ferred to, in which the doctrines of In re Ayers were reaffirmed and applied.

We may refer in this connection to Gunter v. Atlantic Coast Line, 200 U. S. 273, 291, in which case one of the points made was that the Circuit Court of the United States had no power to restrain the Attorney General of South Carolina and the counsel associated with him from prosecuting in the state courts actions authorized by the laws of the State, and hence that the court erred in awarding an injunction against said officers. This court said: "Support for the proposition is rested upon the terms of the Eleventh Amendment and the provisions of section 720 of the Revised Statutes, forbidding the granting of a writ by any court of the United States to stay proceedings in any court of a State, except in cases where such injunction may be authorized by any law relating to proceedings in bankruptcy. The soundness of the doctrine relied upon is undoubted. In re Ayers, 123 U. S. 443; Fitts v. McGhee, 172 U. S. 516. The difficulty is that the doctrinc is inapplicable to this case. Section 720 of the Revised Statutes was originally adopted in 1793, whilst the Eleventh Amendment was in process of formation in Congress for submission to the States, and long, therefore, before the ratification of that Amendment. The restrictions embodied in the section were, therefore, but a partial accomplishment of the more comprehensive result affectuated by the prohibitions of the Eleventh Amendment. Both the statute and the Amendment relate to the power of courts of the United States to deal, against the will and consent of a State, with controversies between it and individuals. None of the prohibitions, therefore, of the Amendment or of the statute relate to the power of a Federal court to administer relief in causes where juris`diction as to a State and its officers has been acquired as a result of the voluntary action of the State in submitting its rights to judicial determination. To confound the two classes of cases is but to overlook the distinction which exists between the power of a court to deal with a subject over which it has

jurisdiction and its want of authority to entertain a controversy as to which jurisdiction is not possessed."

Counsel for the railway company placed some reliance on Pennoyer v. McConnaughy, 140 U. S. 1, 18, in which the previous cases on the general subject of suits against the States were classified. That case was a suit in equity against certain parties "who, under the constitution of Oregon, as Governor, Secretary of State, and Treasurer of that State, comprised the Board of Land Commissioners of that State, to restrain and enjoin them from selling and conveying a large amount of land in that State, to which the plaintiff asserted title." That suit, in view of the nature of the relief asked, and of the relations of the defendants to the matters involved, was held not to be one against the State within the meaning of the Eleventh Amendment. But after a review of the facts the court, as explanatory of the conclusion reached by it, took especial care to observe: "In this connection it must be borne in mind that this suit is not nominally against the Governor, Secretary of State, and Treasurer, as such officers, but against them collectively, as the board of land commissioners." The present suit is, in terms, against Young "as Attorney General of Minnesota," and the decree was sought against him, as such officer, not against him individually, or as a mere administrative officer charged with certain duties.

One of the cases cited in support of the decision now rendered is Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway Co. v. Missouri R. R. & Warehouse Commissioners, 183 U. S. 53, 58, 59. But although that particular suit was held not to be one against the State, the case, in respect of the principles announced by the court, is in harmony with the views I have expressed. For, the court there says: "Was the State the real party plaintiff? It was at an early day held by this court, construing the Eleventh Amendment, that in all cases where jurisdiction depends on the party, it is the party named in the record. Osborn v. United States Bank, 9 Wheat. 738. But that technical construction has yielded to one more in consonance with the

spirit of the Amendment, and in In re Ayers, 123 U. S. 443, it was ruled upon full consideration that the Amendment covers not only suits against a State by name but those also against its officers, agents and representatives where the State, though not named as such, is nevertheless the only real party against which in fact the relief is asked, and against which the judgment or decree effectively operates. And that construction of the Amendment has since been followed." In the present case, the State, although not named on the record as a party, is the real party whose action it is sought to control.

There are other cases in this court in which the scope and meaning of the Eleventh Amendment were under consideration, but they need not be cited, for they are well known. They are all cited in In re Ayers, 123 U. S. 443, 500. "The vital principle in all such cases," this court said in the Ayers case, "is that the defendants, though professing to act as officers of the State, are threatening a violation of the personal or property rights of the complainant, for which they are personally and individually liable," or cases in which the officer sued refused to perform a purely ministerial duty, about which he had no discretion and in the performance of which the plaintiff had a direct interest. The case before us is altogether different. The statutes in question did not impose upon the Attorney General of Minnesota any special duty to see to their enforcement. In bringing the mandamus suit he acted under the general authority inhering in him as the chief law officer of his State. He could not become personally liable to the railway company simply because of his bringing the mandamus suit. The Attorney General stated that all he did, or contemplated doing, was to bring the mandamus suit. The mere bringing of such a suit could not be alleged against him as an individual in violation of any legal right of the railway company or its shareholders. In re Ayers, 123 U. S. 443, 496. The plaintiffs recognized this fact and hence did not proceed in their suit upon the ground that the defendant was. individually liable. They sued him only as Attorney General,

HARLAN, J., dissenting.

209 U. S.

and sought a decree against him in his official capacity, not otherwise.

Some reference has been made to Ex parte Royall, 117 U. S. 241, and other cases, that affirm the authority of a Federal court, under existing statutes, to discharge upon habeas corpus from the custody of a state officer one who is held in violation of the Federal Constitution for an alleged crime against a State. Those cases are not at all in point in the present discussion. Such a habeas corpus proceeding is ex parte, having for its object only to inquire whether the applicant for the writ is illegally restrained of his liberty. If he is, then the state officer holding him in custody is a trespasser, and cannot defend the wrong or tort committed by him, by pleading his official character. The power in a Federal court to discharge a person from the custody of a trespasser may well exist, and yet the court has no power in a suit before it, by an order directed against the Attorney General of a State, as such, to prevent the State from being represented by that officer, as a litigant in one of its own courts. The former cases, it may be argued, come within the decisions which hold that a suit which only seeks to prevent or restrain a trespass upon property or person by one who happens to be a state officer, but is proceeding in violation of the Constitution of the United States, is not a suit against a State within the meaning of the Eleventh Amendment, but a suit against the trespasser or wrongdoer. But the authority of the Federal court to protect one against a trespass committed or about to be committed by a state officer in violation of the Constitution of the United States is very different from the power now asserted, and recognized by this court as existing, to shut out a sovereign State from its own courts by the device of forbidding its Attorney General, under the penalty of fine and imprisonment, from appearing in such courts in its behalf. The mere bringing of a suit on behalf of a State, by its Attorney General, cannot (this court has decided in the Ayers case) make that officer a trespasser and individually liable to the

party sued. To enjoin him from representing the State in such suit is therefore, for every practical or legal purpose, to enjoin the State itself. This court, in the Debs Case, 158 U.S. 564, 584, said: "Every government, entrusted, by the very terms of its being, with powers and duties to be exercised and discharged for the general welfare, has a right to apply to its own courts for any proper assistance in the exercise of the one and the discharge of the other, and it is no sufficient answer to its appeal to one of those courts that it has no pecuniary interest in the matter. The obligation which it is under to promote the interest of all, and to prevent the wrongdoing of one resulting in injury to the general welfare, is often of itself sufficient to give it a standing in court. This proposition in some of its relations has heretofore received the sanction of this court." If there be one power that a State possesses, which ought to be deemed beyond the control, in any mode, of the National Government or of any of its courts, it is the power by judicial proceedings to appear in its own courts, by its law-officer or by attorneys, and seek the guidance of those courts in respect of matters of a justiciable nature. If the state court, by its judgment, in such a suit, should disregard the injunctions of the Federal Constitution, that judgment would be subject to review by this court upon writ of error or appeal.

It will be well now to look at the course of decisions in other Federal courts.

Attention is first directed to Arbuckle v. Blackburn, 113 Fed. Rep. 616, 622, which was a suit in equity, one of the principal objects of which was to restrain the enforcement of an act of the Ohio legislature relating to food products, particularly of a named coffee in which the plaintiffs were interested. The Circuit Court of Appeals held that the bill was properly dismissed, saying, among other things: "What, then, is the object of the injunction sought in this case? It is no more or less than to restrain the officer of the State from bringing prosecutions for violations of an act which said offi