180
Rehnquist, C. J., dissenting
interest in encouraging private citizens to rely on valid state laws of which they have no reason to doubt the validity. Buller v. Buechler, 706 F. 2d 844, 851 (CA8 1983); Folsom Investment Co. v. Moore, 681 F. 2d 1032, 1037-1038 (CA5 1982).
Second, as with the police officer making an arrest, I believe the private plaintiff's lot is "not so unhappy" that he must forgo recovery of property he believes to be properly recoverable through available legal processes or to be "mulcted in damages," Pierson, 386 U. S., at 555, if his belief turns out to be mistaken. For as one Court of Appeals has pointed out, it is at least passing strange to conclude that private individuals are acting "under color of law" because they invoke a state garnishment statute and the aid of state officers, see Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U. S. 922 (1982), but yet deny them the immunity to which those same state officers are entitled, simply because the private parties are not state employees. Buller, supra, at 851. While some of the strangeness may be laid at the doorstep of our decision in Lugar, see 457 U. S., at 943 (Burger, C. J., dissenting); and id., at 944-956 (Powell, J., dissenting), there is no reason to proceed still further down this path. Our § 1983 jurisprudence has gone very far afield indeed, when it subjects private parties to greater risk than their public counterparts, despite the fact that § 1983's historic purpose was "to prevent state officials from using the cloak of their authority under state law to violate rights protected against state infringement." Id., at 948 (emphasis added). See also Monroe v. Pape, 365 U. S. 167, 175-176 (1961).
Because I find today's decision dictated neither by our own precedent nor by any sound considerations of public policy, I dissent.
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