616
Opinion of the Court
nessee, Mark L. Shurtleff of Utah, William H. Sorrell of Vermont, and Jerry W. Kilgore of Virginia.*
Justice Breyer delivered the opinion of the Court.
The Eleventh Amendment grants a State immunity from suit in federal court by citizens of other States, U. S. Const., Amdt. 11, and by its own citizens as well, Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U. S. 1 (1890). The question before us is whether the State's act of removing a lawsuit from state court to federal court waives this immunity. We hold that it does.
I
Paul Lapides, a professor employed by the Georgia state university system, brought this lawsuit in a Georgia state court. He sued respondents, the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia (hereinafter Georgia or State) and university officials acting in both their personal capacities and as agents of the State. Lapides' lawsuit alleged that university officials placed allegations of sexual harassment in his personnel files. And Lapides claimed that their doing so violated both Georgia law, see Georgia Tort Claims Act, Ga. Code Ann. § 50-21-23 (1994), and federal law, see Civil Rights Act of 1871, Rev. Stat. § 1979, 42 U. S. C. § 1983 (1994 ed., Supp. V).
All defendants joined in removing the case to Federal District Court, 28 U. S. C. § 1441, where they sought dismissal. Those individuals whom Lapides had sued in their personal capacities argued that the doctrine of "qualified immunity" barred Lapides' federal-law claims against them. And the District Court agreed. The State, while conceding that a state statute had waived sovereign immunity from state-law suits in state court, argued that, by virtue of the Eleventh Amendment, it remained immune from suit in federal court.
*John Townsend Rich filed a brief for Ceres Marine Terminals, Inc., as amicus curiae urging reversal.
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