persons in respondents' situation
to compel a State to make good on its promise to the Federal
Government was not a "righ[t] ... secured by the ... laws" under §
1983. While it is of course true that newly enacted laws are
automatically embraced within § 1983, it does not follow that the
question of what rights those new laws (or, for that matter, old
laws)
secure is to be determined according to modern notions
rather than according to the understanding of § 1983 when it was
enacted. Allowing third-party beneficiaries of commitments to the
Federal Government to sue is certainly a vast expansion.
It must be acknowledged that
Wright and
Wilder
permitted beneficiaries of federal-state contracts to sue under §
1983, but the argument set forth above was not raised. I am not
prepared without further consideration to reject the possibility
that third-party-beneficiary suits simply do not lie. I join the
Court's opinion because, in ruling against respondents under the
Wright/Wilder test, it leaves that possibility open.
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