Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/411/279
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 04:02:50+00:00

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Petitioners, employees of state health facilities, brought suit for overtime pay due them under § 16(b) of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and damages, which the District Court dismissed as being an unconsented action against the State of Missouri and thus barred by the Eleventh Amendment. The Court of Appeals affirmed. Held: Although amendments to the FLSA in 1966 extended statutory coverage to state employees, the legislative history discloses no congressional purpose to deprive a State of its constitutional immunity to suit in federal forum by employees of its nonprofit institutions, particularly since Congress made no change in § 16(b), which makes no reference to suits by employees against the State. Parden v. Terminal R. Co., 377 U.S. 184, 84 S.Ct. 1207, 12 L.Ed.2d 233, distinguished. The amendments' extension of coverage to state employees is not without meaning as the Secretary of Labor is thereby enabled to bring remedial action on their behalf under § 17 of the FLSA. Pp. 281287.
Although the Eleventh Amendment is not literally applicable since petitioners who brought suit are citizens of Missouri, it is established that an unconsenting State is immune from suits brought in federal courts by her own citizens as well as by citizens of another State. See Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U.S. 1, 10 S.Ct. 504, 33 L.Ed. 842; Duhne v. New Jersey, 251 U.S. 311, 40 S.Ct. 154, 64 L.Ed. 280; Parden v. Terminal R. Co., 377 U.S. 184, 84 S.Ct. 1207, 12 L.Ed.2d 233; 1 C. Jacobs, The Eleventh Amendment and Sovereign Immunity 109110 (1972).
The employees seek overtime compensation due them under § 16(b) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, 52 Stat. 1069, as amended, 29 U.S.C. 216(b), and an equal amount as liquidated damages and attorneys' fees. The District Court dismissed the complaint. The Court of Appeals, sitting in a panel of three, reversed, one judge dissenting. No. 20,204, Apr. 2, 1971 (not reported). On the filing of a petition for rehearing, the Court of Appeals sat en banc and by a closely divided vote set aside the panel decision and affirmed the judgment of the District Court. 452 F.2d 820. The case is here on a petition for a writ of certiorari which we granted. 405 U.S. 1016, 92 S.Ct. 1294, 31 L.Ed.2d 478.
Parden involved a state-owned railroad operating in interstate commerce; and the claims were those of employees under the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA), 35 Stat. 65, as amended, 45 U.S.C. 51 et seq. The term carrier for purposes of that Act was defined by Congress as including '(e)very common carrier by railroad while engaging in commerce between any of the several States.' Id., § 51. The Court concluded that Congress designed to bring stateowned, as well as privately owned, carriers within that definition and that it was empowered to do so by the Commerce Clause. The State's operation of its railroad in interstate commerce, it held, was in subordination to the power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce and application of the FELA to a State in those circumstances was not precluded by sovereign immunity. 377 U.S., at 191193, 84 S.Ct., at 12121213. The Parden case in final analysis turned on the question of waiver, a majority of the Court holding that it was a federal question since any consent of the State to suit did not arise from an act 'wholly within its own sphere of authority' but in the area of commerce, which is subject to pervasive federal regulation. Id., at 196, 84 S.Ct. at 1215.
By reason of the literal language of the present Act, Missouri and the departments joined as defendants are constitutionally covered by the Act, as the Court held in Maryland v. Wirtz, 392 U.S. 183, 88 S.Ct. 2017, 20 L.Ed.2d 1020. The question is whether Congress has brought the States to heel, in the sense of lifting their immunity from suit in a federal courta question we reserved in Maryland v. Wirtz, supra, at 199201, 88 S.Ct., at 20252026.
By holding that Congress did not lift the sovereign immunity of the States under the FLSA, we do not make the extension of coverage to state employees meaningless. Cf. Parden v. Terminal R. Co., supra, at 190, 84 S.Ct. at 1211. Section 16(c) gives the Secretary of Labor authority to bring suit for unpaid minimum wages or unpaid overtime compensation under the FLSA. Once the Secretary acts under § 16(c), the right of any employee or employees to sue under § 16(b) terminates. Section 17 gives the Secretary power to seek to enjoin violations of the Act and to obtain restitution in behalf of employees. Sections 16 and 17 suggest that since private enforcement of the Act was not a paramount objective, disallowance of suits by state employees and remitting them to relief through the Secretary of Labor may explain why Congress was silent as to waiver of sovereign immunity of the States. For suits by the United States against a State are not barred by the Constitution. See United States v. Mississippi, 380 U.S. 128, 140141, 85 S.Ct. 808, 814815, 13 L.Ed.2d 717. In this connection, it is not amiss to note that § 16(b) allows recovery by employees, not only of the amount of unpaid wages but of an equal amount as liquidated damages and attorneys' fees. It is one thing, as in Parden, to make a state employee whole; it is quite another to let him recover double against a State. Recalcitrant private employers may be whipped into line in that manner. But we are reluctant to believe that Congress in pursuit of a harmonious federalism desired to treat the States so harshly. The policy of the Act so far as the States are concerned is wholly served by allowing the delicate federal-state relationship to be managed through the Secretary of Labor.
I believe that proper analysis of whether these employees may sue their state employer in federal court for overtime compensation owed to them under the Fair Labor Standards Act 1 requires consideration of what I view as two distinct questions: (1) did Congress, in extending the protection of the FLSA to state employees such as these petitioners, effectively lift the State's protective veil of sovereign immunity; and (2) even if Congress did lift the State's general immunity, is the exercise of federal judicial power barred in the context of this case in light of Art. III and the Eleventh Amendment? Portions of the Court's opinion convey the impression that these questions are but a single issue. 2 I do not agree.
Sovereign immunity is a common-law doctrine that long predates our Constitution and the Eleventh Amendment, although it has, of course, been carried forward in our jurisprudence. 3 While the present-day immunity of a State from suit by its own citizens or by citizens of another State in the absence of consent obviously cannot be justified on the common-law rationale that 'the King can do no wrong,' the principle has been said to be applicable to the States because of '(t)he inherent nature of sovereignty,' Great Northern Life Insurance Co. v. Read, 322 U.S. 47, 51, 64 S.Ct. 873, 875, 88 L.Ed. 1121 (1944). See also Kawananakoa v. Polyblank, 205 U.S. 349, 353, 27 S.Ct. 526, 527, 51 L.Ed. 834 (1907).
Insofar as the Court may now be suggesting that the Congress has not effectively lifted the State's immunity from private suit in the context of the FLSA, I cannot agree. In the 1966 amendments, § 3(d), 29 U.S.C. 203(d), which defines 'employer' for the purposes of the FLSA was altered to cover expressly 'employees of a State, or a political subdivision thereof, employed . . . in a hospital, institution, or school . . ..' 4 In the face of such clear language, I find it impossible to believe that Congress did not intend to extend the full benefit of the provisions of the FLSA to these state employees. 5 It is trueas the Court points outthat in 1966 Congress did not amend § 16(b) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. 216(b), which provides for private suit by the 'employee' against the 'employer' to recover unpaid compensation. But this is readily explained by the fact that no amendment to the language of § 16(b) was necessary to make the desired extension to state employees; the alternation of the definition of 'employer' in § 3(d) clearly sufficed to achieve Congress' purpose 6 and to express its will. Indeed, to suggest that § 16(b) may not provide for suit by state employees, despite the alteration of § 3(d) to include state employers, ignores the basic canon of statutory construction that different provisions of the same statute normally should be construed consistently with one another. See, e.g., Clark v. Uebersee Finanz-Korporation, A.G., 332 U.S. 480, 488, 68 S.Ct. 174, 177, 92 L.Ed. 88 (1947); Markham v. Cabell, 326 U.S. 404, 410 411, 66 S.Ct. 193, 196197, 90 L.Ed. 165 (1945); Ex parte Public National Bank, 278 U.S. 101, 104, 49 S.Ct. 43, 44, 73 L.Ed. 202 (1928).
The Court rejected such a suggestion in Hans, and it has continued to do so ever since. See Duhne v. New Jersey, 251 U.S. 311, 40 S.Ct. 154, 64 L.Ed. 280 (1920); Fitts v. McGhee, 172 U.S. 516, 524525, 19 S.Ct. 269, 272273, 43 L.Ed. 535 (1899); North Carolina v. Temple, 134 U.S. 22, 10 S.Ct. 509, 33 L.Ed. 849 (1890).
At the same time, it is well established that a State may consent to federal suit and submit to the exercise of federal jurisdiction over it. 10 See, e.g., Petty v. Tennessee-Missouri Bridge Comm'n, 359 U.S. 275, 276, 79 S.Ct. 785, 787, 3 L.Ed.2d 804 (1959); Gunter v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 200 U.S. 273, 284, 26 S.Ct. 252, 256, 50 L.Ed. 477 (1906); Clark v. Barnard, 108 U.S. 436, 447, 2 S.Ct. 878, 882, 27 L.Ed. 780 (1833). The issue, then, is whether the State has consented to this suit by its employees under the FLSA.
This is not to say, however, that petitioners are without a forum in which personally to seek redress against the State. 12 Section 16(b)'s authorization for employee suits to be brought 'in any court of competent jurisdiction' includes state as well as federal courts. See Iowa Beef Packers, Inc. v. Thompson, 405 U.S. 228, 92 S.Ct. 859, 31 L.Ed.2d 165 (1972). As I have already noted, Congress has the power to lift the State's common-law immunity from suit insofar as that immunity conflicts with the regulatory authority conferred upon it by the Commerce Clause. Congress has done so with respect to these state employees in its 1966 amendments to the FLSA; by those amendments, Congress created in these employees a federal right to recover from the state compensation owing under the Act. While constitutional limitations upon the federal judicial power bar a federal court action by these employees to enforce their rights, the courts of the State nevertheless have an independent constitutional obligation to entertain employee actions to enforce those rights. See Testa v. Katt, 330 U.S. 386, 67 S.Ct. 810, 91 L.Ed. 967 (1947). See also General Oil Co. v. Crain, 209 U.S. 211, 28 S.Ct. 475, 52 L.Ed. 754 (1908). For Missouri has courts of general jurisdiction competent to hear suits of this character, 13 and the judges of those courts are co-equal partners with the members of the federal judiciary in the enforcement of federal law and the Federal Constitution, see Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 1 Wheat. 304, 339340, 4 L.Ed. 97 (1816). Thus, since federal law stands as the supreme law of the land, the State's courts are obliged to enforce it, even if it conflicts with state policy, see Testa v. Katt, supra, 330 U.S., at 392394, 67 S.Ct. at 813815; Second Employers' Liability Cases, 223 U.S. 1, 5758, 32 S.Ct. 169, 178, 56 L.Ed. 327 (1912).
* Essentially, the Court purports only to distinguish Parden. There is, of course, the distinction that the lawsuits were brought under different statutes. The lawsuit in Parden was brought under the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA), 45 U.S.C. 5160, against the State of Alabama, owner and operator of a railroad engaged in interstate commerce, by citizens of Alabama in the employ of the railroad. The suit in the present case was brought under § 16(b) of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), 29 U.S.C. 201219, as amended in 1966, Pub.L. 89601, 80 Stat. 830, against the State of Missouri, operator of hospitals and other institutions covered by that Act, by citizens of Missouri employed in such institutions. But the lawsuits have in common that each is an action for damages in federal court brought against a State by citizens of the State in its employ under the authority of a regulatory statute founded on the Commerce Clause. Parden held that a federal court determination of such suits cannot be precluded by the doctrine of sovereign immunity because the States surrendered their sovereignty to that extent when they granted Congress the power to regulate commerce. 377 U.S. at 191, 84 S.Ct. at 1212. That holding fits precisely this FLSA lawsuit and compels reversal of the judgment of the Court of Appeals. I turn, then, to the reasons for may disagreement with the arguments upon which the Court rests its contrary conclusion.
However, even on the Court's premise that the grant to Congress of the commerce power did no more than empower Congress expressly to disallow the immunity, Congress must be taken to have disallowed it in § 16(b) suits since Congress plainly stated its intention in enacting the 1966 amendments to put the States 'on the same footing as other employers' in such suits. Since Parden had been decided two years before the amendments were adopted, Congress understandably had no reason expressly to declare the disallowance since no immunity existed to be disallowed. But Congress' intention to make the States amenable to § 16(b) suits clearly appears in the legislative history of the amendments. 1 Indeed, this case is even more compelling than Parden on that score for the FELA contains no provision expressly including employees of public railroads under the Act but only a general provision making the FELA applicable to 'every' common carrier by railroad in interstate commerce. 377 U.S. at 187188, 84 S.Ct. at 12101211. In contrast, Congress directly addressed the question whether fully to extend the FLSA, including the provision of § 16(b) to the public employees of the defined public institutions: the 1966 amendments thus enact a considered congressional decision to extend the benefits of the FLSA enjoyed by employees of private employers to employees of the States, or political subdivisions thereof, employed in the institutions covered by the amendments. I find no support whatever in either the text of the amendments or their legislative history for the arguments made by the Court for its contrary conclusion.
Third, the Court argues that the amendments may saddle the States with 'enormous fiscal burdens,' and that 'Congress, acting responsibly, would not be presumed to take such action silently.' Ante, at 284285. Not only is the ancestry of the supposed presumption not divulged, but the Court offers no explanation how it overbears the clearly declared congressional purpose to subject States to § 16(b) suits. Moreover, this argument tracks the rejected argument of the dissent in Maryland v. Wirtz that the 1966 amendments 'overwhelm state fiscal policy' and therefore offend 'constitutional principles of federalism' in that they allow 'the National Government (to) devour the essentials of state sovereignty, though that sovereignty is attested by the Tenth Amendment.' 392 U.S., at 203205, 88 S.Ct., at 2028.
Finally, the Court suggests that to deny the employees a federal forum will not leave them without a right of action for damages since § 13(b) authorizes suits in 'any court of competent jurisdiction,' and '(a)rguably, that permits suit in the Missouri courts.' Ante, at 287. I am puzzled how the Court reconciles the implication that petitioners might maintain their § 16(b) action in state court with its basic holding that only 'clear' expression by Congress can be taken as 'lifting the sovereignty of the States and putting the States on the same footing as other employers.' Ibid. But, in any event, plaintiffs in Parden might also have sued in state courts since FELA jurisdiction is 'concurrent with that of the courts of the several States,' 45 U.S.C. 56. Yet, we held that this was irrelevant to the issue of amenability of States to FELA suits in federal court since 'Congress did not intend this language to limit the jurisdiction of the federal courts, but merely to provide an alternative forum in the state courts.' 377 U.S., at 190 n. 8, 84 S.Ct., at 1212.
Parden regarded the Eleventh Amendment to be inapplicable to suits against a State brought by its own citizens in federal court and held that whether the FELA suit was maintainable turned on the availability to Alabama of the protection of the ancient doctrine of sovereign immunity. Yet the Court says, ante, at 284, that '(t)he history and tradition of the Eleventh Amendment indicate that by reason of that barrier a federal court is not competent to render judgment against a nonconsenting State.' Any intimation in that statement that we may infer from the Eleventh Amendment a 'constitutional immunity,' ante, at 285, protecting States from § 16(b) suits brought in federal court by its own citizens, must be rejected. I emphatically question, as I develop later, that sovereign immunity is a constitutional limitation upon the federal judicial power to entertain suits against States. Indeed, despite some assumptions in opinions of this Court, I know of no concrete evidence that the framers of the Amendment thought, let alone intended, that even the Amendment would ensconce the doctrine of sovereign immunity. On its face, the Amendment says nothing about sovereign immunity but enacts an express limitation upon federal judicial power. It is familiar history that it was adopted as the response to the Court's decision in Chisholm v. Georgia, 2 Dall. 419, 1 L.Ed. 440 (1793), that construed Art. III, § 2, of the Constitutionthat '(t)he judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution . . . between a State and Citizens of another State'to extend to a suit in federal court brought by individual citizens of South Carolina against the State of Georgia. An outraged outcry of financially embarrassed debtor States fearful of suits in federal court greeted that decision and resulted in the immediate proposal, and fairly prompt adoption, of the Eleventh Amendment. But all that the Amendment provides in terms is that '(t)he Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State' (emphasis added). The literal wording is thus a flat prohibition against the federal judiciary's entertainment of suits against even a consenting State brought by citizens of another State or by aliens. In the very year the Amendment was formally ratified, 1798, this Court gave it that sweep in holding that 'the amendment being constitutionally adopted, there could not be exercised any jurisdiction, in any case, past or future, in which a state was sued by the citizens of another state . . ..' Hollingsworth v. Virginia, 3 Dall. 378, 382, 1 L.Ed. 644 (1798) (emphasis added). It is true that cases since decided have said that federal courts do have power to entertain suits against consenting States. None has yet offered, however, a persuasively principled explanation for that conclusion in the face of the wording of the Amendment. Since the question whether the Eleventh Amendment constitutionalized sovereign immunity as to noncitizen suits should, therefore, be regarded as open, or at least ripe for further consideration, it is unfortunate that the Court, by referring to the Amendment in this case after Parden held it to be inapplicable, should lend support to the argument that the Amendment reflects the existence of a constitutional bar to suits against a State brought by its own citizens.
'If, as has been suggested, the American doctrine of sovereign immunity is indefensible upon both theoretical and pragmatic groundsif it represents, as the Court has more than once intimated, an unfortunate excrescence of a political and legal order which no longer enlists supportits continued observance should depend upon whether it is incorporated into the Constitution and hence made obligatory upon the judiciary unless waived by the government. It is clear enough, of course, that if the doctrine is to have constitutional status, it must be judicially inferred. There is absolutely nothing in the original Constitution nor in any of the amendments expressly sanctioning the doctrine. And to this generalization the Eleventh Amendment, despite the outcry about sovereign immunity and the sovereignty of the states which preceded its adoption, does not constitute an exception. That amendment, to be sure, did impose a limitation upon the federal judicial power with respect to suits brought against the states by certain classes of individuals, but its language does not support the Court's far-reaching statement that 'as to the states, legal irresponsibility was written into the Eleventh Amendment.' (Keifer & Keifer v. Reconstruction Finance Corp., 306 U.S. 381, 388, 59 S.Ct. 516, 517, 83 L.Ed. 784 (1939).)' Jacobs, supra, at 160.
'If therefore, no new remedy be provided (by Congress under authority granted in the Constitution) . . . it is incumbent upon us to enquire, whether previous to the adoption of the Constitution . . . an action of the nature like this before the Court could have been maintained against one of the States in the Union upon the principles of the common law, which I have shown to be alone applicable. If it could, I think it is now maintainable here . . ..' 2 Dall., at 436437 (emphasis in original).
In sum, except as the Eleventh Amendment may be read to create a jurisdictional bar against suits by citizens of another State or by aliens, the restriction on the exercise of the federal judicial power in suits against a State brought by individuals derives, not from anything in the Constitution, including Art. III, but from traditional nonconstitutional principles of sovereign immunity. Except, as Hamilton put it, where 'there is a surrender of this immunity in the plan of the convention,' in which case in my view consent is irrelevant, Art. III extends rather than bars exercise of federal judicial power to entertain such suits against consenting States, leaving open only the question whether the State in fact consented or may be deemed to have consented. Hans was a 'sovereign immunity' case pure and simple; no alleged bar in either Art. III or the Eleventh Amendment played any role whatever in that decision. Therefore, even if the Eleventh Amendment be read liberally to prohibit the exercise of federal judicial power to entertain suits against a State brought by citizens of another State or foreign country (a question we need not decide in this case), my Brother MARSHALL has no support in Hans for bringing this suit by a State's own citizens within that prohibition. Stated simply, the holding of Hans is that the ancient principles of sovereign immunity limit exercise of the federal power to suits against consenting States. And the fundamental lesson of Parden, as my Brother MARSHALL concedes, is that by adopting and ratifying the Commerce Clause, the States surrendered a portion of their sovereignty as to those cases in thich state activity touches on the federal regulatory power under the Commerce Clause. '(T)he States by the asoption of the Constitution, acting 'in their highest sovereign capacity, in the convention of the people,' waived their exemption from judicial power. . . . (J)urisdiction . . . was thus established 'by their own consent and delegated authority' as a necessary feature of the formation of a more perfect Union.' Principality of Monaco v. Mississippi, 292 U.S. 313, 328329, 54 S.Ct. 745, 750, 78 L.Ed. 1282 (1934).
Indeed, if Art. III is an absolute jurisdictional bar, my Brother MARSHALL is inconsistent in conceding that federal courts have power to entertain suits by or against consenting States. For I had always supposed that jurisdictional power to entertain a suit was not capable of waiver and could not be conferred by consent. It is true that, contrary to the different holding of Hollingsworth v. Virginia, 3 Dall. 378, 1 L.Ed. 644 (1798), some opinions have assumed that a State may consent to suit in federal court. Jacobs, supra, at 107108. But the opinions making that assumption did not confront my Brother MARSHALL's theory that Art. III contains an implicit jurisdictional bar and, accordingly, do not address the highly provocative ancillary question whether such a bar would prohibit federal courts from entertaining suits even against consenting States. Doubtless because my Brother MARSHALL's theory did not occur to the judges, those cases (which did not arise under statutes like the FELA and FLSA) were treated as requiring decision, not in terms of my Brother MARSHALL's theory of a jurisdictional bar that may be removed only by actions tantamount to voluntary consent, but rather within the bounds of traditional notions of sovereign immunityan immunity, I repeat, that my Brother MARSHALL agrees the States surrendered, as Hamilton said, 'in the plan of the convention,' at least insofar as Congress conditions a State's engagement in a regulated interstate enterprise upon amenability to suit. Yet, he argues that, while the surrendered immunity cannot arise to defeat a suit in state court under § 16(b), it may be resurrected from the grave solely that it may be waived to lift the purported jurisdictional bar of Art. III to state employees' suits in federal court under § 16(b). That reasoning, I say with all respect, simply defies logic. Indeed, even if Hans is a constitutional decision, and I do not think it is, at most it holds that Art. III is to be read to incorporate the ancient doctrine of sovereign immunity. But my Brother MARSHALL's reliance on Hans would fare no better in such case, for then the surrender of the immunity 'in the plan of the convention' would obviously foreclose assertion of the immunity in suits in both state and federal courts brought under federal statutes founded on the commerce power.
'We the People' formed the governments of the several States. Under our constitutional system, therefore, a State is not the sovereign of its people. Rather, its people are sovereign. Our discomfort with sovereign immunity, born of systems of divine right that the Framers abhorred, is thus entirely natural. The discomfort has markedly increased since subsidence of the controversy over judicial review of state decisions that was fought out in terms of the amenability of States to suit in federal court. Jacobs, supra, at 4174. Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714 (1908), substantially eviscerated governmental immunity in holding that individuals might sue in federal court to enjoin state officers from enforcing unconstitutional statutes. Congress, reflecting agreement with the soundness of the view that 'the doctrine of Ex parte Young seems indispensable to the establishment of constitutional government and the rule of law,' C. Wright, Handbook of the Law of Federal Courts 186 (2d ed. 1970), accepted that decision. Perez v. Ledesma, 401 U.S. 82, 104110, 91 S.Ct. 674, 686690, 27 L.Ed.2d 701 (opinion of Brennan, J.) In short, the trend since Hans was decided in 1890 has been against enforcement of governmental immunity except when clearly required by explicit textual prohibitions, as in the Eleventh Amendment. Moreover, as Parden illustrates, the trend also is to interpret those prohibitions narrowly and literally. For none can gainsay that a State may grievously hurt one of its citizens. Our expanding concepts of public mortality are thus offended when a State may escape legal redress for its wrongs. I need not address in this case, however, the question whether today's decision constitutes a denial of the Fifth Amendment's counterpart guarantee of due process. See, however, Jacobs, supra, at 163164. Our constitutional commitment, recited in the Preamble, is to 'establish Justice.' That keystone objective is furthered by the trend toward limitation of the defense of governmental immunity represented by Ex parte Young and Parden. Today, however, the Court and my Brother MARSHALL arrest the trendthe Court by watering down Parden in reliance on the Parden dissent and in its discussion of the inapplicable Eleventh Amendment, and my Brother MARSHALL by rejecting Mr. Chief Justice Marshall's view that no jurisdictional bar may be implied in Art. III.
See Jaffe, Suits Against Governments and Officers: Sovereign Immunity, 77 Harv.L.Rev. 1, 221 (1963).
See also § 3(r), 29 U.S.C. 203(r).
See The Federalist No. 81 (Hamilton); Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U.S. 18 1214, 10 S.Ct. 504, 506507, 33 L.Ed. 842 (1890); 1 C. Warren, The Supreme Court in United States History 91 (Rev.Ed.1937); Cullison, Interpretation of the Eleventh Amendment, 5 Houston L.Rev. 1, 69 (1967).
fact that, unlike the present case, nothing had occurred to lift the State's common-law immunity. But such a reading seems to me at odds with his theory that at the time the Union was formed the States surrendered that portion of their sovereignty which conflicted with the supreme federal powers. For if the only relevant issue in Hans was the State's common-law immunity, such a view would seem to compel the conclusion that the State had also pro tanto surrendered their common-law immunity with respect to any claim under the Contract Clause. After all, the only difference between the Contract Clause and congressionally created causes of action is that the Contract Clause is self-enforcing, see e.g., Sturges v. Crowninshield, 4 Wheat. 122, 197200, 4 L.Ed. 529 (1819); it requires no congressional act to make its guarantee enforceable in a judicial suit. It seems to me a strange hierarchy that would provide a greater opportunity to enforce congressionally created rights than constitutionally guaranteed rights in federal court. Yet my Brother BRENNAN, given his theory of waiver of common-law immunity plus his theory that no constitutional limitation upon the exercise of the federal judicial power exists in the context of a suit brought against a State by one of its citizens, is forced either to this anomalous position or else to the admission that Hans was incorrectly decided. He apparently chooses the former.
However, if the issue of the limits of the judicial power, as well as of common-law immunity, is considered to be relevant in cases such as Hans and this case, the decision in Hans is sensibly understood as resting on the former basis alone. For, although the State's common-law immunity may have been no defense to a Contract Clause claim, the State had not consented to suit in federal court and therefore it was not susceptible to the exercise of the federal judicial powerregardless of the source of the federal claim. Thus, there seems to me little basis for doubting that Hans rested upon considerations as to constitutional limitations on the reach of the federal judicial power, a view confirmed by the decision's lengthy analysis of the constitutional debates surrounding Art. III, see 134 U.S., at 1214, 10 S.Ct., at 506507 and by subsequent decisions of this Court, see, e.g., Ex parte New York No. 1, 256 U.S. 490, 497, 41 S.Ct. 588, 589, 65 L.Ed. 1057 (1921); Duhne v. New Jersey, 251 U.S. 311, 313, 40 S.Ct. 154, 64 L.Ed. 280 (1920); Georgia Railroad & Banking Co. v. Redwine, 342 U.S. 299, 304 n. 13, 72 S.Ct. 321, 324, 96 L.Ed. 335 (1952).
Whether I would reach a different conclusion with respect to a case of this character if the State had commenced operation of the relevant facilities after passage of the 1966 amendments is a question that I need not now decide. Certainly, I do not accept the Court's efforts to distinguish this case from Parden on the basis that there we dealt with a 'proprietary' function, whereas here we deal with a 'governmental' function. See ante, at 284285. I had thought we had escaped such unenlightening characterizations of States' activities. Cf. Maryland v. Wirtz, 392 U.S. 183, 195, 88 S.Ct. 2017, 2023, 20 L.Ed.2d 1020 (1968); United States v. California, 297 U.S. 175, 183184, 56 S.Ct. 421, 423424, 80 L.Ed. 567 (1936).
'In 1971, . . . the (FLSA) covered 45.4 million employees and nearly 2 million establishments; 2.7 million of these employees and 118,000 of these establishments were in the sector of state and local government employment, including state schools and hospitals. Yet, less than 4 percent of these establishments can be investigated by the Secretary each year.' Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 2223 (footnotes omitted).
The Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit rejected the governmental-proprietary distinction on facts identical to those of the present case. Briggs v. Sagers, 424 F.2d 130, 132133 (1970). See also Sanitary District v. United States, 266 U.S. 405, 426, 45 S.Ct. 176, 178, 69 L.Ed. 352 (1925); United States v. California, 297 U.S. 175, 183184, 56 S.Ct. 421, 423424, 80 L.Ed. 567 (1936); 3 K. Davis, Administrative Law Treatise 459466 (1958); n. 1, supra.
The Solicitor General states that: 'In 1971 . . . the Act covered 45.4 million employees and nearly 2 million establishments; 2.7 million of these employees and 118,000 of these establishments were in the sector of state and local government employment, including state schools and hospitals. Yet less than 4 percent of these establishments can be investigated by the Secretary each year.' Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 2223.
On this account, it has been suggested that 'the instant case is even more compelling than Parden in asserting that Congress' power to regulate commerce should override sovereign immunity. Since the Supreme Court was willing to find constructive waiver of immunity in order to give protection to a relatively small number of peopleemployees of state owned railwayseven where Congress had not made clear its desire that such protection be given, then a fortiori constructive waiver is applicable where Congress has specifically applied legislation to states as employers, where the class of persons meant to be protected is much greater, and where the purpose and need of regulation is a more fundamental and pressing expression of congressional regulation of commerce.' 17 Vill.L.Rev. 713, 720721 (1972).
as the commerce power, there was no surrender in respect to self-imposed prohibitions, as in the case of the Contract Clause. In other words, my Brother MARSHALL's 'supreme federal powers' are only the enumerated powers whose effective exercise required surrender of the protection of the ancient doctrine. The Commerce Clause is an enumerated power whose effective enforcement required surrender of immunity to empower Congress, when necessary, to subject the States to suit. The Contract Clause, on the other hand, is not an enumerated power and thus not among the 'supreme federal powers.' It is simply a prohibition self-imposed by the States upon themselves and it granted Congress no powers of enforcement by means of subjecting the States to suit or otherwise. In allowing Louisiana the ancient immunity, the Court in Hans took particular care to emphasize that the allowance in no other respect prevented effective enforcement of the prohibitions of the clause. The Court said: 'Whilst the State cannot be compelled by suit to perform its contracts, any attempt on its part to violate property or rights acquired under its contracts may be judicially resisted, and any law impairing the obligation of contracts under which such property or rights are held is void and powerless to affect their enjoyment.' 134 U.S., at 2021, 10 S.Ct., at 509.
LAPIDES v. BOARD OF REGENTS OF UNIVERSITY SYSTEM OF GEORGIA ET AL.

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