Page:United States Reports, Volume 209.djvu/208

 182 OCTOBER TERM, 1907. H,,,,.,,, J., dizeenti. 209 U.S. tlon, and unlees a suit against the Attorney C, eneral of a State, in his official capacity, is not one against a State under the Eleventh Amendment when i determination depends upon a question of constitutional power or right under the Four- teenth Amendment. In that view I cannot concur. In my opinion the Eleventh Amendment has not been modified in the slightest degree as to its scope or meaning by the Four- tecnth Amendment', and a suit which, in its eenes, is one against the State remains one of ttmt character and is for- bidden even when brought to strike down a state statute al- leged to be in violation of that clause of the Fourteenth Amend- ment forbidding the deprivation by a State of life, liberty or property without due process of law. If a suit be commenced in a state court, and involves a right secured by the Federal Constitution, the way is open under our incomparable judicial system to protect that right, first, by the judgment of the state court, and. ultimately by the judgment of this court, upon writ of error. But such right cannot be protected by means of a suit which, at the outset, is, directly or. in legal effect, one against the State whose action is alleged to be inegal. That mode of ..redrs. is absolutely forbidden by the Eleventh Amendment and cannot be made legal by mere construction, or by a.y consideration of the consequences that 'may follow from the operation of the statute. Parties cannot, in any case, obtain redress by a suit o41aint the State. Such has been the uniform ruling in this court, and it is most unfortunate that it is now declared to be competent for a Federal Circuit Court, by exerting its authority over the chief law officer of the State, without the consent of the State, to exclude the State, in its sovereignscapacity, from its own courts when seeking to have the rul{ng of these courts as'to its powers under its own statutes. Surely, the right of a State to invoke the jurisdict!on of its own courts is not les than the right of individuals to invoke the jurisdiction of'a Federal court. The preservation of the dignity and sovereignty of the States, within the limits of their constitutional powers,

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