II 

117TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION S. 3415 

To ensure that the United States, States, and local governments are liable 

for monetary damages for constitutional violations by law enforcement officers. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

DECEMBER 16, 2021 

Mr. WHITEHOUSE introduced the following bill; which was read twice and 

referred to the Committee on the Judiciary 

A BILL 

To ensure that the United States, States, and local governments are liable for monetary damages for constitutional 

violations by law enforcement officers. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Constitutional Ac5 countability Act’’. 

6 SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 

7 Congress finds the following: 

8 (1) The 14th Amendment to the Constitution of 

9 the United States was passed by Congress and rati10 fied by the people of the United States against the 


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1 backdrop of numerous State laws, policies, and prac2 tices that denied African Americans and others their 

3 enjoyment of fundamental rights. 

4 (2) Congress drafted the 14th Amendment to 

5 broadly protect fundamental rights and guarantee 

6 equality to all persons. 

7 (3) To help realize the promise of equality pro8 tected in the 14th Amendment, Congress passed sec9 tion 1979 of the Revised Statutes (42 U.S.C. 1983) 

10 (referred to in this section as ‘‘section 1983’’), cre11 ating a statutory remedy for violations of the Con12 stitution of the United States and Federal law. Ac13 cording to Mitchum v. Foster, 407 U.S. 225, 242 

14 (1972), section 1983 was intended ‘‘to interpose the 

15 Federal courts between the States and the people, as 

16 guardians of the people’s Federal rights’’. 

17 (4) By creating this remedy, Congress recog18 nized that civil suits are a necessary and powerful 

19 tool to protect individual rights. Suits under section 

20 1983 can not only make whole victims who are 

21 wronged. The suits can incentivize actors to take the 

22 steps necessary to avoid wrongdoing in the first 

23 place. 


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1 (5) Unfortunately, the Supreme Court’s current 

2 crabbed interpretation of section 1983 undermines 

3 its ability to accomplish these goals. 

4 (6) Private employers are responsible for the 

5 torts of their employees under the doctrine of 

6 respondeat superior. The risk of liability incentivizes 

7 private employers to effectively hire, supervise, train, 

8 and discipline their employees. 

9 (7) In contrast, under Monell v. Department of 

10 Social Services of the City of New York, 436 U.S. 

11 658 (1978), municipal defendants are not subject to 

12 respondeat superior liability for the constitutional 

13 torts of their officers. Cities may only be held liable 

14 for the constitutional torts of their officers only 

15 when the plaintiff can show that the violation was 

16 the result of a municipal policy or custom. Under 

17 Will V. Michigan Department of State Police, 491 

18 U.S. 58 (1989), States cannot be held liable at all. 

19 (8) The Monell doctrine requires judges to re20 solve difficult questions regarding which officials are 

21 policymakers, whether an official was acting in State 

22 or local capacity, and municipalities’ training and 

23 hiring processes. 

24 (9) In Board of County Commissioners v. 

25 Brown, 520 U.S. 397, 430 (1997), Justice Breyer 


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1 criticized this ‘‘highly complex body of interpretive 

2 law’’ and called for a reexamination of ‘‘the legal 

3 soundness’’ of the Monell doctrine. Numerous schol4 ars, as well as other jurists, have criticized the 

5 Monell doctrine as convoluted, inconsistent, arbi6 trary, and unintelligible. 

7 (10) There is no statutory cause of action for 

8 constitutional violations by Federal officials. Victims 

9 can only bring their claims if courts infer a cause of 

10 action, which they are increasingly unlikely to do. 

11 (11) Police officers are regularly called upon to 

12 make split-second, life-or-death decisions. The cur13 rent liability regime, however, is not sufficient to en14 sure that police departments adequately hire, train, 

15 supervise, and discipline their officers so that they 

16 can respond to these situations in a constitutional 

17 manner. 

18 (12) There are over 18,000 police departments 

19 in the United States and no uniform standard on 

20 how officers should be trained. Departments gen21 erally require significantly more training on how to 

22 deploy force than when it is appropriate to do so. As 

23 recently as 2017, 34 States did not mandate de-es24 calation training for all officers. 


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1 (13) A National Public Radio study of fatal po2 lice shootings of unarmed Black people nationwide 

3 found that several officers were involved in multiple 

4 shootings without consequences. The same study 

5 found that departments hired officers with histories 

6 of domestic violence, as well as officers who were 

7 fired or forced out of other police departments due 

8 to prior misconduct. 

9 (14) According to United States v. Georgia, 

10 546 U.S. 151, 158 (2006), Congress has the power 

11 under section 5 of the 14th Amendment to the Con12 stitution of the United States to provide for direct 

13 enforcement of section 1 of the 14th Amendment 

14 ‘‘by creating private remedies,’’ including ones 

15 ‘‘against the States.’’. 

16 (15) Eliminating restrictions on the liability of 

17 State and local governments is necessary to ensure 

18 that no ‘‘State [shall] deprive any person of life, lib19 erty, or property, without due process of law; nor 

20 deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal 

21 protection of the laws.’’. 

22 SEC. 3. CIVIL ACTIONS FOR DEPRIVATION OF RIGHTS. 

23 Section 1979 of the Revised Statutes (42 U.S.C. 

24 1983) is amended— 


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1 (1) in the first sentence, by striking ‘‘Every’’ 

2 and inserting the following: 

3 ‘‘(a) In this section: 

4 ‘‘(1) The term ‘person’ includes— 

5 ‘‘(A) the United States; 

6 ‘‘(B) a State or Territory or the District of 

7 Columbia; 

8 ‘‘(C) a local government; 

9 ‘‘(D) an agency, government body, or any 

10 subdivision of the United States, a State or 

11 Territory or the District of Columbia, or a local 

12 government, or an entity created by a combina13 tion of any of the foregoing; and 

14 ‘‘(E) an individual or private entity. 

15 ‘‘(2) The term ‘law enforcement officer’ in16 cludes any officer of a local government, or of a 

17 State or Territory or the District of Columbia, or of 

18 the United States, or an entity created by a com19 bination of any of the foregoing who is empowered 

20 by law to execute searches, to seize evidence, or to 

21 make arrests for violations of law. 

22 ‘‘(b) Every’’; 

23 (2) in subsection (b), as so designated, in the 

24 first sentence, by inserting ‘‘the United States,’’ be25 fore ‘‘any State’’; and 


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1 (3) by adding at the end the following: 

2 ‘‘(c) A person is liable under this section for a viola3 tion of rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the 

4 Constitution and laws committed by an individual who at 

5 the time of the violation is employed by the person as, 

6 or contracted by the person to do the work of, a law en7 forcement officer. Liability under this subsection shall 

8 exist without regard to whether such employee or con9 tractor would be immune from liability, and without re10 gard to whether the employee or contractor was acting 

11 pursuant to a policy or custom of the person who is the 

12 employer. 

13 ‘‘(d) Pursuant to section 5 of the 14th Amendment, 

14 no State shall be immune from suit, under the Eleventh 

15 Amendment or other doctrine of State sovereign immu16 nity, for any claims on which subsection (c) subjects a per17 son to liability. 

18 ‘‘(e) For purposes of an action under subsection (c), 

19 the United States waives its sovereign immunity. 

20 ‘‘(f) Except as expressly stated, no provision of this 

21 section shall be construed to abolish, repeal, or limit the 

22 scope of any right of action otherwise available under this 

23 section or any other source of law.’’. 

Æ 


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