Cite as: 521 U. S. 399 (1997)
Opinion of the Court
III
We close with three caveats. First, we have focused only on questions of § 1983 immunity and have not addressed whether the defendants are liable under § 1983 even though they are employed by a private firm. Because the Court of Appeals assumed, but did not decide, § 1983 liability, it is for the District Court to determine whether, under this Court's decision in Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U. S. 922 (1982), defendants actually acted "under color of state law."
Second, we have answered the immunity question narrowly, in the context in which it arose. That context is one in which a private firm, systematically organized to assume a major lengthy administrative task (managing an institution) with limited direct supervision by the government, undertakes that task for profit and potentially in competition with other firms. The case does not involve a private individual briefly associated with a government body, serving as an adjunct to government in an essential governmental activity, or acting under close official supervision.
Third, Wyatt explicitly stated that it did not decide whether or not the private defendants before it might assert, not immunity, but a special "good-faith" defense. The Court said that it
"d[id] not foreclose the possibility that private defendants faced with § 1983 liability under Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U. S. 922 (1982), could be entitled to an affirmative defense based on good faith and/or probable cause or that § 1983 suits against private, rather than governmental, parties could require plaintiffs to carry additional burdens." Wyatt, 504 U. S., at 169.
But because those issues were not fairly before the Court, it left "them for another day." Ibid. Similarly, the Court of Appeals in this case limited its holding to the question of immunity. It said specifically that it
"may be that the appropriate balance to be struck here is to permit the correctional officers to assert a good
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