Source: https://openjurist.org/415/us/651
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 00:55:34+00:00

Document:
Respondent brought this class action for injunctive and declaratory relief against the Illinois officials administering the federal-state programs of Aid to the Aged, Blind, and Disabled (AABD), which are funded equally by the State and Federal Governments, contending that they were violating federal law and denying equal protection of the laws by following state regulations that did not comply with the federal time limits within which participating States had to process and make grants with respect to AABD applications. The District Court by a permanent injunction required compliance with the federal time limits and also ordered the state officials to release and remit AABD benefits wrongfully withheld to all persons found eligible who had applied therefor between July 1, 1968, the date of the federal regulations, and April 16, 1971, the date of the court's preliminary injunction. The Court of Appeals affirmed, rejecting the state officials' contentions that the Eleventh Amendment barred the award of the retroactive benefits and that the judgment of inconsistency between federal regulations and state provisions could be given only prospective effect. Held: The Eleventh Amendment of the Constitution bars that portion of the District Court's decree that ordered retroactive payment of benefits. Pp. 658—678.
(a) A suit by private parties seeking to impose a liability payable from public funds in the state treasury is foreclosed by the Amendment if the State does not consent to suit. Pp. 662—663.
(b) The Court of Appeals erred in holding that Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714, which awarded only prospective relief, did not preclude the retroactive monetary award here on the ground that it was an 'equitable restitution,' since that award, though on its face directed against the state official individually, as a practical matter could be satisfied only from the general revenues of the State and was indistinguishable from an award of damages against the State. Ford Motor Co. v. Department of Treasury, 323 U.S. 459, 65 S.Ct. 347, 89 L.Ed. 389, followed. Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600; State Dept. of Health and Rehabilitation Services v. Zarate, 407 U.S. 918, 92 S.Ct. 2462, 32 L.Ed.2d 803; Sterrett v. Mothers' & Children's Rights Organization, 409 U.S. 809, 93 S.Ct. 68, 34 L.Ed.2d 70; Wyman v. Bowens, 397 U.S. 49, 90 S.Ct. 813, 25 L.Ed.2d 38, disapproved to extent that their holdings do not comport with the holding in the instant case on the Eleventh Amendment issue. Pp. 663—771.
(c) The State of Illinois did not waive its Eleventh Amendment immunity and consent to the bringing of respondent's suit by participating in the federal AABD program. Parden v. Terminal R. Co., 377 U.S. 184, 84 S.Ct. 1207, 12 L.Ed.2d 233, and Petty v. Tennessee-Missouri Bridge Comm'n., 359 U.S. 275, 79 S.Ct. 785, 3 L.Ed.2d 804, distinguished. Nor does the mere fact that a State participates in a program partially funded by the Federal Government manifest consent by the State to be sued in federal courts. Pp. 671—674.
(d) The Court of Appeals properly considered the Eleventh Amendment defense, which the state officials did not assert in the District Court, since that defense partakes of the nature of a jurisdictional bar. Ford Motor Co. v. Department of Treasury, supra. Pp. 677—678.
On appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, the Illinois officials contended, inter alia, that the Eleventh Amendment barred the award of retroactive benefits, that the judgment of inconsistency between the federal regulations and the provisions of the Illinois Categorical Assistance Manual could be given prospective effect only, and that the federal regulations in question were inconsistent with the Social Security Act itself. The Court of Appeals rejected these contentions and affirmed the judgment of the District Court. Jordan v. Weaver, 472 F.2d 985 (7 Cir. 1973).6 Because of an apparent conflict on the Eleventh Amendment issue with the decision of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Rothstein v. Wyman, 467 F.2d 226 (1972), cert. denied, 411 U.S. 921, 93 S.Ct. 1552, 36 L.Ed.2d 315 (1973), we granted the petition for certiorari filed by petitioner Joel Edelman, who is the present Director of the Illinois Department of Public Aid, and successor to the former directors sued below. 412 U.S. 937, 93 S.Ct. 2776, 37 L.Ed.2d 398 (1973).
Despite such disclaimers,9 the very first suit entered in this Court at its February Term in 1791 was brought against the State of Maryland by a firm of Dutch bankers as creditors. Vanstophorst v. Maryland, see 2 Dall. 401 and Warren, supra, at 91 n. 1. The subsequent year brought the institution of additional suits against other States, and caused considerable alarm and consternation in the country.
'It is one thing to tell the Commissioner of Social Services that he must comply with the federal standards for the future if the state is to have the benefit of federal funds in the programs he administers. It is quite another thing to order the Commissioner to use state funds to make reparation for the past. The latter would appear to us to fall afoul of the Eleventh Amendment if that basic constitutional provision is to be conceived of as having any present force.' 467 F.2d, at 236—237 (footnotes omitted).
As in most areas of the law, the difference between the type of relief barred by the Eleventh Amendment and that permitted under Ex parte Young will not in many instances be that between day and night. The injunction issued in Ex parte Young was not totally without effect on the State's revenues, since the state law which the Attorney General was enjoined from enforcing provided substantial monetary penalties against railroads which did not conform to its provisions. Later cases from this Court have authorized equitable relief which has probably had greater impact on state treasuries than did that awarded in Ex parte Young. In Graham v. Richardson, 403 U.S. 365, 91 S.Ct. 1848, 29 L.Ed.2d 534 (1971), Arizona and Pennsylvania welfare officials were prohibited from denying welfare benefits to otherwise qualified recipients who were aliens. In Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U.S. 254, 90 S.Ct. 1011, 25 L.Ed.2d 287 (1970), New York City welfare officials were enjoined from following New York State procedures which authorized the termination of benefits paid to welfare recipients without prior hearing.12 But the fiscal consequences to state treasuries in these cases were the necessary result of compliance with decrees which by their terms were prospective in nature. State officials, in order to shape their official conduct to the mandate of the Court's decrees, would more likely have to spend money from the state treasury than if they had been left free to pursue their previous course of conduct. Such an ancillary effect on the state treasury is a permissible and often an inevitable consequence of the principle announced in Ex parte Young, supra.
Three fairly recent District Court judgments requiring state directors of public aid to make the type of retroactive payment involved here have been summarily affirmed by this Court notwithstanding Eleventh Amendment contentions made by state officers who were appealing from the District Court judgment.13 Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969), is the only instance in which the Eleventh Amendment objection to such retroactive relief was actually presented to this Court in a case which was orally argued. The three-judge District Court in that case had ordered the retractive payment of welfare benefits found by that court to have been unlawfully withheld because of residence requirements held violative of equal protection. 270 F.Supp. 331, 338 n. 5 (D.C.Conn.1967). This Court, while affirming the judgment, did not in its opinion refer to or substantively treat the Eleventh Amendment argument. Nor, of course, did the summary dispositions of the three District Court cases contain any substantive discussion of this or any other issues raised by the parties.
This case, therefore, is the first opportunity the Court has taken to fully explore and treat the Eleventh Amendment aspects of such relief in a written opinion. Shapiro v. Thompson and these three summary affirmances obviously are of precedential value in support of the contention that the Eleventh Amendment does not bar the relief awarded by the District Court in this case. Equally obviously, they are not of the same precedential value as would be an opinion of this Court treating the question on the merits. Since we deal with a constitutional question, we are less constrained by the principle of stare decisis than we are in other areas of the law.14 Having now had an opportunity to more fully consider the Eleventh Amendment issue after briefing and argument, we disapprove the Eleventh Amendment holdings of those cases to the extent that they are inconsistent with our holding today.
The mere fact that a State participates in a program through which the Federal Government provides assistance for the operation by the State of a system of public aid is not sufficient to establish consent on the part of the State to be sued in the federal courts. And while this Court has, in cases such as J. I. Case Co. v. Borak, 377 U.S. 426, 84 S.Ct. 1555, 12 L.Ed.2d 423 (1964), authorized suits by one private party against another in order to effectuate a statutory purpose, it has never done so in the context of the Eleventh Amendment and a state defendant. Since Employees, supra, where Congress had expressly authorized suits against a general class of defendants and the only thing left to implication was whether the described class of defendants included States, was decided adversely to the putative plaintiffs on the waiver question, surely this respondent must also fail on that issue. The only language in the Social Security Act which purported to provide a federal sanction against a State which did not comply with federal requirements for the distribution of federal monies was found in former 42 U.S.C. § 1384 (now replaced by substantially similar provisions in 42 U.S.C. § 804), which provided for termination of future allocations of federal funds when a participating State failed to conform with federal law.16 This provision by its terms did not authorize suit against anyone, and standing alone, fell far short of a waiver by a participating State of its Eleventh Amendment immunity.
Our Brother MARSHALL argues in dissent, and the Court of Appeals held, that although the Social Security Act itself does not create a private cause of action, the cause of action created by 42 U.S.C. § 1983, coupled with the enactment of the AABD program, and the issuance by HEW or regulations which require the States to make corrective payments after successful 'fair hearings' and provide for federal matching funds to satisfy federal court orders of retroactive payments, indicate that Congress intended a cause of action for public aid recipients such as respondent.17 It is, of course, true that Rosado v. Wyman, 397 U.S. 397, 90 S.Ct. 1207, 25 L.Ed.2d 442 (1970), held that suits in federal court under § 1983 are proper to secure compliance with the provisions of the Social Security Act on the part of participating States.18 But it has not heretofore been suggested that § 1983 was intended to create a waiver of a State's Eleventh Amendment immunity merely because an action could be brought under that section against state officers, rather than against the State itself. Though a § 1983 action may be instituted by public aid recipients such as respondent, a federal court's remedial power, consistent with the Eleventh Amendment, is necessarily limited to prospective injunctive relief, Ex parte Young, supra, and may not include a retroactive award which requires the payment of funds from the state treasury, Ford Motor Co. v. Department of Treasury, supra.
'(The Attorney General of Indiana) appealed in the federal District Court and the Circuit Court of Appeals and defended the suit on the merits. The objection to petitioner's suit as a violation of the Eleventh Amendment was first made and argued by Indiana in this Court. This was in time, however. The Eleventh Amendment declares a policy and sets forth an explicit limitation on federal judicial power of such compelling force that this Court will consider the issue arising under this Amendment in this case even though urged for the first time in this Court.' 323 U.S., at 466—467, 65 S.Ct., at 352.
Once the federal court had jurisdiction over the case, the fact that it ruled adversely to the claimant on the constitutional claim did not deprive it of its pendent jurisdiction over the statutory claim. United States v. Georgia Pub.Serv. Comm'n, 371 U.S. 285, 287—288, 83 S.Ct. 397, 399, 9 L.Ed.2d 317.
In Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714, a suit by stockholders of a railroad was brought in a federal court against state officials to enjoin the imposition of confiscatory rates on the railroad in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Eleventh Amendment was interposed as a defense. The Court rejected the defense, saying that state officials with authority to enforce state laws 'who threaten and are about to commence proceedings, either of a civil or criminal nature, to enforce against parties affected an unconstitutional act, violating the Federal Constitution, may be enjoined by a Federal court of equity from such action.' Id., at 156, 28 S.Ct., at 452. The Court went on to say that a state official seeking to enforce in the name of a State an unconstitutional act 'comes into conflict with the superior authority of that Constitution, and he is in that case stripped of his official or representative character and is subjected in his person to the consequence of his individual conduct. The state has no power to impart to him any immunity from responsibility to the supreme authority of the United States.' Id., at 159—160, 28 S.Ct., at 454.
Most welfare decisions by federal courts have a financial impact on the States. Under the existing federal-state cooperative system, a state desiring to participate, submits a 'state plan' to HEW for approval; once HEW approves the plan the State is locked into the cooperative scheme until it withdraws,3 all as described in King v. Smith, 392 U.S. 309, 316, 88 S.Ct. 2128, 2132, 20 L.Ed.2d 1118 et seq. The welfare cases coming here have involved ultimately the financial responsibility of the State to beneficiaries claiming they were deprived of federal rights. King v. Smith required payment to children even though their mother was cohabitating with a man who could not pass muster as a 'parent.' Rosado v. Wyman, 397 U.S. 397, 90 S.Ct. 1207, 25 L.Ed.2d 442, held that under this state-federal cooperative program a State could not reduce its standard of need in conflict with the federal standard. It is true that Rosado did not involve retroactive payments as are involved here. But the distinction is not relevant or material because the result in every welfare case coming here is to increase or reduce the financial responsibility of the participating State. In no case when the responsibility of the State is increased to meet the lawful demand of the beneficiary, is there any levy on state founds. Whether the decree is prospective only or requires payments for the weeks or months wrongfully skipped over by the state officials, the nature of the impact on the state treasury is precisely the same.
Counties are citizens of their State for purposes of diversity of citizenship. Bullard v. City of Cisco, 290 U.S. 179, 54 S.Ct. 177, 78 L.Ed. 254; Moor v. County of Alameda, 411 U.S. 693, 718—719, 93 S.Ct. 1785, 1800, 36 L.Ed.2d 596. And they are not States for purposes of 28 U.S.C. § 1251(a) which gives this Court original and exclusive jurisdiction of: '(1) All controversies between two or more states. . . .' Illinois v. City of Milwaukee, 406 U.S. 91, 98, 92 S.Ct. 1385, 1390, 31 L.Ed.2d 712. But, being citizens of their State, suits against them by another State are in our original but not exclusive jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1251(b)(3). Ibid. Yet, as agencies of the State whether in carrying out educational policies or other they are the State, as Griffin held, for purposes of the Fourteenth Amendment. And Griffin, like the present case, dealt only with liability to citizens for state policy and state action.
This suit is brought by Illinois citizens against Illinois officials. In that circumstance, Illinois may not invoke the Eleventh Amendment, since that Amendment bars only federal court suits against States by citizens of other States. Rather, the question is whether Illinois may avail itself of the nonconstitutional but ancient doctrine of sovereign immunity as a bar to respondent's claim for retroactive AABD payments. In my view Illinois may not assert sovereign immunity for the reason I expressed in dissent in Employees v. Department of Public Health and Welfare, 411 U.S. 279, 298, 93 S.Ct. 1614, 1625, 36 L.Ed.2d 251 (1973): the States surrendered that immunity in Hamilton's words, 'in the plan of the Convention,' that formed the Union, at least insofar as the States granted Congress specifically enumerated powers. See id., at 319 n. 7, 93 S.Ct., at 1635; Parden v. Terminal R. Co., 377 U.S. 184, 84 S.Ct. 1207, 12 L.Ed.2d 233 (1964). Congressional authority to enact the Social Security Act, of which AABD is a part, former 42 U.S.C. §§ 1381—1385 (now replaced by similar provisions in 42 U.S.C. §§ 801—804 (1970 ed., Supp. II)), is to be found in Art. I, § 8, cl. 1, one of the enumerated powers granted Congress by the States in the Constitution. I remain of the opinion that 'because of its surrender, no immunity exists that can be the subject of a congressional declaration or a voluntary waiver,' 411 U.S., at 300, 93 S.Ct., at 1626, and thus have no occasion to inquire whether or not Congress authorized an action for AABD retroactive benefits, or whether or not Illinois voluntarily waived the immunity by its continued participation in the program against the background of precedents which sustained judgments ordering retroactive payments.
So here, Illinois elected to participate in the AABD program, and received and expended substantial federal funds in the years at issue. It thereby obligated itself to comply with federal law, including the requirement of former 42 U.S.C. § 1382(a)(8) that 'such aid or assistance shall be furnished with reasonable promptness to all eligible individuals.' In Townsend v. Swank, 404 U.S. 282, 286, 92 S.Ct. 502, 505, 30 L.Ed.2d 448 (1971), we held that participating States must strictly comply with the requirement that aid be furnished 'to all eligible individuals,' and that the States have no power to impose additional eligibility requirements which exclude persons eligible for assistance under federal standards. Today's decision, ante, at 659—660 n. 8, properly emphasizes that participating States must also comply strictly with the 'reasonable promptness' requirement and the more detailed regulations adding content to it.
In agreeing to comply with the requirements of the Social Security Act and HEW regulations, I believe that Illinois has also agreed to subject itself to suit in the federal courts to enforce these obligations. I recognize, of course, that the Social Security Act does not itself provide for a cause of action to enforce its obligations. As the Court points out, the only sanction expressly provided in the Act for a participating State's failure to comply with federal requirements is the cutoff of federal funding by the Secretary of HEW. Former 42 U.S.C. § 1384 (now 42 U.S.C. § 804 (1970 ed., Supp. II)).
But a cause of action is clearly provided by 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which in terms authorizes suits to redress deprivations of rights secured by the 'laws' of the United States. And we have already rejected the argument that Congress intended the funding cutoff to be the sole remedy for noncompliance with federal requirements. In Rosado v. Wyman, 397 U.S. 397, 420—423, 90 S.Ct. 1207, 1221—1223, 25 L.Ed.2d 442 (1970), we held that suits in federal court under § 1983 were proper to enforce the provisions of the Social Security Act against participating States. Mr. Justice Harlan, writing for the Court, examined the legislative history and found 'not the slightest indication' that Congress intended to prohibit suits in federal court to enforce compliance with federal standards. Id., at 422, 90 S.Ct., at 1223.
I believe that Congress also intended the full panoply of traditional judicial remedies to be available to the federal courts in these § 1983 suits. There is surely no indication of any congressional intent to restrict the courts' equitable jurisdiction. Yet the Court has held that '(u)nless a statute in so many words, or by a necessary and inescapable inference, restricts the court's jurisdiction in equity, the full scope of that jurisdiction is to be recognized and applied.' Porter v. Warner Holding Co., 328 U.S. 395, 398, 66 S.Ct. 1086, 1089, 90 L.Ed. 1332 (1946). 'When Congress entrusts to an equity court the enforcement of prohibitions contained in a regulatory enactment, it must be taken to have acted cognizant of the historic power of equity to provide complete relief in light of the statutory purposes.' Mitchell v. DeMario Jewelry, 361 U.S. 288, 291—292, 80 S.Ct. 332, 335, 4 L.Ed.2d 323 (1960).
Absent any remedy which may act with retroactive effect, state welfare officials have everything to gain and nothing to lose by failing to comply with the congressional mandate that assistance be paid with reasonable promptness to all eligible individuals. This is not idle speculation without basis in practical experience. In this very case, for example, Illinois officials have knowingly violated since 1968 federal regulations on the strength of an argument as to its invalidity which even the majority deems unworthy of discussion. Ante, at 659—660 n. 8. Without a retroactive-payment remedy, we are indeed faced with 'the spectre of a state, perhaps calculatingly, defying federal law and thereby depriving welfare recipients of the financial assistance Congress thought it was giving them.' Jordan v. Weaver, 472 F.2d 985, 995 (CA7 1972). Like the Court of Appeals, I cannot believe that Congress could possibly have intended any such result.
Such indicia of congressional intent as can be gleaned from the statute confirm that Congress intended to authorize retroactive payment of assistance benefits unlawfully withheld. Availability of such payments is implicit in the 'fair hearing' requirement, former 42 U.S.C. § 1382(a)(4), which permitted welfare recipients to challenge the denial of assistance. The regulations which require States to make corrective payments retroactively in the event of a successful fair hearing challenge, 45 CFR § 205.10(a)(18), merely confirm the obvious statutory intent. HEW regulations also authorize federal matching funds for retroactive assistance payments made pursuant to court order, 45 CFR §§ 205.10(b)(2), (b)(3). We should not lightly disregard this explicit recognition by the agency charged with administration of the statute that such a remedy was authorized by Congress. See Griggs v. Duke Power Co., 401 U.S. 424, 433—434, 91 S.Ct. 849, 854 855, 28 L.Ed.2d 158 (1971).
Of course, § 1983 suits are nominally brought against state officers, rather than the State itself, and do not ordinarily raise Eleventh Amendment problems in view of this Court's decision in Ex parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 28 S.Ct. 441, 52 L.Ed. 714 (1908). But to the extent that the relief authorized by Congress in an action under § 1983 may be open to Eleventh Amendment objections,2 these objections are waived when the State agrees to comply with federal requirements enforceable in such an action. I do not find persuasive the Court's reliance in this case on the fact that 'congressional authorization to sue a class of defendants which literally includes States' is absent. Ante, at 672. While true, this fact is irrelevant here, for this is simply not a case 'literally' against the State. While the Court successfully knocks down the strawman it has thus set up, it never comes to grips with the undeniable fact that Congress has 'literally' authorized this suit within the terms of § 1983. Since there is every reason to believe that Congress intended the full panoply of judicial remedies to be available in § 1983 equitable actions to enforce the Social Security Act, I think the conclusion is inescapable that Congress authorized and the State consented to § 1983 actions in which the relief might otherwise be questioned on Eleventh Amendment grounds.
A finding of waiver here is also consistent with the reasoning of the majority in Employees, which relied on a distinction between 'governmental' and 'proprietary' functions of state government. Id., at 284—285, 93 S.Ct., at 1617—1618. This distinction apparently recognizes that if sovereign immunity is to be at all meaningful, the Court must be reluctant to hold a State to have waived its immunity simply by acting in its sovereign capacity—i.e., by merely performing its 'governmental' functions. On the other hand, in launching a profitmaking enterprise, 'a State leaves the sphere that is exclusively its own,' Parden v. Terminal R. Co., 377 U.S., at 196, 84 S.Ct., at 1215, and a voluntary waiver of sovereign immunity can more easily be found. While conducting an assistance program for the needy is surely a 'governmental' function, the State here has done far more than operate its own program in its sovereign capacity. It has voluntarily subordinated its sovereignty in this matter to that of the Federal Government, and agreed to comply with the conditions imposed by Congress upon the expenditure of federal funds. In entering this federal-state cooperative program, the State again 'leaves the sphere that is exclusively its own,' and similarly may more readily be found to have voluntarily waived its immunity.
Indeed, this is the lesson to be drawn from this Court's decision in Petty v. Tennessee-Missouri Bridge Comm'n, 359 U.S. 275, 79 S.Ct. 785, 3 L.Ed.2d 804 (1959), where the Court found that the States had waived the sovereign immunity of the Commission by joining in an interstate compact subject to the approval of Congress. The Court in Petty emphasized that it was 'called on to interpret not unilateral state action but the terms of a consensual agreement' between the States and Congress, id., at 279, 79 S.Ct., at 788, and held that the States who join such a consensual agreement, 'by accepting it and acting under it assume the conditions that Congress under the Constitution attached.' Id., at 281—282, 79 S.Ct., at 790. Although the congressional intent regarding the sue-and-be-sued clause was by no means certain, the Court held that the surrounding conditions made it clear that the States accepting it waived their sovereign immunity. Id., at 280, 79 S.Ct., at 789, especially since this interpretation was necessary to keep the compact 'a living interstate agreement which performs high functions in our federalism.' Id., at 279, 79 S.Ct., at 788.
In his complaint in the District Court, respondent claimed that the Illinois Department of Public Aid was not complying with federal regulations in its processing of public aid applications, and also that its refusal to process and allow respondent's claim for a period of four months, while processing and allowing the claims of those similarly situated, violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Respondent asserted that the District Court could exercise jurisdiction over the cause by virtue of 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331 and 1343(3) and (4). Though not briefed by the parties before this Court, we think that under our decision in Hagans v. Lavine, 415 U.S. 528, 94 S.Ct. 1372, 39 L.Ed.2d 577 (1974), the equal protection claim cannot be said to be 'wholly insubstantial,' and that therefore the District Court was correct in exercising pendent jurisdiction over the statutory claim.
Effective January 1, 1974, this AABD program was replaced by a similar program. See 42 U.S.C. §§ 801—805 (1970 ed., Supp. II).
'Initial awards may be new grants, reinstatements, or certain types of resumptions. They can be effective for the month in which Form FO—550 is signed but for no prior period except (under conditions not relevant to this case).
Respondent appealed from the District Court's judgment insofar as it held him not entitled to receive benefits from the date of his applications (as opposed to the date of authorization of benefits as provided by the federal regulations) and insofar as it failed to award punitive damages. The Court of Appeals upheld the District Court's decision against respondent on those points and they are not at issue here. 472 F.2d 985, 997—999.
'Hamilton, in The Federalist, No. 81, made the following emphatic statement of the general principle of immunity: 'It is inherent in the nature of sovereignty not to be amenable to the suit of an individual without its consent. This is the general sense and the general practice of mankind; and the exemption, as one of the attributes of sovereignty, is now enjoyed by the government of every State in the Union. Unless, therefore, there is a surrender of this immunity in the plan of the convention, it will remain with the States, and the danger intimated must be merely ideal. The circumstances which are necessary to produce an alienation of State sovereignty were discussed in considering the article of taxation and need not be repeated here. A recurrence to the principles there established will satisfy us that there is no color to pretend that the State governments would by the adoption of that plan be divested of the privilege of paying their own debts in their own way, free from every constraint but that which flows from the obligations of good faith. The contracts between a nation and individuals are only binding on the conscience of the sovereign, and have no pretensions to a compulsive force. They confer no right of action independent of the sovereign will. To what purpose would it be to authorize suits against States for the debts they owe? How could recoveries be enforced? It is evident it could not be done without waging war against the contracting State; and to ascribe to the federal courts by mere implication, and in destruction of a preexisting right of the State governments, a power which would involve such a consequence would be altogether forced and unwarrantable." Monaco v. Mississippi, 292 U.S. 313, 323—325, 54 S.Ct. 745, 748, 749, 78 L.Ed. 1282 (1934) (footnotes omitted).
It may be true, as stated by our Brother DOUGLAS in dissent, that '(m)ost welfare decisions by federal courts have a financial impact on the States.' Post, at 680—681. But we cannot agree that such a financial impact is the same where a federal court applies Ex parte Young to grant prospective declaratory and injunctive relief, as opposed to an order of retroactive payments as was made in the instant case. It is not necessarily true that '(w)hether the decree is prospective only or requires payments for the weeks or months wrongfully skipped over by the state officials, the nature of the impact on the state treasury is precisely the same.' Post, at 682. This argument neglects the fact that where the State has a definable allocation to be used in the payment of public aid benefits, and pursues a certain course of action such as the processing of applications within certain time periods as did Illinois here, the subsequent ordering by a federal court of retroactive payments to correct delays in such processing will invariably mean there is less money available for payments for the continuing obligations of the public aid system.
Brief for Respondent 15—18. Decisions of this Court in which we summarily affirmed a decision of a lower federal court which ordered the payment of retroactive awards and in which the jurisdictional statement filed in this Court raised the Eleventh Amendment defense include: State Dept. of Health and Rehabilitative Services v. Zarate, 407 U.S. 918, 92 S.Ct. 2462, 32 L.Ed.2d 803 (1972), aff'g 347 F.Supp. 1004 (S.D.Fla.1971); Sterrett v. Mothers' and Children's Rights Organization, 409 U.S. 809, 93 S.Ct. 68, 34 L.Ed.2d 70 (1972), aff'g unreported order and judgment of District Court (ND Ind.1972) on remand from Carpenter v. Sterrett, 405 U.S. 971, 92 S.Ct. 1199, 31 L.Ed.2d 246 (1972); Gaddis v. Wyman, 304 F.Supp. 717 (S.D.N.Y.1969) (order at CCH Poverty Law Rep. 10,506 (1968—1971 Transfer Binder)), aff'd per curiam sub nom. Wyman v. Bowens, 397 U.S. 49, 90 S.Ct. 813, 25 L.Ed.2d 38 (1970).
In the words of Mr. Justice Brandeis: 'State decisis is usually the wise policy, because in most matters it is more important that the applicable rule of law be settled than that it be settled right. . . . This is commonly true even where the error is a matter of serious concern, provided correction can be had by legislation. But in cases involving the Federal Constitution, where correction through legislative action is practically impossible, this Court has often overruled its earlier decisions. The Court bows to the lessons of experience and the force of better reasoning, recognizing that the process of trial and error, so fruitful in the physical sciences, is appropriate also in the judicial function.' Burnet v. Coronado Oil & Gas Co., 285 U.S. 393, 406—408, 52 S.Ct. 443, 447, 76 L.Ed. 815 (1932) (dissenting opinion) (footnotes omitted).
HEW sought passage of a bill in the 91st Congress, H.R. 16311, § 407(a), which would have given it authority to require retroactive payments to eligible persons denied such benefits. The bill failed to pass the House of Representatives. See H.R. 16311, The Family Assistance Act of 1970, Senate Committee on Finance, 91st Cong., 2d Sess., C169—170 (Comm. Print No. 5, 1970).
The Court of Appeals felt that § 1983, the enactment of the AABD program, and the issuance by HEW of the above regulation, indicated that Congress intended to include within the Social Security Act the remedy of 'effective judicial review' and 'the remedy of restoration of benefits withheld in violation of federal law.' 472 F.2d, at 994—995 and n. 15. But the adoption of regulations by HEW to permit the use of federal funds in the satisfaction of judicial awards is not determinative of the constitutional issues here presented.
'We have considered an rejected the argument that a federal court is without power to review state welfare provisions or prohibit the use of federal funds by the States in view of the fact that Congress has lodged in the Department of HEW the power to cut off federal funds for noncompliance with statutory requirements. We are most reluctant to assume Congress has closed the avenue of effective judicial review to those individuals most directly affected by the administration of its program. . . . We adhere to King v. Smith, 392 U.S. 309, 88 S.Ct. 2128, 20 L.Ed.2d 1118 (1968), which implicitly rejected the argument that the statutory provisions for HEW review of plans should be read to curtail judicial relief and held Alabama's 'substitute father' regulation to be inconsistent with the federal statute. While King did not advert specifically to the remedial problem, the unarticulated premise was that the State had alternative choices of assuming the additional cost of paying benefits to families with substitute fathers or not using federal funds to pay welfare benefits according to a plan that was inconsistent with federal requirements.' 397 U.S., at 420—421, 90 S.Ct., at 1222.
Court to 'afford New York an opportunity to revise its program . . . or, should New York choose (not to revise its program), issue its order restraining the further use of federal monies pursuant to the present statute,' 397 U.S., at 421—422, 90 S.Ct., at 1222, indicates that the Court felt that retroactive relief was not a permissible remedy. Brief for Petitioner 17—20. We do not regard Rosado as controlling either way since the Court was not faced with a district court judgment ordering retroactive payments or with a challenge based on the Eleventh Amendment.
Respondent urges that the State of Illinois has abolished its common-law sovereign immunity in its state courts, and appears to argue that suit in a federal court against the State may thus be maintained. Brief for Respondent 23. Petitioner contends that sovereign immunity has not been abolished in Illinois as to this type of case. Brief for Petitioner 31—36. Whether Illinois permits such a suit to be brought against the State in its own courts is not determinative of whether Illinois has relinquished its Eleventh Amendment immunity from suit in the federal courts. Chandler v. Dix, 194 U.S. 590, 591—592, 24 S.Ct. 766, 767, 48 L.Ed. 1129 (1904).
Effective January 1, 1974, this AABD program was replaced by a similar program. See 42 U.S.C. §§ 801—805 (1970 ed., Supp. II). The program in Illinois is administered by the Department of Public Aid. Ill.Rev.Stat., c. 23, §§ 3—1 to 3—12 (1973). The former program was funded in part by the State and in part by the Federal Government. 42 U.S.C. §§ 303, 304, 306, 1201—1204, 1206, 1351—1355, 1381—1385.
The Social Security Act states what a 'state plan' must provide. At the time this suit was brought, 42 U.S.C. § 1382(a) provided: 'A State plan for aid to the aged, blind, or disabled, or for aid to the aged, blind, or disabled and medical assistance for the aged, must . . ..
Nearly identical provisions are now found in 42 U.S.C. § 802(a) (1970 ed., Supp. II).
The jurisdictional statement in the Sterrett case explicitly urged that the decree below violated the Eleventh Amendment since it would expend itself on the public treasury—the second question in the jurisdictional statement.

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