Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution
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Amendment XI (the Eleventh Amendment) of the United States Constitution was passed by the U.S. Congress on March 4, 1794 and was ratified on February 7, 1795.
The 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.
The amendment was passed after the Supreme Court's 1792 ruling in Chisholm v. Georgia, [2 U.S. 419] (1793), that federal courts had the authority to hear cases in law and equity against states by private citizens, and that states did not enjoy sovereign immunity from suits made by citizens of other states.
Although the amendment's text does not by its own terms include suits brought by a citizen against his own state, the Supreme Court has consistently held (e.g., in Hans v. Louisiana [134 U.S. 1] (1890)) that a broader principle of state sovereign immunity inheres in the Eleventh Amendment. The dissenting view, which has never garnered more than four justices' support, is that the states surrendered their sovereign immunity when they ratified the Constitution (and certainly when they ratified the Fourteenth Amendment), and that the Eleventh Amendment should therefore be read narrowly as a constitutional limitation on the diversity jurisdiction of the federal courts.
The Eleventh Amendment confers on non-consenting states immunity from suit for money damages or other equitable relief. Nonetheless, federal courts may enjoin the enforcement of unconstitutional state statutes under Ex parte Young. Furthermore, the Supreme Court has held that Congress may abrogate state immunity from suit, if this is done pursuant to a valid exercise of its constitutional powers. See, e.g., Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, [427 U.S. 445] (1976). The Fourteenth Amendment grants Congress such power, but not Article I. See Congressional power of enforcement.
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