Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/13-534_19m2.pdf
Page Number: 33.0

10 

NORTH CAROLINA STATE BD. OF DENTAL
EXAMINERS v. FTC 
ALITO, J., dissenting 

are  not  sovereign  was  critical  to  our  analysis  in  Hallie, 
and  thus  that  decision  has  no  application  in  a  case,  like
this one, involving a state agency. 

Here, however, the Court not only disregards the North
Carolina  Board’s  status  as  a  full-fledged  state  agency;  it 
treats the Board less favorably than a municipality.  This 
is  puzzling.  States  are  sovereign,  Northern  Ins.  Co.  of 
N. Y.  v.  Chatham  County,  547  U. S.  189,  193  (2006),  and 
California’s  sovereignty  provided  the  foundation  for  the 
decision  in  Parker,  supra,  at  352.  Municipalities  are  not
sovereign.  Jinks  v.  Richland  County,  538  U. S.  456,  466 
(2003).  And  for  this  reason,  federal  law  often  treats  mu-
nicipalities differently from States.  Compare Will v. Mich-
igan  Dept.  of  State  Police,  491  U. S.  58,  71  (1989) 
(“[N]either  a  State  nor  its  officials  acting  it  their  official 
capacities  are  ‘persons’  under  [42  U. S. C.]  §1983”),  with 
Monell v. City Dept. of Social Servs., New York, 436 U. S. 
658,  694  (1978)  (municipalities  liable  under  §1983  where 
“execution  of  a  government’s  policy  or  custom  . . .  inflicts
the injury”). 

The  Court  recognizes  that  municipalities,  although  not 
sovereign, nevertheless benefit from a more lenient stand-
ard  for  state-action  immunity  than  private  entities.    Yet 
under  the  Court’s  approach,  the  North  Carolina  Board  of
Dental  Examiners,  a  full-fledged  state  agency,  is  treated 
like  a  private  actor  and  must  demonstrate  that  the  State
actively supervises its actions. 

The  Court’s  analysis  seems  to  be  predicated  on  an  as-
sessment  of  the  varying  degrees  to  which  a  municipality 
and  a  state  agency  like  the  North  Carolina  Board  are
likely to be captured by private interests.  But until today, 
Parker immunity was never conditioned on the proper use 
of state regulatory authority.  On the contrary, in Colum-
bia  v.  Omni  Outdoor  Advertising,  Inc.,  499  U. S.  365 
(1991), we refused to recognize an exception to Parker for 
cases  in  which  it  was  shown  that  the  defendants  had