Surviving Sovereign and Qualified Immunity Challenges in Civil Rights Actions

42 U.S.C. § 1983 is a critically important statute: it allows citizens to sue state and local government actors for violating their constitutional rights. "Section 1983" suits are used to challenge everything from excessive violence by police and correctional officers to violations of free speech by state university administrators. Because of the sovereign immunity granted to states by the Eleventh Amendment, Section 1983 suits are vulnerable to dismissal on jurisdictional grounds even when they have tremendous substantive merit. These dismissals are often the result of inartful pleading and can be avoided by taking care to identify the correct defendants and ask for the proper relief. 

Following an overview of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and the Eleventh Amendment, this program will guide attorneys through the proper pleading of a Section 1983 complaint to avoid unnecessary dismissal on sovereign immunity grounds. This program will also cover the judicially created doctrine of qualified immunity, which limits the extent to which state and local government actors can be sued for damages in their individual capacities under Section 1983, and which also requires a thoughtful and strategic pleading to overcome.   

Learning Objectives:  

1. Review the doctrines of state sovereign immunity and qualified immunity in cases filed under 42 U.S.C. § 1983

2. Discuss the Ex Parte Young exception to state sovereign immunity and distinguish between prospective and retrospective relief

3. Prepare § 1983 complaints that are more likely to survive sovereign and qualified immunity challenges