                  U.S. Supreme Court

           HAFER v. MELO, 502 U.S. 21 (1991) 

                      502 U.S. 21 

    BARBARA HAFER, PETITIONER v. JAMES C. MELO, JR.,
                        ET AL. 
       CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
           APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT 

                      No. 90-681 

                 Argued October 15, 1991 
                Decided November 5, 1991 

After petitioner Hafer, the newly elected Auditor General of 
Pennsylvania, discharged respondents from their jobs in her office, they 
sued her for, inter alia, monetary damages under 42 U.S.C. 1983. The 
District Court dismissed the latter claims under Will v. Michigan Dept. 
of State Police, 491 U.S. 58, 71 , in which the Court held that state 
officials "acting in their official capacities" are outside the class of 
"persons" subject to liability under 1983. In reversing this ruling, the 
Court of Appeals found that respondents sought damages from Hafer in her 
personal capacity and held that, because she acted under color of state 
law, respondents could maintain a 1983 individual-capacity suit against 
her. 

Held: 

State officers may be held personally liable for damages under 1983
based upon actions taken in their official capacities. Pp. 3-10. 

     (a) The above-quoted language from Will does not establish that
     Hafer may not be held personally liable under 1983 because she
     "act[ed]" in her official capacity. The claims considered in Will
     were official-capacity claims, and the phrase "acting in their
     official capacities" is best understood as a reference to the
     capacity in which the state officer is sued, not the capacity in
     which the officer inflicts the alleged injury. Pp. 3-5. 

     (b) State officials, sued in their individual capacities, are      
     "persons" within the meaning of 1983. Unlike official-capacity     
     defendants - who are not "persons" because they assume the identity
     of the government that employs them, Will, supra, at 71 - officers 
     sued in their personal capacity come to the court as individuals,  
     and thus fit comfortably within the statutory term "person," cf.   
     491 U.S., at 71 , n. 10. Moreover, 1983's authorization of suits to
     redress deprivations of civil rights by persons acting "under color
     of" state law means that Hafer may be liable for discharging       
     respondents precisely because of her authority as Auditor General. 
     Her assertion that acts that are both within the official's        
     authority and necessary to the performance of governmental         
     functions (including the employment decisions at issue) should be  
     considered acts of the State that cannot give rise to a            
     personal-capacity action is unpersuasive. That contention ignores  
     this Court's holding that 1983 was enacted to enforce provisions of
     the Fourteenth Amendment against those who carry a badge of a State
     and represent it in some capacity, [502 U.S. 21, 22]  whether they 
     act in accordance with their authority or misuse it. Scheuer v.    
     Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 243 . Furthermore, Hafer's theory would      
     absolutely immunize state officials from personal liability under  
     1983 solely by virtue of the "official" nature of their acts, in   
     contravention of this Court's immunity decisions. See, e.g.,       
     Scheuer, supra. Pp. 27-29.                                         

     (c) The Eleventh Amendment does not bar 1983 personal-capacity    
     suits against state officials in federal court. Id., at 237, 238. 
     Will's language concerning suits against state officials cannot be
     read as establishing the limits of liability under the Amendment, 
     since Will arose from a suit in state court, and considered the   
     Amendment only because the fact that Congress did not intend to   
     override state immunity when it enacted 1983 was relevant to      
     statutory construction. 491 U.S., at 66 . Although imposing       
     personal liability on state officers may hamper their performance 
     of public duties, such concerns are properly addressed within the 
     framework of this Court's personal immunity jurisprudence. Pp.    
     29-31.                                                            

912 F.2d 628 (CA3 1990), affirmed. 

O'CONNOR, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which all other
Members joined, except THOMAS, J., who took no part in the
consideration or decision of the case. 

Jerome R. Richter argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the
briefs was Goncer M. Krestal. 

William Goldstein argued the cause for respondents. With him on the
brief was Edward H. Rubenstone. *  

[ Footnote * ] Richard Ruda filed a brief for the National Association
of Counties et al. as amici curiae urging reversal. 

Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the American
Civil Liberties Union et al. by Andrew J. Pincus, John A. Powell, and
Steven R. Shapiro; for the American Federation of Labor and
Gongress of Industrial Organizations by Robert M. Weinberg, Walter
Kamiat, and Laurence Gold; for Kenneth W. Fultz by Cletus P.
Lyman; and for Nancy Haberstroh by Stephen R. Kaplan. 

JUSTICE O'CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court. 

In Will v. Michigan Dept. of State Police, 491 U.S. 58 (1989), we held 
that state officials "acting in their official capacities" are outside 
the class of "persons" subject to liability [502 U.S. 21, 23]  under 42 
U.S.C. 1983. 491 U.S., at 71 . Petitioner takes this language to mean 
that 1988 does not authorize suits against state officers for damages 
arising from official acts. We reject this reading of Will, and hold 
that state officials sued in their individual capacities are "persons" 
for purposes of 1983. 

                          I 

In 1988, petitioner Barbara Hafer sought election to the post of
Auditor General of Pennsylvania. Respondents allege that, during the
campaign, United States Attorney James West gave Hafer a list of 21
employees in the Auditor General's Office who secured their jobs
through payments to a former employee of the office. App. 10. They
further allege that Hafer publicly promised to fire all employees on the
list if elected. Ibid 

Hafer won the election. Shortly after becoming Auditor General, she
dismissed 18 employees, including named respondent James Melo, Jr.,
on the basis that they "bought" their jobs. Melo and seven other
terminated employees sued Hafer and West in Federal District Court.
They asserted state and federal claims, including a claim under 1983,
and sought monetary damages. Carl Gurley and the remaining
respondents in this case also lost their jobs with the Auditor General
soon after Hafer took office. These respondents allege that Hafer
discharged them because of their Democratic political affiliation and
support for her opponent in the 1988 election. Id., at 28, 35, 40. They
too filed suit against Hafer, seeking monetary damages and
reinstatement under 1983. 

After consolidating the Melo and Gurley actions, the District Court
dismissed all claims. In relevant part, the court held that the 1983
claims against Hafer were barred because, under Will, she could not be
held liable for employment decisions made in her official capacity as
Auditor General. [502 U.S. 21, 24]  

The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit reversed this portion of the 
District Court's decision. 912 F.2d 628 (1990). As to claims for 
reinstatement brought against Hafer in her official capacity, the court 
rested on our statement in Will that state officials sued for injunctive 
relief in their official capacities are "persons" subject to liability 
under 1983. See Will, supra, at 71, n. 10. Turning to respondents' 
monetary claims, the court found that six members of the Gurley group 
had expressly sought damages from Hafer in her personal capacity. The 
remaining plaintiffs "although not as explicit, signified a similar 
intent." 912 F.2d, at 636. * The court found this critical. While 
Hafer's power to hire and fire derived from her position as Auditor 
General, it said, a suit for damages based on the exercise of this 
authority could be brought against Hafer in her personal capacity. 
Because Hafer acted under color of state law, respondents could maintain 
a 1983 individual-capacity suit against her. 

We granted certiorari, 498 U.S. 1118 (1991), to address the question
whether state officers may be held personally liable for damages under
1983 based upon actions taken in their official capacities. [502 U.S. 21,
25]  

                          II 

In Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159 (1985), the Court sought to 
eliminate lingering confusion about the distinction between personal- 
and official-capacity suits. We emphasized that official-capacity suits 
"`generally represent only another way of pleading an action against an 
entity of which an officer is an agent.'" Id., at 165 (quoting Monell v. 
New York City Dept. of Social Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 690 , n. 55 (1978)). 
A suit against a state official in her official capacity therefore 
should be treated as a suit against the State. 473 U.S., at 166 . 
Indeed, when an official sued in this capacity in federal court dies or 
leaves office, her successor automatically assumes her role in the 
litigation. See Fed.Rule Civ.Proc. 25(d)(1); Fed.Rule App. Proc. 
43(c)(1); this Court's Rule 35.3. Because the real party in interest in 
an official-capacity suit is the governmental entity, and not the named 
official, "the entity's `policy or custom' must have played a part in 
the violation of federal law." Graham, supra, at 166 (quoting Monell, 
supra, at 694). For the same reason, the only immunities available to 
the defendant in an official-capacity action are those that the 
governmental entity possesses. 473 U.S., at 167 . 

Personal-capacity suits, on the other hand, seek to impose individual 
liability upon a government officer for actions taken under color of 
state law. Thus, "[o]n the merits, to establish personal liability in a 
1983 action, it is enough to show that the official, acting under color 
of state law, caused the deprivation of a federal right." Id., at 166. 
While the plaintiff in a personal-capacity suit need not establish a 
connection to governmental "policy or custom," officials sued in their 
personal capacities, unlike those sued in their official capacities, may 
assert personal immunity defenses such as objectively reasonable 
reliance on existing law. Id., at 166-167. 

Our decision in Will v. Michigan Dept. of State Police, 491 U.S. 58
(1989), turned in part on these differences between [502 U.S. 21, 26] 
personal- and official-capacity actions. The principal issue in Will was
whether States are "persons" subject to suit under 1983. Section 1983
provides, in relevant part: 

     "Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance,
     regulation, custom, or usage, of any State ... subjects, or
     causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other
     person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any
     rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and
     laws, shall be liable to the party injured... ." 

The Court held that interpreting the words "[e]very person" to exclude 
the States accorded with the most natural reading of the law, with its 
legislative history, and with the rule that Congress must clearly state 
its intention to alter "`the federal balance'" when it seeks to do so. 
Will, supra, at 65 (quoting United States v. Bass, 404 U.S. 336, 349 
(1971)). 

The Court then addressed the related question whether state officials, 
sued for monetary relief in their official capacities, are persons under 
1983. We held that they are not. Although "state officials literally are 
persons," an official-capacity suit against a state officer "is not a 
suit against the official, but rather is a suit against the official's 
office. As such, it is no different from a suit against the State 
itself." 491 U.S., at 71 (citation omitted). 

Summarizing our holding, we said: "[N]either a State nor its officials 
acting in their official capacities are `persons' under 1983." Ibid. 
Hafer relies on this recapitulation for the proposition that she may not 
be held personally liable under 1983 for discharging respondents, 
because she "act[ed]" in her official capacity as Auditor General of 
Pennsylvania. Of course, the claims considered in Will were 
official-capacity claims; the phrase "acting in their official 
capacities" is best understood as a reference to the capacity in which 
the state officer is sued, not the capacity in which the officer 
inflicts the alleged injury. To the extent that Will [502 U.S. 21, 27]  
allows the construction Hafer suggests, however, we now eliminate that 
ambiguity. 

                          A 

Will itself make clear that the distinction between official-capacity 
suits and personal-capacity suits is more than "a mere pleading device." 
Ibid. State officers sued for damages in their official capacity are not 
"persons" for purposes of the suit, because they assume the identity of 
the government that employs them. Ibid. By contrast, officers sued in 
their personal capacity come to court as individuals. A government 
official in the role of personal-capacity defendant thus fits 
comfortably within the statutory term "person." Cf. id., at 71, n. 10 
("[A] state official in his or her official capacity, when sued for 
injunctive relief, would be a person under 1983 because 
`official-capacity actions for prospective relief are not treated as 
actions against the State'") (quoting Graham, 473 U.S., at 167 , n. 14). 

Hafer seeks to overcome the distinction between official- and 
personal-capacity suits by arguing that 1983 liability turns not on the 
capacity in which state officials are sued, but on the capacity in which 
they acted when injuring the plaintiff. Under Will, she asserts, state 
officials may not be held liable in their personal capacity for actions 
they take in their official capacity. Although one Court of Appeals has 
endorsed this view, see Cowan v. University of Louisville School of 
Medicine, 900 F.2d 936, 942-943 (CA6 1990), we find it both unpersuasive 
as an interpretation of 1983 and foreclosed by our prior decisions. 

Through 1983, Congress sought "to give a remedy to parties deprived of 
constitutional rights, privileges and immunities by an official's abuse 
of his position." Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167, 172 (1961). Accordingly, 
it authorized suits to redress deprivations of civil rights by persons 
acting "under color of any [state] statute, ordinance, regulation, 
custom, or usage." 42 U.S.C. 1983. The requirement of action under color 
of state law means that Hafer may be liable for [502 U.S. 21, 28] 
discharging respondents precisely because of her authority as Auditor 
General. We cannot accept the novel proposition that this same official 
authority insulates Hafer from suit. 

In an effort to limit the scope of her argument, Hafer distinguishes 
between two categories of acts taken under color of state law: those 
outside the official's authority or not essential to the operation of 
state government, and those both within the official's authority and 
necessary to the performance of governmental functions. Only the former 
group, she asserts, can subject state officials to personal liability 
under 1983; the latter group (including the employment decisions at 
issue in this case) should be considered acts of the State that cannot 
give rise to a personal-capacity action. 

The distinction Hafer urges finds no support in the broad language of
1983. To the contrary, it ignores our holding that Congress enacted
1983 "to enforce provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment against
those who carry a badge of authority of a State and represent it in
some capacity, whether they act in accordance with their authority or
misuse it." Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 243 (1974) (quoting
Monroe v. Pape, supra, at 171-172). Because of that intent, we have
held that, in 1983 actions, the statutory requirement of action "under
color of" state law is just as broad as the Fourteenth Amendment's
"state action" requirement. Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U.S.
922, 929 (1982). 

Furthermore, Hafer's distinction cannot be reconciled with our decisions 
regarding immunity of government officers otherwise personally liable 
for acts done in the course of their official duties. Her theory would 
absolutely immunize state officials from personal liability for acts 
within their authority and necessary to fulfilling governmental 
responsibilities. Yet our cases do not extend absolute immunity to all 
officers who engage in necessary official acts. Rather, immunity from 
suit under 1983 is "predicated upon a considered inquiry into the 
immunity historically accorded the relevant [502 U.S. 21, 29]  official 
at common law and the interests behind it," Imbler v. Pachtman, 424 U.S. 
409, 421 (1976), and officials seeking absolute immunity must show that 
such immunity is justified for the governmental function at issue, Burns 
v. Reed, 500 U.S. 478, 486-487 (1991). 

This Court has refused to extend absolute immunity beyond a very limited 
class of officials, including the President of the United States, 
legislators carrying out their legislative functions, and judges 
carrying out their judicial functions, "whose special functions or 
constitutional status requires complete protection from suit." Harlow v. 
Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 807 (1982). State executive officials are not 
entitled to absolute immunity for their official actions. Scheuer v. 
Rhodes, supra. In several instances, moreover, we have concluded that no 
more than a qualified immunity attaches to administrative employment 
decisions, even if the same official has absolute immunity when 
performing other functions. See Forrester v. White, 484 U.S. 219 (1988) 
(dismissal of court employee by state judge); Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 
supra, (discharge of Air Force employee, allegedly orchestrated by 
senior White House aides) (Bivens action); Davis v. Passman, 442 U.S. 
228 (1979) (dismissal of congressional aide) (Bivens action). That Hafer 
may assert personal immunity within the framework of these cases in no 
way supports her argument here. 

                          B 

Hafer further asks us to read Will's language concerning suits against 
state officials as establishing the limits of liability under the 
Eleventh Amendment. She asserts that imposing personal liability on 
officeholders may infringe on state sovereignty by rendering government 
less effective; thus, she argues, the Eleventh Amendment forbids 
personal-capacity suits against state officials in federal court. [502 
U.S. 21, 30]  

Most certainly, Will's holding does not rest directly on the Eleventh 
Amendment. Whereas the Eleventh Amendment bars suits in federal court 
"by private parties seeking to impose a liability which must be paid 
from public funds in the state treasury," Edelman v. Jordan, 415 U.S. 
651, 663 (1974), Will arose from a suit in state court. We considered 
the Eleventh Amendment in Will only because the fact that Congress did 
not intend to override state immunity when it enacted 1983 was relevant 
to statutory construction: "Given that a principal purpose behind the 
enactment of 1983 was to provide a federal forum for civil rights 
claims," Congress' failure to authorize suits against States in federal 
courts suggested that it also did not intend to authorize such claims in 
state courts. 491 U.S., at 66 . 

To the extent that Hafer argues from the Eleventh Amendment itself, she 
makes a claim that failed in Scheuer v. Rhodes, supra. In Scheuer, 
personal representatives of the estates of three students who died at 
Kent State University in May, 1970, sought damages from the Governor of 
Ohio and other state officials. The District Court dismissed their 
complaints on the theory that the suits, although brought against state 
officials in their personal capacities, were in substance actions 
against the State of Ohio, and therefore barred by the Eleventh 
Amendment. 

We rejected this view. "[S]ince Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123 (1908)," we 
said, "it has been settled that the Eleventh Amendment provides no 
shield for a state official confronted by a claim that he had deprived 
another of a federal right under the color of state law." Scheuer, 
supra, at 237. While the doctrine of Ex parte Young does not apply where 
a plaintiff seeks damages from the public treasury, damages awards 
against individual defendants in federal courts "are a permissible 
remedy in some circumstances notwithstanding the fact that they hold 
public office." 416 U.S., at 238 . That is, the Eleventh Amendment does 
not erect a barrier [502 U.S. 21, 31]  against suits to impose 
"individual and personal liability" on state officials under 1983. Ibid. 

To be sure, imposing personal liability on state officers may hamper 
their performance of public duties. But such concerns are properly 
addressed within the framework of our personal immunity jurisprudence. 
See Forrester v. White, supra, at 223. Insofar as respondents seek 
damages against Hafer personally, the Eleventh Amendment does not 
restrict their ability to sue in federal court. 

We hold that state officials, sued in their individual capacities, are 
"persons" within the meaning of 1983. The Eleventh Amendment does not 
bar such suits, nor are state officers absolutely immune from personal 
liability under 1983 solely by virtue of the "official" nature of their 
acts. 

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is 

Affirmed. 

JUSTICE THOMAS took no part in the consideration or decision of
this case. 

[ Footnote * ] The Third Circuit looked to the proceedings below to 
determine whether certain respondents brought their claims for damages 
against Hafer in her official capacity or her personal capacity. 912 
F.2d 628, 635-636 (1990). Several other Courts of Appeals adhere to this 
practice. See Conner v. Reinhard, 847 F.2d 384, 394, n. 8 (CA7), cert. 
denied, 488 U.S. 856 (1988); Houston v. Reich, 932 F.2d 883, 885 (CA10 
1991); Lundgren v. McDaniel, 814 F.2d 600, 603-604 (CA11 1987). Still 
others impose a more rigid pleading requirement. See Wells v. Brown, 891 
F.2d 591, 592 (CA6 1989) ( 1983 plaintiff must specifically plead that 
suit for damages is brought against state official in individual 
capacity); Nix v. Norman, 879 F.2d 429, 431 (CA8 1989) (same). Because 
this issue is not properly before us, we simply reiterate the Third 
Circuit's view that "[i]t is obviously preferable for the plaintiff to 
be specific in the first instance to avoid any ambiguity." 912 F.2d, at 
636, n. 7. See this Court's Rule 14.1(a) ("Only the questions set forth 
in the petition, or fairly included therein, will be considered by the 
Court"). [502 U.S. 21, 32]  


