Municipal Court Immunity and the Eleventh Amendment

Abstract

Municipal attorneys may be called upon to defend their judges and the municipal court itself. Municipal courts in many states enjoy sovereign immunity under the Eleventh Amendment and this defense may be available to municipal courts in all states under a growing line of federal cases. The Eleventh Amendment provides superior protection then the traditional Monell defense used in all other suits against a municipality and its agents. This paper briefly describes the traditional test for determining immunity and the test used to determine immunity for lower courts. The paper also surveys the states where the Eleventh Amendment defense is already established for municipal courts and other lower state courts.