506
Opinion of the Court
opinion addressed the District Court's authority to issue a warrant to arrest the artifacts, not the disposition of title to them. As the plurality explained, "[t]he proper resolution of [the Eleventh Amendment] issue . . . does not require— or permit—a determination of the State's ownership of the artifacts." Id., at 699 (emphasis added); see also id., at 700 (noting that while adjudication of the State's right to the artifacts "would be justified if the State voluntarily advanced a claim to [them], it may not be justified as part of the Eleventh Amendment analysis, the only issue before us"). Thus, any references in Treasure Salvors to what the lower courts could have done if they had solely adjudicated title to the artifacts, rather than issued a warrant to arrest the res, do not control the outcome of this case, particularly given that it comes before us in a very different posture, i. e., in an admiralty action in rem where the State makes no claim of actual possession of the res.
Nor does the fact that Treasure Salvors has been cited for the general proposition that federal courts cannot adjudicate a State's claim of title to property, see, e. g., Idaho v. Coeur d'Alene Tribe of Idaho, 521 U. S. 261, 289-290 (1997) (O'Connor, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment); id., at 305-306 (Souter, J., dissenting), prevent a more nuanced application of Treasure Salvors in the context of the federal courts' in rem admiralty jurisdiction. Although the Eleventh Amendment bars federal jurisdiction over general title disputes relating to state property interests, it does not necessarily follow that it applies to in rem admiralty actions, or that in such actions, federal courts may not exercise jurisdiction over property that the State does not actually possess.
In considering whether the Eleventh Amendment applies where the State asserts a claim in admiralty to a res not in its possession, this Court's decisions in cases involving the sovereign immunity of the Federal Government in in rem admiralty actions provide guidance, for this Court has recognized a correlation between sovereign immunity principles
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