Page:United States Reports 502 OCT. TERM 1991.pdf/557

 502us2$26J 01-22-99 08:32:58 PAGES OPINPGT

Cite as: 502 U. S. 367 (1992)

399

Stevens, J., dissenting

particular petitioners, who do not have a model record of compliance with previous court orders in this case, is particularly unlikely to lead to an equitable result. The inmates have as much claim as the prison officials to an understanding of the equities. The District Court should be free to take the views of both sides into account, without being forced to grant more deference to one side than to the other. Justice Stevens, with whom Justice Blackmun joins, dissenting. Today the Court endorses the standard for modification of consent decrees articulated by Judge Friendly in New York State Assn. for Retarded Children, Inc. v. Carey, 706 F. 2d 956 (CA2), cert. denied, 464 U. S. 915 (1983). I agree with that endorsement, but under that standard I believe the findings of the District Court in this action require affirmance of its order refusing to modify this consent decree.1 I When a district court determines, after a contested trial, that a state institution is guilty of a serious and persistent violation of the Federal Constitution, it typically fashions a remedy that is more intrusive than a simple order directing the defendants to cease and desist from their illegal conduct. See Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. of Ed., 402 U. S. 1 (1971). A district court has a duty to command a remedy that is effective, and it enjoys the broad equitable authority necessary to fulfill this obligation. See id., at 15–16; Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U. S. 294, 300 (1955); see also Missouri v. Jenkins, 495 U. S. 33 (1990). 1 Indeed, in an alternative holding, the District Court concluded that a modification would not be warranted even under the “flexible” standard advanced in Carey. See Inmates of Suffolk County Jail v. Kearney, 734 F. Supp. 561, 565 (Mass. 1990).