Cite as: 527 U. S. 706 (1999)
Opinion of the Court
providing that anyone attempting to enforce the Chisholm decision would be " 'guilty of felony and shall suffer death, without benefit of clergy, by being hanged.' " Currie, supra, at 196.
An initial proposal to amend the Constitution was introduced in the House of Representatives the day after Chisholm was announced; the proposal adopted as the Eleventh Amendment was introduced in the Senate promptly following an intervening recess. Currie, supra, at 196. Congress turned to the latter proposal with great dispatch; little more than two months after its introduction it had been endorsed by both Houses and forwarded to the States. 4 Annals of Congress 25, 30, 477, 499 (1794); 1 Stat. 402.
Each House spent but a single day discussing the Amendment, and the vote in each House was close to unanimous. See 4 Annals of Congress, at 30-31, 476-478 (the Senate divided 23 to 2; the House 81 to 9). All attempts to weaken the Amendment were defeated. Congress in succession rejected proposals to limit the Amendment to suits in which " 'the cause of action shall have arisen before the ratification of the amendment,' " or even to cases " 'where such State shall have previously made provision in their own Courts, whereby such suit may be prosecuted to effect' "; it refused as well to make an exception for " 'cases arising under treaties made under the authority of the United States.' " 4 id., at 30, 476.
It might be argued that the Chisholm decision was a correct interpretation of the constitutional design and that the Eleventh Amendment represented a deviation from the original understanding. This, however, seems unsupportable. First, despite the opinion of Justice Iredell, the majority failed to address either the practice or the understanding that prevailed in the States at the time the Constitution was adopted. Second, even a casual reading of the opinions suggests the majority suspected the decision would be unpopular and surprising. See, e. g., 2 Dall., at 454-455 (Wilson, J.)
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