Monroe v. Pape

Monroe v. Pape
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued 8 November, 1960 Decided 20 February, 1961
Full case name	Monroe, et al. v. Pape, et al.
Citations	365 U.S. 167 (more) 81 S. Ct. 473; 5 L. Ed. 2d 492; 1961 U.S. LEXIS 1687
Holding
While municipalities can not be liable under the Civil Rights Act of 1871, individuals acting “under color of law” can be sued for damages for denying the constitutional rights of individuals.[1] 42 U.S.C. § 1983 was also meant to give a remedy to parties deprived of constitutional rights, privileges, and immunities by an official's abuse of his position, as the federal remedy was supplementary to any state remedy, and the latter need not have been first sought and refused before the federal one was invoked.[2]
Court membership
Chief Justice Earl Warren Associate Justices Hugo Black · Felix Frankfurter William O. Douglas · Tom C. Clark John M. Harlan II · William J. Brennan Jr. Charles E. Whittaker · Potter Stewart
Case opinions
Majority	Douglas, joined by Warren, Black, Clark, Harlan, Brennan, Whittaker, Stewart
Concurrence	Harlan, joined by Stewart
Dissent	Frankfurter
Laws applied
Fourteenth Amendment, Section 1 of the "Ku Klux Act" of 20 April 1871 (codified at 42 U.S.C. § 1983)
Overruled by
Monell v. Department of Social Services of the City of New York, 436 U.S. 658 (1978) (in part)

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Monroe v. Pape

Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167 (1961), was a United States Supreme Court case that considered the application of federal civil rights law to constitutional violations by city employees. The case was significant because it held that 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a statutory provision from 1871, could be used to sue state officers who violated a plaintiff's constitutional rights.^[3] § 1983 had previously been a relatively obscure and little-used statute, but since Monroe it has become a central part of United States civil rights law.