Cite as: 506 U. S. 139 (1993)
Opinion of the Court
Livesay, 437 U. S. 463, 468 (1978) (footnote omitted). Denials of States' and state entities' claims to Eleventh Amendment immunity purport to be conclusive determinations that they have no right not to be sued in federal court. Moreover, a motion by a State or its agents to dismiss on Eleventh Amendment grounds involves a claim to a fundamental constitutional protection, cf. Lauro Lines s.r.l. v. Chasser, 490 U. S. 495, 502-503 (1989) (Scalia, J., concurring), whose resolution generally will have no bearing on the merits of the underlying action. Finally, the value to the States of their Eleventh Amendment immunity, like the benefit conferred by qualified immunity to individual officials, is for the most part lost as litigation proceeds past motion practice.4
Respondent, following the rationale of the First Circuit in this case and in Libby v. Marshall, 833 F. 2d 402 (1987), maintains that the Eleventh Amendment does not confer immunity from suit, but merely a defense to liability. Were this true, petitioner arguably would not be entitled to avail itself of the collateral order doctrine. See, e. g., Van Cauwenberghe v. Biard, 486 U. S. 517, 526-527 (1988). Support for this narrow view of the Eleventh Amendment is drawn mainly from Ex parte Young, 209 U. S. 123 (1908), under which suits seeking prospective, but not compensatory or other retrospective relief, may be brought against state officials in federal court challenging the constitutionality of official conduct enforcing state law.
4 The result reached today was largely anticipated by Ex parte New York, 256 U. S. 490 (1921). There, private citizens brought an in rem libel action in Federal District Court against ships chartered and operated by New York State. New York moved to dismiss on the ground that the action was in the nature of an in personam proceeding and was thus barred by the Eleventh Amendment. When the District Court denied the motion, the State applied to the Court for a writ of prohibition. Although noting that the State's interest could be pressed on appeal, id., at 497, the Court issued the extraordinary writ in order to vindicate fully the "fundamental" constitutional rule that a State may not be sued in federal court without its consent, id., at 497, 503.
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