Ex Parte Young Exception to 11th Amendment

 But there is one important exception to these limitations on federal jurisdiction. 

[P. 263] In Ex parte Young the Supreme Court held that a suit against a state official seeking to force the official to comply with federal law is not barred by the Eleventh Amendment as a suit against the State.

Thus, in Young the Court held that the Attorney General of the State of Minnesota could be enjoined in federal court from enforcing a state statute that allegedly violated the Fourteenth Amendment.

Here is how one commentator (Prof. Nowak) explains this exception:  “This holding was based on the fiction that the officer could not be given authority to violate federal law so that the suit was not against the state authority itself.  Today the fiction is maintained to the extent that a state officer must be the named defendant in such a suit.”  [The use of prospective relief by a federal court will be upheld even if it involves the ordering of the official to use state funds. . . .  ]“Thus, in the same suit in which the Court struck the lower federal court’s order to the state officer to pay past due welfare checks, it upheld the order which forced him prospectively to disburse state payments in conformity with federal laws.” 

Take a look at the discussion of Edelman v. Jordan on p. 263, 264 & 266 of your casebook. 

The Edelman Court held “that when a plaintiff sues a state official alleging a violation of federal law…the federal court may award an injunction that governs the official’s future conduct, but not one that awards retroactive monetary relief.” (p. 263)

Now, take a look at the discussion of Edelman on page 266 of the casebook.

In Edelman, welfare recipients were seeking reimbursement for past welfare payments withheld by state officials in violation of federal law.

The Edelman Court held that, under Ex Parte Young, the plaintiffs could sue in federal court for an injunction ordering state officials to pay future benefits, but that the Eleventh Amendment barred any retroactive relief for past welfare benefits.

Notice that if a private individual directly sues the State (Smith v. State of Iowa), the Ex Parte Young exception does not apply and the suit is barred. Ex Parte Young only apples when the individual sues a state official for an injunction against future official conduct--e.g., Smith v. Robert Jones, Attorney General of Iowa (to enjoin enforcement of some state law under, for example, the Free Speech Clause).

What are the interests that we are trying to balance here?  What is the justification for the Young exception to the general rule of state sovereign immunity?  p. 264

Federalism and state sovereignty vs. the Supremacy Clause. The Ex Parte Young exception allows “allows federal courts to hear suits against state officials if the suit seeks to force them to conform their conduct to federal law.”

The supremacy of Federal law is protected--at least partially—by the exception allowing federal courts to issue injunctions vindicating federal rights prospectively.   

Since Ex parte Young is based on the primacy of federal law, what result if I sue a state official in federal court seeking an order requiring him to conform to State law?

That is the Pennhurst case (p. 261) –the federal judicial power does not extend to suits that seek relief against state officials on the basis of state law and the Ex Parte Young exception does not apply.